The Financial Conduct Authority has launched a new permanent digital sandbox to support innovative businesses and start-ups in developing new proofs of concept for products and services.

It was announced by Jessica Rusu, chief data, information and intelligence officer, at the Innovate Finance Global Summit yesterday.

The Digital Sandbox will be available from summer 2023 to support a broader range of innovators, she said. It will be available even for applicants outside of, or after, specific TechSprint activities.

It will offer synthetic transaction and market data, such as that used in the Push Payment Fraud TechSprint, combined with more than 200 data assets.

It will also include payments and transactions data, investment data, Company House data, consumer data including credit data, Covid data, and more.

Ms Rusu said: “We are also crowd-sourcing data, enabling an Open ‘API marketplace’ giving access to other FinTech datasets, with over 1,000 APIs already on-boarded.”

There will also be direct access to academics, government bodies, venture capitalists and charities.

One of the primary reasons the FCA invests in technology and innovation is to better support the firms it regulates, Ms Rusu said.

She pointed out that in the past few months, there have been several significant market events, from the collapse of FTX, Silicon Valley Bank and Credit Suisse, to several significant moments in tech, with the release of ChatGPT, the clamp down on TikTok, and most recently the UK government white paper on Artificial Intelligence.

She said: “The use of data and tech continues to transform financial services. We’re transforming too – we're working intensely to leverage data and innovation to protect consumers, enable growth, and transform our operations.”

She said the FCA has introduced a number of digital tools, including decision trees, and an FAQ digital assistant to match firms with the most appropriate service for their needs, and provide additional guidance to help answer any further questions.

She added: “Our vision for the digital front door work will continue and goes much further, including numerous technology and data initiatives, such as digitising forms at the gateway, building firm portals within RegData, revamping our website, and evolving our data processing power to simplify the way firms submit data to us.”