Spreedly Raises $2.5 Million in New Funding

Spreedly Raises $2.5 Million in New Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Spreedly

Spreedly_homepage_Oct2015

A few weeks ago, when we first read the rumors of new funding for Spreedly, we checked with the source, company CEO Justin Benson. He told us to stay tuned. “Bigger news is coming,” he said.

And so today, with word that the “Payments as a Platform” specialist has raised $2.5 million in new funding, we are happy to say that the bigger news has arrived.

“This new round brings our total raised capital to a little under $5 million,” Benson said in a blog post this afternoon. “We worked with our existing investors E-Merge and as part of this new round we’re thrilled that we were able to add a founder of Ogone to our list of investors,” he said.

Spreedly_stage_FinDEVr2015

Spreedly CTO Nathaniel Talbott speaking during his presentation “The Vault Grown Up” at FinDEVr 2015 in San Francisco.

Benson emphasized the importance of this kind of traction as a motivator to help make it “through the early slog via critical validation.” He also explained how a strategy of targeting “greenfield” opportunities and early investments in the technology enabled Spreedly to get a “fully featured product” to market as quickly as they did. Benson said that the funding would allow the company to invest in sales, business development, and marketing talent “so we don’t remain the best kept secret in payments.”

Spreedly helps marketplaces and platforms accept a wider range of payment types while reducing cost, complexity, and compliance burden. Benson said the company now has nine developers on staff, a trio of “business folks”, and manages 300 marketplaces and platforms that are generating annualized processing volume of nearly $2 billion. Spreedly’s APIs are used by companies including Oxfam, SeatGeek, Tango, and Zomato.

Founded in January 2008 and headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, 12-person Spreedly demonstrated its universal credit card, token technology at its FinDEVr 2015 debut in San Francisco.

Spreedly is also a Finovate alum. The company presented its Payment Method Distribution and Card-on-File updater at FinovateSpring 2014 in San Jose.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: blooom, Cardlytics, MasterCard, Mitek, Spreedly, Top Image Systems, Vouch

On Finovate.com

  • “Spreedly Raises $2.5 Million in New Funding”

Around the web:

  • BNY Mellon to deploy iRemit, a cloud-based remittance solution from Top Image Systems.
  • Vouch Financial CEO Yee Lee weighs in on the future of banking.
  • Cardlytics partners with MasterCard to deliver card-linked services.
  • New York Magazine profiles Blooom President Greg Smith, a former Goldman Sachs banker.
  • Mitek adds facial recognition to its ID document-verification solution, Photo Verify.

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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Fintech Fundings: 27 Companies Raise $420 Million Week Ending 23 October

Fintech Fundings: 27 Companies Raise $420 Million Week Ending 23 October
By Jim Bruene Posted on
Categories: Funding

Money_clickThere was a little of everything this week in what continues to be a strong month in funding (already over $1 billion). Worldwide, 28 companies raised about $420 million ($417 million not including funds from 4 undisclosed rounds).

Two blockbuster deals contributed over half the total: $170 million to German marketplace lender Auxmoney and $81 million to health insurance management platform Collective Health. And seven other rounds surpassed the $10-million mark. But there were also plenty of smaller seed bets this week, something we haven’t seen as much of recently. Ten companies raised $1.7 million or less. Finally, congratulations to Finovate alum Financit which grabbed an undisclosed, but we are guessing considerable, amount of capital from Goldman Sachs.

So far this year, $15.7 billion has been raised privately. In addition, $5.9 billion was invested through two blockbuster payment IPOs last week.

Here are the deals from 17 Oct to 24 Oct 2015, by size:

Auxmoney
P2P loan platform
Latest round: $170 million Series C
Total raised: $198 million
HQ: Dusseldorf, Germany
Tags: Consumer, lending, marketplace, peer-to-peer, loans, investing
Source: Crunchbase

Collective Health
Health insurance platform for businesses
Latest round: $81 million Series C
Total raised: $119 million
HQ: San Mateo, California
Tags: Enterprise, small biz, SMB, health insurance, management
Source: Crunchbase

Insureon
Insurance for small businesses
Latest round: $31.5 million
Total raised: $31.5 million
HQ: Chicago, Illinois
Tags: SMB, insurance, lead gen, quotes
Source: Crunchbase

Poynt
Smart payment terminal
Latest round: $28 million Series B
Total raised: $28 million
HQ: Palo Alto, California
Tags: SMB, small biz, merchants, acquiring, mPOS, point-of-sale, acquiring, payments
Source: Crunchbase

Citrus Payments
Web and mobile payment solutions for merchants
Latest round: $25 million
Total raised: $32.3 million
HQ: Mumbai, India
Tags: Consumer, payments, billpay, billing, SMB, merchants, point-of-sale, acquiring
Source: Crunchbase

iControl
Payment management
Latest round: $20 million
Total raised: $20 million
HQ: Burtonsville, Maryland
Tags: Business, SMB, trading partner management, Goldman Sachs (investor)
Source: FT Partners

Wave Crest Group
Prepaid card platform
Latest round: $14 million
Total raised: $32.9 million
HQ: Gibraltar
Tags: Enterprise, B2B2C, debit cards, prepaid, mobile, payments processing
Source: Crunchbase

MoneyForward
Online personal financial management
Latest round: $13.3 million Series C
Total raised: $30.9 million
HQ: Tokyo, Japan
Tags: Consumer, PFM, account aggregation, banking
Source: Crunchbase

Skills Fund
Lending to bootcamp students
Latest round: $11.5 million Seed
Total raised: $11.5 million
HQ: Austin, Texas
Tags: Consumer, student loans, accelerated learning, alt-lending
Source: Crunchbase

NerdWallet
Personal finance information portal
Latest round: $5 million Series A ($510 million valuation)
Total raised: $102 million (includes $33 million debt)
HQ: San Francisco, California
Tags: Consumer, financial services, lead gen, price comparison
Source: Crunchbase

inMediata
Healthcare payment management
Latest round: $4 million
Total raised: $4 million
HQ: Charlotte, North Carolina
Tags: Health care, payments, B2B2C, small business, SMB
Source: FT Partners

PIN Payments
Payments for developers
Latest round: $3.1 million
Total raised: $3.1 million
HQ: Melbourne, Australia
Tags: Consumer, PFM
Source: Crunchbase

WB21
Real-time global money-transfer system
Latest round: $2.27 million
Total raised: $2.94 million
HQ: Palo Alto, California
Tags: Consumer, payments, remittances,
Source: Crunchbase

Moneytree
Mobile transaction aggregation
Latest round: Undisclosed Series A (“in millions”)
Total raised: $1.6 million (prior to the Series A)
HQ: Tokyo, Japan
Tags: Consumer, mobile, debit/credit cards, account aggregation, PFM
Source: Crunchbase

Pepper
Mobile payment and loyalty app
Latest round: $1.7 million
Total raised: $1.7 million
HQ: London, England, United Kingdom
Tags: Consumer, payments, mobile, rewards
Source: FT Partners

LoanBook Capital
Marketplace lending platform
Latest round: $1.25 million
Total raised: $2.4 million
HQ: Barcelona, Spain
Tags: Consumer, P2P, lending, loans, underwriting, investing
Source: Crunchbase

SoftPay Mobile
Mobile point-of-sale
Latest round: $1 million Series A
Total raised: $1 million
HQ: Hanoi, Vietnam
Tags: Consumer, payments, mPOS, acquiring, merchants, Life.SREDA (investor)
Source: Crunchbase

SlimTrader
Trading platform for African commerce
Latest round: $1 million
Total raised: $1 million
HQ: Seattle, Washington
Tags: Consumer, ecommerce, payments, mobile
Source: Crunchbase

Timelio
P2P receivables financing plaform
Latest round: $500,000 Seed
Total raised:$500,000
HQ: Melbourne, Australia
Tags: SMB, small biz, receivables financing, invoice factoring, P2P, peer-to-peer
Source: Crunchbase

BSAVE
Bitcoin investing
Latest round: $400,000
Total raised: $400,000
HQ: London, England, United Kingdom
Tags: Consumer, virtual currency, investing
Source: Crunchbase

HomeCanvasr
Off-market real estate listings
Latest round: $200,000 Seed
Total raised: $200,000
HQ: Brooklyn, New York
Tags: Consumer, home purchase, real estate, mortgage
Source: FT Partners

Equinvest
Online platform for equity investing
Latest round: $170,000
Total raised: $170,000
HQ: Rome, Italy
Tags: Consumer, startups, SMB, equity investing, angel investing, VC
Source: Crunchbase

FastSeva
Online telecom recharge and billpay
Latest round: $100,000
Total raised: $100,000
HQ: Surat, India
Tags: Consumer, mobile, telecommunications, billing, invoicing
Source: Crunchbase

Financit
In-store financing specialist
Latest round: Undisclosed
Total raised: $21.4 million
HQ: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Tags: Consumer, financing, B2B2C, indirect lending, loans, underwriting, in-store POS, Finovate alum
Source: Finovate

Abra
Bitcoin remittances
Latest round: Undisclosed Series A
Total raised: $14 million
HQ: Mountain View, California
Tags: Consumer, payments, cyrptocurrency, remittances, American Express (investor)
Source: FT Partners

LetsVenture
Fund-raising platform for startups
Latest round: Undisclosed
Total raised: Unknown
HQ: Singapore
Tags: SMB, enterprise, investing, fund raising, equity, investing
Source: Crunchbase

Stockal
Automated personal trader
Latest round: Undisclosed Seed
Total raised: Unknown
HQ: Bangalore, India
Tags: Consumer, mobile, investing, trading, analytics
Source: Crunchbase

—–
Image licensed from 123rf.com

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Finovate Alums Earn Top Honors at U.K. Emerging Payments Awards

Finovate Alums Earn Top Honors at U.K. Emerging Payments Awards
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Clover Network, Currency Cloud, Ethoca, Hyperwallet, Kalixa, MasterCard, Revolut

Three Finovate/FinDEVr alums won top honors at the Emerging Payments Awards in London, United Kingdom, earlier this month.

HyperwalletLogoHyperwallet won in the “Best Corporate/Government Payments Programme” division with its Paylution Global Disbursements Program. In a statement, CEO Brent Warrington highlighted the scalability and flexibility of the Hyperwallet platform, and reported that more than five million independent workers are currently using the technology. Hyperwallet demonstrated its RESTful API and embedded payout widget at FinDEVr 2015 in San Francisco in October.

Revolut_logo_high-resIn partnership with Optimal Payments, Revolut won the “Best Emerging Payments Startup” category. Optimal Payments and Revolut teamed up back in July to launch a multi-currency MasterCard and mobile app that helps travelers take advantage of the best exchange rates available. Revolut made its Finovate debut this year at FinovateEurope 2015 in London.

Clover_logoClover Mobile won “Best Payment Technological Innovation” for its Future-Proof mPOS. Clover Mobile was launched in the fall of 2014, a year after Clover was acquired by First Data. Clover made its Finovate appearance at FinovateSpring 2012 in San Francisco.

The other four Finovate/FinDEVr alums that made it to the finals were:

The event’s overall Industry Contributor Award went to IrisGuard for its EyeBank Iris Recognition electronic payment platform. The platform has been deployed to help bring “sustainable financial inclusion” to those in the Syrian refugee program. As of June 2015, the program had enrolled more than 1.6 million refugees.

Now in its eighth year, the Emerging Payments Awards help recognize creative and business talent in the payments industry. The Awards are run by the Emerging Payments Association, which has also provided the Prepaid Awards since 2006. The Association said that this year’s Emerging Payments Awards was its largest event to date.

If you’re in the United Kingdom and love fintech, then make sure FinovateEurope 2016 is on your calendar. Our two-day conference returns to London, February 9 and 10, 2016.

 

 

 

 

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: blooom, Diebold, Prairie Cloudware, SimplyTapp, Trulioo, TSYS, Yodlee

On Finovate.com

  • Finovate Alums earn top honors at U.K.’s Emerging Payments Awards.

Around the web

  • NPR’s Morning Edition features Greg Smith, president of Blooom, in a segment on robo-advisory.
  • Diebold and SimplyTapp team up to introduce a white-label mobile wallet.
  • Trulioo now provides real-time ID-verification coverage in India.
  • INTECH licenses Digital Payments Guardian from Prairie Cloudware.
  • Yodlee integrates with Salesforce Financial Services Cloud.
  • TSYS and Ingenico partner on new solution to simplify EMV certification.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account

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Financeit Closes Undisclosed Amount of Funding from Goldman Sachs

Financeit Closes Undisclosed Amount of Funding from Goldman Sachs
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinanceIt, Funding

FinancitHomepage1015

Canada-based Financeit, a company that offers cloud-based POS financing, closed an undisclosed amount of funding today.

Goldman Sachs led the round, and the amount furnished is undisclosed.

The company’s last round of funding, an installment of $13 million, was received in November 2013. This brought the company’s total amount raised to $21.5 million. Today’s undisclosed amount brings the company’s total funding somewhere north of that amount.

According to the press release, Financeit plans to use the funds to add to its merchant partner base of 4,000. Co-founder and CEO Michael Garrity states, “The minority investment made by Goldman Sachs gives us growth capital to put our leading-edge financing platform into the hands of more merchants.”

Last year, in partnership with FIS, Financeit launched in the United States. Check out the launch video here. In its four years of operation across the two countries, Financeit has received more than $1 billion in loan applications.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: DAVO Technologies, Expensify, FinanceIt

On Finovate.com

  • Financeit closes undisclosed amount of funding from Goldman Sachs.

Around the web

  • CEO CFO interviews feature DAVO Technologies’ CEO Owen Brown, co-founder.
  • FirstRound.com: Expensify’s CEO David Barrett talks about the tactics that doubled Expensify’s customer base in just six months.

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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FinDEVr New York Launch, March 2016

FinDEVr New York Launch, March 2016
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: FinDEVr 2016 New York

FinDEVrNYHomepage

The biggest takeaway from our just-completed FinDEVr event was just how fast the fintech world is moving towards platforms, APIs and other sophisticated integrations. And it’s too hard to keep pace with just a single annual developer’s event.

So we are excited to announce a second show, FinDEVr New York, 29/30 March 2016.

Tickets are on sale. Special ticket pricing for developers lowers pricing <$500. Register now before pricing increases.

ChainPreso

Based on feedback from previous FinDEVr events, including the record 600 who attended last week, we’ve landed on a format that resonates with the technical crowd. Four or five dozen leading fintech providers will show off their newest tools and APIs in fast-paced, 15-minute presentations focusing on the TECH in fintech.

The dual-track program—along with ample time to work one-on-one with the presenters—will be held in the New World Stages in mid-town Manhattan.

NewWorldStagesIMG

Curious about the content? Next week, the full-length videos of the 63 presentations at FinDEVr San Francisco will be available at Finovate.com.

If you’re interested in presenting at FinDEVr New York, please email newyork@findevr.com for more details.

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Finovate Debuts: LiquidLandscape’s Visualization Solves Scattered Data

Finovate Debuts: LiquidLandscape’s Visualization Solves Scattered Data
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Finovate Debuts, LiquidLandscape

LiquidLandscapeHomepage

LiquidLandscape offers banks a risk-visualization workspace. The startup’s LiquidLandscape Notebook is a collaborative space where banking executives view and interact with data on a map and communicate with each other about the correlations.

Company facts:

  • Barclays tech-accelerator alum
  • 3 employees
  • Headquartered in San Francisco
  • Founded 2013

All financial services firms must communicate about data, but it is not always easy to understand how the data-points relate, or what potential issues the correlations may indicate. LiquidLandscape helps solve this issue of scattered data.

CEO Margit Zwemer describes the product as instant replay for financial services’ data that creates a “tube map” to show data-bottlenecks. The LiquidLandscape dashboard can map the data in an intelligible way, making it easy for employees to zoom in, at any level, to help answer the questions:

  1. What is the problem?
  2. What data indicate the issue?
  3. What decision was made?

In the screenshots below, the user is examining capital flow among major countries.

LiquidLandscapeDataOverview

After the user selects their desired specifications, type, and ranges, LiquidLandscape maps the data. In the screenshot below, the user has drilled down to examine Hong Kong’s trades with China, Japan, and the United States.

LiquidLandscapeWorldTrade

The platform also facilitates communication. Rather than require employees to email data back and forth, LiquidLandscape creates efficiency by enabling users to comment within the platform on specific data-points.

The screenshot below shows the discussion log on the right panel that creates a history of the chat-log around data. All comments are tied to the data, and users can respond to comments, making it easy to keep communication threads organized.

LiquidLandscapeDiscussion

It is easiest to understand the power of LiquidLandscape’s platform through examples. Using various types of big data, the dashboard helps analyze:

  • Fund flows between ETFs
  • Risk-limit breaches between individual traders and the risk department’s requirements
  • Connections between different parts of an organization
  • Mortgage applications completed online vs. in-app
  • Audit trails for compliance
  • Consumer credit qualification

LiquidLandscape is secure and fully compliant. And while there are essentially no limits on what its engine can help visualize, the startup is currently focused on helping financial services companies understand and mitigate risk. LiquidLandscape does, however, have future plans to broaden its focus in the upcoming years.

What’s next?
This fall, LiquidLandscape launched in beta. The company is in the middle of fundraising and plans to grow its three-person team.

Here is the LiquidLandscape team debuting at FinovateFall 2015:

http://finovate.wistia.com/medias/2lffbvq11o?embedType=api&videoFoam=true&videoWidth=800

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OnDeck Adds New Small Business Lending Options

OnDeck Adds New Small Business Lending Options
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: On Deck Capital

OnDeck_homepage_Oct2015

Online SME lender OnDeck has announced a significant expansion of its product line for small businesses.

The expanded product suite includes broader loan terms—increasing the maximum loan amount from $250,000 to $500,000—and granting borrowers up to 36 months to repay (from 24 months). Lines of credit will be available up to $100,000 (from $20,000) for a monthly fee of $20 and no “draw fees.” Repeat customers will be eligible for annual rates as low as 5.99%, as well as loyalty pricing benefits.

Calling the new product line a “natural expansion,” OnDeck CEO Noah Breslow said the new options would give customers more ways to finance their growth. The combination of OnDeck’s “fifth-generation OnDeck Score,” its economies of scale, and its customer service, he said, meant the company was now able provide “credit solutions for virtually any small business financing need.”

OnDeck_stage_FinDEVr2014

From left: Ondeck’s Miranda Lanzillotti, marketing communications manager, and Pamela Rice, senior vice president of technology, discussed lending APIs at FinDEVr 2014.

One of the pioneers in alternative lending, OnDeck has used data aggregation and digital payment technology to provide small and medium businesses with capital since 2007. Since inception, the company has delivered more than $3 billion in funds to companies working in more than 700 industries. OnDeck provides its third-party partners with APIs that deliver fully integrated lending functionality that includes loan applications, preapprovals, and prequalifications.

Just this week, OnDeck announced it was expanding its partnership with the Association for Enterprise Opportunity. And last month, the company teamed up with Intuit to launch a $100 million lending fund for small businesses.

Fortune magazine listed OnDeck as one of the 100 Best Places to Work for Millennials. The company was highlighted among the top 25 alternative lending startups by Let’s Talk Payments, and ranked in the top 20 of Selling Power’s list of 2015 Best Companies to Sell For.

OnDeck presented at FinDEVr 2014 in San Francisco and returned this year to FinDEVr 2015. In 2012, OnDeck demonstrated OnDeck Connect at FinovateSpring 2012 in San Francisco. The company was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in New York City. OnDeck went public in December 2014, raising $200 million and earning a valuation of $1.3 billion.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Algomi, Cachet Financial Solutions, Encap, Feedzai, Kabbage, LiquidLandscape, Mambu, Motif Investing, On Deck Capital, PayItSimple, SecondMarket

On Finovate.com

  • Finovate debuts: “LiquidLandscape’s Visualization Solves Scattered Data”
  • “FinDEVr Launches in New York, March 2016″
  • “OnDeck adds new small business lending options”

Around the web

  • The Financial Brand: Beyond the Arc’s Steven Ramirez considers three fintech trends from Finovate alums.
  • Nasdaq acquires SecondMarket to help startups sell shares.
  • Motif Investing partners with J.P. Morgan to offer investors fractional IPO shares.
  • ING and Kabbage partner to bring platform lending to Europe’s small businesses.
  • PayItSimple USA changes its name to Splitit.
  • Encap Security announces formation of new advisory board.
  • Algomi wins “Most Innovative Trading Product/Service” category at the Financial News Awards in Trading & Technology for the second consecutive year.
  • OakNorth Bank chooses Mambu as its banking technology partner.
  • Feedzai introduces data science studio for fraud prevention.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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SumUp Brings its mPOS Technology to America

SumUp Brings its mPOS Technology to America
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: SumUp, VISA

SumUp_homepage_Oct2015

SumUp, a leading European mPOS (mobile point of sale) innovator, is launching in the United States.

And if you ask SumUp CEO Daniel Klein, the company has arrived just in time.

“We are here to help U.S. merchants and partners, such as cash register vendors, to transition quickly and securely to EMV, by making payments as easy as possible for their customers,” Klein said. He pointed out that SumUp is the “platform of choice for EMV transactions in 14 countries” serving tens of thousands of merchants.

SumUp_stage_FEU2013b

SumUp CMO and co-founder Stefan Jeschonnek demonstrated his company’s platform at FinovateEurope 2013 in London.

As part of its U.S. launch, SumUp will be unveiling a new EMV contactless card terminal, available for pre-order at $99. The new terminal is designed specifically for the U.S. market, enabling merchants to accept electronic and e-wallet, Apple Pay and Android Pay payments via NFC, as well as accept payments with EMV chip-cards. “The shift to EMV chip-cards puts more costly fraud liability on stores without chip terminals,” Klein added, “but only half of small businesses are even aware of EMV liability.”

SumUp provides end-to-end payment-processing solutions supported by its own proprietary EMV card terminals, and mobile apps. U.S. merchants using the technology will be able to accept Visa, MasterCard, and American Express payments. SumUp will charge a transaction fee of 2.75%. The company plans to announce strategic partnerships with “major U.S. companies” soon.

One company already partnered with SumUp is Visa, whose SVP for Innovation and Strategic Partnerships, Bill Gajda, praised SumUp’s “impact on the conversion of cash to electronic commerce” around the world. Gajda added that encouraging EMV adoption was also important. “We are focused on encouraging and supporting the adoption of EMV chip technology in the U.S. as quickly and efficiently as possible, so that everyone can realize the powerful security benefits that EMV chips provide,” he said.

Founded in 2011 and headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, SumUp demonstrated its platform at FinovateEurope 2013 in London. The company has more than $56 million in funding.

For more information about our upcoming FinovateEurope 2016 conference, visit our information page.

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