In this episode of The CTO Show with Mehmet, I sit down with Tomas Navickas, Co-Founder and CTO of myTU, a digital-first financial institution known for running an entire bank on less than €1,000/month in cloud costs. We explore how efficiency, AI, and smart architecture are redefining the future of digital banking and fintech.

Tomas shares how myTU built efficiency into its DNA, why fraud prevention requires more than rules, and how APIs and AI are reshaping payments. This conversation is packed with insights for founders, CTOs, and anyone interested in the intersection of technology, regulation, and finance.

Key Takeaways

• How efficiency became myTU’s moat in a competitive fintech landscape

• Lessons from running a bank on €1K/month in cloud costs

• The role of AI in fraud prevention — from reactive to real-time decisioning

• Why APIs are the future of B2B payments

• Cloud-native vs. legacy banking systems: what traditional banks can’t solve

• The next wave of digital banking innovation: conversational interfaces

What You’ll Learn

• Practical strategies for scaling efficiently without massive infrastructure spend

• How AI is transforming fraud detection and compliance in fintech

• The regulatory realities of building a cloud-first bank

• Why support can be minimized by design before AI automation

• Where fintech is heading in the next decade

About Tomas Navickas

Tomas Navickas is the Co-Founder and CTO of myTU, a European fintech building cloud-native digital banking solutions. With over two decades of experience in software, engineering, and financial systems, Tomas brings deep expertise in building efficient, scalable, and secure platforms.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ntomas/

https://www.mytu.co/

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Episode Highlights

• [00:03:00] Tomas’s journey from coding at age 6 to CTO and fintech founder

• [00:05:00] Running a bank on €1K/month — architecture decisions that made it possible

• [00:10:00] AI’s role in fraud prevention and customer protection

• [00:17:00] Cloud-native vs. legacy banks: why traditional migration fails

• [00:29:00] Reinventing B2B payments with APIs

• [00:40:00] How AI could automate compliance, support, and even development

• [00:46:00] Predicting the next wave of digital banking innovation

• [00:50:00] Tomas’s advice for founders and aspiring fintech builders