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PayPal Partners with Xero to Support B2B Invoice Payment

By David Penn Posted on August 19, 2016
Categories: PayPal, Xero

PayPal has teamed up with Xero to enable small business users of the cloud-based accounting platform to pay for platform-generated invoices with PayPal. Along with this new PayPal Express Checkout option, users will also be able to track outstanding invoices and get real-time updates when invoices are paid.

Previewing the partnership, Xero CTO Craig Walker wrote on the company blog: “This update will deliver a seamless new checkout experience for customers that will make it easy for invoices to get paid as soon as they are received, using Xero’s online invoices and PayPal Express Checkout.” Walker added that the new integration would also make payment reconciliation and automatic fee creation easier.

Steve Fusco, PayPal’s VP and GM for North American distribution, underscored Walker’s emphasis on the problem small businesses face with unpaid invoices. “Sometimes it feels like you have to go above and beyond to get your invoices paid,” he said. “But with PayPal Express Checkout, we are offering Xero customers a faster and simpler way to get paid, and reduce time spent on the payment process to just a couple of clicks.” The technology is scheduled to be available “in the next few weeks.”

In writing about the news earlier this week, PYMNTS.com noted that the partnership with PayPal would help with Xero’s efforts to expand beyond its home market in New Zealand. Xero integrated with fellow Finovate alum BizEquity and launched a direct feed partnership with leading southeast Asia FI, UOB, earlier this month. In July, Xero announced a partnership with Commonwealth Bank, the largest bank in Australia.

Both a Finovate and FinDEVr alum, Xero demonstrated its Business Identification solution at FinovateSpring 2011. The company also presented its technology at FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2014, contributing a presentation and workshop on “Building an API-driven Ecosystem for Small Business.” Xero was founded in 2006 and is headquartered in Wellington, New Zealand.

Founded in 1998 and headquartered in San Jose, California, PayPal demonstrated its Instant Account Creation technology at FinovateEurope 2012. The company also participated in our developers conference, FinDEVr Silicon Valley, in 2014.

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SocietyOne Has Facilitated $38 Million in Personal Loans in 2016

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on August 19, 2016
Categories: SocietyOne

Australian P2P lender SocietyOne’s new CEO Jason Yetton disclosed some growth figures this week. The company told the Sydney Morning Herald that it has arranged $38 million ($50 million AUD) in personal loans on its platform so far this year.

This number is almost double the nearly $20 million the company facilitated in the latter half of 2015, and it is 10x the $3.8 million from the same period in 2015. As a result of this growth, the company’s portfolio of outstanding personal loans totals $76 million, which represents 0.5% of Australia’s $15 billion personal loans market.

In his interview with the Herald, Yetton said, “We readily admit that our current lending volume is still a small sum in the context of a $20 billion ($15 billion USD) personal loan market, which itself is one fifth of the overall consumer finance market in Australia.” He added that his point is that “we now have a solid base from which we can grow and meet our ambitious target of taking a 2% to 3% share of that $100 billion market by 2020 to 2021.”

SocietyOne’s returns average 10% for institutional and sophisticated investors. Since the company was founded in 2011, SocietyOne has lent an average of $15,000 to its borrower base of 5,000. Yetton, who took the reins as new CEO in March, plans to distribute loans to a “much wider range of borrowers.”

At FinovateAsia 2012, SocietyOne launched ClearMatch, a feature that allows investors to bid together at different interest rates and amounts against a single loan. Finovate returns to Asia this year: Hong Kong on November 8. The application deadline is fast approaching, so act soon to secure your spot on the FinovateAsia stage.

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PrivatBank’s Partnership with InComm Initiates Launch of Prepaid Products in Ukraine

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on August 19, 2016
Categories: InComm, PrivatBank

PrivatBank and prepaid commerce company InComm partnered this week to launch prepaid products in Ukraine, where PrivatBank is headquartered.

The partnership will enable PrivatBank’s 25 million Ukrainian customers to purchase prepaid codes and top up their account with no additional fees. Clients can already use PrivatBank’s web interface, Privat24, to purchase prepaid codes. The 5.5 million clients who prefer the bank’s mobile interface will be able to purchase codes via the app later this month.

Currently, clients can use the account funds to add credit to video chat and voice-call applications. In a press release, the companies stated plans to expand the product line in the future, but did not indicate when.

At FinovateSpring 2014 PrivatBank launched an ATM that connects to Android phones via NFC, eliminating the need for buttons on the ATM itself. Founded in 1992, PrivatBank serves customers in Ukraine, Latvia, Portugal, Italy, Cyprus, and Georgia.

InComm SVP Thomas Cornelius presented at FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2014 where he showed how the company’s Cashtie API provides rails for cash payments. If you’re interested in seeing more developer tools, FinDEVr is coming to Santa Clara on the 18th/19th of October. Early bird tickets expire soon, so register today to save your spot.

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Obloco Beta Tests Expense Reporting Solution with Washington Trust Bank

By David Penn Posted on August 19, 2016
Categories: Obloco

Think global. Test local.

Spokane, Washington-based Obloco will beta test its white-label expense-reporting solution with area businesses and Washington Trust Bank (WTB). Obloco Expense Reporting gives community banks and credit unions the ability to offer their business customers a simple expense reporting solution in addition to their online business banking. “Businesses manage their other expenses via online banking already,” Obloco CEO Victor Yefremov said, “It just makes sense to have expense reporting in the same place.”

CEO Victor Yefremov demonstrated Obloco Expense Reporting at FinovateSpring 2016.

Obloco Expense Reporting solves the problem company CTO Sam Fleming referred to as “the One-der Receipt.” He explained: “The reason it’s a One-der Receipt is there’s one line item, yet it takes 12 inches (of paper).” Obloco differs from other popular expense reporting and management solutions by focusing on the needs of smaller businesses rather than the “complex workflows” of larger enterprises. “We don’t want that tier of check-offs,” Fleming said. “We just want a simple process where people can collect their receipts.”

Users can type in the amount of the expense in the app—displayed on a smartphone during the company’s FinovateSpring demonstration—as well as vendor or merchant name, category, and any codes or project tags. Capture the receipt with a photo from the smartphone camera, mark the expense as billable or reimbursable if applicable, and that’s it. Users can generate and send completed expense reports directly from the app. The administrative back end features a dashboard that gives the business owner or accounting professional an overview of all expenses, including actual receipts, as well as a way to approve expenses and generate CSV and PDF reports.

Geoff Forshag, VP and director of products and services for Washington Trust Bank, says, “We believe the Obloco digital expense reporting solution can be a great addition to our current suite of business solutions.” The oldest and biggest privately held commercial bank in the northwestern U.S., Washington Trust Bank was founded in 1902 and has more than 40 branches and offices in Washington, Idaho, and Oregon. WTB has assets of more than $5 billion.

Obloco was founded in 2014. The company demonstrated its expense reporting solution at FinovateSpring 2016.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on August 19, 2016
Categories: Boku, CenturyLink, Google, IBM, InComm, MasterCard, Obloco, PayPal, PrivatBank, Ripple, Risk Ident, SocietyOne, Temenos, Xero

On Finovate.com

PrivatBank’s Partnership with InComm Initiates Launch of Prepaid Products in Ukraine

Obloco Beta Tests Expense Reporting Solution with Washington Trust Bank

SocietyOne Has Facilitated $38 Million in Personal Loans in 2016

PayPal Partners with Xero to Support B2B Invoice Payment

Around the web

Boku partners with Google to enable carrier billing as payment option on Google Play in Lithuania.

Ghana-based startup, Sovereign Bank, deploys T24 core-banking system from Temenos.

CenturyLink to host SatuitCRM and SatuitCRA software as part of new agreement.

Risk Ident CEO Robert Valerio appointed to European Advisory Board of the Merchant Risk Council (MRC).

Fortune features PayPal, MasterCard, and IBM on its list of companies that will change the world.

Nikkei Asian Review looks at how Japanese banks will leverage Ripple.

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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One Week Left — Submit Your Demo Application for FinovateAsia 2016!

By Erika Sanchez Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: Finovate Marketing, FinovateAsia 2016

Summer is quickly passing by which means FinovateAsia 2016 is getting that much closer!

The anticipation is building for our inaugural FinovateAsia in Hong Kong (PMQ, 8 November 2016), and the final deadline to secure a coveted demo spot on stage is coming up next week: Friday, August 26. In case you need a refresher, Finovate is a powerful platform to:

Drive product adoption of the latest and most cutting-edge solutions in fintech.
Showcase new technology in front of an influential audience of high-level financial and banking executives, press and industry analysts, venture capitalists, regulators, and entrepreneurs.
Generate press recognition, find customers, network with peers, raise capital, and discover partners.

If these sound like great ways to take your technology to the next level, then now is the time to get involved with FinovateAsia. For more details on the presenter package, demo costs, and how to apply, please email us at asia@finovate.com.

We look forward to reading your application!

FinovateAsia 2016 is sponsored by: InvestHK/startmeup.hk and more to be announced.

FinovateAsia 2016 is partners with: BankersHub, Big Data Made Simple, Celent, CoinTelegraph, CrowdFundBeat, FemTechLeaders, Finolab, Fintech Finance, Fintech News Singapore, Harrington Starr, Korea FinTech Forum, Miss FQ, SME Finance Forum, Swiss Finance + Technology Association, and Verdict Financial.

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Upserve’s New Square Partnership Offers Clients Access to Funding via Square Capital

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: Swipely, Upserve

When popular point-of-sale (POS) hardware and software company Square launched Square Capital in 2014, it joined the likes of OnDeck, CAN Capital, and Kabbage to provide working capital to small businesses. The company this week announced it has expanded Square Capital to non-Square customers through a partnership with Upserve (formerly Swipely).

Upserve, which processes credit-card payments for food-services businesses and provides performance analytics and management tools, will offer access to its 7,000 customers to Square. Expanding Square Capital through this partnership is key, since Upserve will offer Square access to client sales data to help Square make underwriting decisions. Square Capital’s loans are revenue-based; borrowers repay the loan by giving a fixed percentage of their daily sales.

In an interview with Bloomberg, head of Square Capital Jacqueline Reses said, “We think that the application of what we do is broader than just within Square’s ecosystem. … . So long as we believe that we have a data advantage in underwriting, and it’s relevant to our core business, you can see us extending beyond Square further.”

The terms of the deal were not disclosed; however, Recode reported that since Upserve is advertising the loans on Square’s behalf, Upserve is likely benefiting from a cut of the referrals. This is Square Capital’s first expansion outside of its own customer base.

Founded in 2009, Upserve manages more than $800 billion in annual transaction volume and adds 200 to 250 restaurants to its customer base each month. The company demoed as Swipely at FinovateSpring 2012 and has raised more than $40 million.

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Qumram Wins Swisscom StartUp Challenge 2016

By David Penn Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: Qumram

Zurich, Switzerland-based Qumram is one of five winners of the Swisscom Startup Challenge, a competition now in its fourth year. Along with Advanon, Fashwell, Nanolive, and Xsensio, Qumram has won a spot in a one-week business acceleration program in Silicon Valley that begins in September. “I was impressed yet again by the creativity and drive of these start-up companies,” Swisscom Chief Digital Officer and one of the competition judges, Roger Wüthrich-Hasenböhler, said. “I’m pleased that our program can support young entrepreneurs in making a start and promoting innovative strength in Switzerland.”

“It’s great when a plan comes together,” Qumram CMO Nicola Cowburn tweeted this week.

More than 200 startups from fields ranging from IT and fintech to e-health and smart homes competed for the opportunity to be one of ten companies to pitch their ideas this week before the Swisscom jury of technology specialists. The mostly (90%+) Swiss applicant pool was judged on the basis of overall potential, as well as the chances for cooperation or implementation of the technology.

Also judging for the challenge were Adrienne Corboud, EPFL vice president; Dave Brown, Business Angel of the Year; and Beat Schillig, managing director of Venturelab. The pitch competition was held at the EPFL, which was recently called the #12 engineering school in the world in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings.

Qumram specializes in providing financial service organizations with a complete audit trail for every digital interaction and transaction, whether the channel is social media, mobile, or online. The company’s solutions help organizations take advantage of new communications channels while remaining compliant and mitigating risk. Founded in 2011, Qumram demonstrated its technology at FinovateSpring 2016. The company, which recently opened new offices in London and San Francisco, was featured by Swiss Finance Startups as its startup of the month in July. In June, Qumram added Peter Ödman and Patrick Barnet to its board of directors.

Qumram will demonstrate its latest technology at FinovateFall in New York, 8/9 September. Find out more about our upcoming fall fintech event.

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HelloWallet’s New Feature is a Budget Within a Budget

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: HelloWallet

Goals-based saving tools have existed for quite some time, but what if the goal you’ve saved for isn’t just a one-time purchase? HelloWallet’s new feature, Flexible Budgets, launched this week to help users spend wisely over a longer time-period and to help plan for large, infrequent expenses.

The new tool is meant to be used in tandem with a regular monthly budget. Use cases include:

Track spending while on vacation
Plan for quarterly insurance payments
Track an annual clothing budget
Maintain a budget for a wedding (as someone who’s getting married in two weeks, I’m well aware of the importance of tracking expenses to make sure there’s enough left over to cut the final check for booze at the end of the reception!)

This feature addresses a common complaint among budgeters who struggle with big-ticket, infrequent purchases. It essentially offers a way for users to set up a budget within a budget. The Flexible Budgets feature is now available in the HelloWallet app for iOS and will launch on Android later this year.

While the app would certainly come in handy as I finalize wedding expenditures, I won’t be able to use it any time soon. HelloWallet is only available as a B2B model aimed to help employers help their employees with financial health. The company’s current customers include: Salesforce, T. Rowe Price, Allstate, Vanguard, and more.

Matt Fellowes, founder of HelloWallet, gave a Best of Show-winning demonstration of Retirement Explorer at FinovateFall 2015. Retirement Explorer is a planning tool that allows users to model and save retirement scenarios. During the demo, Fellowes also announced it now allows banks to integrate HelloWallet’s financial wellness programs.

Two months ago, HelloWallet launched a savings and debt guidance tool to help users achieve their saving, spending, and debt-repayment goals. Founded in 2009, the company was purchased by Morningstar in 2014.

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Finovate Fall Sneak Peek: M1 Finance

By David Penn Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: FinovateFall 2016, FinovateFall 2016 Sneak Peek, M1 Finance

A look at the companies demoing live to 1,500+ fintech professionals on 8/9 September 2016. Register today.

M1 Finance is the most efficient way to build savings and manage wealth. With M1, any investor can create, organize, and automate a customizable portfolio – all within an intuitive investment platform.

Features:

Creation of a customizable portfolio made up of any tradable security
Easy management and automated trading on your portfolio
Same-day deposits and next-day withdrawals

Why it’s great
Holding deposits in a bank is outdated. With M1, you can automate the seamless transition into assets of your choosing.

Presenters

Brian Barnes, CEO and Founder
Barnes founded M1 Finance after working as an equity analyst and management consultant. He is a Stanford graduate.
LinkedIn

Steven Gall, VP Engineering
Gall is an experienced technology leader with a background in systems consulting. He leads back-end development for M1 Finance.
LinkedIn

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FinovateFall Sneak Peek: Overbond

By David Penn Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: FinovateFall 2016, FinovateFall 2016 Sneak Peek, Overbond

A look at the companies demoing live to 1,500+ fintech professionals on 8/9 September 2016. Register today.

Overbond is an end-to-end digital bond-origination platform. Overbond brings all bond market participants together and makes primary bond issuance transparent and secure.

Features:

Secure communications channels
Real-time market data with custom reporting and analytics
Ultimate efficiency and transparency

Why it’s great
Overbond is transforming how global investment banks, institutional investors, corporations, and governments connect and access the fixed-income primary market.

Presenters

Vuk Magdelinic, CEO and Cofounder
Magdelinic leads digital transformation programs at global banks. He has fifteen years experience in capital markets, management consulting, and technology (PwC, CIBC, Deloitte, Danaher); Ivey MBA; U of T—electrical engineering.
LinkedIn

Han Ryoo, Co-Founder and Head of Product
Ryoo has 8+ years of fixed income and fintech experience. Before Overbond, he specialized in corporate bond origination and led business development and operations at three startups.
LinkedIn

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FinovateFall Sneak Peek: GainX

By David Penn Posted on August 18, 2016
Categories: FinovateFall 2016, FinovateFall 2016 Sneak Peek, GainX

A look at the companies demoing live to 1,500+ fintech professionals on 8/9 September 2016. Register today.

The GainX Innovation Strategy Management platform enables FSIs to adapt, innovate, and commercialize repeatedly. Get greater ROI on innovation spend and sustained competitive advantage in the market.

Features:

Insights: Industry benchmarks, gap analysis, innovation-capacity assessment
Intellect: Track/manage innovation-spend and ROI in real time
Open Thinking: Behavioral analytics and idea management

Why it’s great
Unlike anything in the market, GainX gives you visibility on all things innovative with relevant and real-time metrics, deep engagement, and faster time-to-market. One platform to unleash your ROI.

Presenters

Angelique Mohring, CEO and Founder
Mohring founded GainX after working with Global1000s for 20+ years as a tech executive and global change agent. She is an expert in innovation strategy, tech, and economic growth through innovation.
LinkedIn

Malcolm van Raalte, CTO and Co-Founder
van Raalte has 20+ years of experience in building technology platforms in fast-growing, high-tech businesses. He has been instrumental in building the GainX platform into a world-class solution.
LinkedIn

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