Author: David Penn

Wio Bank Partners with Xero to Enhance Accounting for SMEs in the UAE

Wio Bank Partners with Xero to Enhance Accounting for SMEs in the UAE
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Xero
  • Small business management platform Xero has teamed up with UAE-based digital bank Wio Bank PJSC.
  • The partnership will enable Wio Bank’s business customers to access a range of business finance management and accounting solutions.
  • Xero is headquartered in New Zealand. The company made its Finovate debut in 2011.

A newly announced partnership between UAE-based digital bank Wio Bank PJSC and small business management platform Xero will help small and medium-sized businesses in the region streamline and simplify their accounting operations. Wio Bank’s business customers will benefit from ready access to seamless bank feeds, automated reconciliation, and real-time financial insights.

The integration will help businesses working with Wio Bank to leverage automation to reduce error-prone, manual data entry. The technology will also help enhance cash flow visibility thanks to seamless invoice matching. Real-time insights ensure an accurate view of overall financial health, making it easier for business owners to make more informed decisions.

“We’re pleased to work with Xero to bring effortless accounting to UAE businesses,” Wio Bank Chief Commercial Officer Prateek Vahie said. “This integration reflects our commitment to making business banking smarter, faster, and more efficient. By automating financial workflows, we’re giving business owners more time to focus on growth.”

Xero provides small and medium-sized businesses with financial management solutions—including accounting software and invoicing technology that helps them be more efficient. With more than 4.4 million users of its solutions around the world, Xero offers flexible subscription plans for businesses ranging from solopreneurs to established enterprises. Xero’s platform features solutions that facilitate invoicing, payment acceptance, inventory management, payroll, expense management, and more.

“Our integration with Wio Bank is a significant step towards supporting more UAE businesses with better visibility of their finances, helping them spend less time on admin and more time doing what they love, growing their business,” Xero Regional Director EMEA, Colin Timmis said.

Headquartered in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, Wio Bank PJSC serves individuals with a platform that helps them save, spend, borrow, manage, and invest. The institution also offers Banking-as-a-Service and embedded finance solutions to serve small and medium-sized businesses. Launched in 2022, Wio Bank is backed by shareholders including ADQ, Alpha Dhabi, e&, and First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB).

Xero made its Finovate debut in 2011. The New Zealand-based company was founded in 2006. Earlier this summer, Xero announced its acquisition of SMB billpay platform Melio. Already available via the Xero App Store, the Melio platform makes payment workflows easy and flexible, providing a diverse range of payment methods to better serve customers and help vendors get paid faster.

Photo by David Rodrigo on Unsplash

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HSLC, Triad Bank Turn to Vine Financial to Enhance and Automate Lending

HSLC, Triad Bank Turn to Vine Financial to Enhance and Automate Lending
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Vine Financial
  • Lending platform provider Vine Financial announced partnerships with a pair of financial institutions: HSLC of Ohio and Triad Bank of Oklahoma.
  • Both institutions will deploy Vine’s platform to manage the entire commercial loan lifecycle, including document reading, financial spreading, and document generation.
  • Austin, Texas-based Vine made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2024 in New York.

AI-powered lending platform Vine Financial has announced a new partnership with HSLC, a $227 million community bank serving customers in Ohio and Kentucky. The institution will leverage Vine’s technology to eliminate manual document processing in its commercial lending, equipment financing, and agricultural lending portfolios. Integrating Vine’s lending platform will enable HSLC to boost accuracy and reduce commercial loan processing time from days to hours.

“HSLC has a true dedication to their community and especially the businesses they serve,” Vine CEO and Co-Founder David Eads said. “A big part of our mission is freeing community bankers up to do what they do best: build relationships with their customers. Chris and his team are a great example of that, and we are proud to support the banks making a difference in their local economies.”

The partnership will give HSLC a single, unified system that covers the entire commercial loan lifecycle. Vine’s platform automates document reading, financial spreading, and document generation, replacing the costly and time-consuming manual processes that continue to plague commercial lending. Vine’s technology will provide HSLC not only with greater efficiency, but also with greater accuracy, as well. The company notes that institutions using its technology have seen accuracy improvements of up to 30%.

Headquartered in Kenton, Ohio, HSLC recently opened doors on new branches in Lexington, Kentucky, where the institution does the lion’s share of its lending to businesses. Founded in 1888, HSLC’s full name is The Home Savings and Loan Company of Kenton, Ohio, and is a mutual financial institution that is owned by its customers.

“When I first heard about Vine, I knew we had an opportunity ahead of us. If there was something out there that could truly cut our loan processing time down from days to just hours, we needed that,” HSLC President, CEO, and Director Chris Jones said. “Anything that streamlines our work and makes us more efficient is a win for us and for our borrowers. We’ve had a great implementation with Vine and look forward to working with them.”

Founded in 2019, Vine Financial is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company made its Finovate debut last year at FinovateFall in New York, demonstrating its comprehensive Loan Lifecycle platform that uses AI to provide document import, financial analysis, and document generation. Vine Financial notes that its technology enables credit teams to work 5x faster and with 30% greater accuracy.

Vine’s partnership news with HSLC comes just a month after the fintech reported that Oklahoma-based Triad Bank had begun using its commercial lending technology to streamline its lending workflows. Founded in 1983, Triad Bank has $224 million in assets and a pair of branches in south Tulsa, including the institution’s headquarters.

“Vine offers a highly customizable loan analysis platform, allowing us the ability to tailor data inputs, risk metrics, and report outputs to fit our specific underwriting framework and portfolio review strategy,” Triad Bank, Tulsa, SVP Melissa Patocka said. “As a community bank with a credit policy different from a larger institution, Vine was able to adapt to our workflow, making it easy to align the platform with our specific underwriting and analysis needs.”

Photo by Jeremy Doddridge on Unsplash

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FinovateFall: Incentivizing Outperformance and Building Trust with Better Data

FinovateFall: Incentivizing Outperformance and Building Trust with Better Data
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: FinovateFall 2025

Check out some of the latest additions to our FinovateFall 2025 speaker line-up!

From leveraging AI to streamline workflows to incentivizing outperformance in financial services teams, this year’s crop of FinovateFall Special Addresses tackles many of the critical aspects that determine how well financial institutions engage customers, build and market new solutions, and grow their businesses. Take a look below at who will be speaking from the main stage in just a few weeks time.

FinovateFall 2025 comes to New York’s Marriott Marquis Times Square, September 8 through 10. Get your ticket. Book your room. And join us for three days of live tech demos, insightful keynotes, and networking with hundreds of fellow fintech and financial services professionals.

Growth Amid Uncertainty: How Financial Services Leaders Can Use Incentives to Outperform

Lindsey Bly, Senior Director, Product Marketing, CaptivateIQ, will talk about why outdated compensation structures are eroding growth, and what financial institutions can do to fix this problem. Mon, Sep 8, 11:05 am.

Bly will also explain how firms can use incentive compensation as a flexible tool to better manage market uncertainty, margin pressure, and evolving product priorities.

Headquartered in San Francisco, California, CaptivateIQ offers a platform that combines quota, territory, headcount, and compensation into a single, AI-powered workspace that is built for agility, alignment, and scale.

Founded in 2017, CaptivateIQ bridges the gap between incentive compensation management and sales planning.

Sharpen Your Tech Stack: Boost Agility in a Shifting Landscape

Anna Van Erven, Strategic Awareness & Advocacy Lead, Progress ShareFile, will discuss how ensuring that your tech stack is lean and adaptable is key to controlling costs, automating low-value work, and keeping the focus on strategy rather than on software. Mon, Sep 8, 12:20 pm.

Van Erven will also share insights into how companies can audit their own tech stack to help build a resilient, adaptable foundation for the future.

Headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina, Progress ShareFile provides technology to streamline document and client-facing workflows.

The company’s automation, e-signing, and secure document sharing solutions help businesses become more efficient and collaborate more effectively.

The Hidden Threat in Identity Verification — Why the First Step is Everything

Bryan Lewis, President and Chief Executive Officer, Intellicheck, will explain why the first step in identity verification is the most important and how everything that follows this step is compromised if this initial step is wrong. Tue, Sep 9, 9:25 am.

Lewis also will talk about the key role of the barcode and why facial recognition alone is insufficient as an authentication strategy.

Intellicheck provides an identity validation and proofing service that leverages its proprietary analysis of Department of Motor Vehicles-issued identification documents to build trusted, real-time customer identity verification.

Headquartered in New York, Intellicheck was founded in 1994.

From Chaos to Clarity: A CIO + CEO Conversation on Confident Tech Decisions

UPSTACK’s Chris Trapp (Founder & CEO) and Josh Jewett (Operating Executive) will discuss lessons learned and share practical guidance on their experiences from both sides of the buying table when it comes to investments in everything from AI and cloud technology to CX and enterprise IT. Tue, Sep 9, 12:25 pm.

The two fintech veterans will talk about how financial institutions can cut through vendor noise to move from stalled evaluations to confident action.

Founded in 2017, UPSTACK is a full-service technology brokerage that helps businesses make smarter technology investments.

The company takes a vendor-neutral approach to offer expert advisory and execution across colocation, cloud, connectivity, networking, cybersecurity, AI, and more.

The State of Business Identity: Why Trust Starts with Better Data

Andrea Hong, Head of Product, Middesk, will talk about how fraud risks have never been higher for businesses and how the current identity infrastructure is failing to protect businesses from synthetic identities, shell companies, and more. Tue, Sep 9, 1:40 pm.

Hong will discuss how more companies are leveraging better data and workflows to detect fraud risks earlier and make better decisions across the customer lifecycle.

San Francisco, California-based Middesk offers simple and trusted business onboarding. The company’s technology enables firms to use instant, reliable insights to verify and onboard more business customers faster.

Founded in 2019, Middesk includes fintechs such as Affirm, Brex, Plaid, and Gusto among its customers.

Photo by Jopwell

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Minerva Brings More Control, Visibility to Sanctions Screening

Minerva Brings More Control, Visibility to Sanctions Screening
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, MinervaAI
  • Financial crime solutions provider Minerva announced two platform updates to give compliance teams more control and greater visibility when it comes to sanctions and watchlist screening.
  • The two new features are a screening analytics dashboard and a sanctions list source selection tenant configuration page.
  • Minerva made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022 in New York. The company is headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Financial crime solutions provider Minerva recently unveiled a pair of platform updates designed to give compliance teams more control over and greater visibility into sanctions and watchlist screening operations. The company introduced a new screening analytics dashboard that gives users a view into the performance of their screening program. Additionally, Minerva launched a sanctions list source selection tenant configuration page for administrators that allows customers to customize their sanctions list coverage.

“I’m excited to share our latest product update,” Minerva Head of Product Jordan Bibla wrote on the company blog. “We released a new screening analytics dashboard to provide visibility into your screening program’s performance over time. We also rolled out sanctions list source selection to provide control over which underlying sanctions sources you screen against.”

Minerva’s new screening analytics dashboard now features a Current Snapshot view that provides point-in-time profile metrics including total profile count, monitored count, and escalation, acceptance, and rejection rates. This information will help compliance teams see exactly how well their screening program is performing. The dashboard also provides charts that show historical trends to let users see how profile statuses are changing over time. This feature enables compliance teams to more readily identify patterns and track performance.

The platform also now has a tenant configuration page to enable users with administrative access to empower customers to customize their sanctions list coverage based on their individual compliance requirements. The new page features Source Management, which enables administrative users to deselect sanctions lists that are not relevant for their screening program; Regional Filtering, which displays both active and inactive sources and can be filtered by geographic region; and Tenant-Wide Application, which enables selections to apply to the entire tenant for ongoing monitoring and risk assessment searches to provide consistency across the entire screening program.

Founded in 2019 and headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Minerva made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022 in New York. At the conference, the company demonstrated how its AI-powered AML platform provides accurate sanctions and watchlist screening, KYC, KYB, enhanced due diligence, and ongoing monitoring insights in seconds. Use cases for Minerva’s technology include not just AML compliance in banking, but also in industries such as real estate, law enforcement, cryptocurrency exchanges, payments facilitators, and more.

Minerva began the year with the news that it had partnered with financial crime and compliance automation platform Hummingbird to integrate Minerva’s screening data directly into the Hummingbird platform. This will enable Hummingbird users to access comprehensive global screening for sanctions, politically exposed persons (PEPs), open source intelligence (OSINT), and adverse media. This spring, Minerva introduced its Automated Screening Workflow solution that automates as much as 97% of screening activity.

Photo by Arturo Castaneyra on Unsplash

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Hoosier Hills Credit Union Teams Up with Teslar Software

Hoosier Hills Credit Union Teams Up with Teslar Software
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Teslar
  • Teslar Software announced a new partnership with Indiana-based Hoosier Hills Credit Union this week.
  • The partnership will enable Hoosier Hills CU to “refine its lending operations from the ground up,” the community financial institution said in a statement.
  • Headquartered in Arkansas, Teslar Software made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022 in New York.

Indiana-based Hoosier Hills Credit Union has teamed up with Teslar Software in an effort to “refine their lending operations from the ground up.” In a statement, the financial institution, which serves 40 counties in southern Indiana and northern Kentucky, identified both streamlining internal processes and enhancing data visibility as key priorities.

“We recognized that many of our back-office processes involve too many touchpoints and too much manual effort,” Hoosier Hills CU SVP of Lending Operations Ashley Wilkerson said. “Right now, many of these functions are decentralized and rely heavily on email. One of our goals with Teslar is to automate and centralize these functions to improve efficiency and enhance the experience for both our members and our team.”

Teslar offers a Lending Process Automation Platform that automates labor-intensive tasks and builds efficient workflows that are configured specifically for the individual institution. These include workflows for processes such as loan origination, deposit operations, advanced portfolio and credit risk management, as well as operational workflows, including exceptions and tickler tracking. The platform aggregates and unifies data in a single system and provides tools and visibility that ensure consistent, rapid processing, and foster collaboration.

“I was initially expecting Teslar’s main benefit to be data and reporting, but once I saw the workflow capabilities, it was eye-opening. Teslar is really an efficiency tool more than anything,” Hoosier Hills CU Chief Operations Officer Charlie King said. “We do so many things well as a credit union—by leveraging Teslar’s innovative tools we can complement our strengths, increase our efficiency, and deliver even more value to our members.”

Founded in 1969 as the Bedford Independent Federal Credit Union, the institution was launched by workers at the GM Foundry in Bedford, Indiana. Today, as Hoosier Hills Credit Union, the credit union has more than $895 million in assets, and nearly 40,000 members.

Springdale, Arkansas-based Teslar Software made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022 in New York. At the conference, the company demonstrated how its technology enables community banks and credit unions to offer indirect lending via simplification, digitization, and automation. Indirect lending enables community financial institutions to grow their customer and member base by teaming up with local businesses to offer financing to consumers for purchases such as outdoor equipment, furniture, and more.

Teslar Software was founded in 2008. The fintech’s partnership news with Hoosier Hills CU comes less than a month after the company reported that Altamaha Bank and Trust had selected it to help streamline lending operations, enhance exception tracking, and provide both employees and customers with a more unified experience. Altamaha Bank and Trust serves communities in Southeast Georgia and was founded in 1946.

“For us, Teslar checked all the right boxes,” Altamaha Bank and Trust Chief Technology Officer Shan Venable said. “We looked at a lot of fintechs, but the features Teslar offers and their long-term experience integrating with both our core and imaging systems fit exactly what we needed. We didn’t want a platform that requires large resource commitments or dedicated staff to manage. We wanted something intuitive and easy for our employees to use.”

Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on Unsplash

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AI Squared Unveils Sparx, Unifying Sales, Finance and Operations Data

AI Squared Unveils Sparx, Unifying Sales, Finance and Operations Data
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: AI Squared, Alumni profile

The rapid adoption of AI in financial services has its challenges. Among them is the lack of AI-ready data, which can be a major problem when it comes to effectively deploying AI. Running AI-powered systems on flawed data can have consequences ranging from mere missed opportunities to operational failures that lead to both reduced customer trust and reputational damage for the company. According to a survey by research firm Gartner, 60% of AI projects through 2026 are expected to fail due to a lack of AI-ready data.

To this end, AI integration solutions provider AI Squared has launched Sparx, a Data-Science-In-a-Box offering that enables small businesses, mid-market companies, and non-profits to access production-ready AI. Sparx integrates AI into existing business workflows, yet requires no coding, infrastructure changes, or participation by data scientists. Sparx unifies sales, finance, and operations data into a real-time, AI-powered view, and deploys in less than an hour.

“Until now, building AI-powered insights meant investing in complex systems and tools, and hiring specialists,” AI Squared CEO and President Darren Kimura said. “With Sparx, we have removed that complexity. Businesses can start seeing value in hours, not months. Sparx empowers customers to integrate AI quickly and affordably, accelerating decision-making and enhancing operational efficiency so they can move faster and uncover new opportunities.”

Sparx connects to existing systems and automatically syncs and cleans the data. The solution has an intuitive interface that enables users to communicate with their data in conversational English and to receive actionable insights instantly—without requiring the involvement of IT experts or data scientists. Sparx offers real-time visibility into operations and provides contextual data to help teams identify trends and boost efficiency.

Having established itself as a solution provider for large institutions in financial services, insurance, and SaaS—to say nothing of the company’s founding contracts with the US Department of Defense—AI Squared’s decision to develop and launch Sparx is an effort to bring AI to smaller businesses and non-profits. Where typical AI platforms—including AI Squared’s own Unified Platform—are often much more than these firms need, Sparx is tailor-made for smaller organizations. The solution is easy to set up and customize while still providing robust data integration and real-time AI insights.

“Like most small and medium-sized enterprises, we faced high costs, complexity, and a long development cycle to address our needs to deploy production-ready AI for our mountain of data,” said Steve Braaten, Chief Architect at Khasm Labs, a partner of AI Squared. “Sparx is solving this for us, giving our team fast and actionable insights without the heavy lift.”

Founded in 2019 by Dr. Benjamin Harvey, AI Squared made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2023 and returned later that year for FinovateFall 2023. Darren Kimura succeeded Harvey as CEO earlier this year, having joined the company in 2024 as President and Chief Operating Officer. He has been credited with helping shape the company’s operational growth and strategic direction. With more than 25 years of experience in scaling technology companies, Kimura praised Harvey, who will transition to a new role focused on positioning AI Squared as a thought leader, and bolstering customer engagement.

“Ben’s vision and leadership have positioned AI Squared as a market leader, and I am honored to build upon that strong foundation,” Kimura said. “We have an exceptional team, and I look forward to driving forward our mission of making AI more accessible and impactful for organizations worldwide.”

Photo by Magda Ehlers

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Telesign Teams Up with PCI Pal to Help Contact Centers Fight Fraud

Telesign Teams Up with PCI Pal to Help Contact Centers Fight Fraud
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Telesign
  • Identity verification provider Telesign, a Proximus Global company, has teamed up with SaaS-based secure payments provider PCI Pal.
  • The two companies will offer a Fraud Management Suite that uses Telesign Intelligence to provide fraud teams and AI bots with real-time risk intelligence before potentially fraudulent transactions occur.
  • Headquartered in Marina del Rey, California, Telesign made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2023.

A new partnership between identity verification innovator Telesign, a Proximus Global company, and SaaS-based secure payments provider PCI Pal will create a Fraud Management Suite to help international businesses leverage AI to identify fraudulent payments before they occur.

The new solution is designed to be especially effective against Card-Not-Present (CNP) attacks that are easy for fraudsters to use and difficult for fraud prevention teams to stop before they make their impact. Because fraudsters only need the expiration date and three-digit CVV number in order to assume another person’s identity over the phone and make fraudulent transactions, this type of fraud can be especially difficult for contact center workers to detect.

The new offering from Telesign and PCI Pal provides agents and AI bots with real-time risk insights before the transaction begins. This reduces chargebacks and revenue loss, but does not add friction to the customer experience. The solution leverages Telesign Intelligence, an AI-powered tool that identifies fraudulent activity by scoring the level of transaction risk associated with the phone number being used for the transaction. This score can be used to determine whether or not the transaction should be allowed to go through, blocked, or flagged for further review and additional verification.

“AI is transforming how we approach security—not just in detecting fraud, but in anticipating it,” PCI Pal CTO Mufti Monim said. “This launch lays the groundwork for a more intelligent and adaptive platform, that secures payments across all channels while enhancing both customer and agent experiences. It’s the first step in a broader roadmap to unify fraud prevention, compliance, and customer experience into one seamless, scalable platform.”

The partnership comes as Juniper Research reports that the cost of payment fraud to consumers and businesses is expected to grow from $44 billion in 2024 to $109 billion in 2029. Further, Juniper Research notes that 79% of companies reported being victims of payment fraud attacks in 2024.

“Payment card fraud is a significant challenge for contact centers, and this partnership addresses that issue by making voice-based interactions with enterprise more trusted, seamless and secure,” Proximus Global Business Lead Rajdip Gupta said. “Our work with PCI Pal aligns with our ongoing commitment to protect enterprises from evolving threats, without disrupting the customer experience.”

Founded in 2005 and headquartered in Marina del Rey, California, Telesign made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2023. At the conference, the company introduced a new tool that depicts risks inherent in the onboarding process and showed how firms can mitigate the risk via intelligent phone number analysis and insight.

Photo by Jed Azzam

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Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News

Fintech Rundown: A Rapid Review of Weekly News
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: 10x Banking, Array, Fintech Rundown, Jack Henry, Klarna, NTT Data, Thunes

Over the weekend we learned that fintech investment in the UK reached $7.2 billion in the first half of 2025. That figure is down slightly from last year’s total of $7.6 billion, according to KPMG’s Pulse of Fintech report. Meanwhile, here in the US, President Trump has signed an executive order enabling investors to buy alternative assets, including cryptocurrencies, for their 401(k) retirement savings plans.

Be sure to check back for more fintech news headlines all week long here at Finovate’s Fintech Rundown!

Digital banking

New Zealand-based Co-operative Bank partners with 10x Banking for core replacement.

Lending

Finastra inks collaboration with NTT Data, extending its Lending Cloud Service.

Payments

Payments processor Silverflow teams up with fintech provider payabl. to upgrade its payments infrastructure.

TransferMate secures in-principle approval from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to add payment services.

Global payroll and financial platform Ontop partners with Thunes to offer real-time wage access.

Payments company Nayax embeds its payment technology into 100,000 Autel Energy EV chargers in North America and Europe.

Crypto and Defi

Digital asset platform Zodia Markets raises more than $18 million in Series A funding.

E-commerce

Klarna unveils new enablement via the Stripe for WooCommerce integration.

Financial wellness

Jack Henry and Array team up to launch new Banno Digital Banking Platform capability, MyFinancialHealth.

Fraud prevention

Sidney Federal Credit Union deploys Illuma’s IllumaSHIELD voice authentication and caller fraud prevention solution.

Photo by Alexandre Chambon on Unsplash

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Finovate Global Pakistan: Profits in E-Commerce, Investment in Logistics, and Partnerships in Cybersecurity

Finovate Global Pakistan: Profits in E-Commerce, Investment in Logistics, and Partnerships in Cybersecurity
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Finovate Global

This week’s edition of Finovate Global features news on recent fintech developments in Pakistan.

Fintech Deal Draws Bazaar Technologies Closer to Profitability

A report in Bloomberg indicates that Pakistan’s most well-funded startup, Bazaar Technologies, is closing in on profitability. The company, which was founded in 2020, offers a B2B e-commerce platform that connects small retailers with suppliers. This digitization of traditional supply chains has been credited with empowering thousands of smaller merchants, known as “kiryana” shops, to participate in the digital economy.

It is the company’s recent acquisition of digital payments platform Keenu that has observers believing that Bazaar could achieve profitability in the coming quarters. Keenu offers payment services, including point-of-sale (POS) solutions, an online payment gateway, and a mobile wallet app, via a merchant acquiring network that spans more than 150 cities throughout Pakistan. A licensed Electronic Money Institution (EMI), Keenu processes more than $1 billion in annual payments.

The acquisition marked the first time a major Pakistan-based e-commerce company integrated payments into its operations, and has been seen as part of the State Bank of Pakistan’s National Payment Strategy to advance digital transformation and financial inclusion in the country.

“This is more than an acquisition—it’s a strategic alignment that redefines what it means to serve households and businesses in Pakistan,” Bazaar Technologies Co-Founder Saad Jangda said.

Bazaar has raised more than $100 million in funding from investors including Dragoneer Investment Group, Tiger Global, and Indus Valley Capital. The company is headquartered in Karachi.

Logistics Fintech Trukkr Secures Funding from UAE’s Yango Group

Via its investment arm, Yango Ventures, UAE-based technology company Yango Group announced an investment in Trukkr, a fintech platform in Pakistan that provides financial services to companies in the trucking business. The amount of the investment was not disclosed, but the funding does represent the first Pakistan-based investment for Yango Ventures. The investment will also provide Trukkr with Yango Group’s product expertise and insights from its operations in more than 30 markets around the world.

“We are excited to partner with Yango Group, in addition to their strategic equity investment, we find that their experience in building state-of-the-art logistics tech and deploying it in over 30 countries will allow us to strengthen our offerings in Pakistan and beyond,” Trukkr CEO Sheryar Bawany said.

Founded in 2019 by Hisham Adamjee, Mishal Adamjee, Kasra Zunnaiyyer, and Ali Haji, Trukkr is digitizing and modernizing Pakistan’s logistics market—a market alued at more than $35 billion. The company’s integrated SaaS platform and embedded finance solutions help trucking companies better conduct fleet management, trip coordination, invoicing, and lending operations. Recently securing a Non-Banking Finance Company (NBFC) license from the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), Trukkr also provides working capital and fleet financing solutions, as well as a robust loan management suite.

“Pakistan’s logistics sector is full of potential, and Trukkr is helping move it forward—by giving operators the financial tools they need to scale and succeed in a competitive market,” Yango Group CEO Daniil Shuleyko said. “We’re here to support that transformation with our experience and technology. This is the kind of local innovation we want to help grow, and it’s just the start of our work in Pakistan.”

Pakistan Bolsters Cybersecurity in Fintech as NIBAF Teams Up with Risk Associates

In a bid to enhance cybersecurity for the financial sector, the National Institute of Banking and Finance-Pakistan (NIBAF Pakistan) partnered with Risk Associates to deliver training on the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). The training featured cybersecurity professionals and representatives from leading Pakistan-based banks and financial institutions, and was led by Risk Associates, an internationally recognized certification body and PCI Qualified Security Assessor (QSA).

The training included discussion on payment security architecture, cardholder data protection, and compliance lifecycle management. The partnership between NIBAF Pakistan and Risk Associates was made official via a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed in June.

“Together with NIBAF Pakistan, we are delivering forward-looking training that empowers banking professionals to anticipate, adapt, and respond to dynamic threats with operational precision and confidence,” Risk Associates CEO Aftab Rizvi said in a statement. NIBAF Pakistan Co-CEO Lubna Farooq Malik noted that insofar as the financial industry is at the “forefront of profound digital transformation,” it must also lead the way in developing solutions that keep the financial industry and its customers safe.

Headquartered in Bella Vista, NSW, Australia and founded in 2004, Risk Associates assess and certifies businesses in order to establish their commitment to maintaining high security standards and complying with regulatory requirements. The company offers a variety of robust preventive, detective, and corrective cybersecurity solutions, and is a specialist in cybersecurity, risk, compliance, information governance, strategy, and training.

Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world.

Central and Eastern Europe

  • Latvian fintech Handwave secured $4.2 million in seed funding for its palm-based payment and identity platform.
  • Deutsche WertpapierService Bank (dwpbank) agreed to acquire Berlin-based brokerage-as-a-service platform lemon.markets.
  • Dutch paytech Mollie launched in Hungary, Slovenia, and the Czech Republic.

Middle East and Northern Africa

  • Alaan, an AI-powered corporate spend management platform based in the UAE, secured $48 million in Series A funding.
  • Israel-based startup QuamCore raised $26 million to build one million qubit quantum computer.
  • Open banking and embedded finance platform Tarabut secured in-principle approval from the Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates (CBUAE).

Central and Southern Asia

  • Uzbekistan-based fintech and digital bank Uzum locked in $70 million in equity financing at a valuation of $1.5 billion.
  • Logistics fintech Trukkr secured investment from UAE-based tech company Yango Group.
  • Indian debt collections platform DPDzero raised $7 million in Series A funding.

Latin America and the Caribbean

  • Mexican fintech platform Finsus acquired the technology of merchant cash advance platform Anticipa.
  • Stablecoin-based financial infrastructure company VelaFi forged a strategic partnership with stablecoin-powered payment network Noah.
  • Clip launched its all-in-one (AIO) point-of-sale (POS) device in Mexico.
  • Cross-border payment platform dLocal unveiled its SmartPix solution that enable merchants to process tokenized Pix payments including recurring and on-demand charges.

Asia-Pacific

Sub-Saharan Africa

Photo by Abuzar Xheikh on Unsplash

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Streamly Snapshot: Startup Success, Financial Management, and the Innovation Ecosystem

Streamly Snapshot: Startup Success, Financial Management, and the Innovation Ecosystem
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Speaker series, Streamly

This week’s Streamly Snapshot features our final interview from FinovateSpring 2025 in San Diego, California.

What does it take for a startup to be successful? In today’s innovation ecosystem, one increasingly important skill is not just building innovative solutions, but also managing the finances—the investment capital, the debt financing, the cash flow—that support a growing enterprise. In this interview, Christopher Hollins, Global Head of Product Sales and Design at Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), a Division of First Citizens Bank, talks about the challenges that startups face when it comes to optimizing financial operations, scaling businesses, and managing cash flow. Hollins also shares his insights on the digital tools and platforms that are available to startups to help them grow and scale their businesses.

“Even in this environment, which is short on IPO exits, the innovation is not showing that it’s short of anything other than tremendous creativity, driving for positive results, and actually managing through all of the change that is happening in the macro economy and within the innovation ecosystem, itself.”

In his role at SVB, Hollins has been instrumental in transforming the platform’s solution delivery model to ensure that SVB’s Commercial Bank innovation economy clients can access the best partners and solutions to solve their challenges as they grow. Hollins joined SVB in May 2021, bringing more than 20 years of international marketing, sales, and strategy experience in financial services, mobile telecom, and technology to the firm.

Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, SVB was founded in 1983. Acquired by First Citizens Bank in 2023, the firm today is the bank of choice for many of the world’s most innovative technology companies and investors. SVB provides commercial and private banking services to individuals and companies in technology, life sciences, healthcare, private equity, venture capital, and premium wine industries. The institution reports $99 billion in total client funds and counts 40% of the Forbes 2025 AI list among its customers.

Photo by Alexas_Fotos on Unsplash

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Uptiq Announces Strategic Partnership with Broadridge

Uptiq Announces Strategic Partnership with Broadridge
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, UPTIQ
  • AI-powered financial services platform Uptiq has forged a strategic partnership with and received a minority investment from Broadridge Financial Solutions. The amount of the investment was not disclosed.
  • Courtesy of the partnership, Uptiq will integrate its technology into Broadridge’s Wealth Lending Network (WLN) to give financial advisors access to AI-automated, securities-based lending workflows.
  • As Cion Digital, Uptiq made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2022. The company rebranded the following year.

AI platform for financial services, Uptiq, announced a new strategic partnership with and a minority investment from Broadridge Financial Solutions. The company, which made its Finovate debut as Cion Digital at FinovateSpring 2022, will integrate its technology into Broadridge’s Wealth Lending Network (WLN). This will give financial advisors and banks working with Broadridge access to turnkey, agentic AI applications to automate securities-based lending workflows. The amount of the minority investment was not disclosed.

“Uptiq was purpose-built to remove the heavy lifting from lending,” Uptiq CEO and Founder Snehal Fulzele said. “Our AI-driven platform surfaces the most relevant loan options, actively guiding advisors so they can focus on serving clients instead of wrestling with process complexities. By connecting directly with Broadridge’s Wealth Lending Network banks, we’re making it easier than ever to provide securities-based lending as a compelling and compliant liquidity solution.”

Via its Wealth Lending Network, Broadridge provides a digital platform that connects wealth managers, financial advisors and their clients with a network of lenders that offer securities-based lines of credit. This streamlines access to securities-based lending solutions, especially for those financial advisors and wealth management firms that are not affiliated with a bank. The Uptiq integration will make it easier for financial advisors to source and compare loan options, as well as automate a range of manual tasks including referral submission, loan processing, and covenant tracking. The partnership helps financial advisors provide more credit options for clients, enhances client service and compliance, and streamlines the process of providing lending solutions to wealth management customers.

“This strategic partnership helps modernize wealth management, addressing the growing demand for artificial intelligence in financial services, as well as a need to develop a better wealth lending process that is efficient, compliant, and personalized,” Broadridge President of Wealth Management Mike Alexander said. “With Uptiq’s AI-powered tools and Broadridge’s Wealth Lending Network, we’re enabling advisors to deliver smarter lending recommendations, save time, and ultimately help their clients access the liquidity needed to achieve their financial goals. Our investment demonstrates our commitment to driving innovation in the wealth lending ecosystem.”

Broadridge serves clients in asset management, capital markets, wealth management, and related industries. The company’s technology and operations platforms process and generate more than seven billion communications a year, and support the trading of more than $10 trillion of securities internationally. Broadridge was founded in 1962 as a part of Automatic Data Processing (ADP), and was spun off as an independent company in 2007. Headquartered in Lake Success, New York, Broadridge employs more than 14,000 associates in 21 countries, and is publicly traded on the NYSE under the ticker BR. The company has a market capitalization of $31 billion.

Making its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2022 as Cion Digital, Uptiq rebranded the following year in an effort to underscore the company’s commitment to serving wealth managers and financial advisors. The company’s platform combines deep domain expertise with AI to streamline operations and produce better outcomes across financial workflows. Uptiq’s agentic AI-powered apps automate lending, banking, and wealth management workflows, while the firm’s AI Workbench provides a no-code platform to facilitate both workflow deployment and future growth.

Photo by Morgan Housel on Unsplash

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Fab Five: FinovateFall Scholarship Program Showcases Female-Led Fintechs

Fab Five: FinovateFall Scholarship Program Showcases Female-Led Fintechs
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: FinovateFall 2025, List series, Women in Fintech

This year at FinovateFall 2025, our Sustainability & Inclusion Scholarship program will bring five female-led fintechs to the Finovate stage. Designed to help expand the Finovate demo line-up to feature more voices, more perspectives, and more cutting-edge innovation within fintech, our Sustainability & Inclusion Scholarship program helps shine a light on the next generation of fintech founders and startups.

Below are five companies, all female-founded and/or owned, that earned Sustainability & Inclusion Scholarships for this year’s autumn conference in the “Female Owned/Founded” category. Be sure to check them out live on stage next month at FinovateFall in New York, September 8 through 10.

Gentreo

Headquartered in Quincy, Massachusetts, and founded in 2018, Gentreo meets customers where they are and helps them get to where they want to be to create non-balance sheet recurring revenue. The company offers comprehensive life and estate planning to help families plan for life’s inflection points with accessible, affordable digital life and estate planning solutions. Renee Fry is Founder and CEO. LinkedIn.

Kaaj AI

Founded in 2024 and headquartered in San Francisco, California, Kaaj AI empowers banks and credit unions to deeply understand small business needs, serve them faster, grow their loan portfolio, and manage risk more effectively. The company provides an AI-powered platform to help lenders and brokers close more small business loans. Shivi Sharma is Co-Founder and President. LinkedIn.

Krida

Based in New York and founded in 2024, Krida reduces cycle times, manual tasks, and borrower drop-off, thereby giving banks a faster path to funded loans, higher throughput, and stronger community relationships. Krida automates application data intake, insights, and document generation to enable bankers to focus on building their businesses. Shivangi Khannais is Co-Founder.

MoneyPlanned

Launched in 2021, MoneyPlanned is headquartered in Bengaluru, India. The company empowers institutions to offer intelligent, automated financial planning—boosting advisor efficiency, reducing cost-to-serve, and delivering personalized client experiences at scale. MoneyPlanned’s end-to-end system uses automation, behavioral modeling, and machine learning to provide personalized financial planning in real time. Nikhila Putcha is Co-Founder. LinkedIn.

Warrant

Headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, and founded in 2024, Warrant accelerates compliant marketing, reducing review cycles from days to minutes. The company helps financial institutions see 3x gains in marketing revenue opportunities and reduce churn with faster customer communications. Austin Carroll is Founder and CEO. LinkedIn.

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