AccountScore and Validis Bring the Benefits of Open Banking to U.K. SMEs

AccountScore and Validis Bring the Benefits of Open Banking to U.K. SMEs
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: AccountScore

Helping small businesses in the U.K. maximize the opportunities of Open Banking is the goal of the new partnership forged between AccountScore and financial data sharing and standardization specialist Validis. The two companies announced that they will work together to ensure that SMEs get access to more transparent financial services, and that U.K. institutions gain the most accurate financial overview of their clients.

The agreement between the AISP accredited Open Banking platform and Validis will enable small businesses to share financial data with a single click through a single, consent-driven workflow. Banks can visualize the data from an “insight-fueled interface” and track critical processes like loan originations. This collaboration will help institutions develop more personalized banking services for specific businesses, and enhance their ability to make better, more accurate decisions faster.

“As Open Banking becomes more established, having a single intuitive workflow where SMEs can share their data easily and securely opens up huge possibilities for financial services,” AccountScore CEO Emma Steeley said. “Our unique relationship with Validis ensures we can visualize all the financial data required to help these institutions tailor their services, make the right decisions, and identify insights that they could not previously.”

In addition to helping businesses and financial institutions make more of their data, the ability of different datasets to complement each other – using management account data to confirm bank transaction data, for example – adds new value to the processes financial institutions conduct every day. This is value institutions have not been able to capture until recently.

“We are excited to sign this partnership agreement with AccountScore,” Validis CEO Joel Curry said. “For too long financial institutions were only seeing individual pieces of the puzzle, but now they will have access to all the data, all in one place.” Curry called the partnership “a truly innovative step forward for small business financial services.”

AccountScore demonstrated its consents.online solution at FinovateEurope earlier this year. Consents.online is the consent management feature of the company’s Open Banking solution, and helps users manage their online consents in one centralized location. Customers can visit consents.online and review what data has been accessed and by whom, as well as change consent permissions.

Founded in 2016 and headquartered in London, U.K., AccountScore has partnered with The Insolvency Panel earlier this year to develop a solution for the debt and debt solutions sector to give financially challenged individuals the ability to more easily share their financial data with financial institutions. In February, Freedom Finance announced that it had reduced application time to five minutes thanks to technology from AccountScore.

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Emailage and Featurespace Target Online Application Fraud

Emailage and Featurespace Target Online Application Fraud
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Emailage, Featurespace

The newly announced collaboration between email risk assessment innovator Emailage and fraud prevention and risk management firm Featurespace is designed to combat online application fraud, a problem that grew by 159% last year according to U.K. Finance.

The partnership integrates Featurespace’s ARIC Fraud Hub with Emailage’s data and risk assessment scores. The combined solution identifies and reports application fraud in real time, boosting the accuracy of customer authentication during processes like onboarding and account maintenance. The integration will also make it easier for institutions to comply with the latest payment regulations.

“In order to keep up with the fast-changing payment landscape, we are always on the lookout to leverage our expertise and that of other providers,” Chief Partnership Officer at Emailage Tim White said. “Emailage and Featurespace are two companies moving in the same direction in terms of innovation and growth. Therefore, we felt this collaboration was a highly strategic opportunity.”

“This is yet another step in our journey to provide our customers with full regulatory compliance and a best-in-class solution,” White said.

Emailage turns email addresses into global digital identifiers. The company leverages a worldwide data network to assess the likelihood that the individual who provided the email address is reliable as a potential customer or applicant. Via the integration, digital identities that are established by Emailage are then processed by the Adaptive Behavioral Analytics of Featurespace’s ARIC platform, which builds individual behavioral profiles. This improves the ability of the machine learning models to automatically detect risk and to combat new threats as they develop. Emailage noted that it has helped organizations around the world mitigate $2.8 billion in fraudulent purchases and applications.

“This integration makes it easy for all of our customers to leverage the combined power of our innovative Adaptive Behavioral Analytics and Emailage’s proprietary data set to improve risk scoring and reduce exposure to sophisticated online threats at the point of application,” Featurespace CEO Martina King said.

Founded in 2008, Featurespace demonstrated its ARIC Fraud Manager solution at FinovateFall 2016. The company’s partnership announcement with Emailage comes at the same time as a report that banking and payments solutions provider Contis has completed deployment of Featurespace’s ARIC Fraud Hub.

In June, Featurespace announced that it would power transaction monitoring for Ireland’s Permanent TSB. This spring, the company was highlighted by Aite Group in its 2019 report on anti-fraud and AML machine learning platform vendors, and its CEO was profiled by Hypepotamus on the topic of workplace diversity.

Earlier this year, Featurespace announced a partnership with retail finance technology provider Deko, and launched its technology in Singapore. The company began 2019 with a major fundraising, bringing in $32.3 million (£25 million) in new capital in a round led by Insight Venture Partners.

Emailage demonstrated its Browser Extension at its Finovate debut in 2015. The extension marks email with an easily identifiable icon that enables users to get an instant analysis on the risk associated with the email. With the extension, users of Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer can leverage Emailage’s fraud-detecting technology to assess the risk of emails and websites.

Emailage won Best E-commerce Initiative at the PayTech Awards in London last month. This spring, the company introduced a trio of new points of presence in Singapore, Australia, and Germany, in what company CTO Rafael Loureiro said demonstrated the company’s “strategic commitment” to making its technology available worldwide. An office in Dublin, Ireland, was opened in June.

Emailage also announced it added a “big four” U.S. bank, a major Asian payment platform, and a global e-commerce solution provider to its shared intelligence network in the first quarter of this year. Founded in 2012, the company has raised $15.7 million in funding from investors including Anthos Capital, Cobre Capital, and Mucker Capital. Rei Carvalho is CEO.

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Business Valuation Specialist BizEquity Teams Up with UBS

Business Valuation Specialist BizEquity Teams Up with UBS
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: BizEquity

UBS has formed a partnership with BizEquity, an online provider of estimated business valuations. This will allow a select group of UBS financial advisors in the US arm of its global wealth management business, to access BizEquity’s database of businesses and valuation information, reports Sharon Kimathi of Fintech Futures (Finovate’s sister publication).

Enterprise access through BizEquity will support UBS financial advisors to provide clients with informal valuation reports that will assist them with their financial planning needs.

James Jack, director of the business owner strategic client segment at UBS Financial Services said: “Our advisors are constantly looking for new ways to grow their business and expand their reach, particularly in middle-market businesses. Access to the BizEquity platform will help us to deliver highly tailored advice to our clients.”

“UBS is one of the preeminent names in the wealth management industry and we are proud to announce our partnership. The clients and prospects that it serves will benefit from our service to help them answer one of the most important questions they will ever ask: ‘What is my business worth?’” said Michael M. Carter, founder and CEO of BizEquity.

BizEquity is a leading provider of business valuations, distributing its cloud-based service through thousands of financial advisors to help better inform businesses of their lending, insurance, and wealth management needs and potential.

Founded in 2010, BizEquity demonstrated its BizEquity One UK solution at FinovateEurope 2015. The technology provides real time, dynamic valuations, “Zillow-esque” search functions on more than two million pre-valued businesses in the U.K., real time advice and alerts during the valuation process, and an dashboard that provides an infographic-like overview of business value and KPIs.

BizEquity has raised $5.1 million in funding. Brinker Capital and Frost Books are among the company’s investors.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: AccountScore, BizEquity, Emailage, Featurespace, ID R&D, Klarna

On Finovate.com

  • AccountScore and Validis Bring the Benefits of Open Banking to U.K. SMEs.
  • Emailage and Featurespace Target Online Application Fraud.
  • Business Valuation Specialist BizEquity Teams Up with UBS.

Around the web

  • ID R&D launches facial liveness detection solution, IDLive Face.
  • Klarna and global fashion retailer ASOS to expand to the U.S.
  • Banking and payments solution provider Contis deploys Featurespace’s ARIC Fraud Hub.

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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Grayscale Selects Coinbase to Store its $2.7 Billion in Crypto Assets

Grayscale Selects Coinbase to Store its $2.7 Billion in Crypto Assets
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Coinbase

Digital currency wallet and crypto management platform Coinbase landed a major win today. The California-based company announced that Grayscale, a major digital asset fund manager, has partnered with Coinbase to store its $2.7 billion worth of assets on Coinbase Custody.

Launched in 2017, Coinbase Custody is a cold storage solution for crypto assets. In May of this year, Coinbase Custody reported it had reached $1 billion in crypto assets under management. Today’s agreement with Grayscale, which will use Coinbase Custody to store all of its digital assets, more than doubles Coinbase Custody’s AUM.

According to the Coinbase blog, Grayscale selected Coinbase Custody after researching more than 30 other custodians. All were evaluated on factors such as security, regulatory compliance, insurance coverage, scalability, and their suitability as a partner. “We’re honored to have been selected based on such a comprehensive evaluation process,” Coinbase said in a blog post.

Coinbase aims to be top-of-mind with traditional wealth management firms as they add crypto to their offerings. The company’s Coinbase Pro offering provides a compliant way to access a regulated, verified crypto liquidity with APIs and hands-on customer service.

After its most recent funding round of $300 million, Coinbase’s total funding hit $525 million and its valuation rose to $800 million. Coinbase demoed Instant Exchange at FinovateSpring 2014. 

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Coinbase, CREALOGIX, Taulia, Tuition.io

On Finovate.com

  • Grayscale Selects Coinbase to Store Crypto Assets

Around the web

  • Bobsguide awards Taulia partnership award for its alliance with NHS Business Services.
  • Tuition.io powers student loan repayment for Montefiore St. Luke’s Cornwall.
  • CREALOGIX records over $101 million (CHF 100 million) in sales for the first time.

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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PayStand Leverages the Blockchain to Document Proof-of-Action

PayStand Leverages the Blockchain to Document Proof-of-Action
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: PayStand

No blockchain experience? No problem.

Business payments platform PayStand is launching what it’s calling Assurety-as-a-Service, which is exactly what it sounds like. The new API allows businesses with no prior blockchain experience to verify any event, action, or identity in real-time by creating a record that is notarized on the blockchain.

To picture what this looks like, imagine having a frictionless notary public that can scale; notarizing an unlimited number of documents. In a blog post detailing the API, PayStand illustrates a multitude of use cases across a variety of industries. In the insurance industry, for example, businesses can track the exchange of high-value assets and use an automated collections process to settle a claim more efficiently. And businesses in the real estate vertical can record, track, and transfer land titles, property deeds, and liens, and ensure all documents are accurate and verifiable.

The solution levels the blockchain playing field by not requiring businesses to have any prior experience with the enabling technology. “Assurety-as-a-Service lets businesses skip the steep learning curve and start using blockchain right now,” said PayStand CEO Jeremy Almond. “Any developer can use our API and spin up their own blockchain app in minutes,” added Omar Baqueiro, Director of Product and Engineering.

The Assurety-as-a-Service API helps businesses deploy applications that prevent fraud by leveraging PayStand’s hybrid blockchain to document proof-of-action without allowing anyone to edit the record. The tool offers the accountability of a public blockchain while providing data privacy of a private blockchain. As Baqueiro phrased it, Assurety-as-a-Service “combin[es] the advantages of a trustless, decentralized, immutable public chain with the privacy and security expected of enterprise-level solutions.”

Today’s development comes after the company’s 2018 launch of a blockchain that ensures payment, adding security to the PayStand Bank Network. On that blockchain is stored an immutable record of every transaction the company processes.

PayStand showcased at our developers conference, FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2014. Earlier this year the company launched a service that uses the blockchain to automate invoice collection. Businesses can integrate the tool, Automated Receivables, into their existing customer payments infrastructure.

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DriveWealth Powers Commission-Free Trading for Revolut Cardholders

DriveWealth Powers Commission-Free Trading for Revolut Cardholders
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: DriveWealth, Revolut

Alternative banking provider Revolut announced the roll out of commission-free stock trading on its app today. Starting today Revolut Metal customers in the U.K. and Europe can buy and hold shares of 300+ stocks listed on the NYSE and NASDAQ directly from the Revolut app.

The feature is powered by DriveWealth, which is registered as a full-carrying and clearing broker-dealer and will help Revolut navigate the complexities of brokerage. New Jersey-based DriveWealth offers a suite of APIs that allow companies across the globe to help their users invest in the U.S. stock market. The firm provides digital investment products for brokerages to offer clients as well as a brokerage service offering dollar-based, real-time investing.

Overall, Revolut is making stock market investing more inclusive. Trades are free, the annual custodian fee totals 0.01% (when others in the industry charge 0.25% to 1.5%), and there are no account minimums. At launch, all fees are waived for eligible customers during the beta period. The company did not specify when it plans to implement fees but said, “These will come into effect later, and we will communicate with you in advance about when that will be.”

Revolut said it is most proud of integrating the ability to buy partial shares of stock. Fractional share investing, one of DriveWealth’s flagship features, allows users to purchase a small portion of a stock. This democratizes investing by making a stock like Amazon, which trades at almost $1,900 per share, more accessible to investors with lower capital.

Another badge of honor is that trades can be made instantly, meaning users will pay the asking price of a stock when their order hits the market. And, specific to Revolut, users can fund their trading account in multiple currencies and benefit from the interbank exchange rate.

The trading feature not only helps Revolut compete with banks, but also helps the company build its user base for its Metal account. Launched last August, the Metal account offers users 100 free trades per month, along with a host of other features, for $14.99 per month.

In the future, Revolut plans to open trading to users outside of Europe, offer ETFs and other new products, and introduce European stocks. Additionally, the company will open up free trades to Premium and Standard customers, who will be able to make 8 free trades per month and three free trades per month, respectively. This variance is representative of Revolut’s tiered pricing model, which offers free Standard accounts while charging $9.99 per month for a Premium account.

Revolut debuted at FinovateEurope 2015 in London. The company’s CEO and founder Nikolay Storonsky showed off the app’s money transfer capabilities that help users avoid banking fees without actually using a bank.

Adding Revolut as a client is another notch in the belt for DriveWealth, which last month partnered with Sigma Securities and Trove Technologies to offer digital U.S. equities trading in Nigeria. Last August, DriveWealth collaborated with fellow Finovate alum Bambu to launch a white-label roboadvisory platform for U.S. wealth managers. Other DriveWealth clients include MoneyLion, Vested Finance, and INVSTR.

At FinovateAsia 2016, DriveWealth released a new API to enable partners to offer a robo advisory product suite and a self-directed equity investing platform. Robert Cortright is CEO.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: DriveWealth, EZBOB, Lighter Capital, nCino, PayStand

On Finovate.com

  • PayStand Leverages the Blockchain to Document Proof-of-Action.
  • DriveWealth Powers Commission-Free Trading for Revolut Cardholders.

Around the web

  • Columbia Bank to leverage nCino’s Bank Operating System.
  • Fast Company highlights Lighter Capital as a competitor to Clearbanc.
  • Ezbob wins the Best Fintech Partnership category for its Smart Onboarding Engine in this year’s Banker’s Tech Projects Awards.

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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Onfido Unveils International Partnership Program

Onfido Unveils International Partnership Program
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Onfido

The new international partner program launched this week by Onfido will help expand the reach of the company’s identity verification solutions and explore new use cases. ForgeRock, IDEMIA, and iovation are among the cybersecurity and identity access management (IAM) specialists that have agreed to include Onfido’s AI-powered identity verification services in their own offerings.

“Empowering the channel is an important strategic move that will enable us to accelerate our expansion into the U.S.A., Southeast Asia, and Europe, while exploring new product innovation in areas such as account takeover and authentication,” Director of Alliances and Partnerships at Onfido Ed Ackerman said. “With some of the biggest enterprise names already signed up to our program, we’re now selecting additional applications from companies to join and share in exciting new revenue-generating opportunities.”

Onfido demonstrated its Facial Check with Video technology, available via the company’s SDK, at FinovateFall 2018. The solution leverages liveness detection by having users film themselves performing a variety of random movements and then comparing the image in the video to the facial image of the user extracted from their identity document.

Onfido’s technology can be integrated into existing cloud-based systems or co-sold by partners as a combined solution stack. The company boasts a number of fellow Finovate alums as current program members as well, including Mambu, Qwil Messenger, Signicat, InvestGlass, FiveDegrees, and Thought Machine.

Along with the program launch news, Onfido also reported that Visa was now offering Onfido’s end-to-end identity verification service on its marketplace. And that’s not the first of this type of partnership: Salesforce has offered Onfido’s technology on its AppExchange since in December 2017.

Recently selected to participate in the new data protection ICO Sandbox, Onfido has spent the summer partnering with firms like cross-border money transfer specialist MoneyNetint and international payments company Currencies Direct to enhance the verification component of their onboarding processes. Other partnerships for Onfido this year include a collaboration with Checkr to support the background check specialist’s Checkr Connect IDV solution, and an agreement with mobility-as-a-service company Drover to help the firm offer a more secure, seamless onboarding experience for customers.

Onfido raised $50 million in funding this spring in a round led by SBI Investment and Salesforce Ventures, which took the company’s total financing to more than $100 million. Founded in 2012, Onfido is headquartered in London, U.K. Co-founder Husayn Kassai is CEO.

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Pepper Power: HSBC Brings Robot Retail Banking to FinovateFall

Pepper Power: HSBC Brings Robot Retail Banking to FinovateFall
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: FinovateFall 2019

Is HSBC’s Pepper the best bot in banking?

Attendees at FinovateFall in New York this September will have an opportunity to judge for themselves as the social humanoid robot, Pepper, makes its Finovate debut. Following our Innovation Keynote on Wednesday, September 25th, attendees will have the opportunity to meet, greet, take selfies with (#PoseWithPepper), interact with, and see Pepper’s capabilities and customer journeys for themselves.

Developed by SoftBank Robotics, Pepper has been deployed at HSBC banks across the U.S. Pepper was first launched at HSBC’s flagship Manhattan branch, and has been rolled out to locations from Miami, Florida to Seattle, Washington. The technology has been credited for gains in everything from ATM transaction volume to new credit card applications.

“As we’ve already seen in HSBC’s Fifth Avenue, Beverly Hills and Seattle branches, Pepper provides services that truly elevate the retail banking experience for both visitors and staff,” Head of Marketing and Business Strategy for SoftBank Robotics America Kass Dawson said.

And in a world in which robotic technologies are often referred to simply as “bots,” and appear to most consumers as mere animations on a digital screen, the arrival of Pepper is both a throwback and a vision into the ways new technologies will enable new forms of banking. Dawson referred to Pepper as a “unique banking experience that is enriched by human-robot interactions.”

HSBC Head of Innovation Jeremy Balkin, who will address FinovateFall this year, explained how Pepper fits in with what he referred to as the “Branch of the Future.” Comparing the rise of robotics in banking to the advent of the smartphone, Balkin said that giving customers products and services that leverage these technologies is key to delivering the digital experience consumers increasingly expect from all service providers.

“By creating these revolutionary new types of digitally enhanced retail banking experiences that use data intelligence and leading edge robotics,” he said, “HSBC is transforming the everyday task of a branch visit into a memorable and extraordinary experience.”

So what does Pepper do? With the ability to provide information on 300 different actions ranging from account opening to applying for a credit card, Pepper performs in three main areas:

  • Attention Please! Pepper helps reduce customer waiting time by communicating directly with bank staff based on customer responses to qualifying questions.
  • Education and Empowerment: Pepper informs customers on the latest available technologies, products, and services such as ATMs, the bank’s mobile app, and self-service options.
  • Product and Service Awareness: Pepper boosts awareness of the bank’s products and services, especially special promotions, by facilitating more productive interactions with HSBC Relationship Managers.

In an extensive feature on Pepper last month, The Financial Brand’s Bill Streeter noted Pepper’s talents: “It uses natural language processing, a component of artificial intelligence to understand multiple languages,” he wrote. “(Pepper) is said to be capable of recognizing basic human emotions and adapting its behavior to what it perceives.”

Streeter quoted HSBC Bank USA’s Head of Retail Banking and Wealth Management for the U.S. and Canada Pablo Sanchez who was blunt in describing Pepper’s ability to move metrics positively. “Unless the robot adds value then it is a gimmick,” he said. “But we knew it was going to help us. We just didn’t realize it would get a billion hits and would increase sales so much.”

To learn more about the technology behind Pepper, visit SoftBank Robotics. And to see Pepper in action for yourself, visit our FinovateFall registration page, pick up your ticket, and reserve your spot at the show.

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Bambu Brings in $10 Million

Bambu Brings in $10 Million
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Bambu, Funding

Digital wealth technology company Bambu is bringing home the bacon today in the form of Series B funding. The $10 million round comes courtesy of three-time investor Franklin Templeton and new investor PEAK6 Strategic Capital, both of which co-led the round.

The Singapore-based company will use the funds to expand its reach of B2B clients, an audience Bambu sought out while a multitude of players in the space were taking a direct-to-consumer approach. And during the four years since launch, Bambu has made sizable gains in this market. Originally limited to Asia– the company marketed itself as Asia’s Premier B2B Roboadvisory– the company has since grown its client base into international markets. Bambu landed its first U.S.-based client and opened a new London office in March of last year.

As part of its B2B expansion, Bambu will target new segments in the financial services vertical and build teams in offices across the globe. As a part of that effort, the company will demo its technology at this year’s FinovateFall conference in New York, which kicks off September 23. Today, Bambu provides solutions to more than 15 financial institutions across the U.S., Europe, UAE and Asia including Standard Chartered, Refinitiv, and Connect by Crossroads.

“We are committed to working with a global client base to digitize saving and investing so it’s easier and more accessible to investors everywhere. We welcome PEAK6 together with the continued support from Franklin Templeton in this round,” said Bambu founder and CEO Ned Phillips. He added, “This is a strong confirmation that we have built a unique business and platform for the global market. We see growing demand across all markets, and we are increasing our ability to serve clients globally.”

Bambu’s cloud-based technology helps wealth managers bring automated investment services to their clients. The three-tiered approach includes the company’s Intelligent Advisor, a private banking product that creates efficiencies for relationship managers; White Label Robo, a white-labeled solution that helps asset managers create a personalized portfolio and risk profile for clients; and the BambuAPI developer hub, which offers developers their choice of modules to integrate into their own solutions.

With 70 employees working across Singapore, London, Hong Kong, San Francisco, and Johannesburg, Bambu has raised a total of $13.4 million in funding. The company won Best of Show for its demo at FinovateAfrica last year. Earlier this year, Bambu earned a spot on Fintech News Singapore’s list of 29 Hottest Fintechs in Singapore 2019.

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