Innsider is delighted to congratulate Mauritz Wilkes on five years at INNOPAY. This month, to congratulate INNOPAY’s Mauritz Wilkes on five years with the company, we asked him to tell us more about himself and his work.
Mauritz Wilkes joined INNOPAY in October 2018 in the role of business analyst, which is now called junior consultant. He had done a bachelor’s degree in International Business Management in Düsseldorf, which included a semester abroad in London, followed by a Master of Finance in Frankfurt. During that time, he gained experience in various financial institutions and professional service companies. Among others, he worked for Sirius Venture Partners, NIBC Bank and KPMG in various consulting departments. Today, as a senior consultant, Mauritz sees himself most importantly as a project manager, strategic advisor and coach. Thanks to his financial mathematics background, he is a natural sparring partner for quantitative challenges, and he particularly enjoys supporting the development and modelling of business cases. Besides focusing on growing the German office, his key goal for the foreseeable future is to build the German digital identity ecosystem. He lives in Frankfurt Bockenheim, which is just two subway stations or a five-minute e-scooter ride away from INNOPAY’s offices in the TechQuartier.
After finishing my Master of Finance degree, I looked at where the greatest value is currently being created in the financial industry. At INNOPAY, I found a specialised strategic consultancy that helps financial institutions – and beyond – to adapt to the fundamental disruptions they are facing. I also felt that the company offered an entrepreneurial environment where I could make a personal difference.
I love the fact that I can push forward on topics that excite me personally, in a pleasant atmosphere and for interesting clients. I have had many tempting offers over the past five years, but I keep turning them down because I feel that there’s no better place for me to be at the moment than at INNOPAY. I like being at the forefront of innovation and shaping the future infrastructure for our digital lives. In contrast to IT implementation consulting, we address the big questions and have an impact on what the digital economy and society will look like in the future. This is reflected every day in our work with clients on exciting and challenging projects, and also within our team as colleagues.
Fortunately, my colleagues are not just resources for me, or anonymous email addresses or telephone numbers. First and foremost they are human beings, and many have become friends over time. At INNOPAY, I am in a community of like-minded people; we can passionately discuss a specific detail of the digital transactions’ world, but we also enjoy going out for a beer together after work. I am very happy that I get to work with curious and ambitious people every day, who think out of the box to make a difference.
The state of knowledge about data sovereignty and digital sustainability is very heterogeneous. While some active practitioners are very sophisticated and are not only advancing the concepts theoretically but also implementing them in practice, the broad masses do not yet have a good understanding. Fortunately, this is slowly starting to change, among other things thanks to political initiatives. And needless to say, at INNOPAY we will continue to work on sharing our vision on these topics.
If I had to choose just one game changer, then I would say digital identity. After all, we call digital identity ‘the mother of all transactions’ with good reason; it is the fundamental infrastructure for efficient data sharing and controlled, consent-based data access.
After some restructuring in the German organisation, we are now very well positioned for sustainable growth. The next step is to execute this and expand our footprint in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We not only hope that INNOPAY will have the same relevance and market leadership for strategic questions around digital transactions here as in the Netherlands, but we are also working hard every day to achieve it.