Microfinance is a renowned albeit controversial solution for giving financial access to the unbanked, even if micro-transactions increase costs, limiting outreach potential. The economic and financial sustainability of Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) is a prerequisite for widening a potentially unlimited client base. Automation decreases costs, expanding the outreach potential, and improving transparency and efficiency. Technological solutions range from branchless mobile banking to geo-localization of customers, digital/social networking for group lending, blockchain validation, big data, and artificial intelligence, up to "MicroFinTech" - FinTech applications adapted to microfinance. Of interest to both scholars, students, and professors of financial technology and microfinance, this book examines these trendy solutions comprehensively, going beyond the existing literature and showing potential applications to the traditional sustainability versus outreach trade-off.

This book offers a primer on the valuation of startups. Innovative startups are characterized by high growth potential that usually absorbs liquidity. This is unattractive for traditional banks, replaced by other specialized intermediaries such as venture capital or private equity funds, which diversify their portfolio basing their strategies on a multi-year exit. Startups coexist in an evolving ecosystem with established firms, to which they transfer innovativeness, technology, flexibility, and time-to-market speed, contributing to reinvent the business models and receiving from mature firms feedback on the current market features, the existing clients, and their unsatisfied needs. The valuation paradigms represent a central issue for any start-upper seeking external finance, either from family and friends or through a wider professional placement. This book, complemented by practical cases (concerning, for instance, FinTechs, digital platforms, and e-Health applications) offers a guide to practitioners, students, and academics about the trendy valuation patterns of the startups based on their strategic business planning

This book offers an updated primer on the valuation of digital intangibles, a trending class of immaterial assets. Startups like successful unicorns, as well as consolidated firms desperately working to re-engineer their business models, are now trying to go digital and to reap higher returns by exploiting new intangibles. This book is innovative in its design and concept since it tackles a frontier topic with an original methodology, combining academic rigor with practical insights. Evaluation issues are increasingly based on an analytical comprehension of augmented business models and virtual function analysis, nurtured by real-time big data. The impact of digitalization on scalable business models is the main competitive advantage factor of the BigTechs and other Unicorns, representing a target for startups and the reengineering of traditional firms. The transition from the Internet to the metaverse represents the last frontier, showing how 3D virtual and augmented reality impacts social networking. The second edition of this book updates the contents of the first edition while comprehensively introduces these innovative topics--such as the metaverse, cloud storage, multi-sided digital platforms, ESG-compliance, and value co-creation patterns of digitized stakeholders--and demonstrates how best practices can be applied to specific asset appraisals, making it of interest to researchers, students, and practitioners alike.

Features: A systematic and comprehensive understanding of the Block chain technology and the potential in Healthcare. How security and privacy concerns of healthcare data can be addressed using Blockchain Technology. Concept of smart contracts for performing advance level scripting to create a blockchain network for providing a platform for the development of decentralized applications is discussed Chapter on role of blockchain based insurance application using Ethereum/Hyperledger is included Use cases of blockchain for various aspects of drug manufacturing and pharma supply chain..

Standard corporate evaluation approaches are improved by trendy innovation, especially as it concerns technological scale up and environmental issues such as digital networking or ESG compliance. Whereas traditional firm appraisal follows institutional guidelines and best practices, frontier research still must define the boundaries of these trendy issues, linking a strong theoretical background to practical advances that still need fine-tuning. This book, written by an academic who is also a senior consultant, combines theoretical rigor with practical insights, providing an innovative framework for researchers, evaluators, managers, and practitioners.

This book offers a primer on the valuation of startups. Innovative startups are characterized by high growth potential that usually absorbs liquidity. This is unattractive for traditional banks, replaced by other specialized intermediaries such as venture capital or private equity funds, which diversify their portfolio basing their strategies on a multi-year exit. Startups coexist in an evolving ecosystem with established firms, to which they transfer innovativeness, technology, flexibility, and time-to-market speed, contributing to reinvent the business models and receiving from mature firms feedback on the current market features, the existing clients, and their unsatisfied needs. The valuation paradigms represent a central issue for any start-upper seeking external finance, either from family and friends or through a wider professional placement. This book, complemented by practical cases (concerning, for instance, FinTechs, digital platforms, and e-Health applications) offers a guide to practitioners, students, and academics about the trendy valuation patterns of the startups based on their strategic business planning

This book offers a primer on the valuation of digital intangibles, a trending class of immaterial assets. Startups like successful unicorns, as well as consolidated firms desperately working to re-engineer their business models, are now trying to go digital and to reap higher returns by exploiting new intangibles. This book is innovative in its design and concept since it tackles a frontier topic with an original methodology, combining academic rigor with practical insights. Digital intangibles range from digitized versions of traditional immaterial assets (brands, patents, know-how, etc.) to more trendy applications like big data, Internet of Things, interoperable databases, artificial intelligence, digital newspapers, social networks, blockchains, FinTech applications, etc. This book comprehensively addresses related valuation issues, and demonstrates how best practices can be applied to specific asset appraisals, making it of interest to researchers, students, and practitioners alike.

Standard corporate evaluation approaches are improved by trendy innovation, especially as it concerns technological scale up and environmental issues such as digital networking or ESG compliance. Whereas traditional firm appraisal follows institutional guidelines and best practices, frontier research still must define the boundaries of these trendy issues, linking a strong theoretical background to practical advances that still need fine-tuning. This book, written by an academic who is also a senior consultant, combines theoretical rigor with practical insights, providing an innovative framework for researchers, evaluators, managers, and practitioners.

Microfinance is a renowned albeit controversial solution for giving financial access to the unbanked, even if micro-transactions increase costs, limiting outreach potential. The economic and financial sustainability of Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) is a prerequisite for widening a potentially unlimited client base. Automation decreases costs, expanding the outreach potential, and improving transparency and efficiency. Technological solutions range from branchless mobile banking to geo-localization of customers, digital/social networking for group lending, blockchain validation, big data, and artificial intelligence, up to "MicroFinTech" - FinTech applications adapted to microfinance. Of interest to both scholars, students, and professors of financial technology and microfinance, this book examines these trendy solutions comprehensively, going beyond the existing literature and showing potential applications to the traditional sustainability versus outreach trade-off.

This ground-breaking book shows how innovative microfinance solutions can help billions to avoid 'poverty traps' and escape atavistic misery. While the success of microfinance has globally exceeded even the wildest expectations, there are still many obstacles, above all the lack of proper business planning on the side of the borrowers. Here Moro Visconti's important book comes to aid, offering bottom-up development strategies for micro-credit-driven startups and beyond. His forceful analysis of poverty traps and the practical guidelines given (including business plan templates as Excel sheets) are designed to help practitioners and analysts alike in understanding and reaching the true potential of microfinance.