Fintech Sandbox’s Founder Shares 2026 Predictions

By W.B. King

As the holidays quickly approach, IT executives like Sarah Biller, founder of Fintech Sandbox, are already looking past good cheer, presents and eggnog. She shared four 2026 tech predictions with Finopotamus.

The first prediction builds on the premise that hindsight reveals managing disruption for growth and relevance offers more opportunity than managing continuity, noted Biller, who also serves as executive director at Vantage Ventures that launches and funds technology entrepreneurs in Appalachia.  

Sarah Biller

“The ability of fintech founders as much as incumbent organizations to continuously collect and mine data will separate the winners from the losers in this cycle of innovation in the financial services sector,” she continued. “In other words, the ability for financial services to meet the demands of a rapidly changing operating environment fueled by AI [artificial intelligence] necessitates a shift of perception to apperception (or incorporate new capabilities based on past experiences).

The Boston-based Fintech Sandbox, a not-for-profit entity, has a mission to advance financial innovation and lower barriers for early-stage startups, by providing free access to data and educational resources for promising fintech entrepreneurs around the world, building the future of financial innovation, she explained.

Data Matters

For her second prediction, Biller cited C.S. Lewis: “There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” She continued, “If the last 12 months haven't been a sobering wake-up call for the industry about the importance of data access to the future of financial services, let's say it simply: Data matters more than ever. AI models depend on vastly increasing data requirements, including the volume, variety, velocity, as well as the infrastructure that supports the use of this data (e.g., the ability of organizations to me the quality, diversity and governance requirements).

In response to this anticipated trend, Biller said FinTech Sandbox is reexamining its “learnings on the role of data in driving forward innovative fintech solutions.” Additionally, the company is “considering these new opportunities and the incredible technical capabilities AI enables currently and those to come. We will have a tremendous amount to say on this topic across the first quarter of 2026 from our decade of working hand in hand with innovators.”

All About the AI

Fintech investments encapsulated her third prediction. “We can argue that 2026 is the tipping point of digitization over aging, analog financial services infrastructure. In prior years, brute force (at a high cost of capital) has bridged the fine line between operating and operational excellence in financial services and enabled incumbents to hold onto protective product or regulatory moats without making the needed investment in internal systems.”

AI, she further explained, will separate the firms that have invested “not just front-end systems, but core infrastructure.” As such, “that enables them to mine data for insights on customer expectations, new distribution channels, products or, importantly, rising risks and / or seamlessly integrate best-in-class external capabilities like fraud protection software, payment processes, etc. to compensate for a lack of investment.”

AI-enabled revenue opportunities from data-intensive innovations will take the spotlight from legacy software as a service (SaaS)-based business models, she said of her fourth prediction.

“We see from our perch at Fintech Sandbox the rise of fintech companies whose revenue comes from sources traditionally owned by incumbents or entities outside of core financial services,” she noted. “We predict 2026 will see more fintech founders build companies more on the basis of diverse revenue streams like interest from lending, interchange fees, or referral fees for promoting third-party partners. Each of these revenue models creates dependencies on data not previously exploited at scale.”