Finanz launches “Engine”:financial education enters the apps of banks and insurers
The Milan-based startup's ambition is to close the gap between people and the European financial system, giving institutions a personalised, simple and genuinely engaging educational experience, ready to be integrated and offered to their own customers.
Milan, 21 September 2026 – Finanz today announces the launch of Finanz Engine, the modular solution that allows banks, neobanks, fintechs and insurance companies to embed a complete, personalised financial education experience within their own app, fully white-labelled. The startup's bet is that within a few years understanding your own money, and the financial and insurance products you are signing up for, will be a feature customers expect to find in their banking app, exactly as they expect to be able to make a transfer today.
The starting point is that financial and insurance providers already have the relationship with the customer, and already have their trust: entrusting your savings to a bank is an enormous act of trust. What is missing is another piece altogether, understanding. Without grasping what a fund is, how a policy works, or why inflation erodes idle money, trust does little more than safeguard assets, and never turns into a decision.
That distance explains why digital financial channels remain largely transactional. More than 75% of Europeans still don’t invest, while over €10 trillion sits idle in current accounts. People open their banking app just to check their salary, and think about insurance only at renewal or when they need to file a claim. As a result, liquidity remains untouched, households stay underinsured, and financial institutions struggle to turn available products into real customer action, even when the offer is only one tap away.
Finanz Engine works on two fronts. For the end customer, it delivers a tailored learning journey: an initial questionnaire on goals and level of knowledge sets the starting point, then short lessons, quizzes and game mechanics guide the person one step at a time. The aim is not to pile up notions, but to build real understanding and, above all, a habit: opening your banking app stops being a purely transactional gesture and becomes a moment in which you learn something useful. For the institution, the return is immediate in terms of engagement and frequency of use, but above all it is a way to refresh its digital experience and speak to younger generations in a language they recognise. And because understanding comes before decisions, the learning journey also becomes the natural premise for taking out a product.
The experience keeps the partner's brand and visual identity, alongside a "powered by Finanz" signature. That is a deliberate choice: the institution is not integrating technology from an unknown startup, but a brand that in Europe is already synonymous with financial education for more than 300,000 people, a reference point in its category in Italy and Spain, with the ambition of becoming a leader across Europe. Trust, in this case, travels in both directions.
"Our goal is not only to make finance understandable, but to bring it where people already are, inside the apps they use every day to manage their financial lives, from their bank through to their insurer," says Lorenzo Perotta, Chief Executive Officer of Finanz. "Financial institutions have the relationship and they have the trust. What is often missing is the language. Engine exists to close that gap."
The service is already live within the platforms of several Italian financial institutions, with partnerships spanning banks, payment providers and asset management firms. The insurance sector represents the most recent direction of development, the one where product complexity makes the need for education most pressing, and it proceeds alongside the expansion of the available modules and the rollout across European markets.
Underpinning the model is a piece of evidence the industry is beginning to recognise: a customer who understands the product they sign up for keeps it longer, disputes it less, and comes back. Financial education thus stops being a social responsibility initiative running parallel to the business and becomes part of the business itself, with a direct and measurable impact.
Financial and insurance institutions have always said they want to be present in their customers' lives. Helping them understand is the most concrete way to actually be there.
About Finanz
Founded in 2022 by four partners under 25, all named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, Finanz develops a free financial education app for iOS and Android, today with more than 300,000 users, available in 11 countries and rated 4.8 on average across more than 3,000 reviews. It has reached sixth position among finance apps in Italy and ranks in the category's Top 10 in Spain.
Through Finanz Engine it provides financial education and behavioural analytics infrastructure to banks, fintechs and insurance companies across Europe. The company has closed a €700,000 funding round, alongside a further €500,000 under the Italian Smart&Start scheme. Finanz is ISO/IEC 27001 certified and operates in compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation. Finanz serves exclusively educational and informational purposes and does not provide advisory or distribution services.
Press contacts
Lorenzo Monteleone, Marketing and Communications - lorenzo.monteleone@finanzapp.io
Stefano Metta, CCO and Head of Engine - stefano.metta@finanzapp.io
Lorenzo Perotta, CEO - lorenzo.perotta@finanzapp.io
