Breaking barriers in FinTech: Kore Labs founder Sabrina Del Prete wins prestigious Innovate UK award

London, 4 February 2024

Sabrina Del Prete, founder and CEO of Kore Labs, has been named one of the 50 winners of the 2025 Innovate UK Women in Innovation Prize. It drew 1,452 nominations this year. Since 2016, this government-backed programme has awarded prizes to 200 women innovators.

The recognition places Del Prete among the UK’s most forward-thinking entrepreneurs and innovators—a testament to her journey from global banking executive to financial technology disruptor.

“Building Kore Labs was never just about technology—it was about fixing a broken system,” said Del Prete. “Too often, we forget that financial products can have a profound impact on people and that outdated ways of working hinder product governance and innovation. 

Think about the PPI scandal, with 53 million policies impacted and £38 billion in compensation paid out. I wanted to use technology and AI to tackle the epidemic of mis-selling, and permanently shift the balance of power between financial firms and their customers to ensure a better deal for all. 

We work with Tier 1 financial institutions. Collectively, our clients serve over 140 million individuals and over 100,000 businesses in 40 countries. As our market reach grows globally, we have a unique opportunity to make a lasting and meaningful impact on both the financial services industry and society.” 

From Vision to Market Leadership

Kore Labs is the first digital innovator to enable financial services firms to optimise product management, governance and innovation through technology. The firm’s cloud-based platforms - KorePRM^® and WikiKore^® – unlock hidden data and insights on financial products to drive smarter decisions, whilst modernising processes and controls.

Leading UK and international financial brands are using this information to redefine operations, offer customers more relevant and high-value products, and take control of governance and regulatory compliance. Kore Labs is a category-defining financial technology company with the aim of reconnecting the financial services industry to their mission of empowering people and businesses.

An Entrepreneur with a Legacy of Impact

With over 30 years in financial markets, Del Prete has held global leadership roles at JP Morgan Chase, Barclays, and Coutts, and was previously Chief Digital Transformation Officer at Williams & Glyn (RBS Group). She is a Board Trustee at The London Foundation for Banking & Finance, a charity dedicated to enhancing financial capability and education. She actively collaborates with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) through their Innovation Pathway programme. Her work has earned her a place on the Innovate Finance Women in FinTech Powerlist for four consecutive years, as well as the 2023 EISA Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Emily Nott, Head of Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion at Innovate UK, said: “Innovate UK’s Women in Innovation Awards spotlight the UK’s most groundbreaking women entrepreneurs. This year’s winners have shown incredible leadership and creativity. We’re thrilled to support them in scaling their businesses and inspiring the next wave of women innovators. Their success stories will undoubtedly pave the way for more women to enter and thrive in the world of innovation.”

“It is testament to the quality of these awards that previous winners have gone on to grow their business, secure major investments and partner with organisations from Google to Disney. It truly shows the value of Government investing in creative, women-led projects in every corner of the UK – supporting economic growth to deliver our Plan for Change.” - Feryal Clark, Minister for AI.

Read about all the winners here: https://iuk-business-connect.org.uk/programme/women-in-innovation/

ENDS

About Kore Labs

Kore is a digital turn-key solution for product intelligence and governance for the global financial services industry. Its Product-Management-as-a-Service platform, KorePRM^®, offers a set of specialised digital tools for creating, managing, and optimising financial products, from ideation to retirement.  

With hundreds of controls and checks to facilitate compliance, transparency and collaboration, Kore allows organisations to build a granular digital audit trail of product events and decisions. Kore drives efficiency in product innovation, while providing a rich source of actionable data. Kore has a rapidly expanding international customer base.

Follow us on LinkedIn or Contact us to learn more.

Kore media contact
marketing@korelabs.co

About Innovate UK – Women in Innovation

The Innovate UK Women in Innovation Awards launched in 2016. Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, is the UK’s innovation agency. It works to create a better future by inspiring, involving and investing in businesses developing life-changing innovations. Its mission is to help companies to grow through their development and commercialisation of new products, processes and services.

Research conducted with women innovators revealed that access to funding and finance remains the most significant barrier to success, alongside challenges such as the lack of visible role models and difficulty accessing key networks. Over the past eight years, the Women in Innovation Awards have worked to break down these barriers. They have championed women entrepreneurs, driven business growth, and created opportunities for more women and girls to be inspired into innovation. They have had an incredible impact and kickstarted positive change across the innovation system.

Through the Awards, Innovate UK has invested over £11 million in 200 pioneering women innovators and the programme has driven a >100% increase in the number of successful women-led applications across all Innovate UK funding competitions.

This pipeline of high-potential, women-led businesses will be ready to engage with the upcoming Invest in Women Taskforce. This industry-led, government-backed initiative is establishing a £250 million funding pool – one of the world’s largest investment resources for female-led and mixed-gender enterprises.