Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Personetics Accommodates Digital-Only and Challenger Banks.
  • Diebold Nixdorf Brings its Bank-Like Kiosk to Emirates NBD Customers.
  • Munnypot Announces Strategic Partnership with Capita.
  • Switch Speeds Virtual Card Adoption with CardSavr API.

Around the web

  • aixigo wins top honors in the Outstanding Front-End Digital Solutions Provider (Vendor) category of the Private Banking Conference & Awards in Germany for its wealth management platform.
  • Trunomi announces partnership with blockchain-based digital ID solution, Shyft.
  • Mambu and Form3 team up to launch cloud-based payments processing service.
  • Fiserv collaborates with Rippleshot to provide early breach detection solution, Card Risk Office Fraud Warning.
  • Mitek adds identity document verification and biometric facial recognition technology to its platform courtesy of a new agreement with Experian.
  • Earnix introduces AcceleRate-it with Direct Deploy technology.
  • Trulioo wins Startup Canada’s Global Entrepreneurship Award.

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.

Finicity Forges New Partnership with Mortgage Cadence

Finicity Forges New Partnership with Mortgage Cadence

Financial data aggregator and insights provider Finicity continues to make moves in mortgagetech by partnering with fellow Finovate alum, Mortgage Cadence. The two have teamed up to integrate Finicity’s Verification of Assets (VoA) solution into Mortgage Cadence’s loan origination platform.

“Our goal as a financial data aggregator is to find best-in-class partners who are also committed to data access, quality, and insights, and ultimately a better experience for borrowers,” Finicity CEO Steve Smith said. “We are excited to work with Mortgage Cadence to accelerate and improve the digital loan process.”

A short online process lets borrowers give consent to have their financial data accessed, enabling lenders using Mortgage Cadence with the VoA integration to generate a verification report with a single click. This, according to Finicity, can cut the traditional closing time by as much as six days.

Finicity’s VoA solution provides bank-validated insight into the borrower’s assets including information on accounts at multiple financial institutions, account types, balances, and detailed transactions, as well as the account owner(s) and address(es). Available via a simple API integration, the technology enables lenders to digitize and streamline asset verification.

“Our agreement with Finicity simplifies yet another important step in the mortgage process for both borrowers and lenders, getting everyone involved in the transaction to the closing table more quickly and with fewer steps,” executive managers of Services Center for Mortgage Cadence Brian Benson said.

Finicity demonstrated its Verification of Income (VoI) and Verification of Assets (VoA) credit decisioning solutions at FinovateFall 2017. Founded in 1999 and headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, Finicity has raised more than $50 million in funding and includes fellow Finovate alum Experian among its investors. The company has also been a contributor to our developers conference, FinDEVr, presenting “The Frictionless Aggregation Experience” at FinDEVr New York 2017.

Winning the FinTech Breakthrough Awards’ Best Personal Budgeting Service category earlier this month for its Mvelopes solution, Finicity partnered with digital mortgage marketplace provider BeSmartee in March, integrating its Verification of Assets solution into BeSmartee’s point-of-sale mortgage origination platform. The same month, Finicity announced that its asset verification technology would be integrated with Ellie Mae’s Encompass digital mortgage solution.

Making its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2017 last year, Mortgage Cadence demonstrated its Collaboration Center. The platform provides lenders with a secure, multi-party communications portal that brings all parties, their workflow and information for the loan into a single, secure location.

Mortgage Cadence’s deal with Finicity is the company’s latest initiative to enhance its platform’s asset verification capabilities. In April, Mortgage Cadence integrated FormFree’s AccountCheck asset verification service into its Enterprise Lending Center. In terms of partnerships, the company secured the largest credit union in Oklahoma, Tinker Federal Credit Union with more than $3.6 billion in assets and 360,000+ members, as a technology partner in March.

Founded in 1999 and with offices in Denver, Colorado, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, Mortgage Cadence is a wholly owned subsidiary of Accenture, and serves more than 600 lenders across the U.S.

Intelligent Environments Rebrands as ieDigital

Intelligent Environments Rebrands as ieDigital

Reflecting what the company calls its “core digital capabilities” and desire for international expansion, London, U.K.-based automation technology innovator Intelligent Environments has rebranded as ieDigital.

“As a leading fintech business with global ambitions, it’s important that our brand travels as well as our expertise,” said Jeremy Young, who joined the company as CEO at the beginning of the year. “We feel the new brand brings our visual identity right up to date, is more versatile and altogether more digital. The name is also much better aligned with our core business, and easier for customers and colleagues across all territories to pronounce, which is incredibly important.”

From its origins as one of the leading home automation specialists in the U.K., the company has since grown to become a financial services technology provider to a growing number of major financial institutions. These clients include Bank of Ireland U.K., The Generali Group, Home Retail Group, HSBC, Ikano, and Lloyds Banking Group.

As Intelligent Environments, the company demonstrated its Interact Collect solution at FinovateEurope earlier this year. A component of its Interact digital engagement platform, Collect gives organizations an approach to consumer debt collection that is low stress, non-confrontational, and digital-first. An intuitive interface and omni-channel access combines with a self-service-oriented user experience to raise repayment rates, lower costs, and improve customer relationships. The technology enabled the company to take home Best Collections Technology honors at the 2017 CCS Awards back in November.

In addition to Collect, the Interact platform offers Interact Acquire, a customer acquisition solution with comprehensive data capture and cross-device support to keep costs low and boost completion rates; and Interact Connect, a customer loyalty and engagement solution.

Dwolla Launches Start, a Pay-as-You-Go Payment Solution

Dwolla Launches Start, a Pay-as-You-Go Payment Solution

Payments platform Dwolla introduced a new product plan today. It’s called Start, and it offers a white-labeled, out-of-the box way for businesses to send and receive money without a large time or money commitment.

Launching in beta today, Start will complement Dwolla’s other offerings: Scale, which provides a consistent monthly bill with a set number of transactions; and Enterprise, which the company describes as a customizable, “white-glove” approach for complex businesses. Start is differentiated from Scale and Enterprise because it does not lock businesses into contracts, nor does it require monthly minimums. Overall, the new offering helps Dwolla deliver on its commitment of “helping businesses of all sizes start and scale their growth.”

Businesses can integrate their existing app with the Start API or they can use Start’s dashboard, which does not require any coding. After signing up, businesses simply complete AML and KYC checks and can then go live after being contacted by a Dwolla representative.

The beta version of Start is currently being rolled out to select businesses. There is no word on when Dwolla will open the product for a full launch.

Founded in 2008 and headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa, Dwolla offers a white-label payments API that allows firms to credit or debit any U.S. bank account the user has connected. The company integrates with Sift Science to help reduce fraud by leveraging real-time identity verification. And in May of 2017, Dwolla integrated with Plaid to instantly verify and authenticate customers’ bank accounts using tokenization.

The company most recently demoed FiSync at FinovateSpring 2015. Earlier this year, Dwolla closed a $12 million investment led by Foundry Group that brought its total funding up to $51.4 million. Last month, the company partnered with Cryptanite Blockchain Technologies to process their online payments.

BondIT Integrates Bond Portfolio Solution with FIIG Securities

BondIT Integrates Bond Portfolio Solution with FIIG Securities

Fixed income portfolio platform BondIT has initiated a partnership with FIIG Securities. Through the agreement, FIIG will leverage BondIT’s bond portfolio solution for relationship managers.

Australia-based FIIG offers fixed income services for 6,000 clients, managing more than $7.6 billion (AUD 10 billion) in assets. The company will bring BondIT’s bond portfolio solutions to its core investment management platform, SimCorp Dimension, allowing front office users to leverage the technology for new portfolio construction, investment idea generation, relative value analysis, portfolio monitoring, and portfolio optimization.

In the press release, John Prickett, Chief Operating Officer at FIIG Securities described how more investors are interested in the diversification that corporate bonds can bring to their portfolios and that this spike has increased the demand for fixed income and corporate bonds. He added, “The BondIT software will further enhance our offering, pairing the knowledge of our expert team with the latest technology to identify more fixed income opportunities for our clients and help them maximize their investments.”

Powered by machine learning algorithms, BondIT’s tools empower advisors to automate the optimization of fixed-income portfolio creation and management. The technology allows individual investors to select 12 different constraint dimensions to personalize their portfolio. BondIT leverages these data points, combined with AI, to create algorithms that offer flexibility in optimizing risk and returns in non-linear, multi-dimensional portfolio selections.

BondIT’s COO Eran Nachshon debuted the technology at FinovateFall 2016 in New York. The company added $4 million to its Series B round last week, bringing its total funding to $18.2 million. BondIT is headquartered in Herzliya, Israel and was founded in 2012.

Arxan Brings its App Protection Technology to Android

Arxan Brings its App Protection Technology to Android

Arxan Technologies has launched Arxan for Android, the first cybersecurity solution to leverage Google for Android-supported development language Kotlin to secure Android apps. The technology defends Android apps written in either Kotlin or Java from reverse engineering and tampering, which helps guard businesses against the kind of brand destruction, financial loss, and theft wrought by cybercrime.

VP of Product Management Rusty Carter credited the technology for not only providing full support for Kotlin, but also for the way it manipulated key aspects of Android to maximize security, “This capability minimizes impact on development resources from the first build on through every follow-on release,” Carter said. “As the application threat landscape continues to intensify, we are continuing to expand our capabilities to help protect customer applications for Android, including those developed using Kotlin.”

Developed by the JetBrains programming team out of St. Petersburg, Russia (along with open source contributors), Kotlin first appeared in 2011 and made its stable release late in April 2018. The programming language is an industrial-strength, object-oriented programming language that is designed to be fully interoperable with – and able to facilitate a migration to – Java.

Arxan for Android features:

  • APK-based, post-build protection that does not require source codes changes and minimizes impact on the software development lifecycle.
  • Java and Kotlin support to secure the widest possible range of Android apps
  • Easy-to-use JSON-based configuration for quick implementation and faster time-to-market
  • Enterprise-level platform support and training

Founded in 2001, Arxan Technologies demonstrated its mobile application shielding for financial services technology at FinovateEurope 2014. The company’s solutions defend mobile apps from hacking and malware with its patented “guarding” technology that is embedded directly into the app. This turns ordinary apps into self-defending, tamper-proof apps that can resist cyberattacks that use techniques such as code tampering and reverse engineering.

Arxan’s technology is deployed on more than 250 million devices by Fortune 500 corporations in financial services, retail, healthcare, as well as in other industries. Earlier this year, the company launched a new app security monitoring and analysis service, Arxan Threat Analytics, that enables businesses to learn about cyberattacks while the attacks are underway and to provide countermeasures before the attack is completed or becomes widespread.

Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Arxan has also participated in our developers conference, presenting Mobile Payments: Protecting Apps and Data from Emerging Risks at FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2015. The company had raised more than $28 million in funding before it was acquired by TA Associates in 2013 for $132 million. Joe Sander is CEO.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Arxan Brings its App Protection Technology to Android.
  • BondIT Integrates Bond Portfolio Solution with FIIG Securities.
  • Dwolla Launches Start, a Pay-as-You-Go Payment Solution.
  • Intelligent Environments Rebrands as ieDigital.
  • Finicity Forges New Partnership with Mortgage Cadence.

Around the web

  • Low-code development specialist OutSystems launches OutSystems Sentry, a new proactive security monitoring service for the company’s PaaS clients.
  • PayPal acquires Jetlore, an AI-powered prediction engine for retailers.
  • Halma partners with OurCrowd for life protection technologies.
  • CNP Awards recognizes ThreatMetrix for ThreatMetrix ID.
  • EY names Flywire CEO Entrepreneur of the Year finalist in New England.

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.

Signifyd Takes in $100 Million in Series D Funding

Signifyd Takes in $100 Million in Series D Funding

Ecommerce fraud protection provider Signifyd has more than doubled its financing total with a new round of funding today. The company just closed a $100 million Series D round, bringing its total to $187 million.

Leading the round is Premji Invest, with participation from existing investors Bain Capital Ventures, Menlo Ventures, American Express Ventures, IA Ventures, Allegis Cyber, and Resolute Ventures. Signifyd will use the new capital to grow its retail customers.

“Premji invests in private companies with all the necessary ingredients to become thriving stand-alone public companies,” said Sandesh Patnam, lead partner at Premji Invest. He added that his firm is impressed with Signifyd’s growth, company culture, and the breadth of its customers. “More than that,” Patnam continued, “it comes down to the high quality of Signifyd’s innovation and technology. It couldn’t be clearer that guaranteed fraud protection is reaching mainstream adoption, and Signifyd is leading this space.”

Founded in 2011, Signifyd offers fraud protection for ecommerce merchants using technology that leverages machine learning algorithms, user behavior, and data science to identify fraudulent orders. Signifyd reduces merchant chargebacks on fraudulent charges, as well as saves companies money on shipping declined orders. In one case study, the company helped a major retailer realize a return on investment of 3.8 times over three years. Signifyd currently serves 10,000 retailers across the globe including top brands such as Build.com, Helly Hansen, iRobot, Jet, Lacoste, and Wayfair.

Signifyd demoed its chargeback mitigation solution at FinovateSpring 2013. Last month, the company opened its first European office in Spain following a partnership with Magento in February. Signifyd has been named on the Forbes FinTech 50 and was listed among Bloomberg’s 50 Most Promising Startups. Additionally, it has been named a top place to work by Entrepreneur, Inc. Magazine, San Francisco Business Times, and the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

VASCO Rebrands as OneSpan to Focus on Secure Onboarding

VASCO Rebrands as OneSpan to Focus on Secure Onboarding

Business solutions company VASCO is making a major pivot today, along with a fully-fledged rebrand, as well as an acquisition to support the company’s new objectives.

VASCO, now known as OneSpan, has narrowed its focus to become an anti-fraud platform. OneSpan will trade on NASDAQ under the ticker symbol “OSPN.” It is expected to begin trading on Monday, June 4.

OneSpan offers a Trusted Identity platform (TID), an API-based solution that aims to reduce fraud associated with onboarding and transactions while offering an enhanced experience for the end user. TID’s new Intelligent Adaptive Authentication reviews and scores data pulled from user behavior, devices, and transactions to offer a real-time view of user security without interfering with the user experience.

“The launch of our Trusted Identity platform provides a single foundation that spans the needs of our customers today and into the future while our name change underscores a generational evolution in our strategy,” said OneSpan CEO Scott Clements. “We listened closely to the challenges our customers are facing and identified a significant gap between customer needs and solutions available in the market. OneSpan is addressing this gap by delivering a much needed and innovative approach to reducing the billions of dollars banks are losing annually to fraud.”

Bolstering today’s transition is OneSpan’s acquisition of Dealflo for $54.5 million (£41 million). Founded in 2009 and headquartered in the U.K., Dealflo offers configurable onboarding solutions to financial services clients. The company has partnerships with Equifax, TransUnion’s iovation, Mitek, and VASCO’s eSignLive (now OneSpan Sign).

“This acquisition will enable us to grow our subscription revenue and Dealflo’s technology will be a major differentiator for our eSignLive solution,” said Clements. “In addition, Dealflo’s identity verification capabilities will allow us to accelerate the launch of our TID platform based onboarding, identity and anti-fraud solutions.”

Dealflo has operations across North America and EMEA, and is headquartered in London. The Dealflo team will join OpenSpan, working to bring Dealflo’s solutions into new geographic markets.

OneSpan presented as VASCO at FinovateFall 2017 in New York. The company debuted the OneSpan Sign (then eSignLive) Digital Lending Solution. The solution leverages the blockchain and e-signature capabilities to offer a compliant, digital lending solution. Last month, the company teamed up with Finovate alum nCino to offer nCino clients access to an electronic signature solution.

Tradeshift Raises $250 Million in Round Led by Goldman Sachs

Tradeshift Raises $250 Million in Round Led by Goldman Sachs

Fintech has a brand new unicorn.

Supply chain financing innovator Tradeshift has locked in $250 million in new capital courtesy of a just-completed Series E round. The investment was led by Goldman Sachs and the Public Sector Pension Investment Board, and featured participation from HSBC, H14, Bullhound, and a new venture firm founded by Tradeshift founders called Gray Swan.

“We are very happy with this validation of our vision,” Christian Lanng, Tradeshift founder and CEO said. “We have always believed that the future of supply chains is 100% digital and that connecting trade is the first step to a digitally connected economy. This investment will enable us to continue our rapid growth and consolidate our leadership position. We welcome Goldman Sachs and PSP Investments as our newest investors and look forward to their valuable contributions as we enter our next growth phase.”

The latest round of funding takes Tradeshift’s total capital to more than $400 million and gives the San Francisco-based firm a valuation of $1.1 billion.

Working with more than 1.5 billion businesses in 190 countries around the world, Tradeshift enables supply chain payments and marketplaces, supporting trade finance alternatives, spend and receivables management, lending and payments, as well as private marketplaces. Tradeshift has helped free the $9 trillion in capital locked in online payments and was referred to in the November 2017 Forrester report on the Vendor Landscape: B2B Business Networks as the company whose technology “cause(s) other PO/invoice network vendors to change strategy.”

Tradeshift demonstrated the Instant Payments feature of its platform at FinovateEurope 2012. Instant Payments enables SMEs to receive instant payment for invoices approved through the platform, giving businesses access to lower interest rates compared to other funding opportunities. The solution also helps relieve pressure on cash flow due to late payments and extended payment terms.

Recently recognized with Best B2B Payments Platform honors from the FinTech Breakthrough Awards, Tradeshift launched Tradeshift Pay in May which combines supply chain payments and financing and blockchain-based early payments into a single solution. In March, the company partnered with Canon Business Process Services in a deal that enabled Canon customers to leverage Tradeshift’s platform to improve their supply chain, including source-to-pay processes.

The company began the year with the launch of Tradeshift Frontiers, an innovation lab and incubator geared toward helping bring the benefits of new technologies like AI and distributed ledgers to the world of supply chain management and global trade. Tradeshift was founded in 2010.

Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World

As Finovate goes increasingly global, so does our coverage of financial technology. Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World is our weekly look at fintech innovation in developing economies in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Central and Eastern Europe.

Africa

  • Lidya Scores $6.9 Million in Series A Investment.
  • Kenya finance ministry publishes draft of initial regulations its digital lending industry.
  • Fintech Futures profiles Cameroon-based crypto wallet and exchange app, Interstellar.

LATAM

  • Argentine lending platform Moni raises $3 million in funding.
  • Brazil’s central bank launches new fintech sandbox, Laboratório de Inovações Financeiras e Technológicas (LIFT).
  • MarkitSERV extends network of derivatives clearinghouses to include Mexico’s Asigna.

CEE

  • Czech Republic’s Worldcore announces completion of its cryptocurrency exchange.
  • Is fintech an “opportunity or threat” to emerging Europe?
  • Czech utility conmpany, Pražská Plynárenská, to accept payments in bitcoin.

Asia

  • Ant Financial inks deal with Shanghai Pudong Development Bank, its third deal with an established Chinese bank in a week.
  • Malaysian fintech Jirnexu raises $11 million in Series B led by Japan’s SBI Group.
  • Philippine government points to northern Philippines as a future blockchain, cryptocurrency, and fintech hub.

MENA

  • Emirates NBD teams up with Diebold Nixdorf to introduce digital kiosk, Emirates NBD EasyHub.
  • ADGM and KPMG Lower Gulf announce FinTech Abu Dhabi Innovation Challenge.
  • Emirates NBD introduces its NBD Accelerator Auto Loans program.

Top image designed by Freepik

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Tradeshift Raises $250 Million in Round Led By Goldman Sachs.
  • VASCO Rebrands as OneSpan to Focus on Secure Onboarding.
  • Signifyd Takes in $100 Million in Series D Funding.

Around the web

  • Compass Plus announces new partnership with Payhuddle Solutions in Asia Pacific.
  • FICO to help Raiffeisen Bank accelerate digital transformation.
  • Fidor appoints Adam Woolford as Chief Information Officer.

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.