Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • “Brunon Bartkiewicz Named New CEO at ING Bank Slaski”

On FinDEVr.com

Around the web

  • Xignite announces its XigniteGlobalCurrencies API is now available in the Oracle Cloud Marketplace. Join Xignite at FinDEVr 2016 in New York, March 29 and 30.
  • CardFlight integrates with Stripe to encourage developers to build EMV payment functionality within their mobile apps.
  • Jack Henry partners with The Clearing House to help spread “real-time payment ubiquity” among FIs.
  • Fenergo to provide Client Lifecycle Management solutions to Nikko Securities America.
  • WePay wins gold at 2016 Stevie Awards for sales and customer service.
  • Entrepreneur reports: Payoneer to enter Indian market.
  • Insuritas replaces GoogleCompare by launching new technology that provides one-stop shopping for financial products.
  • Bill.com launches the Bill.com Network to promote faster, lower-cost payments for businesses.

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.

Swipely Rebrands as Upserve to Focus Exclusively on Restaurants

Swipely Rebrands as Upserve to Focus Exclusively on Restaurants

UpserveHomepage

Marketing-insights startup Swipely has rebranded to Upserve and launched some major additions to its product line. The Rhode Island-based company was founded in 2009 to “provide marketing tools to main street merchants” and has since narrowed its focus to offer analytics tools exclusively to restaurants. Today’s rebranding reflects that focus.

In a blog post announcing the change, Swipely CEO and Co-founder Angus Davis highlights Upserve’s growth serving the restaurant industry, which employs 1 out of every 10 people in the U.S. workforce:

  • Serves thousands of restaurants across all 50 states
  • Manages 11 million meals per month, up more than 1.7X from last year
  • Manages relationships with 16 million active diners through its CRM program, Guest Book

Along with the rebrand, Upserve added to its product line, which originally consisted of sales analytics, server performance, and menu popularity. The company’s newly launched mobile app helps restaurant owners remotely manage all of their restaurants by comparing sales with labor performance and generating reports across locations.

In an interview with Street Fight, Davis touted how the app will help balance restaurant ownership with work obligations, stating, “It lets them get out of the restaurant for a while and still feel like they’re there.”
DualMobile

Upserve is also launching ShiftPrep, which combines data from table management, point-of-sale systems, and CRM. That data is matched with machine learning, predictive analytics, and external data such as weather to forecast customer dinner traffic.

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Upserve presented at FinovateSpring 2012 where it demoed Payment Marketing. The company has raised a total of just over $40 million in equity. Last year, it was featured in AlwaysOn’s OnFinance Top 100 list.

BBVA Acquires Holvi for Undisclosed Sum

BBVA Acquires Holvi for Undisclosed Sum

Holvi_homepage_Mar2016

Described by Wired magazine as one of the “hottest startups in Finland,” Holvi has just been acquired by Spanish bank BBVA, a fellow Finovate alum.

“We’re excited about Holvi as we share a vision about the benefit of technology for the customer,” BBVA’s Teppo Paavola said. Paavola, chief development officer and GM of new digital business for BBVA, also praised the way Holvi leveraged technology “to bring a new approach to small business banking, where services essential to a business’s future, such as invoicing, are built into their core offer.”

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Pictured: Holvi co-founder Tuomas Toivonen demonstrating his company’s platform at FinovateEurope 2013 in London.

“We found the ideal owner in BBVA,” Holvi CEO Johan Lorenzen added in a statement on the Holvi blog. “A bank with the understanding of the digital world to give us the necessary room to grow, and then the scale and expertise to underpin that growth with sound foundations.”

Terms of the acquisition were not immediately available.

Calling itself “Banking for Makers and Doers,” Holvi provides SMEs, freelancers, and entrepreneurs with a business current account that features its own international bank account number (IBAN), as well as a suite of banking, accounting, and invoicing tools to make it easier to manage company finances. Holvi accounts provide automatic financial statements, including a real-time update of VAT balance, and can be used to send invoices and even set up an online store. As of April 2016, Holvi customers in Germany, Austria, and Finland will also get access to a Holvi Business MasterCard.

Last December, Holvi was featured in TheNextWeb’s look at “10 Finnish startups to watch in 2016.” That same month, Let’s Talk Payments included Holvi in a roundup of top Nordic fintech startups. Business Insider also recognized the company last fall, naming it among the “12 hottest” fintech startups in the region. And in September, Holvi launched its Supercharge feature to make it easier for customers to add money to their Holvi accounts.

Founded in 2011 and headquartered in Helsinki, Finland, Holvi demoed its technology at FinovateEurope 2013. The company is an authorized payment institution licensed and regulated by FIN-FSA (the Financial Supervisory Authority of Finland.)

 

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com:

  • “BBVA Acquires Holvi for Undisclosed Sum”
  • “Swipely Rebrands as Upserve to Focus Exclusively on Restaurants”

Around the web

  • TransferTo forges strategic partnership with emerging markets telecom, Millicom.
  • Digital Insight adds Android Fingerprint ID to its mobile banking app.
  • Nomis Solutions hires Frank Bria as vice president and go-to-market leader for new presentment optimization and personalized pricing initiative.
  • Xero extends partnership with MidPoint to make cross-border procurement easier.
  • Hyperwallet adds two new VPs: Tomas Likar and Daniel Berardo. See Hyperwallet at FinDEVr 2016 in New York this month.
  • Kasasa accountholders can now use their institution-issued credit card to qualify for rewards.
  • USA Today interviews Brendon McQueen, CEO of Tuition.io.
  • BioCatch granted new patent to detect user ID on electronic devices.
  • Lighter Capital has funded seven new clients so far this year.

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.

 

DoubleNet Pay, Token Earn Spots at Plug and Play Accelerator

DoubleNet Pay, Token Earn Spots at Plug and Play Accelerator

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Two Finovate alums – DoubleNet Pay and Token – are among the 23 startups picked for the third cohort of Plug and Play’s Financial Technology Platform of Innovation.

The companies will spend three months of mentorship, “structured deal review, pilots, investments, and even acquisitions” with Plug and Play Fintech’s “ecosystem” of corporate partners. Companies are chosen by members of the Plug and Play venture team, as well as VC and corporate judges. The 23 startups will pitch their technologies to investors and industry professionals at Plug and Play’s EXPO in May.

Scott Robinson, founder and director of Plug and Play FinTech, pointed to its new corporate sponsors as a key to the program’s continued success. “This unprecedented level of support will result in new levels of innovation from our startups.”

See a list of all 23 companies.

DoubleNetPay_logo_box_snaggit_resizeDoubleNet Pay helps people better manage their finances by focusing on cash flow, or what the company calls “the problem of having ‘too much month’ at the end of the money.” The company’s technology tracks expenses and due dates, and schedules payments around payday cycles so that users know exactly how much discretionary spending they really have. Founded in 2013 and headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, DoubleNet Pay was highlighted in Human Resource Executive Online last fall in a look at workplace wellness. The company, led by co-founders Brian Cosgray and Cody Laird, demonstrated its platform at FinovateSpring 2015. Check out our Finovate Debut feature from last August.

Token-LogoToken also made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2015 (read our debut profile of Token), and followed up with an appearance at FinDEVr 2015 in San Francisco later in the year.  The company offers an end-to-end, secure payment system that uses digital signatures to authorize transactions instead of both “shared secrets” like passwords and account numbers, as well as traditional tokenization. Launched in 2015, Token was a winner at Innotribe 2015 New York last summer (along with fellow alums, SizeUp and Pendo Systems), and was a finalist in the BBVA Open Talent competition in August.  The company is based in Palo Alto, California.

Update: An earlier version stated the duration of the program at three weeks.

SocietyOne Appoints Former WestPac Exec as CEO

SocietyOne Appoints Former WestPac Exec as CEO

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SocietyOneCEOAustralia-based P2P lender SocietyOne announced it has appointed Jason Yetton, former senior executive at Westpac, as its new CEO.

Prior to his position at Westpac, he played a variety of roles at BT Financial Group. Yetton, a graduate of Harvard Business School’s General Manager program, was recently selected as a member of the federal government’s fintech advisory group.

Yetton will begin in his new role on Monday. SocietyOne’s current CEO & co-founder Matt Symons will assume a new role as chief strategy and innovation officer.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Yetton will face a number of challenges in his new role:

  • Building awareness of P2P lending (a concept that has been slow to take root in Australia) and ramping up marketing to promote the SocietyOne brand as a leader in the space.
  • Adding retail investors to the SocietyOne platform
  • Preparing the company for a potential IPO

Since launching in 2012, SocietyOne has matched more than $78 million in loans. This week alone, the startup originated a record $8.7 million in loans. According to The Australian Business Review, The company has secured 2% to 3% of the nation’s $100 billion unsecured lending market.

SocietyOne launched ClearMatch at FinovateAsia 2012 in Singapore. ClearMatch connects borrowers with lenders by allowing investors to bid at different interest rates on a single loan. This minimizes data entry for the borrower while broadening the reach of investor portfolios.

Personal Capital Exceeds $2 Billion AUM

Personal Capital Exceeds $2 Billion AUM

PersonalCapitalHomepage2016

This week, digital wealth management and advisory platform Personal Capital surpassed $2 billion in assets under management (AUM), up from $1.6 billion in November of last year.

In a press release, the San Francisco-based company reported that one third (just north of $660 million) of the total AUM comes from clients with more than $1 million in assets held at Personal Capital. Furthermore, half of Personal Capital’s one million clients come from traditional adviser relationships, while the other half stem from simpler, self-service brokerages.

On the Personal Capital platform, users aggregate an average of 15 different financial accounts. The company’s active members who track up to $100k in investable assets log into the platform on average of 12 times per month. Those who are tracking up to $1 million or more log in 17 times per month.

Read Personal Capital CEO Bill Harris’s announcement of the news on the company’s blog.

Personal Capital most recently presented to a crowd of developers at FinDEVr 2015 in San Francisco. The company launched One Click Investment Proposals at FinovateSpring 2014 in San Jose.


FinDEVr New York 2016 is coming up on March 29 & 30.Register today to save your seat.

WorkFusion Raises $14 Million Series C Round Led by Nokia Growth Partners

WorkFusion Raises $14 Million Series C Round Led by Nokia Growth Partners

WorkFusion_homepage_Mar2015

Here’s some investment news we missed when it broke in late December: WorkFusion, a company that combines machine learning and crowdsourcing to automate business processes, raised $14 million in Series C investment. The round was led by Nokia Growth Partners, and featured participation from existing investors Greycroft Partners, iNovia Capital, Mohr Davidow Ventures, and RTP Ventures.

The investment takes WorkFusion’s total capital to more than $36 million. The company says the new funding will help fuel its business development initiatives around the world.  

WorkFusion_stage_FF2014

Pictured: WorkFusion CEO Max Yankelvich demonstrating his company’s Active-Learning Automation technology at FinovateFall 2014 in New York.

Calling 2016 “the year of automation,” Yankelvich pointed out that WorkFusion’s customers have reduced operational costs by 60% and gained what he called “business agility.” For financial services companies, WorkFusion’s SaaS technology is deployed for customer onboarding, claims processing, and compliance, among other processes.

Among the more recent financial services companies to deploy WorkFusion’s technology is fellow Finovate alum, Markit, which announced its partnership with the machine learning specialist in February. The company has been profiled recently in the New York Business Journal, as well as in  AlleyWatch, which features a Q&A with WorkFusion VP of Marketing, Adam Devine.

Founded in 2010 and headquartered in New York City, WorkFusion demonstrated its Active-Learning Automation platform at FinovateFall 2014. Eighteen out of the top 20 information services businesses use WorkFusion’s technology, as do leading financial, global commerce, and business process outsourcing providers. Check out our Finovate Debut post featuring WorkFusion.

 

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • “Personal Capital Exceeds $2 Billion AUM”
  • “WorkFusion Raises $14 Million Series C Round Led by Nokia Growth Partners”
  • “DoubleNet Pay, Token Earn Spots at Plug and Play Accelerator”
  • “SocietyOne Appoints Former WestPac Exec as CEO”

Around the web

  • Payoneer powers international payments for South American e-commerce merchant, Linio.
  • TSYS certifies the new mobile EMV solution from Handpoint.
  • Global Retail Banker interviews Dilip Rao, head of business development and operations for Ripple in the Asia-Pacific region.
  • “Micronotes Names Artificial Intelligence Innovator and MIT Expert Dr. Luis Perez-Breva to Board of Advisors”
  • “Avoka Named Top Ten FinTech Worldwide by KPMG”
  • Notable features Financeit’s COO, Casper Wong.

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.

CFPB Issues New Policy Encouraging Fintech Innovation

CFPB Issues New Policy Encouraging Fintech Innovation

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Guest post by Erica A.N. Kramer and Justin B. Hosie*
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On February 18, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released the final version of its Policy on No-Action Letters. The policy is part of the CFPB’s Project Catalyst Initiative whose stated mission is to “support innovators in creating consumer-friendly financial producfpb project catalystcts and services.” The new policy is designed to further the initiative’s mission by allowing developers of new consumer financial services to submit a request to the CFPB for a “No-Action Letter” regarding their innovation’s regulatory compliance.

The most important feature of the No-Action Letter is that it will include a statement indicating that “[CFPB] staff has no present intention to recommend initiation of an enforcement or supervisory action against the requester in respect to the particular aspects of its product under the specific identified provisions and applications of statutes or regulations that are the subject of the [No-Action Letter].” In other words, a No-Action Letter provides an innovator with a green light indicating that the proposed product or service does not conflict with cited statutes or regulations.

mastercard pricelessIn fact, the Supplementary Information included with the policy goes so far as to indicate that CFPB staff would not recommend an enforcement or supervisory action against the holder of a No-Action Letter, absent new or extraordinary circumstances. To borrow from MasterCard’s commercials, the value of a regulatory green light from the CFPB in today’s environment is “Priceless.”

In addition to the No-Action Letter itself, the CFPB believes the new policy encourages informal preliminary discussions. This presents a unique opportunity to participate in an open dialogue with your regulator while still in the development stage. Ultimately, this dialogue will likely increase your chances of producing a final product perceived as both legally compliant and beneficial to consumers.

When the CFPB initially proposed the policy, some critics argued that requiring innovators to produce voluminous information and identify rules that may conflict with the product was overly burdensome. Unsurprisingly, the CFPB declined to remove this requirement in the final policy. Contrary to the way product development works in the real world, the CFPB expects you to either thoroughly analyze potential regulatory risks before launch, or face its wrath.

Since this policy is in its infancy, there is no way to know whether it will be efficient or effective. The CFPB admits it will only provide No-Action Letters in “exceptional circumstances.” However, that does not mean you should pass up the opportunity to request one, especially if you think you have something “exceptional” to offer.

We encourage you to view this policy as a useful tool in your arsenal. We recommend that you first engage in an objective and thorough analysis of the perceived risks and benefits of the new service. Once you’ve done so, contact a lawyer experienced in the fintech industry (hint, hint*) who can assist you in identifying potential regulatory pitfalls and help you draft a persuasive request for a No-Action Letter. While the process may seem overwhelming at the outset, having a No-Action Letter will allow you the freedom to move forward while avoiding the stress of costly regulatory enforcement activity.

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*Justin B. Hosie is a Partner at Hudson Cook LLP, licensed to practice law in Florida and Tennessee. Erica A.N. Kramer is an Associate at Hudson Cook, LLP, licensed to practice law in Florida. You can contact Justin for more information at (423) 490-7560 or [email protected].

Prosper Appoints USAA Exec as New CFO

Prosper Appoints USAA Exec as New CFO

ProsperHomepage2016

KimballUSAA2U.S. peer-to-peer lending platform Prosper announced it has selected David Kimball to take the seat of Macy Lee, who served as the company’s CFO from April 2014 until July of 2015. Kimball most recently held a position as a senior financial officer at USAA. Prior to that, he worked at Ford Motor Company where he held multiple finance-related roles. Kimball, a graduate of Brigham Young University, will begin working at Prosper on March 18.

This news comes about a month after the California-based company announced it raised its rates to keep up with both the Federal Reserve, which raised the benchmark rate by 25 basis points in December and its main competitor, Lending Club, which increased rates by an average of the same amount as the Fed.

Prosper presented at FinovateSpring 2009 as well as the inaugural Finovate in 2007.

Finovate Debuts: Innofis Enhances the UX for Banks and Customers

Finovate Debuts: Innofis Enhances the UX for Banks and Customers

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Customers shouldn’t be the only ones enjoying a great user experience. That’s the driving factor behind Innofis, a company that furnishes a suite of digital banking tools providing a beautiful user experience for both bankers and their customers.

In 2012, the company saw an opportunity in offering digital banking services. The initial team, whose roots stem from banking, IT, and digital offerings, launched Innofis that same year. By the end of the year, they already had two customers, and they knew they were onto a great idea.

Company facts

  • Headquartered in Barcelona, Spain
  • Founded in 2012
  • Privately owned
  • 80+ employees
  • €6M in revenue
  • >3 million digital end customers (retail and corporate)

InnofisDemoIMG

The company’s back-end management tools make it simple for any bank employee to control banking campaigns across all channels. The company uses big data combined with contextual customer behavior to help banks extend relevant calls to action.

DMorenoWe caught up with the company’s CEO, David Moreno at FinovateEurope 2016 for an interview to learn more about Innofis.

Moreno, who has served as CEO of Innofis since 2012, started his career at a bank where he worked in retail and corporate banking, marketing, IT, and consulting. During his 11-year tenure, he saw and experienced many different functions of the bank.

Finovate: What problem does Innofis solve?
Moreno: Many banks are still in the process of either starting up their digital platform or looking for modules which complement their existing offer. Established banks are often struggling with legacy systems and little or no connection between the new digital channels and the more traditional ones. Innofis helps banks solve these issues by either implementing a complete digital platform or providing the missing parts with specific modules. Furthermore, banks face a challenge in keeping up with continuous market innovation, such as wearables, augmented reality and geolocation. Innofis keeps a tab on these developments and adds them to their digital service offering as they appear.

Finovate: Who are your primary customers?
Moreno: Our clients are banks. We are working with some of the world’s largest banks and have millions of their customers using our digital platforms.

InnofisOmnichannel
Innofis multi-channel interface

Finovate: How does Innofis solve the problem better?
Moreno: We do not necessarily propose a complete digital ‘reset’ for banks. We are mindful of the investments made and difficulty of infrastructure switching costs. Our modular approach is the ideal answer to this situation. We often actually reuse existing applications and provide an efficient combination between old and new.

Finovate: Tell us about your favorite implementation of your solution.
Moreno: We did recently have the opportunity to help a bank in the Middle East start from scratch and implement our entire range of digital channels (mobile, tablets, desktop, wearables) together with our administration platform that allows to manage completely the channels and the way they interact with their clients . It was great to see these go live and see customer usage rates jump up right away.

Dashboard

Innofis administration dashboard

Finovate: What in your background gave you the confidence to tackle this challenge?
Moreno: I have many years of experience working in banks. I do not approach the constant financial innovation as a threat for banks, but rather an opportunity to adapt existing resources and provide better service for banking clients. I believe that my background, together with a strong technical team who made our platform a reality, have allowed us to position ourselves as a trusted advisor and provider for banks.

Finovate: What are some upcoming initiatives from Innofis that we can look forward to over the next few months?
Moreno: We continue working on some ground-breaking modules that complement our platform. At FinovateEurope, we showed our approach of focusing on the UX for the people inside the bank who actually have to work with the systems. And the response has been tremendous. We believe banks understand now that a good customer-facing UX is a must. The real challenge now is to provide products that can actually be used easily and efficiently by the banks.

EditCampaignsGeolocationInnofis geofenced offer capability
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Finovate: Where do you see Innofis a year or two from now?
Moreno: We are on a road of international expansion. We are experiencing increasing demand from Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and others and we are planning to build out our organization in order to keep delivering the quality of implementation that customers have come to expect from us.


Innofis CEO David Moreno, along with David Falk, demoed the company’s Omnichannel Predictive Banking at FinovateEurope 2016 in London.