Deutsche Bank Takes Equity Stake in Modo Payments

Deutsche Bank Takes Equity Stake in Modo Payments

Payments technology company Modo Payments announced this afternoon it received an equity investment from Deutsche Bank. The amount was undisclosed. Prior to today’s announcement, Modo had raised a total of $11.3 million since it was founded in 2010.

The German bank plans to leverage Modo’s technology to expand its digital business-to-business and business-to-consumer payments. Specifically, Deutsche hopes to extend its payment capabilities into non-traditional channels, such as the mobile wallets and peer-to-peer networks of Alipay, Paypal, M-Pesa, and WeChat.

John Gibbons, head of global transaction banking at Deutsche Bank, refers to payments as the “bloodline of banking.” In the press release, he noted that Modo will give Deutsche “more flexibility” in facilitating non-traditional transactions. “Going forward, we will be able to directly process payments to mobile wallets and app-based payment solutions,” Gibbons added.

“The Modo team is focused on doing the most good for the most people by reducing friction in payments. That is why we do what we do every day, and this partnership with Deutsche Bank is a great opportunity to work with one of the world’s largest payment providers that can implement our technology on a global scale and further our reason for being” said Bruce Parker, founder and CEO at Modo. “We’re excited to see where this relationship can take us and how we can continue creating interoperability between payment systems around the world.”

Modo exchanges payment data across platforms on behalf of banks, payment networks, and providers, enabling them to store, share, and track payment event data. The company presented at FinovateFall 2016, where it showcased its Modo Digital Payments Hub. Late last year, Modo appointed former CEO of Klarna North America, Brian Billingsley, as its Chief Revenue Officer. More recently, the company earned top honors at the ETA TRANSACT Payments Pitch-Off earlier this year.

PaySimple Adds New Integrations for Targeted Email Marketing

PaySimple Adds New Integrations for Targeted Email Marketing

Service commerce platform PaySimple announced its latest integrations today, unveiling partnerships with MailChimp and Constant Contact.

By integrating with these email marketing platforms, PaySimple is enabling its merchant clients to automatically synchronize their customer records from PaySimple reports. Merchants can leverage their customer purchase data to segment customer lists, create targeted marketing campaigns, and make more informed marketing decisions.

“We designed this integration to help our merchants promote their businesses, keep their customers engaged, and generate more sales by leveraging powerful payment data in their email marketing,” said PaySimple President, David Sharp. “Ultimately, this is part of PaySimple’s mission to empower SMBs to reach their full potential.”

Founded in 2006, PaySimple focuses on making enterprise-scale efficiencies available to small businesses at a reasonable cost. The Colorado-based company offers technology to help businesses accept payments, manage customers, and automate billing.  PaySimple is making today’s integrations available as a part of its PaySimple Pro account offering.

The company serves 17,000 clients in a range of industries, from fitness to professional services. At FinovateFall 2012, PaySimple CEO Eric Remer demonstrated how the company uses early payment incentives to help small businesses get paid faster. Earlier this spring, PaySimple launched a real-time data integration with Quickbooks Online to offer business owners a better view of their business’ financial health.

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Crypterium

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Crypterium

FinovateFallA look at the companies demoing live at FinovateFall on September 24 through 26, 2018 in New York. Register today and save your spot.

Crypterium, the world’s first cryptobank, will help you to spend your crypto holdings with the same ease as cash. Pair your crypto account with the virtual card in Crypterium’s app and pay with it as you go.

Features

  • Spend cryptocurrency at over 42 million points of acceptance
  • Transfer money worldwide in seconds using just the recipient’s phone number
  • Buy cryptocurrency instantly with your bank cards

Why it’s great
Crypterium believes cryptocurrency is the future of money, and it’s time to make it go mainstream. With its app, you’ll be able to pay with crypto anywhere in the world.

Presenters

Marc O’Brien, CEO
O’Brien is former CEO of Visa U.K., the company’s second most important market. He is also a key advisor on some of the most exciting startups in the U.K., including Revolut, Britain’s first digital bank unicorn.
LinkedIn

Austin Kimm, COO
Kimm is former CEO of Renaissance Life and Pensions (in Russia and Ukraine) and CEO Renaissance Insurance Group. The company was sold for approximately $200 million in 2013.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Round Pegs

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Round Pegs

FinovateFallA look at the companies demoing live at FinovateFall on September 24 through 26, 2018 in New York. Register today and save your spot.

Round Pegs’ early stage validation of digital opportunities unlocks corporate innovation in a result-driven approach, connecting corporate assets with the startup way.

Features

  • Validate digital opportunities as a startup would
  • Reach executive consensus and avoid larger investments
  • Co-create your product with beta users

Why it’s great
From increasing your digital channels engagement to creating your own fintech, Round Pegs has enabled companies to reach consensus in digital innovations valued at over $45 million.

Presenter

Pedro Donati, CEO
Donati was a former IT director at the largest e-commerce in Latin America and was former channels director at Itau Unibanco, the largest non-government owned bank in Latin America.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Sezzle

FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Sezzle

FinovateFallA look at the companies demoing live at FinovateFall on September 24 through 26, 2018 in New York. Register today and save your spot.

Sezzle is an interest-free installment product designed to financially empower young ‘prime-to-be’ consumers at retail checkouts.

Features

  • No ‘hard’ credit checks for new users
  • Four automatic and interest-free installments per checkout
  • Simple user signups and one-click repeat user checkouts

Why it’s great
Sezzle’s simple and easy-to-use payment system enables consumers to get what they desire today without any additional interest or fees.

Presenter

Charlie Youakim, CEO
Youakim is a serial tech entrepreneur who has founded two successful payments companies that have raised over $68 million in venture capital. His first company was Passport. His second is Sezzle.
LinkedIn

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • PaySimple Adds New Integrations for Targeted Email Marketing.
  • Deutsche Bank Takes Equity Stake in Modo Payments.

Around the web

  • US Alliance Group looks to Fiserv Debit Gateway and Accel Network partnership to support growth.
  • Xero opens new Americas HQ in downtown Denver.
  • Sberbank becomes Founding Partner of World Economic Forum Centre for Cybersecurity.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Shoeboxed Acquired by Earth Class Mail

Shoeboxed Acquired by Earth Class Mail

Receipt and business card digitization company Shoeboxed unboxed some major news today. The North Carolina-based company sold to Earth Class Mail, after having raised $2.5 million since it was founded in 2007. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Founded in 2004, Earth Class Mail offers a postal mail scanning and forwarding service to help businesses and frequent travelers clear paper clutter. The Texas-based company receives, processes, and digitizes clients’ paper mail. It then enables users to view, access, search, and share the cloud-hosted, digitized versions. After processing the paper copies, Earth Class Mail either stores physical copies on premise or shreds the paper, if the client prefers. Additionally, Earth Class Mail leverages integrations with third parties to automate actions required. For example, if the piece of mail is an invoice, it will send it to Bill.com or sync it to cloud storage. The company will even deposit a check on the user’s behalf.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=38&v=ASi6EAJNzi0

With the acquisition of Shoeboxed, Earth Class Mail will help users get rid of another source of pesky paper– receipts.  Another benefit Earth Class Mail gains with the acquisition are Shoeboxed one million customers in 90 countries, half of which are small businesses in the U.S.

In an interview with TechCrunch, Shoeboxed CEO and co-founder Tobias Walter said, “The combined power of our two companies will be a massive shift for small businesses to finally become paperless and say goodbye to old workflows that cost them hours of their productivity. I could not be happier with the new home we found for the company, the team and our customers!”

At FinovateSpring 2015, Shoeboxed won Best of Show for demonstrating how banks can leverage the company’s receipt capture platform. In the demo, Walter showcased how banks can use Shoeboxed to help clients view line item data from email receipts, receive reminders about product return deadlines, product recall information, and more. Last August, the company launched Fetch, an “expense-report-free” expense reporting solution for small businesses.

eToro Adds IOTA Cryptocurrency to Platform

eToro Adds IOTA Cryptocurrency to Platform

After launching its cryptocurrency exchange earlier this year, social trading platform eToro has bolstered the number of the cryptocurrencies it offers, adding IOTA to the roster.

IOTA was launched in 2015 to provide fast communication and transactions for internet of things (IoT) platforms and has a market capitalization of $1.4 billion. The currency shows promising use as an IoT platform and, as eToro states in its blog, has received “quite a bit of attention” from the blockchain and cryptocurrency communities.

The addition of IOTA to eToro’s platform boosts the Israel-based company’s total cryptocurrency count to 12. This is up from the 10 cryptocurrencies eToro announced when it launched the exchange in March.

eToro CEO Yonni Assia, along with the company’s VP of Product, Tal Ben-Simon, demonstrated CopyFunds for Partners at FinovateEurope 2017. Since then, the company announced that clients can now invest directly in shares on the platform and it has gone on to raise a $100 million in Series E round in March, more than doubling its funding to $162 million.

What’s on the Analysts’ Hot Lists

What’s on the Analysts’ Hot Lists

If you’ve always wanted to hear top fintech analysts’ take on what’s hot in the industry, now’s your chance. Next month at FinovateFall, we’ll host four fintech research analysts on stage as they pitch what they think is the top opportunity for banks and financial services companies.

Each analyst will have seven minutes on stage (slides allowed!) to describe their thoughts on what’s hot in fintech right now. Here’s who you can expect to see on stage:

Jacob Jegher

Jegher is an experienced fintech executive and digital banking thought leader. He advises clients on emerging technologies and business strategies related to retail, small business, and corporate digital banking. Jegher provides strategic consulting to financial institutions and solution providers on issues ranging from digital strategy to vendor selection. In addition to his client-facing responsibilities, Jacob leads Javelin’s overall strategy, marketing, and product development efforts.

Most recently, Jegher was Vice President of Global Solution Marketing and Head of Analyst Relations at FIS, where he was responsible for marketing strategy efforts across all business units and solutions. He also brings extensive expertise in the banking research and consulting field, having spent over 10 years as a Research Director at Celent.

Alyson Clarke

Clarke is a principal analyst at Forrester. With more than 19 years of financial services industry experience, she is a highly skilled expert with extensive industry experience in both wealth management and banking. Clarke has global expertise, having previously worked at Forrester in the financial services vertical in its Sydney, London, and San Francisco offices. She is now based in New York and specializes in digital and non-digital channel strategy and innovation, in particular the sales, service, and customer experience of financial services and advice across online channels, smartphones, tablets, and branches.

Daniel Latimore

Latimore, CFA, is the Senior Vice President of Celent’s Banking group and is based in the firm’s Boston office. Latimore’s areas of focus include the banking ecosystem, digital and omnichannel banking, and innovation. Underlying each is a keen interest in consumer behavior and technology-enabled strategy. Latimore is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and client gatherings, having addressed audiences ranging from intimate meetings of CEOs and central banks to conference keynotes in more than a dozen countries. He led research groups at Deloitte and IBM, worked in industry Liberty Mutual and Merrill Lynch (where he lived in New York, Tokyo and London), and was a consultant at McKinsey & Co.

Thad Peterson

Peterson is a senior analyst with Aite Group, focusing on the evolution of the payment space, the customer payment experience, and merchant acquiring.

Recognized as a global thought leader in payments, Peterson has a proven track record of identifying and developing new opportunities and technologies in payments and financial services. He has relevant expertise in applying customer behavior to the payments ecosystem in both corporate and startup environments. Peterson’s consulting background includes engagements on credit and debit cards, mobile payments, airline payment platforms, consumer and merchant loyalty, payment technology evolution, stored value, and product innovation. He holds patents in customer authentication and real-time mobile-enabled loyalty.

Peterson served as an officer in the U.S. Navy for four years and holds a degree in Special Education from the University of Idaho.


FinovateFallJoin us on September 24 through 26 at the Marriott Marquis Times Square in New York to hear these experts talk about the latest in fintech. Register today.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • eToro Adds IOTA Cryptocurrency to Platform.
  • First Data Partners with Ellie Mae to Improve Security of Lending Payments
  • Check out our latest FinovateFall Sneak Peek featuring ebankIT.

Around the web

  • UMB Fund Services adopts Temenos tech for ETF drive.
  • EMIDA joins wireless independent dealer association.
  • InSpirAVE earns spot in Top 100 at the Innovate Celebrate Conference’s Startup of the Year competition.
  • Data-in-use security specialist Enveil announces technology integration with Gemalto.
  • Onfido adds new VP of Global Marketing, General Counsel, and Director of People.
  • FICO extends partnership with Equifax Canada.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

SocietyOne Appoints New CEO as it Nears $500 Million in Total Lending

SocietyOne Appoints New CEO as it Nears $500 Million in Total Lending

Australian peer-to-peer lending company SocietyOne is shaking up its ranks as it approaches a lending milestone this week. The company appointed Mark Jones (pictured) as its new CEO, weeks after founder and former CEO Jason Yetton stepped down.

Jones, who has been with SocietyOne since February 2018, most recently served as chief financial officer and commercial director of SocietyOne. Prior to that role, he worked at WestPac for just over four years, serving in capacities including CFO to Director of Divisional Partnerships. Jones also brings experience from his tenure at Barclays and Citibank.

SocietyOne is celebrating its sixth anniversary this month, just as the company approaches $500 million in total lending since its product was launched in 2012. Since that time, SocietyOne has matched 20,000 customers with $480 million in loans from investors on its platform. The company anticipates it will surpass $500 million in September.

“The last 12 months have represented another year of growth, transformation, and progress,” said Jones. “We have seen continued growth in lending with more than $150 million originated since our fifth birthday.” Along with the boost in lending, Jones attributes the growth to an improvement in margins and disciplined cost management.

Additionally, Jones highlighted SocietyOne’s recent milestones:

  • Closed a strategic investor capital raise in January 2018
  • Appointed Simon Farrell as Chief Technology Officer and Ross Horsburgh as Chief Credit Officer
  • Launched a new personal loan offering through mortgage brokers
  • Ranked by The Australian Financial Review as #37 of the Top 100 Most Innovative Companies for 2018

“The next 6 months will be another exciting period of growth and innovation,” said Jones. Over the next two quarters, SocietyOne will improve the customer experience, build its brand, develop new investor tools, and create new partnerships.

SocietyOne presented its P2P lending platform at FinovateAsia 2012 in Singapore. The company offers borrowers personalized repayment programs with lower interest rates than major banks. Users can borrow between $5,000 to $50,000 for unsecured, personal loans for two, three, or five year terms.

Credit Karma Buys Mortgage Platform Company

Credit Karma Buys Mortgage Platform Company

Consumer credit monitoring and financial health company Credit Karma is furthering its reach into the real estate sector this week with the acquisition of mortgagetech startup Approved.

In a blog post yesterday, Approved Founder and CEO Andy Taylor announced that Credit Karma had acquired the three-year-old startup for an undisclosed amount. “Working with Credit Karma gives us the resources and immediate scale to accelerate our mission-driven work, reaching significantly more homebuyers than we could have imagined when we started,” Taylor said.

Credit Karma, which previously offered a basic mortgage comparison tool, is bolstering its capabilities with Approved at a time when many Millennials are beginning to purchase their own homes. As the company’s Chief Product Officer Nikhyl Singhal explained in an interview with TechCrunch, “As we’ve expanded, you’ve seen us move from credit cards as a way to help members with that part of their life to first personal loans to auto — meaning auto loans, auto insurance,” he said. “Today, we’re really talking more publicly about mortgage. Mortgage being for many of our members the most important financial decision they’ll make.”

Having facilitated almost $5 billion in loan originations, Approved was launched in 2015 by Taylor and co-founder Navtej Sadhal. The two met while working at RedFin, where they realized a need for disruption in the back-end of the mortgage process, where inefficiencies such as fax machines are still prevalent. Taylor vowed to stay true to Approve’s humble roots, adding, “We can’t wait to reveal what we’re working on next.”

Credit Karma already hosts many financial tools such as credit monitoring, tax filing, and credit card comparisons. By adding a more robust mortgage platform to this list, the company is creating a more sticky ecosystem with which to hook its 80 million users, half of which are Millennials.

At FinovateSpring 2009, Credit Karma CEO Ken Lin demonstrated the company’s platform, which offers free credit reports from Equifax and TransUnion, and seeks to serve as a hub for users to monitor their financial health. The company has facilitated the origination of more than $40 billion in credit products since it was founded in 2007. Earlier this year, the company teamed up with SpyCloud to help users determine if their data is being used on the dark web. Check out our recent interview with Colleen McCreary, Credit Karma’s first Chief People Officer.