In this episode of the Connector Podcast, host Koen Vanderhoydonk interviews Asgeir, Chief Commercial Officer of AQ Risk (Applied Quantitative Risk). The conversation begins with an overview of AQ Risk’s founding in 2015 by CEO Morten Wienfeldt and its mission to combine broader bank data sets with sophisticated quantitative risk models from capital markets. AQ Risk offers a three‑product suite that addresses pricing, exposure analytics, operational risk, and regulatory compliance. Asgeir explains his commercial role and the company’s scaling ambitions for 2023 and beyond, targeting progressive banks across Europe and aiming to become a leading solution provider in the EMEA region. The core market problem is articulated: banks must balance shareholder value with systemic responsibilities, yet many lack tools to transparently allocate cost and risk at product‑ and client‑level, leading to systematic mispricing, especially in retail lending. AQ Risk’s flagship AQ Optimizer adds risk‑based pricing and exposure analytics to core banking platforms, delivering an average 12 % boost in profitability and improving regulator relationships through clearer risk appetite insights. The discussion expands to broader industry trends—rising capital requirements, demand for transparent, digitised, self‑service banking experiences, and the shift from monolithic legacy cores to service‑oriented architectures. Asgeir highlights the need for sophisticated engines to support dynamic, cost‑based pricing and what‑if simulations, noting that mispricing erodes profitability and solvency. Scaling tactics are described as bootstrapped, client‑focused, and capable of delivering double‑digit million‑euro impact within weeks, leading to higher Net Promoter Scores and faster market adoption. The episode closes with contact information (aqrisk.com) and holiday greetings.
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Welcome to the Connector Podcast, an ongoing conversation connecting fintechs, banks, and regulators worldwide. Join CEO and founder Koen Vanderhoydonk as you learn more about the latest available trends and solutions in the markets.
Welcome to another Connector Podcast, and today I have a special guest all the way from Denmark. Asgeir, can you tell us a little bit more about AQ Risk? What's your story?
Thank you so much, Koen. I'm very pleased to be here and thanks for the invite. So AQ Risk is really an abbreviation of Applied Quantitative Risk. It links to the fundamentals of our platform and services. So the company was founded in 2015 by our CEO, Morten Wienfeldt, who wanted to address key media challenges within the core banking industry. And basically through a, if you think about it, a more holistic utilization of wider datasets that the banks have available. And along that, or combining that with an application of more sophisticated quantitative risk modeling that we, or some of us otherwise know from the capital markets space. So yeah, and the solution suite that we've comprised or that's been built over the time and we're offering the market is based basically a suite, a solution suite comprising of 3 main solutions that all address functional gaps within the wider core banking space and within the domain of pricing, exposure analytics, op risk, and regulatory compliance.
Oh, nice. And now I'm very curious to know what is your role within the company? And maybe also, we're now right before Christmas, what are your ambitions for 2023?
Yeah, I mean, my role as Chief Commercial Officer is essential to lay out and also get us set to execute our strategy that allows us to seize the full potential. We are a scale-up, like I said, within the fintech space, and we see so many interesting dynamics. There's a lot of competition out there as well. We don't have a known brand, so to speak, from an international perspective. We are in Northern Europe predominantly. And we are scaling throughout Europe. So it's to set the right strategy and be able to execute on that through partnerships, etc. And not just for now, of course, but also that will allow us to secure our goals for the 3 and 5-year term, becoming one of the most relevant solution and service provider for progressive banks in EMEA. So that's the focus and the buildup of In early days of 2023, at least.
Yeah. Exciting times ahead. Now, I'm maybe not agreeing with some of the things you say, especially on the fact that you say not a well-known brand. When I looked up you guys, I mean, you're all over the place in Denmark. I mean, you have a large client set already in Denmark. Is that correct?
That is correct. That is correct. And we are scaling outside of Denmark. That's the first this year. And we already see a good organic growth with our existing client base and also through some of the partnerships we have in the Nordics with data centers that service progressive medium-sized banks for sure and smaller banks. So we are able to service fairly widely within the industry.
And now one thing is very typical about a scaling company. is that you actually are solving a real problem. So what are you solving for who?
Yeah, I mean, we support progressive banks of all sizes, like I said. So, and if you think about it, back to your earlier question and what we're looking into, there is roughly 5,000+ financial institutions across Europe. We have plus 1,000 of these That is falling within our sweet spot because, like I said, it's pretty much of all sizes. So we support progressive banks of all sizes to secure more profitable growth and ultimately help them become more solvent and sustainable. And if you think about it, the challenge for most banks is to balance their drive to maximize shareholder value. That doesn't sound so great sometimes, but that's you know, the purpose of most businesses, and which is of course significantly more challenging in times with extremely unprosperous rate regimes. And then it's the balance along with their important systemic role within the wider society, which is to secure the financial health and strength of businesses and households. And in order to solve this challenge, banks need to optimize their core business beyond automation and the digitization agenda, which has really taken up a lot of focus, of course, for good reasons over the past decade. Yeah, there's a bit more to it, and the need for greater transparency and ability to provide, uh, to, to properly comprehend and allocate cost drivers and risk exposures by banking product and client level, and that really calls for more sophisticated, powerful tools that, that than most banks have available to them today. So yeah.
Okay. I want to bring you back to the introduction because when you said there are a couple of products and one of them was regulations, and now in what you just explained, I hear strongly profitability. But how do you bring both together? Because are they not 2 completely different objectives? Sorry, difficult questions today.
And it is a challenge for most. So it's a really good question. Our clients and banks in general, they have over the past decade been forced to rethink business models in order to comply with new regulation, as we have seen from former crises going back to '07, '08, and other good good ones. There's been a steady increase of new regulation in the pursuit of stronger and healthier banking sector. We believe that the path to becoming more solid and secure profitable growth is really for the banks to get a better understanding of their own business through better exploration and utilization of that data.
Data is the new gold, right?
Yeah, most banks have a lot of data available to them today, so it's really around how do we explore and leverage that the best way. And one of the key aspects addressed by our AQ Optimizer solution, for instance, which is really an add-on to the core banking platform, is the systematic repricing or mispricing of core banking products, particularly in the the retail space and the effects this has on overall profitability and risk exposure. So it's more evident, and you can say this systematic mispricing, that that's potential here in the retail space than in the corporate space. But we do obviously handle both sectors, if you like. So through the improved risk-based pricing, exposure analytics, Our clients experience on average an improvement by roughly 12% in overall profitability.
That's very significant.
Yeah, and if you think about it, it's about ensuring that you are setting the right pricing, incorporating the cost and risk elements into that. At the same time, they achieve a better relationship and standing with regulators through their improved understanding of of their overall risk appetite and actual exposure broken down by product and by client.
Well, interesting. So you're basically in the credits and loan department, I would say. I mean, that's where the niche is. I think there's an overall view on profitability, if I understand well, well. But if you look at loans and credits going into 2023, What would be your forward-looking view? What's the future? What does the future hold?
As I've commented a bit already, of course, but if we take it a big step deeper into some of these elements that I highlighted, if you think about it, the banking sector have over the past decades undergone huge transformations affected by various financial crises and following intervention from regulators.
That's right.
And really impacting the cost of capital for the banks due to these higher capital requirements. Also the increasing demands from wider society for greater transparency, digitization, which highly influenced by developments and dynamics within the e-commerce space. Products and solutions, they have to be super intuitive, always available, self-serviced, and fully automated process with limited touchpoints. So 3 clicks to go, if you like.
Maximum.
In order to facilitate these demands and pressures, banks have had to make huge investments in replacing their earlier monolith wall-to-wall black box core banking platforms with more advanced platforms based on newer tech stacks and service-oriented architecture. And aside of these direct investments, the banks have transformed operations and business models, affecting corporate culture, etc. And some may today even be more classified as tech companies with a banking license rather than the opposite. It's a highly competitive industry requiring banks to rethink traditional models, but also to ensure they are extremely lean and well-trained. And this goes all the way into the offering of loans and credits, the tools they have available to them, but also, like I said, some of the effects of and what links into it around proper exposure analytics and cost assessments so that they can make sure they are competitive and offering the right price to the market. We see top-tier regional banks, they've made significant investments in these regards.
Mm-hmm.
We also see a lot of potential then with the more, if you like, progressive mid-tier and smaller banks to improve, sorry, these capabilities. And particularly within the domain of differentiated and importantly a risk and cost-based pricing methodology, which is allowing even the bank advisors, if you think about it, to offering the loans and credit, allowing them to gain a much more dynamic and better understanding of the profitability down to the product level and on a customer-by-customer basis across their entire commercial operation. So that is really important.
It almost sounds like it takes two to tango. It's like a combination of players within the bank that make it possible to gain in different fronts. It almost sounds like a missed potential. It's something that maybe it's not the future, but it's more the now.
That is very true. We believe, or we can see from most of the clients that engage with, that as I referenced earlier, some of that lost potential in revenues, but also just in ensuring that they got a good understanding and capturing of the exposure they're actually taking and pricing that into the products they're offering. So I think it's in everybody's interest from a societal perspective that banks that we have, that they are here now, but also in the future. And if the bank isn't able to capture and understand these dynamics, it's likely that they are consistently mispricing their portfolio, which impacts the profitability and solvency. And whilst we on the corporate banking side see larger amounts only being repriced annually, think about the high, huge volumes of retail clients, so us private individuals that are much more frequently being repriced by the banks with the potential of being systemically mispriced, if you like, and consequently leading to these lost potentials. So the inability for bank advisors to perform intraday and simulation-based what-if analysis is really prohibiting them to better capture unprofitable business and either refrain from conducting the service or at least incorporate the real cost and secure risk-adjusted prices or pricing. And as I said before, from a societal perspective, it is systemically vital that the banks are well-driven and able to service and support growth for businesses in the local communities, equally able to drive more profitable growth for themselves and continuously be able to improve the services that they may offer, meeting these ever-changing demands from you and me and their overall clients. And that is whether they are— whether it's a retail business client, our expectations for the banks are to offer relevant services when we need it in an intuitive way, easily accessible. And that is at the lowest cost rate, of course, when when we need their credit and the highest yield when we deposit or invest. And to balance and orchestrate all of this, the banks really need reliable yet sophisticated engines that, that can, that can support them in that. And that is why Akerisk often is the preferred trusted partner and solution provider for many of these banks in Northern Europe that we, we service today.
Yeah, cool. I like it that you bring it back to the, the fundamentals of being a bank, which is somehow serving society. So I like that Now, talking about twists, you are a scaling miracle. You're scaling at lightning speeds. So can I ask, what is your secret sauce, if you're allowed to tell us and the audience?
Yeah, I like to think there is no secret sauce, so to speak. It's just a multitude of different things that we pull together and carefully thought through. Other than it's not much more than the principles, I think, that we founded. We are indeed, we are seeing good scale in the market, but at the same time, we are not paced by a third-party investor looking for a quick buck. We are in bootstrapping mode. We are very diligent about what we invest in, the clients we engage, which domains and challenges that we seek to address. So we have a pretty good idea of the market dynamics where we can add value to the banks and replace or complement investments in often these legacy in-house solutions. So ultimately, when you're able to deliver a direct measurable double-digit million euro impact within 30 days—
Sounds good.
—by implementations, Roy, in 2 to 3 months, then A strengthened Net Promoter Score, it of course makes it easier to get to market and scale a bit faster than usual. So, but a multitude of different things, but not really a secret sauce.
Damn it, no secret sauce for the users, but a good story about how you guys doing it. And there's also a sort of best practice. So thank you very much for sharing that. We almost at the end of our podcast of today. And I have only one last question is, where can people contact you?
So people can contact me through the site where we're posting this podcast, for sure. And we have a website. You can scan the QR code listed along this promotion of the podcast, of course, and you'll be directed to a website where you can book an introduction with me directly.
And what would be the— what would be the website?
The website is aqrisk.com.
Very simple, very good. Hey, Eske, many, many, many thanks for joining me in this podcast right before Christmas. I wish you obviously Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. And thanks again also for the audience for tuning in, and stay tuned because more news will come for more fintechs for more innovation in the markets along 2023. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Happy holidays.
Thanks for listening to another episode of The Connector Podcast. To connect and keep up to date with all the latest, head over to www.jointheconnector.com or hit subscribe via your podcast streaming platform.
