Hawk AI Scores $17 Million to Help Banks Fight Money Laundering and Fraud

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Funding, Hawk:AI
Germany-based fraud prevention and AML solution provider Hawk AI has raised $17 million in Series B funding this week.The round was led by Sands Capital and featured participation from DN Capital, Coalition, BlackFin Capital Partners, and Picus Capital, and adds to the $10 million Hawk AI raised in 2021.Hawk AI made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2022. In a round led by Sands Capital and featuring participation from DN Capital, Coalition, BlackFin Capital Partners, and Picus Capital, Germany-based fraud prevention and anti-money laundering solution provider Hawk AI has raised $17 million in Series B financing. The capital adds to the $10 million in Series A funding the company raised in June of 2021, and will be used to help fuel both product development and global expansion. "My co-founder Wolfgang Berner and I started this business based on the strong belief that only leading edge, real-time surveillance technology can deliver the…

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Finovate Alums Raised More Than $380 Million in Q4; $2.7 Billion in 2022

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Funding, Fundings, Quarterly Funding
Finovate alums raised more than $2.7 billion in equity funding in 2022. The sum makes the $8.4 billion raised in 2021 seem all the more an outlier as our alumni funding levels return to those common in 2020 and before. Previous Annual Comparisons 2021: $8.4 billion2020: $3.9 billion2019: $3.0 billion2018: $4.0 billion2017: $2.7 billion The fourth quarter of 2022 saw Finovate alums secure more than $380 million in funding. This amount recalls the relatively modest fundraising haul from Q4 2020, with a comparable number of alums raising capital. Previous Quarterly Comparisons Q4 2021: More than $1.2 billion raised by seven alumsQ4 2020: More than $472 million raised by 17 alumsQ4 2019: More than $876 million raised by 21 alumsQ4 2018: More than $800 million raised by 19 alumsQ4 2017: More than $730 million raised by 23 alums Outsystems' $228.4 million fundraising was easily the quarter's standout investment. Also raising sizable…

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Bold Commerce and PayPal Partner to Create a More Flexible Checkout Experience

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, PayPal
Bold Commerce and PayPal struck up a partnership that will better integrate payments into more checkout experiences.Using Bold Commerce's headless checkout tool, retailers can place a point-of-sale wherever shoppers interact, including on blogs, within social media, and even on the packaging of a physical good.The new solution is available in Bold Commerce’s Checkout Experience Suite. Customizable commerce company Bold Commerce announced today it is collaborating with PayPal to better integrate payments into the checkout experience. Because, as Bold Commerce Co-Founder Yvan Boisjoli puts it, "The checkout experience needs to extend to everywhere shoppers are today, which also means that a full range of payment options need to be available to shoppers wherever they are." Using Bold Commerce's PayPal-enabled tool, retailers can put the checkout wherever shoppers interact. A point of sale can be placed on blogs, within social media, and even on the packaging of a physical good with a…

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Quantum Metric Launches Atlas to Help Enterprises Turn Digital Opportunities into Solutions

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Quantum Metric
Continuous product design platform company Quantum Metric launched its Atlas solution this week.Atlas provides enterprises with a library of pre-built industry guides to help them turn digital opportunities into new products and solutions for customers.Quantum Metric won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope n 2021. Quantum Metric, the continuous product design platform company that won Best of Show in its Finovate debut in 2021, unveiled its latest solution this week. The Colorado Springs, Colorado-based firm announced the launch of Atlas, a structured and accelerated solution to help organizations respond to "critical business questions" with "outcome-driven insights." Atlas provides companies with a comprehensive library of pre-built industry guides that give businesses a tailored set of dashboards, metrics, anomaly detection, and alerts, providing them with a stepwise approach to improving digital use cases. "Organizations consistently struggle to know if their teams are asking the right business questions and working…

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Finovate Webinar: 7 Trends for Community Financial Services in 2023

By Lili Nguyen Posted on
Categories: Eltropy, Sponsored, Uncategorized, Webinars
Recession. Widespread staffing shortages. Increasing fraud. Customer demands — and advancements in technology like we’ve never seen. We've learned a lot about the current industry landscape so far in this first quarter alone, but there are still questions that loom large. Such as: Will the threat of fraud ever go away? Can my call center really become a revenue generator? How will pending legislation around real-time payments and open finance affect our customers? Should we really consider using TikTok? Watch this Finovate webinar, in collaboration with Eltropy, on demand, and find out the top seven trends that CFIs like you should be focusing on in the coming year. You’ll discover: Which trends are the most crucial to ensure success for your CFI this year How the right digital strategies and tools can make or break your institution Examples of what’s working and what’s not in financial services You'll hear from…

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PayEm Raises $220 Million for Spend and Procurement Management

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding
Business spend and procurement management company PayEm raised $220 million this week.The round consists of $20 million in Series A equity funding and a $200 million warehouse debt facility.The equity portion brings PayEm's total equity funds to $47 million. Business spend automation and procurement management platform PayEm brought in $220 million in combined debt and equity this week. PayEm will use the funds to fuel its card operations, serve larger customers, and improve the employee experience within the digital product. The funding, which is comprised of $20 million in Series A equity and $200 million in warehouse debt, saw contributions from Viola Credit, Mitsubishi Financial Group, Collaborative Fund, Pitango First, NFX, LocalGlobe, and Glilot+. "This is a significant milestone in the company's growth. Our new warehouse credit facility allows us to scale our credit cards operation and support larger customers with our fast-growing payments platform. In addition, the new equity…

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Trustly Forges Strategic Partnership with Nordnet to Bring Instant Deposits to Nordic Investors

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Trustly
Payments platform Trustly announced a strategic partnership with Sweden's Nordnet.The partnership will enable Nordnet customers to easily and securely deposit funds using Trustly pay-ins.Trustly, which made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2013, was acquired by Nordic Capital in 2018. A new strategic partnership between open banking, account-to-account (A2A) payments platform Trustly and Nordnet will enable customers of the Swedish savings and investment solution to easily and securely deposit funds in their accounts. The pact brings instant deposits to the whole Nordic region, including markets where instant payments are not yet available. The new service is going live in Sweden initially, and will be available to all new customers who sign up for a Nordnet account. The service will launch in Norway in the first quarter of this year, and in Denmark and Finland later in 2023. "Trustly's technology and customer focus made them a natural choice and good fit for…

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Sandstone Technology Appoints New CTO

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Sandstone
Banking technology company Sandstone Technology appointed a new CTO this month. The company unveiled today it has selected Anthony McKew to fill the role. With more than 35 years of experience in banking and technology, McKew has worked for companies including Linkly, Premier Technologies, and SecurePay. He has expertise in designing and managing enterprise-grade platforms for major retailers, government agencies, and digital operations for vendors and service providers. "I am extremely pleased with the addition of Anthony to our Leadership team as our Chief Technology Officer," said Sandstone CEO Abhish Saha. "This is an essential role, supporting our customers across the globe and being a key driver of our ongoing business strategy and growth. Anthony’s intimate understanding of Financial Institutions and their security and technology needs will be of great value to both our customers and our staff." McKew, who began his appointment on January 9th of this year, fills the shoes…

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Ping Identity Partners with Device Identification Platform Fingerprint

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Ping Identity
Ping Identity has forged a partnership with device identification platform Fingerprint.The partnership will integrate Fingerprint's device identification technology into Ping Identity's identity orchestration service, DaVinci.Ping Identity made its Finovate debut in 2016 at FinovateEurope in London. Ping Identity, which made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope in 2016, announced a partnership with U.S.-based identity tech innovator Fingerprint. The collaboration will integrate Fingerprint's device identification technology with Ping Identity's DaVinci no-code identity orchestration service to enable users of DaVinci to accurately identify devices and stop fraud. Fingerprint's device identification platform provides 99.5% accuracy and, upon integration with PingOne DaVinci, will enable companies to enhance the customer experience by reducing the need for friction-producing multi-factor authentication for known users. The integration will enhance onboarding for new customers, as well. "Our mission is to empower developers to build safe and seamless Internet services," Fingerprint CEO Dan Pinto said. He said that the partnership with…

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Stripe and Amazon Expand Payments Partnership

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
Stripe and Amazon have agreed to "significantly expand" their partnership.Under the agreement, Stripe will process a notable portion of Amazon's total payments volume.The two have been partners since 2017. Payments infrastructure company Stripe announced today that Amazon has agreed to "significantly expand" its use of its core platform, recruiting the California-based company as a strategic payments partner in the U.S., Europe, and Canada. While there is no specific breakdown, Stripe said that it will be processing a "significant" portion of Amazon’s total payments volume across its business units, including Prime, Audible, Kindle, Amazon Pay, Buy With Prime, and more. The two companies first partnered in 2017 to fuel Amazon's expansion in Asia and Europe, as well as to support purchases made on high-traffic shopping days such as Prime Day, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday. "In particular, we value Stripe’s reliability," said Amazon VP of Payments Max Bardon. "Even during peak…

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The Conversation Continues: Greg Palmer and the Finovate Podcast with Quilo, Themis, Northern Trust, and More!

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Podcasting, Quilo, Themis
Finovate Podcast host Greg Palmer wrapped up a year's worth of fintech conversations with this handful of episodes featuring Finovate Best of Show winners, innovative bankers, and insightful venture capitalists. Find the Finovate podcast at Soundcloud and follow Greg Palmer on Twitter for the latest in programming news and updates. Rob Antoniades, Co-founder and General Partner, Information Venture Partners Finovate VP Greg Palmer talks with Information Venture Partners' co-founder Rob Antoniades on whether or not now is a good time to launch a fintech company. Episode 156. "What you should understand about our fund is that it's all B2B. There are four themes that we specifically focus on - the key one is modernizing financial institutions. And whether that's banks or insurers or asset managers or wealth managers, I think it's all about bringing the technology, the digitalization, and more to these institutions to increase their competitiveness." Michael Ruttledge, Chief Information Officer and Head…

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FNZ Agrees to Acquire Fixed Income Investing Platform YieldX

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
FNZ has acquired digital fixed income trading company YieldX.The acquisition will combine FNZ's investment platform, which represents more than 20 million investors across the globe, with YieldX's digital infrastructure.Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Wealth management firm FNZ snapped up some new tech talent today with the acquisition of digital fixed income trading company YieldX. Terms of the deal, which will combine FNZ’s full-service investment platform with YieldX’s digital infrastructure, were not disclosed. FNZ anticipates the buy will help it further its mission "to deliver personalized investment solutions to more people across the wealth management industry." Furthermore, YieldX's focus on technology will help FNZ provide more investment options at scale, offering investors more variety and transparency. "We have a joint vision of opening up wealth by transforming the wealth management industry through more transparent, accessible, and personalized technology solutions. YieldX’s solutions perfectly complement our existing strengths and will further…

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