Maria Gotsch is the President and CEO of the nonprofit venture capital fund Partnership Fund for New York City and Co-Founder of the FinTech Innovation Lab, a New York City-based accelerator program that pairs fintech startups with leading financial institutions. Maria has been called New York City's "Fintech Ecosystem Architect" by Institutional Investor magazine and has an unparalleled view of how major financial institutions are sourcing and incorporating technology into their businesses. Maria has a unique vantage point as a guide to emerging fintechs and liaison to the world's leading financial institutions. Maria also has the enviable position to know what types of technologies financial institutions are working to adopt and what technologies are most promising. For more than ten years, Maria and the FinTech Innovation Lab have helped fintechs conduct hundreds of proofs-of-concept, with 14 alumni companies having been acquired after graduating from the Lab. We discuss the best practices for fintech startups trying to partner with or sell themselves to financial institutions and what's coming next in fintech. I also learn more about the state of the New York City tech/fintech ecosystem, given the COVID-19 pandemic and what the tech community is doing to help bring New York back. You can learn more about the fintech lab and its application due December 1 at fintechinnovationlab.com.