Alumni News

Temenos Launches Responsible Generative AI Solutions

Temenos Launches Responsible Generative AI Solutions
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Temenos
  • Temenos has launched Responsible Generative AI Solutions for financial services.
  • The GenAI tools allow bank employees to use natural language to query the engine, which will leverage banks’ data to generate unique insights and reports.
  • At launch, the new GenAI tools will be available within Temenos Wealth and Temenos Digital products.

Banking technology provider Temenos launched Responsible Generative AI Solutions for financial services this week. The Switzerland-based company is making the solutions available as part of its AI infused banking platform, starting with its Temenos Wealth and Temenos Digital products.

Temenos’ new offering aims to change the way banks leverage their data, and the company anticipates they will ultimately improve banks’ productivity and profitability. Temenos’ new Responsible Generative AI solutions work similarly to other GenAI engines, such as ChatGPT, in that they allow bank employees to use natural language to query the engine, which will leverage banks’ data to generate unique insights and reports. Banks can use the new tools in processes ranging from managing existing accounts to brainstorming new products and mitigating financial crime.

“We all use AI in our daily lives and benefit from the personalized services and insight,” said Temenos President Product and COO Prema Varadhan. “Temenos Explainable AI offers transparent, auditable insights while our Generative AI infused platform delivers these insights instantly in an intelligent and personalized way. Temenos ensures responsible AI practices by providing explainability, security, safe deployment, and banking-specific capabilities. With our AI platform, banks can rapidly implement real-world use cases that enhance efficiency, boost profitability, and create hyper-personalized customer experiences.”

The “responsible” part of Temenos’ new tools lies in its transparency and explainability. Users and regulators will have visibility into the process and will be able to verify the results produced by the engine. The Responsible Generative AI solutions also have a permissions and access security framework to address data security and privacy concerns.

Banks can deploy the new Responsible Generative AI Solutions as standalone solutions or connect them with their existing core systems on-premise, on public or private clouds, or delivered via Temenos SaaS.

Temenos was founded in 1993 and offers solutions for retail and commercial banking, wealth management, payments, fund administrators, insurance companies, and more. The company has clients in 150 countries and offers solutions that touch 30% of the world’s banking population, equivalent to 1.2 billion people.

Photo by Tara Winstead

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AI Integration Platform AI Squared Acquires Multiwoven

AI Integration Platform AI Squared Acquires Multiwoven
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: AI Squared, Alumni News, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • AI integration specialist AI Squared acquired open-source Reverse ETL (rETL) company, Multiwoven. Terms were not disclosed.
  • The acquisition follows AI Squared’s $13.8 million Series A funding round in April.
  • AI Squared made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2023.

AI integration platform AI Squared has acquired open-source Reverse ETL (rETL) company Multiwoven. The transaction fortifies AI Squared’s ability to help organizations more easily move data and AI-based insights into business applications.

In a statement, AI Squared Founder and CEO Benjamin Harvey praised both Multiwoven’s technology as well as its open-source approach to innovation. “From my experiences as a data-science executive at the National Security Agency and as an early employee at Databricks, I recognize and respect the critical role that the open-source community plays in fueling innovation,” Harvey said. “Now as a singular organization, AI Squared and Multiwoven will continue to lead the way in open-source rETL, while simultaneously bringing critical data-movement functionality to our customers.”

Multiwoven is an open-source, reverse ETL platform that facilitates secure data segmentation, synchronization, and activation. The company’s technology makes it easier for firms to deploy this organized data into applications and business tools for sales, marketing, and advertising operations. By integrating Multiwoven’s rETL capabilities into its platform, AI Squared will be able to help organizations efficiently integrate robust data and AI insights into their applications.

“With our new combined team, we will be able to accelerate the development and growth of Multiwoven open-source, which will remain free to use,” Multiwoven Co-Founder and CEO Sojoy Golan said. “We are also excited to now introduce advanced capabilities to activate AI/ML data, together with AI Squared.”

AI Squared also will continue to support development of Multiwoven’s open-source technology. Golan called open-source “a wonderful enabler” that has helped uncover insights not only for Multiwoven’s own users and open-source contributors, but also for “the data practitioners on our Community Slack, and all the other generous people in the open-source community.” As part of the transaction, Multiwoven’s team will join AI Squared. Golan has been named Chief Product Officer; Multiwoven Co-Founders Nagendra Dhanakeerthi and Subin Thattaparambil will serve as Chief Technology Officer and SVP of Engineering, respectively.

Headquartered in Washington, D.C., AI Squared made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2023 and returned to the Finovate stage later that year for FinovateFall in New York. In its most recent appearance, AI Squared demonstrated how adding Generative AI to the platform’s Predictive AI capabilities enables users to build tools such as chatbots to help them more efficiently query their data.

AI Squared was founded in 2019. Learn more about the company in our feature interview with AI Squared’s Benjamin Harvey.

Photo by Lum3n

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Experian Launches Cashflow Attributes to Help Underserved Consumers Access Credit

Experian Launches Cashflow Attributes to Help Underserved Consumers Access Credit
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Experian
  • Experian launched Cashflow Attributes, a tool to offer lenders more data about underserved consumers.
  • Cashflow Attributes offers lenders visibility into more than 900 consumer attributes that reflect consumers’ cashflow and affordability.
  • Lenders can use the insights to aid in their underwriting decisions, drive more personalized experiences, and help improve financial management tools.

Information services company Experian unveiled Cashflow Attributes yesterday, a new solution that leverages open banking to help underserved consumers access fair and affordable credit.

Cashflow Attributes uses more than 900 income, cashflow, and affordability attributes to allow lenders to integrate applicants’ banking data into the decision-making process. Experian expects the new solution will help some of the 106 million U.S. consumers who are considered credit invisible, unscoreable by conventional credit scores, or have a subprime or below credit score and are therefore unable to secure credit at mainstream rates. Credit Attributes layers traditional credit report data with cashflow insights to create a more detailed view of a consumer’s financial health and creditworthiness.

“Supporting financial inclusion and creating an equitable path to credit is ingrained in our DNA,” said Experian Financial and Marketing Services Group President Scott Brown. “We believe banking information holds untapped potential and that our new Cashflow Attributes represent an exciting step forward that can easily be integrated into lending decisions. As we look ahead, we will continue to leverage our core credit data, new data elements and our analytics expertise to unlock new opportunities for both consumers and businesses.”

To use Cashflow Attributes, lenders first provide Experian with depersonalized transaction information from their existing customers or from customers at other banks, as long as they have consumer-permissioned account access. Experian uses its categorization model to analyze and categorize the consumer transaction data and sends the lender the transaction categories and predictive attributes. Lenders can use these categories and attributes to aid in their underwriting decisions, drive more personalized experiences, and help improve financial management tools.

Founded in 1980 and originally known for its consumer credit reporting, Experian has extensive access to data and has added fraud prevention offerings, identity theft protection, credit building tools, and a loan comparison marketplace. On the commercial side, Experian provides a range of services for small businesses, including business credit reporting, marketing products and services, debt collection tools, and more. The company is headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, and is listed on the London Stock Exchange under the ticker EXPN and has a market capitalization of $39.5 billion.

Photo by Lukas

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Nubank Exceeds 100 Million Customer Mark

Nubank Exceeds 100 Million Customer Mark
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Nubank
  • Nubank has surpassed 100 million customers, stating that it is the first digital banking platform outside of Asia to reach this customer milestone.
  • Nubank serves 92 million customers in Brazil, over 7 million in Mexico, and close to 1 million in Colombia.
  • In 2023, Nubank achieved record financial results, reaching more than $1 billion in net profit and over $8 billion in revenue.

Brazilian challenger bank Nubank announced this week it has surpassed 100 million customers across Latin America. The fintech estimates it is the first digital banking platform outside of Asia to reach this customer milestone. Nubank is currently active in three countries, serving 92 million customers in Brazil, over 7 million in Mexico, and close to 1 million in Colombia.

The company has a mission of “fighting complexity to empower people,” offering users a digital bank account, credit card, mobile phone insurance, life insurance, personal loans, and investing tools. The company launched business accounts in 2019 to offer small business users a bank account, credit card, and a phone-based payment acceptance app.

“In 2013, we had set ourselves the ambitious goal to reach one million customers in five years, which seemed almost impossible at the time,” said Nubank Founder and CEO David Vélez. “In a decade, we have surpassed 100 million, which is a testament to the trust our customers place in us and to the power of a truly customer-centric business model. These 100 million customers have written their stories together with ours, and we want to honor them in a special way.”

Since its inception, Nubank has been instrumental in helping its customers save more than 440 million hours of waiting in service queues. Additionally, the company estimated that it helped users save 11 billion dollars in banking fees in 2023.

Perhaps more notable than savings consumers on fees and their time waiting in line, Nubank has also been instrumental in promoting financial inclusion in Brazil, a region notorious for its high rate of unbanked adults. Between July 2021 and July 2022, Nubank added 5.7 million credit cardholders to the country’s credit card market. In a survey it conducted of accountholders from 2021, Nubank found that 60% of Brazilian customers improved their financial journey in the first 24 months, citing frequent and responsible use of credit cards and other financial products.

“Being customer-centric has been guiding us since the very beginning,”said Nubank Co-founder and Chief Growth Officer Cristina Junqueira. “Today, we want our customers to see themselves the way we see them: at the center of everything. In reaching this milestone, we want to focus on the real people and individual stories of empowerment and advance our mission to help improve people’s lives.”

From a U.S. perspective, Nubank’s customer number is not the only impressive metric surrounding the fintech. The company closed last year with record financial results, recording more than $1 billion in net profit and over $8 billion in revenue. The positive financials are especially admirable, given that many U.S.-based challenger banks are still seeking to reach the break even point.

Photo by John Petalcurin

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FIS Launches Embedded Finance Platform Atelio

FIS Launches Embedded Finance Platform Atelio
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, FIS
  • FIS unveiled its embedded finance platform, Atelio by FIS, this week.
  • The platform leverages FIS’ existing technology to enable businesses to embed a variety of financial products and services into their offerings.
  • FIS made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring in 2013. Stephanie Ferris is CEO and President.

FIS is the latest company to introduce a platform to make it easier for businesses and software developers to embed financial services and fintech solutions into their products and services. Atelio by FIS, launched this week, is one of the first banking-as-a-service offerings from a major core provider. The technology will serve B2C fintechs and enable financial and non-financial services companies alike to implement embedded finance into their existing offerings

“Welcome to the future of financial services,” FIS President of Platform and Enterprise Products Tarun Bhatnagar said. “Atelio by FIS is our vision to lead where fintech is going, which is outside the boundaries of how businesses enable, and their customers consume, financial services today.”

Atelio leverages FIS existing technology by way of easily embeddable and consumable components. The platform enables non-financial companies to offer their customers a wide variety of financial experiences: collecting deposits, moving money, issuing cards, sending invoices, and more. Atelio also provides tools to help companies fight fraud, anticipate cash flows, and gain insights into consumer preferences and behaviors.

FIS’ latest offering comes at a time when growth in embedded finance is expected to soar. In its product announcement, the company pointed to research from Bain Capital that indicated that embedded finance will represent 10% of all transactions by 2026. The firm values these transactions at $7 trillion, or more than $50 billion in total revenue. Additionally, research from S&P Global Intelligence showed that banks that offered embedded finance solutions outperformed their peers in terms of deposit growth.

“More than just a new solution, Atelio is built to lend the expertise, tools, and distribution so that our users and clients can focus on creating,” Bhatnagar said. “Our scale, distribution and continued investment in technology have given us the foundation to unlock our financial capabilities to a wider audience and power the next generation of financial innovation.”

Three FIS clients – KeyBank, private student loan provider College Ave, and payment system and billing platform Royal Pay – have already deployed Atelio and are building solutions on the platform.

Jacksonville, Florida-based FIS made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2013. Currently, the company enables 95% of the world’s banks, moves more than $1 trillion a month, and processes $50 trillion via its asset management technology every year. The company’s new product announcement came one day after FIS announced first quarter 2024 results which included the firm’s “fifth straight quarter of exceeding our financial outlook,” according to FIS CEO and President Stephanie Ferris.

Photo by ian dooley on Unsplash

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Expensify Travel Goes Head-to-Head with Navan

Expensify Travel Goes Head-to-Head with Navan
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Expensify
  • Expensify is teaming up with Spotana to launch Expensify Travel, a business travel booking platform based on Spotanas Travel-as-a-Service offering.
  • The new travel service will offer Expensify’s business users access to global travel inventory, lower fares, and servicing.
  • Expensify’s new launch makes it a direct competitor with California-based Navan, a corporate travel and expense management platform that launched in 2015.

Business expense management company Expensify announced the upcoming addition of a new set of capabilities today, which will make it a more robust platform to help businesses plan and manage their expenses. The company is launching Expensify Travel.

Expensify Travel will allow the company’s business users to access global travel inventory, lower fares, and servicing. Expensify Travel will be built on top of New York-based Spotana’s cloud-based Travel-as-a-Service platform, which will help clients manage flight changes, cancellations, and unused ticket credits, as well as offer comprehensive travel management capabilities.

“Book your trip in minutes, we’ll handle the rest. We’ve made it effortless for members to search and book flights, hotels, cars, and trains — all at the most competitive rates available,” said Expensify CEO David Barrett. “Our early release will let business travelers manage it all in one place, with real-time support, customizable rules, and the option to assign virtual travel cards to employees. We couldn’t be more excited for the future of Expensify Travel in partnership with Spotana.”

Expensify plans to have the early release of Expensify Travel next week, offering booking and management capabilities, as well as 24/7 Expensify support. In the future, the new travel offering will be directly integrated into New Expensify, the company’s new super app. When booking their travel in the new chat-based app, customers will be able to book and manage trips, manage travel expenses, chat with colleagues, and more. “Through our partnership, Expensify has created a one-stop shop for travel and expense management for their customers with a seamless user experience,” said Spotnana Founder and CEO Sarosh Waghmar.

Expensify’s new launch makes it a direct competitor with California-based Navan, a corporate travel and expense management platform. Formerly known as TripActions, Navan was founded in 2015 and offers expense management tools such as employee spending controls, automated expense management tools, reporting capabilities, and more.

There are key differences between Expensify’s and Navan’s expense management tools, however. While both companies allow clients to use their own existing corporate expense cards with their expense management tools, Expensify also offers users its own branded debit card. Also, Expensify’s interface is focused on being user friendly to serve small and medium sized businesses, while Navan offers features that are tailored to meet needs of a variety of sizes.

It is more difficult to assess the differences between the companies’ travel booking tools, given that Expensify’s tools have yet to launch. However, it appears that the two will differentiate themselves with tools that serve their individual target markets. For instance, Navan offers a high-touch, premium travel experience, the ability to book meetings and events, and consulting services aimed at larger, corporate clients. Expensify’s tools will likely root in the company’s user-friendly, simplified approach.

Photo by Pixabay

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SumUp Secures $1.6 Billion in Private Credit Debt

SumUp Secures $1.6 Billion in Private Credit Debt
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Daily news, SumUp
  • U.K.-based fintech SumUp has raised $1.6 billion (€1.5 billion) in a private credit debt transaction.
  • The deal was led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management, and will enable SumUp to refinance debt and pursue international growth opportunities.
  • SumUp won Best of Show at FinovateEurope 2013, a year after the company was founded.

In a deal led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management, U.K.-based fintech SumUp has secured $1.6 billion (€1.5 billion) in a private credit debt transaction. The financing will enable SumUp to refinance current debt as well as take advantage of growth opportunities around the world.

The deal gives SumUp a set of new investors: AllianceBernstein, Apollo Global Management, Arini, Deutsche Bank AG, Fortress Investment Group, SilverRock Financial Services, and Vista Credit Partners. It also comes six months after the company raised $307 million (€285 million) in equity and debt in a round led by Sixth Street Growth. Bain Capital Tech Opportunities, Fin Capital, and Liquidity Capital also participated in that financing.

In a statement SumUp CFO Hermoine McKee pointed to an evolution in the company’s “requirements from capital markets” in explaining SumUp’s most recent fundraising effort. “Lenders understand and support our mission to create a world where everyone can build a thriving business, and recognize our successful methods of achieving, sustaining, and balancing profitability and growth,” McKee said. “This new financing will support us as we focus on providing best-in-class support experiences for our merchants and giving them the products and tools they need to succeed.”

To this end, SumUp noted in a statement that the company has generated positive EBITDA since December 2022, as well as achieving a “decade of sustained growth.” The company currently counts four million businesses among its partners, who rely on SumUp for services ranging from payments and order processing to customer acquisition and money management.

“SumUp has always enjoyed solid and steady support from the investor community, and it’s this continued backing which has enabled us to grow sustainably over the past 10+ years, serving millions of merchants of all sizes globally,” McKee said.

Founded in 2012, SumUp won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope in 2013. The company began this year with its SumUp Beacon event which introduced merchants to a range of new SumUp solutions. These new offerings included SumUp Business Account, SumUp Invoices, SumUp Kiosk, and SumUp Online Store. SumUp also unveiled a pair of new Point of Sale (POS) solutions: POS Lite to enhance over-the-counter sales, and POS Pro to provide enhanced inventory management.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

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Beem Credit Union Teams Up with VeriPark To Become the Most “Digital First CU in the Province”

Beem Credit Union Teams Up with VeriPark To Become the Most “Digital First CU in the Province”
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, VeriPark
  • Canada-based Beem Credit Union has partnered with VeriPark to become the most “digital-first, people-first” credit union in the province of Vancouver.
  • VeriPark offers an Intelligence Customer Experience Suite that provides tools to enhance branch automation, lending, and customer engagement.
  • Headquartered in London, VeriPark made its Finovate debut at FinovateMiddleEast 2019 in Dubai.

The latest fintech news from Canada involves a May-December relationship between a credit union that’s less than a year old and a fintech that’s been around since the dot.com days.

British Columbia, Vancouver-based Beem Credit Union has announced a partnership with VeriPark, a software developer based in the U.K. The goal of the partnership is to help the credit union, which was founded earlier this year, become the most “people-first, digital-first credit union in the province.”

Founded in 1998, VeriPark offers an Intelligence Customer Experience Suite that has enabled its customers to achieve 98.5% reduction in cost-to-serve, 55% more sales, 20% greater satisfaction, and 45% more profits. The suite includes VeriChannel, the company’s omni-channel delivery offering, VeriTouch, a customer engagement/CRM solution; branch automation courtesy of VeriPark’s VeriBranch offering; and loan origination and servicing technology via the company’s VeriLoan solution. Institutions in retail banking, corporate/SME banking, private banking/wealth management, and insurance are among those taking advantage of VeriPark’s technology to enhance their operations.

With more than 160,000 members, Beem CU was formed late last year via a merger between Interior Savings and Gulf & Fraser. The merger went into effect on the first of January and the combined institution will boast a network of 55 branches and 14 insurance locations in the region. Beem CU has $10 billion in total assets; Brian Harris, who was CEO of Interior Savings, will take on the role of Chief Executive with Beem CU.

VeriPark made its Finovate debut at FinovateMiddleEast in 2019 in Dubai. At the conference, the company demoed its cloud-based, SaaS service Customer Insights that enables organizations to gather data from a variety of sources to better understand the preferences of their customers.

Earlier this year, the National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) announced that it was going live with a new corporate banking CRM solution built by VeriPark. NBK now benefits from customer profile, sales, and prospect management tools, a 360 degree single view of corporate customers, as well as customer retention solutions. The bank is the largest financial institution in Kuwait with 68 branches in the country and a total of 143 branches around the globe.

VeriPark is headquartered in London. Ozkan Erener is CEO.

Photo by Lee Robinson on Unsplash

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Alloy Partners with Coris To Automate Risk and Fraud Intelligence for SMBs

Alloy Partners with Coris To Automate Risk and Fraud Intelligence for SMBs
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alloy, Alumni News, Daily news
  • Identity decisioning platform Alloy teamed up with SME data intelligence innovator Coris.
  • Courtesy of the partnership, Alloy customers will be able to access Coris’ Merchant Profiler and Corshield solutions directly from within the Alloy platform.
  • Alloy introduced itself to Finovate audiences at FinDEVr Silicon Valley in 2016.

Alloy, the identity decisioning platform, announced a new partnership with SMB data intelligence company Coris. Via the partnership, Alloy customers will be able to access Coris’ solutions to automate SMB onboarding, underwriting, and fraud prevention.

“We’re excited to partner with Coris on improving the SMB risk management process for builders of financial products,” Alloy GM of Partner Solutions Brian Bender said. “Having a wide array of data at their disposal is critical for banks and fintechs to manage identity risk across the customer lifecycle.”

Alloy’s 500+ customers will be able to access a pair of Coris’ solutions directly from within the Alloy platform: MerchantProfiler, Coris’ KYB and small business intelligence product; and Corshield, Coris’ SMB-specific fraud model. Merchant Profiler enables fintechs and software companies to onboard, underwrite, and monitor their SMB customers via GPT-4 powered SMB industry classification. The solution also provides automated analysis of SMB websites, third party consumer reviews, and more; as well as real-time KYB, including Secretary of State business verification, sanctions screening, and TIN matching. Merchant Profiler also offers adverse media insights to see if there is significant negative news or information about a business or its beneficial owners.

CorShield fights business impersonation fraud and first party fraud at the point of sign-up. The solution automatically triangulates known data on SMBs and cross-references applicant data against the known information. CorShield then generates a fraud score to assess the likelihood of fraud and shares the primary reasons for the fraud score with the user.

One firm using CorShield claimed that the solution helped them instantly approve 90% of business applications. The company also said that Coris’ SMB intelligence data has lowered the firm’s application review time by more than 75%.

Founded in 2022 and headquartered in Palo Alto, California, Coris has helped its business customers verify more than 150,000 SMBs and provided data on more than 330 million global SMBs. The company secured $3.7 million in funding earlier this year in a round co-led by Lux Capital and Exponent Founders Capital. Y Combinator, Blank Ventures, WePay Co-Founder Bill Clerico, and Mercury CEO and Co-Founder Immad Akhund also participated.

Alloy introduced itself to Finovate audiences at FinDEVr Silicon Valley in 2016. The company returned to the Finovate stage in 2022 to demo its open payment hub, CHUCK, and its gifting platform Social Money, launched in partnership with Prizeout. Earlier this year, Alloy announced a partnership with embedded finance platform Liberis. The partnership will enable Liberis to integrate automated compliance verifications from Alloy directly into the funding application process.

Headquartered in New York, Alloy was founded in 2002. The company has raised more than $207 million in funding, according to Crunchbase. Alloy includes Lightspeed Ventures, Avenir Growth Capital, and Canapi Ventures among its investors.

Photo by yasin hemmati on Unsplash

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Blend Labs Raises $150 Million, Forges Strategic Partnership with Haveli Investments

Blend Labs Raises $150 Million, Forges Strategic Partnership with Haveli Investments
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Blend, Daily news, Funding, Fundings
  • Cloud banking services provider Blend raised $150 million in new funding from PE firm Haveli Investments.
  • The investment comes in the form of convertible preferred stock with a zero percent coupon.
  • Blend Labs is an alumni of both FinovateSpring and our developers conference FinDEVr Silicon Valley, presenting at both events in 2016.

Cloud banking services provider Blend has secured an investment of $150 million from technology-focused private equity firm Haveli Investments.

The investment comes in the form of convertible preferred stock with a zero percent coupon. Blend will use most of the capital – approximately $145 million – to repay amounts payable under its current credit agreement. The remainder of the investment will be used for general corporate purposes. Overall, the investment is designed to fortify Blend’s financial position and balance sheet, paving the way for long-term growth and value creation.

“This partnership with Haveli reflects confidence in Blend’s continued journey to transform financial services and is an important show of faith in our growth strategy,” Blend Co-founder and Head Nima Ghamsari said. “We look forward to working with Haveli to advance our goal of driving innovation in the space and delivering lasting value for our customers and shareholders.”

Blend made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring in 2016. The company returned to the stage later that year to demo its technology at our developers conference, FinDEVr Silicon Valley. In the years since, Blend has grown into a major cloud banking services provider helping financial services firms process $1.7 trillion in loan applications in 2022, and capturing more than 23% of mortgage market share in the second half of that year. So far in 2024, Blend has forged partnerships with Fannie Mae, Randolph-Brooks Federal Credit Union, Citizens Bank, and Michigan Schools and Government Credit Union (MSGCU).

As part of this week’s investment, Brian Sheth, Chief Investment Officer with Haveli Investments will join Blend’s board of directors. In a statement, Sheth praised the company as a market leader in providing mortgage and consumer banking software for banks, credit unions, and other lenders. “We have known the Blend team for several years and have been impressed with their innovation and vision,” Sheth said. “With a blue-chip customer base and an improved balance sheet, we believe Blend is well positioned to succeed with its modern, next-gen platform.”

Photo by Pixabay

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Permira Acquires Majority Stake in BioCatch with $1.3 Billion Valuation

Permira Acquires Majority Stake in BioCatch with $1.3 Billion Valuation
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, BioCatch, Funding, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Permira has acquired a majority stake in behavioral biometrics company BioCatch.
  • Existing shareholders, Sapphire Ventures and Macquarie Capital, have also increased their stake in BioCatch.
  • The moves have boosted BioCatch’s valuation to $1.3 billion, which is up from $1 billion last year.

Behavioral biometrics company BioCatch announced it has a new majority shareholder. Permira Growth Opportunities II, a fund advised by U.K.-based global private equity firm Permira, has acquired a majority stake in the Israel-based company by buying out shares from Bain Capital Tech Opportunities and Maverick Ventures in a secondary transaction.

Two of the company’s existing shareholders, Sapphire Ventures and Macquarie Capital, have also increased their stake in BioCatch. While specific terms of the transactions were not disclosed, the company’s valuation is now estimated at $1.3 billion.

BioCatch expects the move will help it accelerate its product roadmap and support its growth in general. The increased commitment from Permia will also aid BioCatch’s global expansion efforts. Specifically, the fraud prevention company will leverage Permia’s Continental European ties, with an aim to add new clients in that region.

“After building a strong partnership with Permira over the last year, we are delighted to welcome them as majority shareholders,” said BioCatch CEO Gadi Mazor. “The firm’s impressive experience within technology and cybersecurity, combined with their scale, global network, and our close working relationship, has been invaluable since their initial investment.”

BioCatch was founded in 2011 and has since raised around $324 million in disclosed funding. The company leverages behavioral biometric intelligence to offer account opening fraud detection, mule account detection, account takeover protection, customer authentication solutions, and more. BioCatch currently has more than 190 financial institution customers across the globe, including over 30 of the world’s largest 100 global banks.

Today’s announcement comes a year after BioCatch earned $1 billion following a $40 million investment from Permia. The move made Permia a significant minority shareholder in BioCatch, right behind Sapphire Ventures and Macquarie Capital.

“We have tracked BioCatch with enthusiasm for many years, and now having been a shareholder since early 2023, our conviction in the business, its growth potential, its technology leadership, and its management team continues to grow,” said Permia Growth Opportunities Partner and Co-Head Stefan Dziaski. “We’re excited to become the company’s majority shareholder and look forward to a continued successful partnership with Gadi and the BioCatch team as we seek to further accelerate growth and expansion in the years to come.” 

Photo by George Prentzas on Unsplash

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SecureAuth Acquires Access Management Technology Company Cloudentity

SecureAuth Acquires Access Management Technology Company Cloudentity
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Cloudentity, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Seattle, Washington-based Cloudentity has been acquired by access management firm SecureAuth.
  • Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Cloudentity has raised $13 million in funding.
  • Cloudentity made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022 in New York.

Access management and authentication company SecureAuth has completed its acquisition and integration of Cloudentity. Announced earlier this year, SecureAuth’s acquisition of the Seattle, Washington-based company will help position the firm as a market leader in the Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM) space.

Cloudentity, which made its Finovate debut in 2022 at FinovateFall, is a specialist in advanced SaaS-delivered access management technology. The company supports both Fine-Grained Authorization (FGA) and Business-to-Business-to-Consumer (B2B2C) use cases, and also provides support for advanced authorization and consent specifications including Financial-grade API (FAPI) 2.0, which powers Open Finance communities around the world.

Integrating Cloudentity’s orchestration and FGA capabilities will complement SecureAuth’s suite of identity security solutions such as its AI/ML Risk Engine and Passwordless MFA technologies. The combined functionality will enable businesses to upgrade their customer experiences with enhanced security and compliance – with less friction.

“With the acquisition of Cloudentity, SecureAuth is poised to revolutionize the CIAM market,” SecureAuth Chief Operating Officer Kelly Wenzel said. “Cloudentity was built from the ground up as a pure cloud-native deep identity solution that can be implemented on-premise, via public cloud or private cloud, as a single-tenant or multi-tenant deployment within hours. This powerful combination of deployment flexibility and deep capabilities allows us to serve our customers in implementing identity security without sacrificing customer experience.”

As part of the transaction, Cloudentity CEO Brook Lovatt will join SecureAuth as Chief Product Officer. Lovatt said in a statement that the combined company will help drive innovation in the identity security space. “Together, these technologies provide a comprehensive CIAM solution set with an extremely short time-to-value that enables organizations to quickly and easily deliver exceptional digital experiences, while maintaining the highest standards of security and compliance.”

Cloudentity was founded in 2001. Prior to its acquisition, the company had raised $13 million in funding. Forgepoint Capital and WestWave Capital are among the firm’s investors.

Photo by Amanda Grove

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