From 100 Patents to Best Workplaces: Feedzai’s Innovation-first Culture Recognized by Fast Company

Earlier this year, I was proud when we reached 100 patents. Now Fast Company has recognized us as one of the Best Workplaces for Innovators in the world. Yay! But of course, the order is the other way around: it is because we have an innovation-driven culture that we reached that patent milestone (and other cool achievements).

Feedzai Research: ‘Always Learning, Always Teaching’

How did we get here? Fifteen years ago, our CEO Nuno Sebastião gave me a challenge: “invent the stuff that another company would have to invent to put us out of business.”

To do that, we launched a dedicated Research arm. Feedzai Research acts as a “startup within the startup”. We encourage our researchers to identify trends, opportunities, and threats, and to use or push the state of the art to solve future problems.

What excites me most is seeing people asking big questions, having the courage to propose radical new approaches, and then watching them drive those hypotheses through many iterations and alternatives until they reach a solution.

The path is always a little bit scary (most things fail!). But it’s also quite exciting, because together, in our mode of “always learning, always teaching” we can go from whiteboard ideas to innovations that protect hundreds of millions of people from financial crime.

We believe progress comes from giving people opportunities to learn, grow, and help others do the same. We bring that same mindset to initiatives beyond Feedzai, like research mentorships and the Women in Science Scholarships at Técnico, supporting female engineers as they pursue advanced degrees.

From Research to Real-World Impact: Railgun, Feedzai IQ, and RiskFM

The Feedzai Research team builds practical tools designed to stay ahead of financial criminals. This philosophy of continuous experimentation across Feedzai has delivered some of our most impactful recent innovations: Railgun, Feedzai IQ, and RiskFM.

• Railgun: Our real-time fraud detection engine, featuring advanced AI, to defend millions of people from surging financial crime and scams.
• Feedzai IQ: Feedzai IQ emerged from one of Feedzai’s Zaickathons, our bi-annual hackathon where cross-functional teams step out of their daily comfort zones. Feedzai IQ changes how banks fight fraud by using aggregated network intelligence to catch sophisticated, AI-driven scams that individual banks can’t find on their own. 
• RiskFM: Our groundbreaking foundation model was built specifically to mitigate financial risk. By bringing advanced AI to the front lines of defense, RiskFM gives institutions the power to detect complex fraud patterns faster and with far greater precision.

Research gives us the space to explore, experiment, and learn before we know where an idea may lead. By testing bold ideas and learning from what works and what doesn’t, we create the conditions for breakthroughs that can ultimately become mission-critical.

100 Patents: Results of an Enduring, Innovation-first Culture

Our commitment to continuous research led to a major milestone earlier this year: reaching 100 patents.

A single patent shows a good idea. Ten patents show a strong team. Achieving 100 patents shows an environment where innovation happens consistently. This milestone proves our work environment attracts talented people and nurtures them to succeed.

This recognition by Fast Company belongs to every Feedzaian researcher, team member, and partner who brings their intellect, curiosity, and boldness to work every day. It’s a privilege to be able to invent the products of tomorrow alongside this incredible team of inventors and future-thinking leaders. Our shared devotion to innovation keeps us experimenting, learning, and working to build a world of safer money for everyone.