Author: Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz)

Expensify Reports More than 1 Million New Users and Double the Partnerships in 2017

Expensify Reports More than 1 Million New Users and Double the Partnerships in 2017
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Expensify

Travel and expense management company Expensify released strong growth figures this week, summarizing a successful 2017. So successful, in fact, the company ended the year with the highest growth rate in its 10-year history.

Here are the highlights:

  • Surpassed $100 billion processed
  • Exceeded 660 million expenses created (more than 180 million expenses were created in 2017 alone)
  • Ended the year with more than 50,000 customers and five million end users across 170 countries
  • Doubled the number of companies in its partner program
  • Received Xero’s App Partner of the Year Award

The San Francisco-based company also enhanced its expense reporting product by adding new features. Expensify improved its report approval workflow and has added the ability to automatically export approved reports in real time. Additionally, at the start of 2018, the company introduced a new user interface and a friendlier user experience.

“The past year has been full of tremendous progress and learnings, and we’re deeply grateful to our customers old and new for their enthusiasm along the way,” said David Barrett, founder and CEO of Expensify. “We have ambitious dreams for 2018 and will continue doing everything we can to make life easier for everyone out there who has better things to do than keep track of receipts.”

At FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2016, Expensify presented Bedrock, an open sourced relational database management system. The company last demoed at FinovateSpring 2013, where the company showed off its integrated invoicing technology. Last month, CB Insights featured Expensify in its list of four apps every executive should download now. In November of last year, the company arranged a data sharing agreement with Wells Fargo.

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Japanese Telecom NTT to Distribute Trusona Technology in Japan

Japanese Telecom NTT to Distribute Trusona Technology in Japan
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Trusona

Identity authentication company Trusona has formed a distribution partnership with NTT Advanced Technology Corp. (NTT-AT), a large Japanese telecommunications company. This follows the Arizona-based company’s Asia Pacific launch last August, when it opened offices in Japan.

Through the partnership, NTT-AT will offer Trusona’s frictionless, password-less login solution to its enterprise customers across Japan. NTT-AT clients will have access to Trusona’s Identity Authentication Suite, a solution that replaces passwords with a dynamic, multi-factor login solution. The authentication technology is built with anti-replay technology and can be used to access any digital channel– from web, to mobile, to IoT.

“The opportunity to distribute Trusona’s technology will enable NTT-AT to offer our customers a safer and more secure identity authentication solution that completely gets rid of passwords,” said Eiji Kuwana, SVP of NTT Advanced Technology Corp. “Our company is committed to providing excellent user experience and the best possible security for our customers.”

In the press release, Kazunari Tanaka, APAC Managing Director of Trusona said that Trusona’s password-free authentication solution is “a solution that millions of consumers in Japan have been craving.” Tanaka continued, “Businesses have a responsibility to assure the security of millions of online consumers without complicating user experience.”

Founded in 2015, Trusona is used across a variety of sectors, including government, education, and financial services. The company’s CEO and founder, Ori Eisen, demonstrated Trusona’s Cloud Identity Suite at FinovateFall 2016. The Cloud Identity Suite allows end users to authenticate themselves by using the Trusona app on their smartphone to photograph a QR code on a website login page, then selecting accept on their mobile device.

In November of last year, KPMG and H2 Ventures named Trusona on the list of Emerging Stars on its Fintech 100 rankings. Earlier that year, analyst David Penn highlighted Trusona in his piece The Best Authenticators, Verifiers, and Fraud Fighters.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: AutoGravity, Clinc, Expensify, Geezeo, IdentityMind Global, Kabbage, Kantox, Mitek, Payfone, Realty Mogul, Tradeshift, Trusona, Zopa

On Finovate.com

  • Japanese Telecom NTT to Distribute Trusona Technology in Japan.
  • RealtyMogul Introduces new President, Aaron Halfacre.
  • Tradeshift Launches Innovation Center to Bring the Blockchain to Business Commerce.
  • Payfone Teams Up with U.K. Mobile Network Operator.
  • Expensify Reports More than 1 Million New Users and Double the Partnerships in 2017.

Around the web

  • Auto Finance Excellence talks with AutoGravity CTO Sheng Wang, who discusses the company’s new security features.
  • Sam Maule talks with Kabbage founder Rob Frohwein.
  • F&M Bank selects Geezeo to enhance digital banking.
  • Kantox partners with BELLIN to help support SMEs expanding globally.
  • Mitek and IdentityMind announce integration to enhance their digital ID verification capacities.
  • Zopa re-opens its platform for new customers.

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.

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Trulioo Launches KYC Tool to Connect MNOs

Trulioo Launches KYC Tool to Connect MNOs
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Trulioo

Identity verification company Trulioo is extrapolating the use of its know your customer (KYC) solution to Mobile Network Operators (MNOs). Available via Trulioo’s Global Gateway ID verification platform, the new authentication will be used in tandem with more than 200 data sources to help verify consumers’ identities during the onboarding process.

Specifically, Trulioo will work with 24 MNOs from the U.S., Canada, the U.K., China, India, Spain, France, and Switzerland, all of which will offer data to help Global Gateway customers meet KYC compliance for mobile identity verification. Through this expansion, financial services providers can leverage mobile network carrier data combined with existing KYC data sources to meet KYC regulations. This will be especially helpful for businesses with clients in China, Spain, and France, three markets where it is particularly challenging to fulfill KYC compliance because of limited access to data.

Trulioo CEO Stephen Ufford said the company has “long been heavily investing in MNO relationships” to grow the list of identity verification partners on its platform. He added, “We are very excited to be the first platform to offer the market services from dozens of MNOs through a single contract and API.”

Founded in 2011, Trulioo leverages 400 data sources to offer verification of 4.5 billion personal identities and 250 businesses in 80+ countries. The Canada-based company also offers a data exchange platform that allows data partners to provide access to consumer data for electronic identity verification purposes, allowing them to set bid prices for electronic ID verification on a region-by-region basis.

At FinovateFall 2016, Trulioo’s Head of Growth, Anatoly Kvitnitsky, demonstrated how GlobalGateway blocks fraudulent users from onboarding in real time. Last May, the company teamed up with Mitek to add a layer of biometric authentication to its identity verification tool. Most recently, Trulioo expanded its services to add business verification in October of 2017.

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Juvo Receives Investment from Samsung to Boost Smartphone Usage Among Underbanked

Juvo Receives Investment from Samsung to Boost Smartphone Usage Among Underbanked
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Funding, Juvo

Mobile identity company Juvo has received an investment from Samsung NEXT, an off-shoot of Samsung that launched in 2013 to create new software and foster a startup culture at Samsung. The amount of the investment was undisclosed and adds to the San Francisco-based company’s $54 million in equity funding.

The bigger story here is that the investment is a strategic one. Samsung will bring Juvo access to billions of underbanked prepaid users across the globe. This will help Juvo enable MNOs to increase smartphone adoption among prepaid mobile subscribers.

Juvo was founded in 2014 with a mission to “establish financial identities for the billions of people worldwide who are creditworthy, yet financially excluded.” The company’s tag-line sums this up as, “access for all.”

In today’s press release, Steve Polsky, founder and CEO of Juvo, explained that the investment and alignment with Samsung NEXT is important because it allows Juvo “to further realize our vision by being among the first to integrate financial identity into a hardware device and, with it, offer unprecedented access to greater financial services.” He added, “Samsung opens a critical piece of the ecosystem for Juvo, and its world class organization, market expertise, and reach will accelerate the Juvo mission, putting sophisticated technology in the hands of unbanked people and provide financial access to those who need it most.”

“At Samsung NEXT, we’re focused on working with entrepreneurs and startups that are creating truly impactful software and services–software and services that will transform the way we, as humans, interact with our devices, each other and the world,” said Patrick Chang, Principal at Samsung NEXT Ventures. “Juvo’s impressive traction from mobile operators and consumers offers an opportunity for us to tap into the next billion customers through more comprehensive financial inclusion and accessibility.”

Polsky demoed Juvo’s Identity Scoring at FinovateFall 2016. The company empowers underbanked consumers by offering them a single identity with which to access financial services across the globe. Juvo also incentivizes financially underserved consumers to build credit and access financial services by extending microloans.

Since launch, the company has attained a reach of more than 500 million subscribers across four continents and is deployed in 25 countries. Last fall, Juvo partnered with Malaysian mobile virtual network operator, Tune Talk.

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Xero Teams with DBS on Small Business Account Feeds

Xero Teams with DBS on Small Business Account Feeds
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Xero

Cloud accounting platform Xero has added the Development Bank of Singapore (DBS) as a bank partner this week. By teaming up, the two aim to help their mutual small business clients manage their finances.

The partnership will allow small business customers who use DBS IDEAL, DBS’s online business banking platform, to opt in to have their bank transactions imported automatically into their Xero account every day. This automatic transaction data feed enables businesses to gain a holistic view of their financial standing while avoiding manual data entry.

This bank partnership is one of many the New Zealand-based company has undertaken. Xero is currently integrated with more than 80 Australian banks, 20 New Zealand banks, eight banks in the U.K., four banks in the U.S., five banks in Asia, and one bank in South Africa. Rod Drury, Xero CEO and Founder said, “We are working with more than 140 financial and fintech organizations around the world to establish a global financial web which securely opens up data flows that can help de-risk lending and enable small businesses to access much-needed capital so that they can prosper.”

DBS has more than 280 branches across 18 markets. This expanded reach will help Xero access more small business clients in the region, which experiences particular difficulty arranging direct bank feeds. Singapore requires businesses to apply via paper forms that can take up to 10 days to set up. In fact, the region seems to have a particular difficulty in this area. A recent survey of 150 non-Xero SMEs in Singapore found that small business owners:

  • Spend an average of 15+ hours a month manually importing and reconciling their bank statements
  • Almost 30% spend between 20 and 40 hours a month manually reconciling
  • More than 67% cited manual bank statement reconciliation as a challenge in managing operations

Joyce Tee, DBS Group Head of SME Banking said, “By enabling SMEs to manage their finances in a much more efficient manner, we hope that they can better manage their business and make more informed decisions.”

Xero most recently presented at FinDEVr San Francisco 2014 when the company’s Head of U.S. Partnerships David Pollock spoke about building an API-driven ecosystem for small businesses. At FinovateSpring 2011, CEO Rod Drury debuted the company’s Business Identification solution. The company recently ranked number 16 on the KPMG and H2 Ventures Fintech 100 list. In November of last year, Xero partnered with Worldpay to facilitate e-invoicing for small businesses.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FI.SPAN, FICO, Finastra, Juvo, Quid, SoFi, Thomson Reuters, Trulioo, Xero, Zopa

On Finovate.com

  • Xero Teams with DBS on Small Business Account Feeds.
  • Zopa Boosts Executive Ranks with Trio of C-Level Hires.
  • SoFi’s Choice: Former Twitter COO Anthony Noto to Take Helm as New CEO.
  • Trulioo Launches KYC Tool to Connect MNOs.
  • Juvo Receives Investment from Samsung to Boost Smartphone Usage Among Underbanked.

Around the web

  • Atomico uses Quid for the 2017 State of European Tech report.
  • Bobsguide interviews Lisa Shields, CEO of FI.SPAN.
  • Thomson Reuters unveils Wizcorp, a digital gateway that will provide customers with data on more than 1.8 million Indian private companies.
  • FICO partners with European regulatory risk analytics consultancy, 4most.
  • Finastra announces new partners to its FusionFabric.cloud open architecture.

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.

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Dwolla to Power Identity Verification for Yahoo!’s Tanda Savings App

Dwolla to Power Identity Verification for Yahoo!’s Tanda Savings App
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Dwolla

Bank access API provider and money transfer system, Dwolla, is playing a role in Yahoo!’s latest fintech venture. The Iowa-based company will be powering identity verification and money transfer for Tanda, Yahoo!’s social savings app.

Launched last week, the Tanda app divides users into groups of five or nine to pool money and save for short-term savings goals. Users group their money together over the course of a set period of time and every month, one user gets to take home the entire pot of money. The first two users to receive the funds pay a small fee, while the last recipient earns a 2% bonus.

The Tanda app is intended to be used as an alternative to credit cards or short term loans. The concept comes from a rotating savings and credit association (ROSCA), an idea that’s been around for quite some time.

Using Dwolla’s API, Yahoo! will connect to the user’s bank to move money, store funds, validate their identity, and verify their bank account. This comes exactly one year after Dwolla relaunched its API to offer a more inclusive, white-labeled API that rolls in additional features such as a wallet functionality that holds a balance of funds.

Dwolla, which most recently demoed FiSync at FinovateSpring 2015, was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa. Last summer, the company added a multi-user feature to its Access API dashboard. In May of 2017, Dwolla teamed up with Plaid to offer a fully tokenized ACH payment integration. Ben Milne is founder and CEO.

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iSignthis and Worldline Finalize Partnership

iSignthis and Worldline Finalize Partnership
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: iSignthis, Worldline

Digital identity proofing company iSignthis has finalized its partnership with European payments firm Worldline. The two have completed a technical integration that combines iSignthis’ regtech services with Worldline’s acquiring capabilities.

European ecommerce merchants will have access to the new service, ISXPay, that is being marketed and delivered via iSignthis subsidiary, iSignthis eMoney. ISXPay, which will operate under its own eMoney Monetary Financial Institution license to directly contract European merchants, offers services for everything from JCB card acceptance to alternative payment methods for cryptocurrencies.

Merchant clients leveraging ISXPay will have access to Paydentity, a payment authentication suite with Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance that links a person’s identity to a payment, satisfying AML and PSD2 regulations. Via a single integration ISXPay Paydentity merchant clients can leverage identity verification, customer due diligence, and a payments platform across Europe and Australia.

Founded in 2013, iSignthis went public on the Australian Stock Exchange in March 2015 (ASX:ISX). The company presented its platform at FinovateEurope 2015 in London. In 2016, iSignthis partnered with Coinify to help its bitcoin exchange platform meet AML, KYC, and CTF regulations for customer due diligence. In October of last year, the company agreed to power KYC for online gambling site Omnislots.

Worldline went public in 2014 and showcased a connected piggy bank at FinovateEurope 2017. In July of 2017, the company purchased First Data Baltics for $85 million. Last month, Worldline announced plans to recruit more than 1,500 people across the globe to support its growth.

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defi SOLUTIONS Lands $55 Million

defi SOLUTIONS Lands $55 Million
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: defi Solutions, Funding

Loan origination solutions company defi SOLUTIONS just closed on $55 million in funding. The Series C round comes from Bain Capital Ventures, offering social proof along with a stamp of approval for defi’s suite of loan services. This is the Texas-based company’s first round of financing.

The primary capital portion of the investment will be used to accelerate product development, expand resources and facilities, and grow the number of employees by nearly 50% this year.

This comes at a time when there has been significant rise in auto lending, especially to sub-prime borrowers. Simultaneously, however, loan defaults are soaring as a result of hastily made loans. defi helps lenders take advantage of the opportunity while mitigating risk. Additionally, senior principal at Bain Capital Ventures, Brian Goldsmith explained, “defi delivers competitive advantages that enable forward-thinking lenders to own their processes and exceed their business objectives through one holistic platform.” Goldsmith added, “Our team is thrilled to support defi SOLUTIONS’ growth trajectory in a space that is primed to expand and remain competitive with the increased use of new technology.”

Founded in 2012, defi originally offered a flagship auto financing service. Since then, the company has broadened its offerings to include a full suite of configurable Software-as-a-Service loan origination solutions and has experienced a 70+% compounded annual growth rate. Most recently, defi has added a loan management and servicing system, an analytics and reporting system with dashboards for real-time reporting, a direct lending application portal, a digital loan document service with e-signature, and an online auto loan portfolio marketplace.

At FinovateSpring 2014, defi CEO and founder Stephanie Alsbrooks showcased the company’s loan origination solution for auto lenders. Last month, the Caruth Institute for Entrepreneurship at the SMU Cox School of Business ranked the company number 37 on the top 100 fastest-growing privately-held businesses in the Dallas area.

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ThreatMetrix Teams Up with GlobalOnePay

ThreatMetrix Teams Up with GlobalOnePay
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: ThreatMetrix

Authentication and fraud prevention company ThreatMetrix has partnered with GlobalOnePay, a division of Pivotal Payments. ThreatMetrix will power GlobalOnePay’s Sentinel Defend, a fraud detection and scoring engine that protects cross-border transactions.

This will enable Sentinel Defend to leverage ThreatMetrix’s Digital Identity Network, a program that analyzes and scores 100 million transactions per day to reduce fraud by using anonymized data to offer real-time intelligence on a person’s identity. By running in the background, the network offers a user experience with less friction.

The ThreatMetrix Digital Identity Network delivers the intelligence needed to safely accept more orders across markets, even where identity verification is challenging,” said Leah Evanski, VP of strategic alliances at ThreatMetrix. “We are proud to work with GlobalOnePay, a company that is dedicated to ensuring their customers can safely and easily grow their business globally.”

Tedd Huff, GlobalOnePay’s VP of Product said that the company’s merchant clients “expect the highest level of card processing security available.” Huff continued, “This is why we look to the most innovative approaches on the market to ensure we stay one step ahead of emerging fraud patterns.”

Founded in 2009, San Jose-based ThreatMetrix offers insights into 1.4 billion anonymized user identities to deliver intelligence for 100 million daily authentication decisions. The company verifies more than 20 billion annual transactions supporting 30,000 websites and 4,500 customers across the globe through its Digital Identity Network, which feeds into ThreatMetrix’s Digital Identity Graph.

Launched at FinovateSpring 2016, the Digital Identity Graph gathers information on billions of transactions collected from tens of thousands of websites to build a user’s digital identity by analyzing connections between the user, their locations, behaviors, and devices. At FinovateSpring 2017, the company’s CTO, Andreas Baumhof, and Sr. Director Product Management, Dean Weinert, launched SmartAuthentication for banks with multiple authentication methods.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Coinbase, Jumio, ThreatMetrix, Tink, YellowDog

On Finovate.com

  • Coinbase Brings on Engineering Talent from Memo.AI.
  • ThreatMetrix Teams Up with GlobalOnePay.
  • Jumio Partners with Byteball to Bring KYC to ICO Issuers.

Around the web

  • YellowDog celebrates 3 years, shares how it went from 1 to 17 employees, from £0 to £2.8 million in funding, and 4 awards. YellowDog will demo at FinovateEurope in March.
  • Computer Weekly interviews Tink CEO Daniel Kjellén, one of our featured speakers at FinovateEurope in London.

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.

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