NEW YORK — A group of 11 credit union and CUSO executives wentto the Finovate Fall 2010 conference with a mission: to witness thelatest innovations in financial technology and envision theirapplications for credit unions.

They were there on behalf of the Filene Research Institute,which offered them the chance to attend the Oct. 4-5 conference ata discount in return for their commitment to meet virtually overthe next six months to bring their ideas to fruition.

The first step in that process was Ideafest, a post-conferencemeeting hosted by Denise Gabel, Filene's chief innovation officer.In a space provided by Melrose Credit Union in Queens, N.Y., theexecutives shared their impressions of the 56 products presented atthe conference and settled upon the theme of small business.

“In the current environment, small business is such anopportunity for credit unions to grow,” said Larry Jones, assistantvice president of lending at Bethpage Federal Credit Union inBethpage, N.Y.

From the list of 56 products, the group identified seven thatrelate to small business owners and the financial institutions thatserve them: billFLO, Capital Access Network's Daily RemittancePlatform, CashEdge's Popmoney for Small Business, Fiserv's ZashPay,Kashoo.com, Outright.com, and Strands Labs' Strands PFM.

The group members plan to conduct research on these products andservices and provide their peers in the CU industry with productreviews from a credit union perspective, as well as somecomparisons with competing products. This month, they will bereaching out to the vendors to get the process started.

–[email protected]