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Finovate Blog
Tracking fintech, banking & financial services innovations since 1994
As the buy-now, pay-later (BNPL) craze explodes, some fintechs are in just the right place to catch the sparks. Payment services company Klarna is one of these players, and it has just landed $650 million in funding.
Today’s round adds to the company’s $1.4 billion in previously raised funds, bringing its total to just over $2 billion. The investment also boosts Klarna’s valuation to $10.6 billion, ranking the company as the highest-valued private fintech in Europe and the fourth highest worldwide.
The round was led by Silver Lake, GIC (Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund), and accounts managed by BlackRock and HMI Capital. Additional funds came from Merian Chrysalis, TCV, Northzone, and Bonnier, which have acquired shares from existing shareholders.
Klarna will use the funds to invest in product development, fuel global expansion, and build on its growth.
“We are at a true inflection point in both retail and finance,” said Klarna CEO and Co-founder Sebastian Siemiatkowski. “The shift to online retail is now truly supercharged and there is a very tangible change in the behavior of consumers who are now actively seeking services which offer convenience, flexibility and control in how they pay and an overall superior shopping experience. Klarna’s unique proposition, consumer preference and global retailer network will prove an excellent platform for further growth.”
As consumers seek alternative methods to finance their purchases, Klarna’s BNPL tool that enables users to pay in interest-free installments has gained impressive traction. The company’s shopping app has more than 12 million monthly active users worldwide, with 55,000 daily downloads.
And Klarna’s game is also strong on the merchant side of things, as many retailers have sought to increase online sales during stay-at-home orders. During the first half of 2020, the company added more than 35,000 new retailers to its existing merchant base of more than 200,000 partners including Sephora, The North Face, Timberland, and Ralph Lauren.
As a result of this growth, the company’s volume grew 44% over the first half of this year to more than $22 billion and its revenue increased 36% year-on-year to $466 million over the same period.
We were welcomed to the first day of FinovateFall 2020 by a familiar face: Finovate VP Greg Palmer. Greg kicked things off with a discussion of the importance of digital offerings, noting the increased accessibility to all.
The opening keynote was from Pablos Holman of Intellectual Ventures Lab who issued the friendly reminder that “nobody has ever invented a new technology by reading the directions.” Holman encouraged the audience to find real problems in the world and start innovating where there is a true need. He pointed out two keys to success in this type of innovation: first, form fintech-bank partnerships to give ideas the traction they need; second, run a lot of experiments by trying a handful of things to determine what works the best.
During his Mastermind keynote, Scott Gnau, VP of Data Platforms at InterSystems encouraged the audience to leverage the inflection point that is COVID-19 to focus on digital transformation and build technology that is resilient to change in the future. Part of the key to this, he explained, is to leverage partnerships but maintain ownership of your own data to remain agile.
After a round of virtual meet-ups and networking sessions, the demos began:
Yext kicked things off by showing how it can improve the search experience on company websites and across the entire search ecosystem.
Scientia Consulting presented FinTechInsights, a tool that analyzes digital banking competition in realtime behind their login screens.
Finzly showed its open banking platform, Finzly BankOS.
Lendsmart demoed its AI driven platform that solves for the lack of automation, transparency, and communication in the lending process.
Glance Networks presented its solution for transforming in-branch financial consultations into digital meetings.
NachademoedPhixius, a tool that enables the secure exchange of payment-related information via open APIs within a trusted network.
Icon Savings Plan showcased its portable, universally accessible, workplace retirement savings plan that serves as an alternative to the 401k.
Remitter presented its AI-powered, white-labeled digital communications platform that helps lenders maximize revenue by optimizing customer engagement.
XcooBee demoed its payment workflow automation tools that combine self-checkouts and remote pay to help reduce retail touch-points and boost transactions.
Today we’re announcing the winners of the 2020 Finovate Awards, recognizing excellence in fintech across 23 different categories. This is the second year of the Finovate Awards, which aims to highlight strong work done by the companies who are driving fintech innovation forward and the individuals who are bringing new ideas to life.
This year’s Finovate Awards may not come with ballroom gowns, confetti, and cocktails, but that doesn’t make the accomplishments any less compelling. In fact, the opposite is true. To be receive an award in the midst of a global pandemic-turned-economic crisis is often the result of putting the needs of others first.
Judges for the awards include media analysts, board members, bankers, fintech founders, and more. Each were given the difficult task of taking a record number of nominations and distilling them down to just a single winner in each category.
Best Alternative Investment Platform: CNote
Best Back Office / Core-Service Provider: MAXEX
Best Consumer Lending Platform: NF Innova and Raiffeisen Bank Serbia
Best Customer Experience: Commonwealth Bank of Australia
Best Digital Bank: STASH
Best Digital Mortgage Platform: LendingHome
Best Enterprise Payments Solution: PaymentGalaxy by Finzly
Best Financial Mobile App: TMRW by United Overseas Bank
Best Fintech Accelerator / Incubator: The Venture Center’s FIS and ICBA Accelerators
Best Fintech Partnership: PPP.bank (Citizens Bank of Edmond and Teslar Software)
Best ID Management Solution: buguroo
Best Insurtech Solution: Spire by Ernst & Young
Best Mobile Payments Solution: Nordic API Gateway
Best RegTech Solution: Facteus
Best SMB/SME Banking Solution: ANNA Money
Best Use of AI/ML: Socure
Best Wealth Management Solution: SoFi Invest
Excellence in Financial Inclusion: Current
Excellence in Sustainability: PayActiv
Executive of the Year: Renaud Laplanche, Upgrade
Fintech Woman of the Year: Lisa Kimball, Finicity
Innovator of the Year: Elena Ionenko, Turnkey Lender
Top Emerging Tech Company: Breach Clarity
While only one company can win each category, it’s also worth recognizing the quality of all of the finalists who made it to the last stage in the process.
We owe a huge thank you to the panel of judges, followers, and everyone who took the time to submit a nomination. Congratulations to the winners!
In a financial world still dealing with near-zero interest rates – and less – word that Spain-based financial resource platform Finect has partnered with savings-as-a-solution innovator Raisin is great news for Finect’s two million plus users.
“Spanish families have accumulated a record figure of almost €900,000 million in bank deposits, but not always with a meaningful return. In fact, in many cases, they don’t even earn interest,” Finect CEO Antonia Botas explained. He called the partnership with Raisin part of Finect’s “broader objective: to bring the best products and services to Spanish savers, following the launch of our fund platform in July.”
Finect offers a way for consumers to shop for a wide variety of financial services and products. More than 10,000 savers have used the platform to find and request a financial advisor, and 100+ national and international investment firms leverage Finect’s platform to connect with clients and grow their businesses. Courtesy of the partnership with Raisin, Finect users will have access to 60+ deposit products from Raisin’s European partner banks, and give users the ability to earn as much as 1.41% on their savings.
“With the increase in savings volume since the start of COVID-19 pandemic, creating access to better savings options with higher yields is more important than ever,” Raisin Spain Country Manager Miguel Freire said. “Finect and Raisin share a mission to use digital technology to provide people in Spain with not only more information, but also more competitive options.”
German fintech Raisin, which began operations in the United States over the summer, began the year with the news that it has topped the €20 billion in deposits mark. Founded in 2012, Raisin has more than 280,000 customers across Europe, and more than 98 partner banks.
A Finovate alum since making its debut at FinovateFall in 2013, Finect was founded a year before, and is headquartered in Madrid, Spain.
ABN AMRO is updating its Grip app this week by integrating Subaio’s white label subscription management feature for banks.
The integration comes at a time when users are spending more than ever before on subscriptions, especially digital subscriptions such as movie streaming services and cloud storage products. According to the New York Times, consumers spent an average of $640 on digital subscriptions in 2019, up 7% from 2017.
ABN AMRO’s Grip PFM app now leverages Subaio’s subscription management feature that enables users see all of their recurring payments in one place. The tool alerts users of any changes in subscriptions and even helps them cancel subscriptions from within the app. Subaio relies on an algorithm that uses machine learning to detect patterns in frequency, amount, merchant name, and more.
“Since the launch we’ve already seen tens of thousands of Grip users coming in to see their overview and also cancel subscriptions. It’s fantastic to help people get control of their subscriptions,” said Subaio CEO Thomas Laursen.
Today’s partnership with ABN AMRO is Subaio’s seventh bank partnership. Among the company’s other partners are Nordea and challenger bank Lunar. The company has found that the average user has eight different subscriptions, and that the users are saving $253 (€213) every time they use Subaio’s solution to cancel a subscription.
Founded in 2016, Subaio showcased at FinovateEurope 2020. The company has raised $2.4 million and has 20 employees.
“Buy Now Pay Later” may be the e-commerce rage du jour. But if you check in with the team from Inspirave, then you’ll hear about a better way for consumers to spend and save. The New York based company – which we profiled last fall – unveiled its SaveAway platform this week, enabling consumers to benefit from its unique blend of “financial planning with the path-to-purchase.”
“There has never been a better time to see Inspirave’s economically sustainable blueprint, propelled by greater purchasing power, striking such an inimitably strong chord with our growing community of SaveAway users and partners who recognize that what inspires our new-to-market innovations enabling greater financial wellness and social mobility is our steadfast mission to further human potential and prosperity for all,” Inspirave founder and CEO Om Kundu said in a statement.
SaveAway’s unification of micro-saving and social commerce offers consumers a way to save for the things they really value and avoid purchasing these same items with credit and accumulating unnecessary debt in the process. Aided by the insights, advice – and even material support – of friends and family, consumers using the SaveAway platform can leverage the collective wisdom of those who know them best and care about them the most to help them make financial decisions that are as responsible as they are affordable.
Miguel Sanchez and Philip Shearer, co-founders of diversity-focused accelerator MetaBronx, praised both the Inspirave’s innovation and its approach to spending and saving. “What made the SaveAway platform stand out in the top six companies chosen in 2020 derived from the breakthroughs in Inspirave’s patented technology as much as its novel operating model, pointing to the massive impact SaveAway is moving forward to uniquely deliver,” they said.
The company noted in its statement that those who signed up for Early Access to the SaveAway platform are eligible for a variety of bonuses, including referral credits and entry into a sweepstakes for a $1,000 contribution toward the winner’s SaveAway purchase-goal to be paid by the company. More than 12,000 people have signed up for Early Access to date.
Named a a Top Fintech Forward Company to Watch by American Banker and BAI, and A Finovate alum since 2016, Inspirave is headquartered in New York City.
What’s to like about FinovateFall Digital, our all-digital fintech conference starting Monday, September 14th and continuing through Friday, the 18th? A CEO from one of our demoing companies pointed out that one of the special things about this fall’s conference is that because the FinovateFall is all-digital, it enables people all over the world to participate as virtual attendees.
With this in mind, we wanted to use this week’s Finovate Global to highlight those companies from outside the United States that will be demonstrating their latest fintech innovations as part of our annual autumn event. Here’s hoping they bring a few friends from across the border – or from over the sea – to digitally join us!
Cinchy – Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Provides a real-time data collaboration platform to solve data integration, access, governance, and solution-delivery challenges. Finovate Best of Show Winner. Founded in 2014.
DQ Labs – Bangalore, Karnataka, India. Offers a unified suite of modules that enables companies to unlock the value in their data to gain new insights. Founded in 2019.
Horizn – Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Helps banks and financial institutions dramatically increase digital adoption. Finovate Best of Show winner. Founded in 2012.
Mostly AI– Vienna, Wien, Austria. Enables companies to unlock privacy-sensitive data assets while protecting privacy. Founded in 2017.
Payever – Hamburg, Germany. Offers a Commerce Operating System to help entrepreneurs start, run, and grow their businesses. Founded in 2013.
ScientiaConsulting – London, U.K. Leading fintech consulting and development firm in Europe. Founded in 2010.
Join us next week for Finovate’s latest all-digital fintech conference. Visit our registration page today and save your spot at our live and On Demand event.
Digital Currency Comeback?
Back in January Finovate Global took a look at the growing case for national digital currencies. We highlighted initiatives in countries as different as India and Japan, and underscored observations from Christine Lagarde (former head of the IMF and current president of the European Central Bank) in her address, “The Case for New Digital Currency”.
Now Ms. Lagarde is back in the news hinting at a near-term resolution to the question of a digital euro. In a speech this week at the Bundesbank’s conference on digital banking and payments, Lagarde argued that Europe must be wary of falling behind when it comes to the development of digital payment options, and that consideration of a national digital currency needs to be a part of that conversation.
“The Eurosystem has so far not made a decision on whether to introduce a digital euro,” Lagarde said. “But, like many other central banks around the world, we are exploring the benefits, risks, and operation challenges of doing so.” Lagarde added a taskforce on development of a digital euro is expected to release its findings “in the coming weeks.”
Open Banking All Over the World
We recently investigated the prospects for open banking in Australia. This week we share an overview of the state of open banking in Switzerland courtesy of Fintech Zoom’s Jung Min-Seo.
“Europe may moderately declare to be the cradle of open banking,” Min-Seo wrote, “however in contrast to within the E.U. the place members are obliged to implement PSD2, a directive meant to opening up cost transactions to non-banks and promote competitors, Switzerland has no such regulation in place.”
TechWire Asia looks at how Amazon is leveraging its relationship with India to grow its fintech offerings.
Proving that cash is still alive in India, RapiPay, a subsidiary of Capital India Finance, will install 500,000 micro ATMs in the country over the next two years.
Latin America and the Caribbean
Caribbean-based fintech WiPay teams up with Mastercard to expand digital payments in the region.
Austria’s Paysafecard announces expansion into Mexico.
Mexican fintech Ubank, which offers an automated savings solution, plans to expand to the United States.
Asia-Pacific
Revolut goes live in Japan.
Onfidobrings ID verification to migrant worker e-marketplace, MyCash Money, which serves workers in Malaysia and Singapore.
Backbasepartners with Vietnam’s Tien Phong Commercial Joint Stock Bank (TPBank) to speed the institution’s digital transformation.
Sub-Saharan Africa
Nigerian fintechs Opay and PalmPay, along with South African e-payment firm, Yoco, are the only three Africa fintechs to earn spots on CB Insights’ 2020 Fintech Top 250.
Ozow, a digital payments company based in South Africa, launches its new payments platform.
Nigeria’s Sparkle announces plans for digital distribution of insurance solutions.
Central and Eastern Europe
Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis praises Ukraine as the country with the greatest rate of cryptocurrency adoption in a new report.
Hungarian biometric payment startup PeasyPay announces plans to expand to Spain and the U.K.
Balkan Insight reviews the fintech ecosystem in Croatia.
You know that buy now, pay later (BNPL) has jumped the shark when even Cosmo is writing about it. After all, BNPL is basically millennials’ way of reverse engineering the layaway programs their parents grew up on.
Not only have we recently witnessed new fintechs launch their buy now, pay later technology, we’re seeing a large increase in incumbent players expand their existing services to include BNPL offerings, as well. Just yesterday, Fiservannounced its BNPL payment option in partnership with QuadPay, and today Standard Charteredpartnered with Amazon to offer installment payment plans for customers in the UAE.
While each of the now dozens of BNPL schemes operate a bit differently, most allow the consumer to split up a purchase into multiple installments and repay over a set period of time without incurring interest. As with everything that seems too good to be true, however, negative externalities exist. Here’s a breakdown of the hidden (and not-so-hidden) costs:
The BNPL company
If a consumer makes a purchase and fails to pay one or more of the installments, the BNPL company is generally the one who feels the loss. To mitigate their losses, however, companies generally won’t allow customers to make repeat purchases if they default on a repayment. Not only this, most charge late fees and high interest (some charge up to 30%) to reclaim what they can.
The consumer
The end consumer is always responsible for knowing the repayment arrangement. However, mistakes happen and if the buyer is unable (or forgets) to pay one of the installments, they face multiple costly consequences. As mentioned above, the consumer in default generally faces a late fee. Klarna, for example, charges $35 per month for missed payments. Additionally, while most BNPL offerings are interest-free, some charge high interest on missed payments.
Merchants
Merchants have a pretty good end of the deal when it comes to BNPL. Many offerings allow them to receive the full amount of the buyer’s purchase up-front, and they are not on the hook if the buyer defaults. Some, such as Splitit, allow the merchant to choose a lower fee if they receive the payment as the consumer repays their monthly installments.
The pricing model for merchants vary. Among some of the fees that BNPL companies advertise are: up to 6% plus $0.30 per transaction, 1.5% plus $1.50 per transaction, or 3% plus $1 per transaction.
Banks
While the banks typically aren’t a party to BNPL transactions, these new payment schemes are still costing them. How? Many shoppers are using BNPL to circumvent credit cards, which charge compounding interest each month. For users that are in the habit of financing large purchases, it makes more sense to pay for the purchase over the course of four months, interest-free, than to incur credit card debt by only paying the minimum balance.
Independent lockbox and electronic payments provider CheckAlt has acquired software and engineering company U.S. Dataworks from The Bankers Bank of Oklahoma. Terms of the deal were not immediately available.
CheckAlt CEO and co-chairman Shai Stern put the purchase in the context of upcoming challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 election. “Recognizing that the U.S. Postal Service is going to be overwhelmed and distracted with mail-in voting and other impediments to normal delivery, we must enable additional solutions for our clients to capture payments on-site, remotely, or through any one of our 13 lockbox processing centers around the country,” Stern said.
“Moreover, between the hundreds of financial institutions that both CheckAlt and U.S. Dataworks serve directly, we now have further reach to offer our full suite of payment solutions which include not only paper processing but as well our Catch! product and card processing services.”
With more than 300 financial institution partners, CheckAlt offers financial institutions and commercial clients a range of lockbox and payment processing solutions. These include a full set of check imaging products that provide consolidated item processing across all channels and points of capture: mobile, ATM, and in-branch. The company also offers standard payment processing solutions and services such as credit card processing, integrated receivables, and merchant RDC.
The U.S. Dataworks acquisition marks CheckAlt’s third in six years. The company bought ERAS, a security systems provider, in 2014, and acquired financial services provider Klik Technologies, two years later. CheckAlt’s acquisition announcement comes at the end of a busy summer for the Los Angeles, California-based company. CheckAlt announced an expansion of its partnership with Pawtucket Credit Union ($2 billion in assets) in June, teamed up with Five Star Bank of California ($2 billion in assets) in July, and collaborated with NXTsoft’s OmniConnect to enhance its ability to integrate with credit unions, core providers, and banks.
Founded in 2004, CheckAlt made its Finovate debut last year at FinovateFall. The company demonstrated its LoanPay solution, which enables financial institutions to accept a wide variety of loan payments – from auto and business to mortgage and personal – from their customers. The solution enables customers to use debit, credit, and checking accounts to make both one-time and recurring payments in person, via mobile, or online.
Challenger banks have been slowly making their way into the mainstream banking sector. By offering competitive rates, unique services, and digital-first user experiences, this new breed of banks has disrupted the traditional banking scene, causing some incumbents to rethink their approach.
This certainly seems to be the case with Credit Suisse, a 164-year-old bank. The Switzerland-based firm is steeling itself against challengers by launching its own digital bank, CSX. The new offering aims to be a hybrid approach between challengers and incumbents, and “combines the flexibility and cost effectiveness” of a digital bank with “the comprehensive range of services and expertise” of a traditional bank.
“CSX is intended for all private clients in Switzerland who want to complete their banking business swiftly and easily and who value digital, professional financial advice,” said Anke Bridge Haux, Head of Digital Banking at Credit Suisse. “Of course, we are still available to serve our clients in person. CSX clients can decide for themselves how they want to interact with us, depending on their individual needs.”
In order to serve clients from a range of demographics, Credit Suisse’s new digital bank will be divided into two offerings, CSX and CSX Young. Both take a mobile-first approach, from onboarding to a virtual debit card. Credit Suisse will launch the two accounts at the end of next month. After launching, the app will add services including investments, pensions, and mortgages.
In conjunction with today’s digital banking announcement, Credit Suisse also unveiled plans for a new concept branch that focuses on personalized advice. The bank is piloting the new concept at a new branch in Zurich and is building out the idea with a Digital Bar that offers interactive, personalized advice via video conferencing. Branch locations will also include co-working spaces, multimedia group rooms, and an event zone that can be booked by third parties.
Cross-border payments platform Payoneerannounced a major development this week. The New York-based company unveiled Payoneer for Banks, a tool to help banks make and receive cross-border payments.
The company’s new bank partnerships will offer secure low-cost international payments made in real time using the banks’ existing infrastructure. “By integrating with our APIs, banks can offer a seamless cross-border payments experience to their customers with low investment, which offers the potential for additional revenues, enriched offerings for customers and a competitive advantage,” said Eyal Moldovan, General Manager of SMBs for Payoneer.
The company reports it has already signed on 10 banks, challenger banks, and eWallets in 10 countries and it is in the middle of launching more partnerships. Among the list of disclosed partners are ANNA Money in the U.K.; Bank Asia in Bangladesh; BSB Bank in Belarus; EasyPay in Armenia; GCash, the leading mobile wallet in the Philippines; eZ Cash in Sri Lanka; Faysal Bank and JazzCash in Pakistan; Kuda Bank in Nigeria; Privatbank and Monobank in Ukraine; and Prex in Argentina.
Payoneer noted that now is an ideal time for the bank-focused product since many operations are moving to digital channels and international payment capabilities remain slow and unreliable.
“We focus on creating a bank that customers would love, and that drives a lot of our decisions,” said Monobank Cofounder Michael Rogalskiy. “It was extremely easy to work with Payoneer, because we have the same shared values and the same ideas around money transfers. Our integration allows our customers to have a better user experience, lower fees, and faster access to their international earnings. It’s a relationship that brings value for us, for Payoneer, and for our shared customers.”
London-based identity verification platform Sumsub (which stands for “Sum & Substance”) raised $6 million in Series A funding this week. The round brings the company’s total funding to more than $7.5 million. With the additional capital, the company plans to intensify its product development initiatives, expand into new markets, and pursue its goal of more than 1,000 new SME and enterprise customers by the end of next year.
Sumsub co-founder and CEO Andrew Sever highlighted the compliance and risk management questions that global businesses face when operating in multiple jurisdictions, and pointed to his company’s technology as an answer. “We solve the issue by presenting teams with a single solution to drive customers and enhanced due diligence from one place, customizing the onboarding flow to any jurisdiction or requirement.”
Sumsub provides a single, AI-powered identity verification and compliance risk management toolkit that automates the identity verification process and boosts conversion rates to as high as 97%. The company’s technology offers accelerated ID verification, digital fraud detection, and compliance for businesses in more than 200 markets around the world such as the U.K., North America, Germany, Singapore, and Hong Kong, and has verified “tens of millions of users” since launch in 2015.
The Series A was led by MetaQuotes, a financial trading software development company. The round featured the participation of several existing investors, as well as individual investor Ilia Perekopsky, VP of Telegram messenger.
Earlier this year, Sumsub announced that it and another ID verification company Veriff, had partnered with international money transfer firm TransferGo. TransferGo Compliance Manager Milda Mačiulaitytė said Sumsub’s platform would enable TransferGo to not only deliver a “tailored money transfer experience” but also to make sure that experience provided in a compliant and secure way across all regions.
