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Finovate Blog
Tracking fintech, banking & financial services innovations since 1994
Provenir announced a new partnership with Inovatec Systems.
The partnership will enable auto lenders on Inovatec’s LOS platform to access Provenir’s risk decisioning solutions
Headquartered in New Jersey, Provenir has forged partnerships with TransUnion, Kueski, and Provu in recent months.
Real-time risk decisioning software company Provenirannounced a new partner today. The Parsippany, New Jersey-based technology company has inked a deal with Canadian lending software firm Inovatec Systems that will give Inovatec’s roster of automobile lenders new tools to improve the financing process.
“Inovatec’s configurable loan origination and loan management solutions efficiently support third party solutions that improve the speed, reliability, and efficiency of the entire lending process,” Inovatec Head of Business Development Bob Metodiev said. Courtesy of the new relationship, auto financing companies working with Inovatec will be able to leverage open APIs to access Provenir’s AI-powered decisioning solutions – which are embedded into Inovatec’s LOS platform. Combined with Provenir’s technology, the enhanced solution will help lenders make smarter automated decisions while providing an optimal experience for the customer.
“Through the unique combination of universal access to data, simplified AI and world-class decisioning technology, Provenir provides a cohesive risk ecosystem that enables organizations to make smarter decisions instantly across the entire customer lifecycle,” Provenir EVP for North America Kathy Stares said.
Provenir offers a data, AI, and decisioning platform that leverages the cloud and no-code technology to enable businesses to build advanced decisioning workflows, integrate any data source, and deploy AI and machine learning models. The technology is applicable to a wide variety of contexts – from BNPL, SME lending, and auto financing, to retail POS lending, digital merchant onboarding, and bank loan origination.
Founded in 2004, Provenir was a Gold sponsor of FinovateEurope earlier this year, where the company’s Carol Hamilton, SVP of Global Solutions, spoke as part of a panel on “Achieving Digital Acceleration – What Do Incumbents Need to Do?” In the months since then, the company has announced partnerships with TransUnion, Mexico-based lender Kueski, and its first Brazilian customer, payments and personal credit fintech Provu. Provenir also announced today that it is expanding its presence in Spain. Join Provenir’s Corinne Llelti next week for a special digital presentation exclusive to Finovate – “Driving World Class SME Lending Experiences.”
FinovateFall 2022 ended last week. If you were there, then thanks for helping make the conference our largest, and most well-attended yet.
And if you were not there, then we’ve got good news and better news for you. The good news is that we’re sharing some of the mainstage highlights from FinovateFall 2022 below. The better news is that we’re going to do it all over again next year — so stay tuned!
You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Boat
Whether the enabling force is a technology or a partnership, one big takeaway from the conversations on Day One of FinovateFall 2022 was this: it is critical for financial institutions to take advantage of the resources – technological and organizational – outside of their immediate purview in order to compete, grow, and thrive.
In the morning, with presentations from Apiture’s Chris Cox and InterSystems’ Joe Lichtenberg, the emphasis was on enabling technologies that empower financial institutions to turn data into business insights. Jody Bhagat of Personetics showed how even mid-sized banks can leverage the combination of human talent and digital technology to provide superior customer service and solutions like advanced money management.
In the afternoon, our mainstage speakers turned their attention to the transformative power of good partnerships. As a theme that would extend into Day Two, forging productive partnerships between fintechs and financial institutions is a challenge that smart companies are more than willing to meet. Our Power Panel, featuring financial services professionals from Seattle Bank, Partnership Fund for New York City, FTV Capital, TD Bank Group, and Experian, showed why and how banks and fintechs can move from competition to collaboration and co-creation.
FinovateFall Best of Show winner Debbie during its live demo on stage in New York.
Getting It Done — The Right Way
If Day One of FinovateFall articulated the opportunity that exists for banks and fintechs, Day Two was all about helping them seize it. Experian’s Greg Wright led off in the morning with a discussion on how companies can maximize their successful innovation initiatives. Cornerstone Advisors’ Sam Kilmer followed-up with words of wisdom to help fintech companies seal more and better deals faster with financial institutions eager to supercharge their offerings with new fintech solutions.
In the afternoon, the discussion shifted to the new rules of engagement when it comes to customers and “future-proofing” innovation. Led by Beyond the Arc’s Steven Ramirez, our Power Panel on Customer Experience examined the new landscape in which banks thought of more as apps than as brick and mortar businesses. With experts from Oak HC/FT, Dave, Fidelity Investments, and Quavo, the panel showed how personalization, gamification, and visualization are key elements in the contemporary customer engagement strategy.
And speaking of “the right way”, VantageScore’s Rikard Bandebo shared insights into new tools to help financial institutions engage with “newly lendable’ customers and promote financial inclusion. Pointing out the differing impact of credit scoring models on different communities and demographics, Bandebo explained how new analytic approaches can empower both lenders and borrowers.
What We Learned from Best of Show
Our Best of Show award is more than a great opportunity for our attendees to reward those fintech innovators whose technologies they believe are most likely to make a big difference. The awards also serve as an excellent heat check on the latest developments from some of the world’s most innovative fintech companies and entrepreneurs.
Two of the companies to take home Best of Show trophies from FinovateFall 2022 are innovators that have proven their mettle before. Horizn, with its platform that maximizes the impact of digital transformation, is a five-time Finovate Best of Show winner. LemonadeLXP earned a Finovate Best of Show award back in 2019 for its Launchfire employee and customer engagement solution. Notice a theme? For one, both companies are great representatives of the fintech innovation taking place in Canada – Horizn is headquartered in Toronto, LemonadeLXP is based in Ottawa. For two, both Horizn and LemonadeLXP are examples of companies innovating in the critical second step in digital transformation: the challenge of turning “front line staff into digital experts” and driving “mass adoption of new platforms and digital capabilities” for customers and employees alike.
Hats off to our other Best of Show winners, as well – including Themis, Quilo, and Debbie, each of which won Best of Show last week in their Finovate debuts. And the second time was certainly the charm for New York-based data insights and analysis firm Stratyfy, which won Best of Show last week in its second trip to the Finovate stage. The company’s UnBias technology underscores the role that technology companies will play in helping financial institutions and fintechs to find and undo the bias that undermines fair and equitable policies and practices.
Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing
If there is a third takeaway from FinovateFall worth sharing here, it is this one: there ain’t nothing like a live, in-person fintech conference. And while there may be some events that do not feel much different to the average attendee regardless of whether the presentations are in-person or digital, the same cannot be said of Finovate, the so-called “DisneyLand of Fintech.” From the edge-of-your-seat excitement (and, sometimes, anxiety) during a live on-stage fintech demo to the must-see-it-to-believe-it antics of our Finovate Fintech Fight Club combatants to a fully-packed networking hall, Finovate is a people thing. And when events like ours help put the right people together, who knows what kind of magic our attendees, speakers, demoing companies, and sponsors will create?
Novatti Group has partnered with transaction monitoring company ThetaRay.
Novatti will deploy ThetaRay’s SONAR technology to defend its global payments business from money laundering and other financial crime.
A Finovate alum since 2015, ThetaRay has secured partnerships with companies ranging from Travelex Bank to fellow Finovate alum Payoneer.
Business payments enabler Novatti Group has partnered with AI-powered transaction monitoring specialist ThetaRay to defend its global payments operations against money laundering and other financial crimes. Novatti Group will deploy ThetaRay’s SaaS-based SONAR technology, a solution that leverages AI to detect the earliest indications of money laundering activity. SONAR will monitor hundreds of thousands of transactions a year for Novatti Group, enabling the company to ensure that its processed transactions are fraud-free without sacrificing quality of service.
Group GM of Risk, Legal, and Compliance at Novatti Group Evangelia Pefkou said the company selected ThetaRay for both its efficient technology as well as its ability to scale. “It is a true AI-based solution that effectively prevents financial crime – including unknown and hidden money laundering – with high detection rates and low false positives,” Pefkou said.
Headquartered in Israel, ThetaRay made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall in 2015. In the years since then, the company has brought its transaction monitoring technology to partners including Travelex Bank, PMI Americas, Qolo, as well as fellow Finovate alum Payoneer. ThetaRay’s combination of AI and machine learning has resulted in a transaction monitoring solution that delivers a 50% boost in efficiency, 99% reduction in false positives, and 100% coverage for all known money laundering risks. The company’s technology has enabled businesses to confidently partner with entities in countries and segments that are considered high-risk.
“SONAR detects even the newest and most sophisticated criminal schemes,” ThetaRay CEO Mark Gazit said. “Novatti will be able to simultaneously establish new relationships to grow global business, increase revenues, and improve customer service.”
Founded in 2013, ThetaRay has raised more than $112 million in funding from investors such as Jerusalem Venture Partners, Benhamou Global Ventures, and ABN AMRO Ventures.
With hundreds of ballots officially cast and carefully counted – here are the winners of Best of Show for FinovateFall 2022!
Debbie for its technology that leverages behavioral psychology and rewards to help users pay off 3x more debt and help lenders recession-proof members. Demo.
Horizn for its platform that helps financial institutions maximize the impact of digital and accelerate returns on digital investments with customers and employees. Demo.
LemonadeLXP for its digital growth platform that helps financial institutions and fintechs turn staff into digital experts and support digital customers. Demo.
Quilo for its technology that empowers lenders to digitally syndicate an individual personal loan at the time of underwriting, enabling them to provide more loans to more people. Demo.
Stratyfy for its technology that increases access to financial services by bringing true transparency and less risk to critical financial decisions that impact millions. Demo.
Themis for its collaboration platform designed for risk and compliance requirements to help accelerate partnerships between banks and fintechs. Demo.
We are grateful to all of our demoing companies for being a part of our biggest FinovateFall to date. Thanks as well to our sponsors, our partners, and – last but not least – our awesome attendees who continue to make our conferences among the most anticipated events on the fintech calendar each and every year. We look forward to seeing you again next fall!
Notes on methodology:
1. Only audience members NOT associated with demoing companies were eligible to vote. Finovate employees did not vote.
2. Attendees were encouraged to note their favorites during each day. At the end of the last demo, they chose their six favorites.
3. The exact written instructions given to attendees: “Please rate (the companies) on the basis of demo quality and potential impact of the innovation demoed.”
4. The six companies appearing on the highest percentage of submitted ballots were named “Best of Show.”
5. Go here for a list of previous Best of Show winners through 2014. Best of Show winners from our 2015 through 2022 conferences are below:
Compliance communications surveillance service txtsmarter has raised Series A funding. The amount of the investment was not disclosed.
The Silicon Valley, California-based company also announced a new CEO, Edward Green.
Founded in 2014, txtsmarter demoed its technology at FinovateSpring earlier this year.
Private messaging communications surveillance service txtsmarter is sharing some big news. First, the Silicon Valley, California-based company has closed a Series A funding round led by North Carolina-based investment bank and financial services company, Carolina Financial Group. The amount of the investment was not disclosed.
Second, txtsmarter has appointed a new CEO, Edward Green, to lead the company in its next stage of growth. Formerly CEO of Ring Access and Basys Automation Systems, Green also has 26 years of direct venture capital experience. He replaces outgoing CEO Nuri Otus, who is no longer involved in the company’s operations.
Speaking about the fundraising, Green pointed to growing demands from companies to meet regulatory expectations as they relate to private messaging and communications. “Over the past couple of months, global regulatory agencies have focused on financial institutions, levying billions of dollars of fines for missing texts and WhatsApp messages,” Green explained. “txtsmarter’s unique solution empowers companies to achieve eComms compliance in near real-time across an ever-shifting landscape of communications channels.”
txtsmarter’s technology enables the capture, verification, encryption, and archiving of data from private messaging applications, platforms, and services. The company’s compliance communications surveillance service works with Apple iMessage, Android SMS/MMS, WhatsApp, and other messaging products. By making previously inaccessible data available in real-time – and recently adding the ability to access historical messaging data, as well – txtsmarter helps businesses meet compliance obligations and mitigate data leaks.
This spring, txtsmarter was awarded the 2022 Most Innovative Use of Alternative Data in Regulatory Compliance at the A-Team Innovation Awards. The company called the award a validation of the work its done in developing its intelligent compliance solution, as well as a reflection of the need for such a solution in the marketplace.
“With txtsmarter, there is no data loss, no apps to install, and no learning curve; it’s an elegant solution for the modern world of e-comms compliance surveillance for any company,” Hugh Cumberland, Managing Director, UK/EMEA, said. “We have all seen what big headlines can do to a company’s brand and reputation and have observed the FCA cracking down on firms to ensure all communications are recorded as required. txtsmarter mitigates communication data gaps to prevent sanctions and fines during the audit process. It’s as simple as that.”
New Finovate alum Hawk AI announced a collaboration with Diebold Nixdorf.
The partnership will facilitate the distribution and implementation of Hawk AI’s AML Surveillance and Fraud Prevention suite to banks.
Hawk AI made its Finovate debut earlier this year at FinovateSpring in San Francisco.
Hawk AI, a fraud-fighting and AML platform based in Germany, announced a new partnership with fellow Finovate alum Diebold Nixdorf. Together, the two companies will collaborate to distribute and implement Hawk AI’s AML Surveillance and Fraud Prevention suite in banks to enable them to combat financial crime more effectively. The initial focus on the collaboration will be in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and will make it easier for Diebold Nixdorf customers in particular to access Hawk AI’s financial crime fighting technology.
Hawk AI CEO and co-founder Tobias Schweiger said that the willingness of financial institutions to adopt technology like Hawk AI’s AML Surveillance and Fraud Prevention suite is due to both “operational considerations” as well as the demands of regulatory authorities, which are “starting to ask for answers to fast-changing financial crime trends which no longer can be addressed with old technology and too much labor.” Instead, Schweiger said, Hawk AI’s partnership with Diebold Nixdorf helps alleviate one of the critical problems to answering these regulatory queries; namely the challenge of implementing newer, better financial crime fighting technology. Schweiger credited Diebold Nixdorf for having the “strong know-how, and professional services capabilities” to make implementation easier and less risky for customers.
“We’re thrilled to work with Hawk AI, a pioneer in explainable AI-powered AML and modern fraud prevention,” Diebold Nixdorf Director Solutions DACH Walter Gries said. “While combating new fincrime techniques is urgently needed, financial institutions must ensure a transparent process where frontline workers, auditors, and regulators trust the results. Hawk AI’s systems provide this trust, and we look forward to bringing the technology to new financial institutions together.”
Founded in 2018 and headquartered in Munich, Germany, Hawk AI made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring earlier this year. At the event, the company demoed its technology that combines AI with traditional, rule-based strategies to monitor financial transactions in real-time. When suspicious activity is observed, the platform sends alerts to financial crime specialists for further investigation. This helps limit the amount of false positives that can weigh-down the effectiveness of a financial crime solution and create unwanted friction for customers.
Hawk AI’s partnership with Diebold Nixdorf comes just one month after the German company reported that it was working with KYC and customer onboarding specialist Ondato. Announced last month, Hawk AI and Ondato have teamed up to offer an integrated KYC validation process that features AML transaction monitoring and behavioral analysis. Ondato CEO and co-founder Liudas Kanapienis highlighted this aspect of the partnership in his statement, noting that the collaboration will enable Ondato to “expand client onboarding and compliance management towards behavior monitoring.”
Also in August, Hawk AI teamed up with Aux, a credit union service organization (CUSO) that serves more than 200 credit unions in the U.S. The partnership will make it easier for credit unions to access Hawk AI’s financial fraud and AML solutions. Aux VP of Compliance Services Gaye DeCesare praised Hawk AI’s technology as “easier to use and more cost effective than other legacy products on the market today.” DeCesare also underscored the fact that HAWK AI’s technology is “enhanced with new features and functionality” on a regular basis.
Tampere, Finland-based ReceiptHero is on a mission to make meaningful interactions from every day transactions.
The company’s platform combines digital receipts with loyalty programs and benefits to give merchants new ways to engage with their customers. Consumers benefit from an integrated solution that relieves the burden of paper and email receipts, as well as the hassle multiple loyalty cards and apps.
We caught up with Chris Moore, Chief Operating Officer with ReceiptHero, to talk about how far the company has come since its Finovate debut in 2020, and the role ReceiptHero plays in the emerging data economy. We also talked about the company’s recently announced partnership with Ingenico.
You made your Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2020 in Berlin, Germany. What was that experience like?
Chris Moore: Wow, that feels like a decade ago! Back then we were a very small team and had just released our Nordea bank integration. We had also started to systematically onboard our first batch of Finnish merchants to the platform. The feedback we got from the demo was fantastic; it really felt like we were solving a global problem and not just something we had been talking about here in Finland. You could argue pitching at FinovateEurope was the catalyst to where we are today.
Later that year you secured two million dollars in seed funding. What did that investment say about your company at the time and how did you put the capital to work?
Moore: The seed funding also solidified we were fighting a problem big enough. We picked some great Nordic investors and they’ve provided more than just capital since the investment. Essentially, the funding was to grow the platform and increase our sales efforts in the Nordics, but also to (expand) into other markets, such as Switzerland and the U.K. and put capital towards our POS integrations which are a key part of getting the receipt data flowing from the retailers.
Last fall ReceiptHero partnered with Mastercard and Visa. How did these partnerships come about and what was accomplished through them?
Moore: These partnerships came quicker than we expected. To partner with both Visa and Mastercard at the seed stage was a huge milestone for us. But we also knew that tackling the digital receipt problem would only happen if we had global partners such as the two major card schemes. The partnership with both Visa and Mastercard allows us to move into new markets in Europe with less dependence on local payment providers and therefore fewer integrations before being able to launch our solution. So it was a really big win with regards to scaling the platform and providing confidence at the highest level to support our objective of removing paper receipts as the main method of proof of purchase. I don’t think these partnerships would of been possible without our great development team building out a PCI DSS compliant platform, emphasizing our commitment to safeguarding cardholder data and providing the best possible receipt platform on the market today.
Speaking of Visa, you’ve recently strengthened your relationship with the company. How so?
Moore: Visa has seen increased client requests and interest in digital receipting over the last 18 months and, for a while, they have been trying to find a European partner who can enable such a solution. Building on the technical partnership from 2021, this new agreement puts us in the shop window as an approved partner for Visa’s clients and partners. We are already seeing the benefits of being involved in Visa’s Fintech Partner Connect program and we hope we can announce something soon off the back of this strengthened relationship.
You have talked about the idea of the data economy. In what way is ReceiptHero a part of this data economy – and what role does it play within it?
Moore: We are surrounded by data in our daily lives, most of it is unstructured and in hard to reach places. Receipts printed on paper are just that: unstructured and, as a customer, it’s hard to apply that purchase data to good use. Part of my opening remarks at FinovateEurope was that we are showered by amazing digital payment innovations and sadly the post purchase experience has mainly been left to stay in the analog world. Purchase data is core to building a strong data economy, as this data has so far been siloed and in a format that is hard to receive in real-time. It’s not really been leveraged or valued as it should be. ReceiptHero is breaking down those silos and enabling a world where a consumer can have this data instantly in their banking app or in an approved service where the data is used to better the customer experience.
Part of our unique role in fighting for digital, structured receipts is that we have a fiduciary duty to the data that flows through our platform to use it in a way that benefits all ecosystem stakeholders. We have no ulterior motive here; we are not a bank, a large retailer nor the cash register or payment provider enabling the sale. This allows us to act with the best interest of all stakeholders and help everyone to better utilize this new found digital data for the cardholder and the merchant.
ReceiptHero also plays a role in the trend toward sustainability and responsible consumption. How important has this been to you and to your customers?
Moore: For large retailers that print hundreds of thousands of receipts a day, what happens when you turn off all the receipt printers in your stores nationwide and only send customer receipts via digital channels? What are the impacts to your business from a cost perspective – but also the environmental repercussions? Simply put, less trees get turned into wood and then into paper, which then would have found their short existence as thermal receipts that sadly cannot be recycled due to the harmful chemicals on the paper. Take that scenario and then multiply it across thousands of retailers right across Europe (and, at some point, globally). That becomes a significant change in our fight for sustainability and better digital experiences.
What can you tell us about the fintech industry in Finland that those outside of the country – and the region – might be surprised to hear?
Moore: Well, I have personally been in Finland for 10 years now and I’ve seen the fintech space grow year over year. Sweden has always been a few steps ahead with regard to fintech unicorns, but Finland has now quickly caught up. We have a great ecosystem here where banks seek to innovate and look for fintechs to speed up those embedded features. Now we have unicorn successes such as Enfuce and AlphaSense in Europe. I also think the VC space is heating up with regards to fintech funding, with lots of appetite for investments in young ambitious fintech companies.
You introduced a loyalty rewards solution this summer. Why this move now – and how has the early reception to the new feature been?
Moore: Distributing digital receipts in real-time is the very foundation of what can be built with this data. What we wanted to prove is what happens in adjacent segments when you get this data and wrap a lightweight loyalty solution around it. We’ve started to onboard our SME merchants onto the rewards program, and so far it looks like we’re able to provide even more value to the merchant and the cardholder. For larger retailers where they might already use a loyalty platform, we can enable real-time card-linked receipt data to give them better visibility over repeat spend, lifetime loyalty, and average basket size.
You’ve also announced that you will be joining Ingenico’s new PPaaS platform. What can you tell us about this partnership?
Moore: We’ve announced this week that we’ve signed a partnership with Ingenico, one of the world’s largest payment terminal providers and now part of the Worldline group. PPaaS is Ingenico’s new payment platform that enables a “one-to-many” integration for us, so we can enable our digital receipt solution for thousands of acquirers, another partnership that supports us to scale across Europe. What’s exciting about this partnership is that we can onboard cardholders from the payment terminal, allowing another entry point to receive digital receipts for customers.
What else can we expect to hear from ReceiptHero over the balance of 2022 and into 2023?
Moore: Well, we’ve got some important retailers coming to the platform over the next six months so we’re really excited to announce those in due course. These are retailers that operate across multiple markets and more signs of us expanding further into Europe. There will be some bank partnership news too, but I wont give anymore away on that just yet!
New York-based identity decisioning platform Alloy has raised $52 million in funding at a valuation of $1.55 billion.
Alloy will use the additional funding to help it respond to global demand in the wake of its recently announced international expansion.
Alloy made its Finovate debut at FinDEVr Silicon Valley in 2016.
Alloysecured $52 million in new funding today. The identity decisioning platform for banks and fintechs announced that the investment, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Avenir Growth, gives the New York-based company a valuation of $1.55 billion. The capital will help Alloy respond to growing global demand for its fraud prevention solutions.
Existing investors Canapi Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, Avid Ventures, and Felicis Ventures also participated in the funding. This week’s investment comes almost one year after the company raised $100 million at a valuation of $1.35 million.
“We feel incredibly lucky to have partners that not only understand the impact of our investments into our platform and in expanding globally but also proactively come to the table to support them,” Alloy co-founder and CEO Tommy Nicholas said when this week’s investment was announced. “With this newest investment we’ll be able to accelerate our growth and better address the global fraud challenges that companies are facing.”
Alloy demonstrated its technology at our developers conference, FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2016. At the event, the company discussed how its technology enables businesses to build fully-customizable APIs for customer identification and compliance. In the years since then, Alloy has grown into a fraud-fighting unicorn with more than 300 companies using its API-based platform to automate identity decisions during the account origination process and monitor those decisions on an ongoing basis. Leveraging more than 160 data sources, Alloy enables institutions and companies to pull customer, credit bureau, and alternative data through a single point of integration to help them find and onboard good customers without increasing their exposure to potentially fraudulent activity.
Over the past 12 months, Alloy has experienced revenue gains of more than 2x. Processing more than a million decisions daily, Alloy includes Ally Bank, Ramp, and Evolve Bank & Trust among its customers. The company was named to the seventh annual Forbes Cloud 100 last month, a roster of the world’s top private cloud companies. In August, Alloy also announced that its fraud and risk decisioning platform is now officially available in 40 countries in North America, EMEA, Latin America, and APAC.
“We’ve identified a clear need in the global market for Alloy, particularly with the recent rise in fraud, fines for poor implementation of regulatory requirements, and the growth of embedded finance,” Alloy Head of Global Edwina Johnson said. “We’re excited to bring Alloy’s unique platform, and team, to companies operating worldwide.”
Yesterday we shared the announcement that FinovateFall 2022 is on track to be our biggest event to date. Today we have great news from the other side of the Finovate stage: fully 50% of the speakers at FinovateFall in New York next month will be women.
“This definitely contributes to our DEI initiatives and effort to inject diversity into our events and portfolio as a whole,” Finovate Brand Strategy Director Adela Knox said.
Here are just a few of the women who will share their insights into fintech and the future of financial services at FinovateFall, September 12 through 14.
Remember that early-bird savings for FinovateFall 2022 end soon! Be sure to stop by the FinovateFall registration hub today to take advantage of special discounted ticket prices through Friday, September 2nd.
SC Moatti
SC Moatti will deliver a keynote address titled: Winter Is Coming: Now’s the Time to Hire That Chief Product Officer. Moatti is the founding Managing Partner of Mighty Capital; and the founding CEO of product acceleration platform, Products That Count.
In her address, Moatti will explain the consequences of not heeding the “product call” and why, if there’s one role companies should keep on their list of new hires this season, then it should be a Chief Product Officer.
As part of FinovateFall’s Payments stream, Wells Fargo Head of Enterprise Payments Ulrike Guigui will give a keynote address, Has the Pandemic Changed Payments Forever? 90% of Bank’s Useful Customer Data Comes from Payments – How Can They Ensure They Stay in the Game?
Alyson Clarke
Also in our Payments stream, Bernadette Ksepka, AVP and Deputy Head of Product Development, FedNowSM Service, Federal Reserve System, will sit down with PayGen co-founder and Chief Product Officer Robin LoGiudice to discuss The Continued Evolution of Faster, Cheaper, and Better Payments – Where Next with Instant Payments.
Alyson Clarke, Principal Analyst with Forrester, will deliver a keynote address titled Hybrid Banking – Why the Future is a Blend of Physical and Digital, as part of our Customer Experience stream.
Also in our Customer Experience stream, Symend co-founder and Chief Impact Officer Tiffany Kaminsky will share her insights in an address titled Upping the Ante: Using the Science of Decision-Making for Effective Customer Engagement.
Fintech-as-a-service innovator Solid raised $63 million in Series B funding this week.
Solid offers a platform that enables businesses to build and scale embedded fintech products into their own solutions.
The company, which made its Finovate debut in 2019 as “Wise,” will use the investment to accelerate its expansion into “fintech-ready” verticals such as travel, health care, and the gig economy.
Fintech-as-a-service company Solid has raised $63 million in Series B funding. The company offers infrastructure to enable companies to launch and bring to scale embedded fintech solutions. The round was led by FTV Capital. Existing investor Headline also participated.
“We built the most comprehensive fintech infrastructure from the ground up, so others don’t have to,” Solid co-founder and CEO Arjun Thyagarajan said. “Now, any company can quickly spin up bank accounts, crypto wallets, send payments, and issue cards to their end users, right into their product experience, while Solid does the heavy lifting of building and maintaining compliant fintech infrastructure.”
Solid made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2019 as “Wise.” At the conference, the company demonstrated its small business banking-in-a-box offering that included a checking account, payments, invoicing, cards, and point-of-sale solutions. The company rebranded as Solid last year as part of a pivot to highlight the modern banking platform they had used to launch their Wise business banking solution.
“We went from powering the Wise app to powering other products and ecosystems,” Thyagarajan and company co-founder and President Raghav Lal wrote at the Solid website last spring. “Along the way, we realized our brand and our positioning needed to change, too. And today, we are making the change and excited to share that Wise is now Solid.”
Solid will use the new capital to help fuel the company’s accelerated expansion into what it calls “fintech-ready” verticals like travel, construction, healthcare, and the gig economy. The company’s fully abstracted fintech-as-a-service platform gives developers the tools they need to easily embed fintech products into their offerings. Solid reports that fintech programs that build and launch on its platform own the experience and have little or no regulatory overhead. Solid’s technology also leverages modern APIs and a minimal-code approach to make integration easier. Companies that have used Solid’s platform include fellow Finovate alums like Paystand, as well as SaaS companies such as Everflow and emerging startups like Starlight.
Founded in 2018, Solid is headquartered in San Mateo, California. This week’s investment brings the company’s total funding to more than $80 million according to Crunchbase. Solid reported a 10x growth in revenues, customer base, and transactions processed last year. More than 100 fintech programs and $2 billion in transactions have been processed on the company’s infrastructure year to date.
FinovateFall 2022 in New York next month is on pace to be the biggest Finovate conference to date.
The Finovate team got the word early Tuesday morning: 1600+ registered attendees for FinovateFall. And counting …
“That’s huge!!” said Finovate VP, podcast host, and conference Master of Ceremonies Greg Palmer. “Biggest show in a long time!”
And with less than two weeks to go before the curtain goes up on our fall fintech conference, there’s every chance that the biggest Finovate in a long time is going to get even bigger.
Early-bird discounts end this week, so today is a great time to swing by our FinovateFall registration page and save your spot as Finovate’s return to live events continues. From September 12 though September 14, FinovateFall 2022 will feature three days of live fintech demoes, insightful main stage keynotes on critical fintech topics, as well as fan favorites like our Analyst All Stars Panel, Fintech Fight Club, all-day networking opportunities, and more.
Darlington Building Society has partnered with LexisNexis Risk Solutions to enhance its financial crime prevention strategy.
The U.K.-based financial institution will deploy LexisNexis Risk Solutions’ RiskNarrative platform which features integrations with more than 50 third party data sources.
Darlington Building Society was named Building Society of the Year in 2021 for its work with Finovate alum ieDigital.
U.K.-based Darlington Building Society has partnered with LexisNexis Risk Solutions to upgrade its financial crime prevention capabilities. The Society, founded more than 160 years ago, will deploy the company’s RiskNarrative platform, which will also enhance the Society’s online member portal and customer onboarding experiences.
Using a single API and integrations with more than 50 third party data sources, RiskNarrative gives companies the ability to better identify risk and detect fraudulent activity. The platform will enable Darlington Building Society to orchestrate document verification, PEP and sanctions monitoring, identity and address verification, and risk ratings of applications, as well as creating and managing internal watch lists.
“The partnership with LexisNexis Risk Solutions demonstrates the Society’s commitment to improving application processes for our members,” Darlington Building Society Chief Operating Officer Chris Hunter said. “The rollout of Digital ID&V, as part of the RiskNarrative implementation, is a step forward in simplifying customer account opening and reducing paper usage.”
Darlington Building Society will use technology from LexisNexis to digitize and streamline its onboarding journeys for both mortgage and savings applicants, Darling Building Society Chief Risk Officer David Bews added. Bews said the platform will also enable the Society to “future-proof” its financial crime prevention strategy, by helping the Society adjust its criteria to mitigate future risk as well as react to current threats.
Founded in 1856, Darlington Building Society supports nine branches across the North East, County Durham, and North Yorkshire. The Society offers savings accounts and mortgages, as well as service via its online banking resource, Darlingtononline. As a membership-owned and run mutual financial institution, Darlington Building Society turns its profits into lower mortgage rates, higher savings rates, and support for local charities. The company was namedBuilding Society of the Year in 2021 for its work with U.K.-based digital experience platform provider – and Finovate alum – ieDigital.
LexisNexis Risk Solutions is an international data and analytics company dedicated primarily yo predictive insights and fraud prevention. Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Alpharetta, Georgia, the company serves customers in a wide range of industries including financial services and insurance, healthcare, government, and public safety.
LexisNexis Risk Solutions includes multiple Finovate alums among its recent acquisitions. The company purchased BehavioSec earlier this year, TruNarrative in 2021, Emailage in 2020 and ThreatMetrix in 2018.
