BBVA has reached an agreement to invest $300 million (about €263 million¹) in Neon, a Brazilian digital bank founded in 2016 that aims to improve access to financial services for individuals, self-employed and small businesses in its country. Neon has 15 million registered accounts. The investment takes place in a context of unprecedented technological disruption, with solid growth of digital and innovative models, particularly in financial services. In addition to a clear commitment to innovation, this investment allows BBVA to gain exposure to retail banking in Brazil, a market with one of the highest potential in the world.

Promoting open banking with APIs, retaining digital customers with artificial intelligence and enhancing traceability in logistics with blockchain are the technological solutions devised by five startups that have run pilots with BBVA Open Innovation. Now they are identifying their next steps to tackle the challenges ahead.

The strategic alliance between the two entities has enabled the integration of Google Cloud into BBVA's technology platform. This collaboration is helping the bank reduce the time it takes to launch digital products, better detect cyber threats, make sustainability one of its core capabilities, and compete with digital fintechs.

Carlos Torres Vila promotes programming training among young people in Spain, through the Code.org educational platform, a non-profit organization that, since 2013, has been distributing educational content and fighting to incorporate programming as a compulsory subject for all students. “Today it is essential to promote programming training and promote it as a core subject in primary and secondary schools,” said the bank's Chair.

BBVA has launched a new global software division that brings together more than 16,000 developers across the Group. This new division will speed up delivery of digital solutions and make them more easily scalable across the countries where the bank operates.

Technology will continue to redouble the capacity of digital businesses in 2022 and will bring opportunities to the world to liberalise data, mitigate climate change, look after people's health, advance education and even create parallel universes.