Financeit Recapitalizaton Gives Goldman Sachs Majority Stake

Financeit Recapitalizaton Gives Goldman Sachs Majority Stake

Point-of-sale financing provider Financeit completed an investment round today with existing shareholder Goldman Sachs. The round gives the firm a majority stake in the Toronto-based fintech.

Michael Garrity, CEO and President of Financeit, said the investment was a sign of Goldman Sachs’ “continued confidence in our leadership team, our business model, our platform, and the ability to grow our service.” He highlighted the recent integration with Centah, a SaaS workflow and lead management solutions provider, as an opportunity to expand into the home improvement industry “from lead generation to closing the sale.”

Financeit helps merchants increase closing rates and transaction sizes by enabling them to offer customers affordable monthly or bi-weekly payment plans. The cloud-based technology provides a fast and transparent application process for consumers, and helps merchants better manage cashflow, get paid sooner, and offer customers additional payment options. Financeit is free to use, and requires no merchant fees.

But Financeit adds a twist. “We service the transaction on both sides,” Garrity explained during his Finovate demo. “On one side we have a set of merchant partners who rely on us to power sales at the point-of-sale every day with our innovative solutions. On the other side, we have a set of financial institutions who rely on us to originate and to manage these loans on their behalf in their name and within their compliance framework.”

Financeit most recently demonstrated its technology at FinovateFall 2014, during which the company, in partnership with fellow Finovate alum FIS, launched its U.S.-compliant POS financing platform. Founded in 2011, Financeit was named to CB Insights’ Fintech 250 list in July and in June, the company received new funding capacity of $85 million from a “major Canadian life insurance company.” Since inception, the company has worked with more than 7,000 merchant partners in Canada and processed more than $2.5 billion in loan applications.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Net Neutrality: Pay Up for Fast Fintech or Let the Invisible Hand be Your Guide?
  • Financeit Recapitalization Gives Goldman Sachs Majority Stake
  • Symbiont Smart Contracts to Simplify Index Data Sharing for Vanguard

Around the web

  • Pindrop and Lloyds Banking Group win Gold Award for ‘best risk and fraud management programme’ at the European Contact Centre & Customer Service Awards.
  • Socure named one of the Top AI Companies in the world by CB Insights.
  • GreenKey joins Symphony Software Foundation.
  • Argentine digital consumer lender Wenance chooses Mambu’s SaaS engine.
  • Finicity integrates its asset verification tool into Black Knight’s LoanSphere Exchange Digital platform.
  • HousingWire features Roostify and its focus on the consumer experience.

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.

BLUERUSH Introduces New CEO and Director Steve Taylor

BLUERUSH Introduces New CEO and Director Steve Taylor

Steve Taylor will take the reins at BLUERUSH, the company announced today. Taylor, a current BLUERUSH director, replaces Larry Lubin who will remain with the firm as President and as a director.

“Since getting involved in Bluerush I have become increasingly impressed with the team and the market opportunity for the Digital Reach and Individeo platforms,” Taylor said. “We are now beginning to put the sales, marketing, and R&D elements in place to accelerate the transformation of Bluerush into a SaaS business.”

Additionally, Round 13 Capital co-founder John Eckert will join BLUERUSH’s board of directors. Round 13 contributed to the company’s recent fundraising effort along with the Capital Founders Fund.

Above: BLUERUSH President Larry Lubin demonstrating Individeo at FinovateFall 2017.

“I am very excited to have Steve Taylor on board as the CEO and John Eckert join our Board,” Lubin said. “Steve has been instrumental in helping us develop a roadmap that will help us grow our recurring revenues and he will be in an even better position to drive this as the CEO.”

Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, BLUERUSH demonstrated its Individeo platform at FinovateFall 2017. Individeo leverages big data visualization to produce personalized videos that help financial services customers better understand their financial options. Also active in healthcare and media verticals, the company’s flagship solution, Digital Reach, gives sales and marketing professionals personalization, distribution, and tracking of content, providing a high level of control over how content is distributed and to whom.

In October, the company announced a $1.3 million fundraising, featuring participation from Round 13 and Capital Founders Fund, as well as now-CEO Steve Taylor. BLUERUSH is a publicly-traded company on the TSVX under the ticker symbol “BTV” and has a market capitalization of $5 million.

SBDA Group Closes Series A Investment Round

SBDA Group Closes Series A Investment Round

Banking personalization company SBDA Group has landed a Series A investment today. FinSight Ventures and Digital Space Ventures contributed to the round, the amount of which was undisclosed. This marks the company’s first ever VC funding round.

The U.K.-based company will use the investment to advance its AI-powered customer engagement solution for banks, grow its product suite, and expand its team. SBDA Group sees pending PSD2 regulation as an opportunity. And while the company has selected Europe as its target market, it also has plans to expand into North America. SBDA Group CEO Nikita Blinov said that the company is proud of their solution that “allows retail and corporate banks to take advantage of open banking reforms utilizing our personalised recommendations-based approach that gives a customer a reason to stick with his or her current bank, as switching banks becomes more frequent.”

At FinovateEurope 2016 Blinov, along with Chief Data Scientist Alexander Fonarev, and Project Manager Anna Laskovaya, demoed SBDA Customer Insight, a product that turns raw banking data – such as transactional histories – into targeted marketing and information for customer relationship management. The technology leverages 10,000+ external sources into 500+ facts and personalized AI-driven recommendations. Alexey Garyunov, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of FinSight Ventures, said, “SBDA’s AI technology helps banks and merchants make their product profiles relevant to each customer by solving any problems as they arise. It also identifies the most appealing communication channels with a customer.” Abdul Abdulkerimov, Founding Partner of Digital Space Ventures, added, “SBDA Group has huge potential for international growth and expansion.”

Founded in 2014, SBDA Group currently serves more than 10 top-tier banks and has processed more than 100 million customer profiles. The company was a finalist of BBVA’s Open Talent Artificial Intelligence 2017, and was a gold winner of the UniCredit international hackathon last year. We featured the company in our Fintech Filter for AI post earlier this year.

ID.me Reaches 5 Million Users, Appoints C-Level Execs

ID.me Reaches 5 Million Users, Appoints C-Level Execs

Digital identity platform ID.me has reached a milestone this week. The Virginia-based company now counts 5 million users on its platform.

Along with user growth, ID.me has also scaled its employees, having grown to 60 employees since launching in 2010. In a press release, the company’s founder and CEO Blake Hall said that digital identity has reached a “tipping point.” He explained, “C-suite executives across industries are asking their teams how to protect consumer data from fraudulent actors… ID.me provides a layer of trust to ensure identity is verified and securely authenticated, moving away from relying solely on static identifiers like SSN and date of birth to devices and biometrics.”

To support this growth, ID.me has brought on two new C-level executives– Michael Morrison as Chief Financial Officer and Mike Brown as Chief Technology Officer.  Before joining ID.me, Morrison served as CFO for Qology Direct, a performance-based sales and marketing company. He has also held senior finance and operational positions at American Express, Virgin Mobile USA, Sprint, and XM Satellite Radio. Brown was a founding member of comScore, having served as its CTO for 6 years. He has submitted 24+ patent applications, of which 15 were approved. These are not the first C-level appointments ID.me has made this year. In August, the company hired Julie Filion as Chief Marketing Officer.

ID.me simplifies how individuals share their identities online by offering a network where users verify their identity once and are able to use that digital credential across the web to prove their who they are. The platform is designed to work especially with hard-to-define user groups such as military veterans, public service workers, and teachers. At FinovateSpring 2017, Blake Hall showcased how ID.me streamlines account opening, regulatory compliance, and customer support for banks and fintechs using identity that is accredited by the federal government.

Last month ID.me teamed up with General Motors to support their military discount program. In October, ID.me partnered with Finovate alum ThreatMetrix to deliver ID verification for government and commercial digital services. The company has raised a total of $45.8 million.

Backbase 6 Features New Digital Banking Backend, Open Banking and PSD2 Readiness

Backbase 6 Features New Digital Banking Backend, Open Banking and PSD2 Readiness

Just in time for the holidays, Backbase has released version 6 of its next generation digital banking platform. The enhancements include a cloud native architecture, digital banking accelerators, a new digital banking backend, a new entitlements product line, and what Backbase VP of Product Management Jelmer de Jong called “an API architecture ready for the Open Banking and PSD2 future.”

“Backbase continues to lead the digital banking revolution, driving modernization and innovation to accelerate digital transformation in all key banking segments,” he said. The company made the announcement at its annual customer conference, Backbase Connect last month.

Above: Backbase Global Head of Solutions Engineering Tim Rutten (left) and CEO and founder Jouk Pleiter (right) demonstrating Your Everyday Bank at FinovateEurope 2017.

The release of Backbase 6 is the result of two years of collaboration and beta testing with the company and its customers and partners. Among the major new features of Backbase 6 are:

  • Ready-to-go Banking
  • Digital Banking Services
  • Backbase Entitlements
  • Dynamics Forms / Dynamic Case Management
  • Experience Manager
  • Cloud Native Architecture
  • PSD2 and Open Banking-Ready APIs
  • Comprehensive SDKs

During his Backbase Connect presentation, de Jong highlighted a number of Backbase 6 features, including retargeting, which enables FIs to use offline resources in a customer database to engage clients with more targeted offers and services. “These capabilities enable banks and credit unions across the globe to reach their full digital potential anytime, anywhere, on any device,” de Jong said. The platform has been available to Backbase customers since late November, and customers can determine when and how to adopt and upgrade their systems on their own schedule.

Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Backbase demonstrated its Everyday Bank concept, in which banks and other FIs can remove friction from low-value interactions and transactions and “amplify” higher-value ones. A multiple-time Best of Show winner, Backbase announced last month that France’s mobile-only Orange Bank had gone live with Backbase’s Omnichannel Banking platform. Earlier this year, the company partnered with fellow Finovate alum eWise, bringing account aggregation to Backbase clients via its Open Banking Marketplace.

DoubleNet Pay to Power Cash Flow Management Tool for T. Rowe Price

DoubleNet Pay to Power Cash Flow Management Tool for T. Rowe Price

Financial management technology startup DoubleNet Pay scored a partnership with investment services firm T. Rowe Price this week. The Georgia-based company announced on Tuesday it has integrated its online cash flow management tool into T. Rowe Price’s Retire With Confidence Program.

The savings automation tool empowers participants to manage their income by regularly deducting a select amount from their bank account to save towards goals such as emergency savings, bill payment, and debt management. Brian Cosgray, DoubleNet Pay’s founder and chief executive said that the purpose of the tool, which is available on T. Rowe Price’s Workplace Retirement website, is two-fold. It is intended to “help people easily pay their bills on time” and also aims to help users “start a savings fund before spending their money on discretionary items.” Cosgray added, “We hope making financial best practices automatic each pay period will boost positive financial behavior.”

Diana Awed, head of product and marketing for T. Rowe Price Retirement Plan Services said, “We’ve seen the impact automatic services can have on financial behavior, particularly with retirement savings, and believe the addition of DoubleNet Pay to our financial wellness program will encourage employees to get on the right path with their finances, including paying down debt, starting an emergency fund, and saving for retirement.”

Founded in 2013, DoubleNet Pay is based on the principle pay yourself first. In other words, bills need to be paid and savings accounts must be funded before discretionary spending takes place. At FinovateSpring 2015, the company’s cofounders Brian Cosgray and Cody Laird showed off how DoubleNet Pay takes the stress out of personal financial management. Earlier this summer, the company reeled in $4 million in its first round of funding. Last year, DoubleNet Pay earned a spot in Plug&Play’s accelerator program.

Finovate Partners with UAE Ministry of Finance

Finovate Partners with UAE Ministry of Finance

Finovate has teamed up with the UAE’s Ministry of Finance this week to support the region’s growth of financial, banking and payments technology.

Attendees of the announcement event, held earlier today, received a sneak peek of what to expect at FinovateMiddleEast, which will take place February 26 and 27 in Dubai. Today’s event featured a panel discussion titled Innovation versus Digital Disruption: Perspectives from Banks and Fintechs. During the panel, Jagadeshwaran Kothandapani and Shadab Ahmed of Citi, as well as Sara Grinstead of RAKBank talked about the need for collaboration and partnerships between fintechs and FIs, as well as the need to embrace change, adopt new technology, and manage risk.

Finovate VP Heather Stowell noted that Finovate is also embracing fintech in the UAE, saying, “Supporting fintech globally is the crux of Finovate. We are excited to showcase the region’s fintechs, as well as grow the dialogue and interest in fintech for the region and the UAE as a fintech hub.”

FinovateMiddleEast will take place during UAE Innovation Month and Dubai Innovation Week. The show will bring together early-stage startups, leading established companies, media, financial service institutions, and funders. Book your ticket before December 21 and save up to $400.


With the UAE Ministry of Finance as the strategic partner, FinovateMiddleEast is supported by platinum sponsor UAE Exchange, silver sponsor Temenos, and bronze sponsor Loxon.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Backbase 6 Features New Digital Banking Backend, Open Banking and PSD2 Readiness
  • DoubleNet Pay to Power Cash Flow Management Tool for T. Rowe Price
  • SBDA Group Closes Series A Investment Round
  • ID.me Reaches 5 Million Users, Appoints C-Level Execs
  • BLUERUSH Introduces New CEO and Director Steve Taylor

Around the web

  • Filene interviews Larky CEO Gregg Hammerman on the company’s recent VISA partnership.
  • PR Savings Bank in APAC signs with Temenos.
  • Ripple completes XRP Lockup to create certainty of XRP supply at any given time.
  • ACI Worldwide receives SWIFT gpi certification for itsUniversal Payments (UP) Real-Time Payments solution.
  • Facebook Messenger chief David Marcus joins Coinbase board.

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.

Simility Adds PayPal as Strategic Investor in Latest $17.5 Million Fundraising

Simility Adds PayPal as Strategic Investor in Latest $17.5 Million Fundraising

Fraud and risk management innovator Simility locked in $17.5 million in new funding today. The Series B was led by Accel and featured a strategic investment from fellow Finovate alum, PayPal. “This latest funding round will enable us to enter our next phase of growth by bolstering our world-class team of industry veterans in sales, customer success and data science to meet market demand,” Simility co-founder and CEO Rahul Pangam said.

Current investors The Valley Fund and Trinity Ventures also participated in the round, which brings Simility’s total capital to $25 million. Team members from Simility shared their thoughts on the funding and the future of the company in a blog post this morning.

“My team has helped turn our visionary idea into leads among banking customers,” Head of Latin America Sales Paulo Moura wrote. “This second round of funding means more to us than money; it’s also the touching realization that we’ve earned investors’ confidence in our viability as a company, not just a promising startup.”

Above: Simility Head of Engineering Ravi Sandepudi (left) and CTO/Co-Founder Kedar Samant (right) during their presentation “Fraud Mutates – Detect, Understand, and Block It” at FinDEVr London 2017.

“Everything follows from a great team, I’ve learned,” Simility co-founder and CTO Kedar Samant added. “This new funding round will empower Simility to grow our teams and scale up our operations so that more enterprises can better manage fraud and risk.”

Recent news from Simility only underscores the company’s commitment to adding talent. Simility hired Mick Martin as VP of Sales, named Glenn Cobb as VP of Solution Engineering in August, and brought onboard Lynn Strand as VP of Marketing – all in Q3 of this year. The company noted that today’s investment will enable it to grow its sales operations in the U.S., Brazil, and Europe, as well as expand its data science teams in Europe, and add to partnerships in Europe and India.

Founded in 2014, Simility is headquartered in Palo Alto, California. This summer at our developers conference FinDEVr London, Simility’s Kedar Samant (co-founder and CTO) and Ravi Sandepudi (Head of Engineering) led a presentation titled Fraud Mutates – Detect, Understand and Block It which explained how feature engineering and real-time fraud detection pipelines gives businesses the ability to adapt to evolving cyber threats.

Simility’s technology was featured in Network World’s New Products of the Week in March, the same month Simility unveiled its AI-powered Adaptive 3-D Secure solution. Adaptive 3-D Secure is designed to identify high-risk transactions, leveraging machine learning to examine a wide variety of attributes in real-time, including device fingerprinting, geolocation, and in-session behavioral analytics.

NuCypher Raises $4.3 Million from Token Sale and VC Funds

NuCypher Raises $4.3 Million from Token Sale and VC Funds

According to a report from CoinJournal, NuCypher, a platform that offers security and encryption services for distributed systems, has pulled in $4.3 million. This brings the company’s total funding to just over $5 million.

The funds come from a token pre-sale from 13 cryptofunds and venture capital firms. Leading the VC portion of the round was Polychain Capital. Michael Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital Assets Fund, FBG Capital, Compound VC, Satoshi Fund, and Blockchain Korea Partners, and others also participated.

Founded in 2016, NuCypher works to secure and encrypt big data, the blockchain, the cloud, and the internet of things (IoT). The San Francisco-based company differentiates its technology with the ability to transfer data from one public key to another without either party gaining visibility to the contents of the message.

CoinJournal reported NuCypher said that it is “part of that core infrastructure, enabling developers to store, share and manage private data on public blockchains.” The company emphasized it has been “very diligent” in building out its network ahead of its token sale to make it usable “from day one.”

Above: NuCypher CEO MacLane Wilkison (pictured left) and CTO Michael Egorov (pictured right) presenting at FinDEVr London 2017

At FinDEVr London 2017, the company’s CEO MacLane Wilkison and CTO Michael Egorov gave a presentation titled Body Armor for Big Data. The company is planning to hold its public ICO in early 2018. The token of the ICO will be used to ensure computations are correct. The company said that a year from now it will power many decentralized applications, from data exchanges and marketplaces to end-to-end encrypted databases to healthcare apps.

Earlier this summer, NuCypher introduced its decentralized key management system, NuCypher KMS. In May, the company earned finalist spots in Citi Tech’s Tech for Integrity Challenge and in TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2017’s Startup Battlefield. NuCypher also bears the honor of being a Y Combinator alum.

Apply Now to Present at FinovateSpring 2018!

Apply Now to Present at FinovateSpring 2018!

With the holidays right around the corner, excitement for the new year is building and you won’t want to miss getting a headstart on opportunities available at FinovateSpring 2018. Now is the time to apply: the very early-bird deadline for presenter applications to demo is Friday, December 15.

The event will take place at the Santa Clara Convention Center on May 8 – 11, and will feature our signature seven-minute demo format. Presenters who are selected won’t just receive time up on stage — they’ll also have the opportunity to connect directly with senior-level financial executives, venture capitalists, other entrepreneurs, and influential press, analysts, and bloggers.

Competition to get on stage at Finovate events is high, with more companies applying than the demo slots we have available. And with the fintech scene continuing to grow and pave the way for new technology, now is the time to join your competitors on stage and gain the attention of new clients, investors, and potential partners.

If you’d like to learn more, please email us at [email protected] and we’ll send you a presenter packet outlining the selection criteria, presenter package, demo costs, deadlines, and a link to the online application (applying is completely free and 100% confidential, so there’s nothing to lose!). Plus, if you apply by Friday, December 15, and are selected to demo, you’ll benefit from the very early-bird savings in your final demo cost. Hope to see you apply!


FinovateSpring 2018 is partners with: Aite GroupBankersHubBanking TechnologyBayPayBeFast.TVBigData-MadeSimple.comBreaking BanksByte AcademyCelentFemTechFinancial ITFintech FinanceHeadcountHolland FintechIBS IntelligenceInnovate FinanceMercator Advisory GroupNexChangeThe Nilson ReportOvumThe PaypersPlug and PlaySME Finance Forum, and Swiss Finance + Technology Association.


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