Redefining banking at Amsterdam Fintech Event 2025

The keynote: AI as a new economic lever

Jamie Burink opened with a paradox every banker recognizes. Customers want faster, simpler banking while risk and regulation pull in the opposite direction. Cost-to-serve has hardly moved in a decade but expectations have exploded.

His keynote framed AI not as a productivity tool but as an economic lever that changes the fundamentals of cost, capability and control.

Through three lenses, Efficiency, Capability and Vision, the session showed what’s already real, what’s emerging and what’s next.

Efficiency: the measurable now

Using the real world case of Kamuno, a Swiss fintech initiative backed by Urner Kantonalbank, Jamie showed how automation in loan origination cuts turnaround time and cost without compromising accuracy. In a world where AI in compliance and KYC can already lower cost-to-serve by 50%, efficiency is no longer a differentiator. It’s table stakes.

Capability: the new possible

Kuro, a conversational agent for product development and design, showed how banks can go from idea to product in days instead of months. The live demo proved it. Instead of waiting on IT bottlenecks, teams can prototype and test ideas instantly. Together with the audience, we built a a new lending product for the Chinese market in seconds!

Vision: rethinking the model

The final lens looked forward. Jamie outlined a world where lending becomes objective-driven rather than process-driven. Instead of coding workflows, banks set outcomes like “produce a compliant loan decision” and AI agents coordinate dynamically to reach it.

The implications are profound: flexible systems, lower structural costs and smarter customer interactions.

Jamie Burink giving his keynote at the Amsterdam Fintech Event 2025

The panel: where efficiency meets strategy   

After the keynote, we hosted a panel that brought the discussion to the floor.

We were pleased to welcome a panel of experts who brought deep experience from across the financial and technology sectors. A big thank you to our guests:

• Sebastiaan Bekker, CTO, MyWheels
• Jane Zavalishina, Chairman of the Supervisory board, FINOM Payments
• Paula Steiner, Chief Compliance Officer, Fiat Republic
• Karen Clarke-Hamers, Chief Architect, COFRA Holdings
• Sandeep Gangaram Panday, Security Advisor, Brightlyn

Moderated by Eric Euwes and Frank Schooneveldt, the conversation challenged participants to weigh AI’s promise against its practical realities:

• How much risk should banks accept upfront?
• When does explainability outweigh accuracy?
• Are efficiency gains masking missed opportunities for strategic change?

The discussion echoed a key theme: efficiency matters but it’s not strategy. Banks that focus only on ROI risk missing the bigger transformation ahead.

Left to right: Karen Clarke-Hamers, Jane Zavalishina, Sandeep Gangaram Panday, Paula Steiner and Sebastiaan Bekker

Closing AFE: fintech meets reality over drinks

We were also proud to sponsor the networking drinks that closed the event, a fitting setting for a day centered on human and machine collaboration. As attendees debated the future of agentic banking, one message resonated: AI will not replace judgment but it will redefine how judgment is applied.

AI in banking isn’t about doing the same things faster. It’s about doing fundamentally different things. From automated lending to conversational product design, the shift is already underway.

Banks that see AI as a cost lever will survive. Those that see it as a capability lever will lead.

Eric Euwes giving the closing speech at AFE

Let’s continue the conversation!

We met people at AFE who are challenging what banking can be. If you’re looking to reinvent how you serve customers, design products or build smarter systems, let’s connect.

See Kuro in action, schedule a 30-minute conversation with our team or stay tuned with our latest insights.