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Former JP Morgan Exec Launches Refunds-as-a-Service Startup

Former JP Morgan Exec Launches Refunds-as-a-Service Startup
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
  • TodayPay, a new “refunds-as-a-service” startup, has launched out of stealth mode this week.
  • TodayPay is founded by former JP Morgan executive Jeremy Balkin.
  • TodayPay’s technology decouples the refund from the return logistics to pay customers their refund instantly in their TodayPay mobile wallet.

Jeremy Balkin is leveraging his expertise in the financial services industry to launch a new fintech. The former JP Morgan executive announced this week that TodayPay, what he is calling a “refunds-as-a-service startup,” has exited stealth mode.

At its core, TodayPay helps merchants give their customers instant refunds when they initiate a return. The service also offers the customer multiple options of how they want to receive the funds instead of simply defaulting back to the original payment method.

“I built TodayPay because I’ve seen firsthand how the speed of a payment can change somebody’s life,” said TodayPay Founder Balkin. “There’s over a trillion dollars of value exchanged every year in the form of refunds, yet there’s been almost zero innovation improving the refund customer experience.”

TodayPay offers four main products:

  • Better Refund, an API that decouples the refund from the return logistics to pay customers their refund instantly, while allowing merchants seven days to pay.
  • Refund Now Pay Later, which provides merchants with a pre-qualified credit line of up to $300,000 with up to 90 days to repay the funds. TodayPay takes on the risk of the return so that the merchant can focus on their working capital.
  • instarefund, a consumer facing widget embedded into a merchant’s existing return flow that helps them control the customer experience.
  • Management Portal, a merchant-facing dashboard to help businesses manage all transactions in one place and automate refunds and returns management.

These products may improve the returns experience for merchants, however, TodayPay adds a bit more friction onto the customer experience. That’s because customers receive their refund payment in a TodayPay digital wallet. While the digital wallet is already set up via the customer’s phone number, they still have to log into their TodayPay digital wallet to choose how they’d like to redeem their refund– into their bank account, onto their debit card, or via a gift card.

While TodayPay was in stealth mode, it built relationships to be integrated into Shopify, BigCommerce, Woo, and Magento. The company is backed by Soma Capital, and is working with Astra, Marqeta, and Visa for the digital wallet piece.

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Featurespace Launches GenAI-Powered Financial Crime Fighting Model, TallierLTM

Featurespace Launches GenAI-Powered Financial Crime Fighting Model, TallierLTM
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Daily news, Featurespace
  • Featurespace unveiled its generative AI-powered, Large Transaction Model (LTM), TallierLTM, this week.
  • The technology uncovers hidden transactional patterns typically undetected by current methods that may be indicative of criminal activity.
  • Featurespace made its Finovate debut in 2016, appearing at both FinovateEurope and FinovateFall that year.

Fraud and financial crime prevention company Featurespace unveiled its Large Transaction Model (LTM), TallierLTM, this week. A foundational technology for payments in specific and the financial services industry in general, TallierLTM is a large-scale, self-supervised, and pre-trained model built to power the next generation of AI apps to protect consumers from financial crime.

The technology marks the first time financial professionals in the fraud fighting space have been able to leverage a generative Large Transaction Model. Featurespace noted in a statement that TallierLTM has provided improvements of as much as 71% in fraud value detection compared to the industry standard.

“What OpenAI’s LLMs have done for language, TallierLTM will do for payments,” Featurespace founder David Excell said. “There is widespread concern about how deep-fakes and generative AI have been used to deceive consumers and our financial systems. We plan to reverse this trend by utilizing the power of generative AI algorithms to create solutions that protect consumers and make the world a safer place to transact.”

Connecting to FIs via its enbedding API, TallierLTM analyzes billions of transactions, identifying hidden transactional patterns that current methods often cannot detect. The technology’s insights are based on time sequencing, discovering unusual spending patterns over a short period of time, for example, or between a consumer and a merchant. This increased ability to distinguish legitimate activity from potentially criminal behavior will not only enable data scientists to improve their model’s performance faster, Featurespace Chief Innovation Officer Dr. David Sutton said. It will also allow institutions to “realize the value of machine learning investments more quickly.”

“We know that smarter technology helps financial institutions better understand their consumers,” Sutton added. “We have taken this to the next level by pairing cutting-edge generative AI algorithms with huge volumes of data, enabling a machine to efficiently comprehend the relationships between different customer transactions.”

Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Cambridge, U.K., Featurespace made its Finovate debut in 2016, appearing at both FinovateEurope and FinovateFall. An innovator in adaptive behavioral analytics and automated deep behavioral networks for risk management, Featurespace serves more than 80 direct customers and 200,000 institutions. In recent months, the company announced partnerships with digital payment platform Clip and fellow Finovate alum Zeta. In August, Featurespace launched its ARIC Scam Detect solution to help protect financial services companies and their customers from scams – especially Authorized Push Payment (APP) scams – in real-time.

“As scammers become increasingly sophisticated in their tactics, with the use of Generative AI and machine learning, FIs need an adaptive solution that can protect from changing scam types in real time and monitor both inbound and outbound payments,” company Chief Product Officer Pat Hinchin said.

Featurespace has raised nearly $108 million in funding from investors including Chrysalis Investments, MissionOG, and Insight Partners.

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Switzerland’s Coop Partners with additiv to Launch New Superapp Coop Finance+

Switzerland’s Coop Partners with additiv to Launch New Superapp Coop Finance+
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news
  • Swiss retailer/wholesaler Coop has turned to embedded finance company additiv to launch its new superapp, Coop Finance+.
  • Coop Finance will go live initially with banking services, payments, and pension solutions.
  • Headquartered in Switzerland, additiv most recently demoed its technology at FinovateAsia in 2017.

One of the largest retailer/wholesaler companies in Switzerland, Coop, has turned to embedded finance company additiv to power the launch of its new app, Coop Finance+.

A financial services superapp, Coop Finance+ initially will go live with banking services, payments, and pension solutions. Hypothekarbank Lenzburg will power banking services. Vanguard, OLZ, Liberty Vorsorge and Glarner Kantonalbank will support the app’s pension solutions. App users can open accounts with debit cards, make online payments, and invest in Pillar 3a retirement programs.

“At additiv, we believe that embedding financial products into everyday consumer channels will help improve convenience and financial inclusion,” additiv founder Michael Stemmle said. Company CEO Nils Frowein, who joined additiv in June, praised the new offering as a “transformative project” that will have a “profound impact on the user experience of Coop customers.”

Coop Finance+ offers competitive terms, above-average interest rates on retirement accounts, and loyalty benefits. Additionally, the superapp provides access to free cash withdrawals at all 1,000 Coop supermarkets and Coop City warehouses. The launch of Coop Finance+ makes Coop the largest provider of free cash withdrawals in Switzerland.

“At Coop, we are committed to providing our customers with digital services that are tailored to their needs,” Coop Head of Digital/Customer Thomas Schwetje said. “With Coop Finance+, we are expanding this strategy to offer straightforward and easily accessible account and payment solutions, household budget management, and pension solutions.”

A Finovate alum since 2013, additiv most recently demoed its technology at FinovateAsia 2017 in Hong Kong. In the years since, additiv has grown from a software development firm into a major digital investment and financial solutions platform and finance-as-a-service provider. A leader in orchestrated finance, additiv has offices in Zurich, Frankfurt, Dubai, and Singapore and 300 employees worldwide.

Earlier this month, additiv announced a strategic partnership with SELISE. The collaboration will enable additiv to leverage the company’s expertise in software management to enhance its wealth platform. In June, additiv was named a leading AI innovator within AI Fintech100’s 2023 roster.

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Marqeta Introduces Embedded Credit Experiences

Marqeta Introduces Embedded Credit Experiences
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Marqeta
  • Marqeta launched a new credit card issuing platform to help brands offer embedded credit programs.
  • Using the new tool, fintechs and non-financial services companies can launch both consumer and commercial credit programs.
  • Marqeta’s new card program will allow brands to own the entire customer experience without having to send the customer to a bank website to access card information.

Card issuer Marqeta unveiled its new credit card issuing platform today. The new offering serves as a one-stop shop to help companies launch embedded card programs for both consumer and commercial users.

Marqeta’s new credit platform helps brands promote customer loyalty by enabling personalized rewards and can support any card type and any format. According to Marqeta CEO Simon Khalaf, the new platform will help brands “reimagine what a credit card can be” and engage with consumers “in a whole new way.”

As part of that reimagining, Marqeta’s new platform serves as a single location where fintechs and non-financial services companies can build a credit product that suits their consumers’ unique needs and embed the experiences within their existing app. Specifically, brands can own the entire customer experience and won’t need to send cardholders to a bank’s website to access card information.

The credit platform also provides a rewards engine that helps brands build reward programs that adapt to cardholder needs and preference. Additionally, Marqeta offers brands access to real-time customer data to help further customize cardholder products and– for commercial cardholders– provides a range of flexible funding models such as Net 30 Charge Cards, Receivables Purchase, and Revolving Credit.

“The possibility is huge,” Khalaf added, “but the incumbent solutions are simply not giving consumers what they need. We want our credit card platform to completely change the consumer experience and the brand loyalty equation.”

Today’s development comes courtesy of Marqeta’s January 2023 acquisition of Power Finance for $275 million. Power Finance was founded in 2021 to offer brands a credit card program management service. Power Finance’s platform allowed companies to outsource credit card management, customer experience, application decisioning, transaction processing, and more.

Founded in 2010, Marqeta enables clients to manage their own card programs and banking tools. The company offers configurable and flexible payment tools and customizes payment cards for their end customers. Marqeta is a publicly traded company listed on the NASDAQ under the ticker MQ. The company has a market capitalization of $2.83 billion.

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ebankIT Teams Up with Finotta to Deliver Personalized Financial Guidance

ebankIT Teams Up with Finotta to Deliver Personalized Financial Guidance
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, ebankIT, Finotta
  • Embedded finance company Finotta has teamed up with banking software provider ebankIT.
  • The partnership will integrate Finotta’s Personified Personalized Financial Guidance platform with ebankIT’s digital banking solution.
  • Both Finotta and ebankIT are Finovate alums. ebankIT most recently demoed its technology at FinovateEurope in March. Finotta made its Finovate debut at FinovateFall 2022.

Embedded finance company Finotta has forged a new partnership with omnichannel banking software firm ebankIT. The partnership will integrate Finotta’s Personified platform with ebankIT’s digital banking solution in order to deliver better financial wellness tools and Personlized Financial Guidance (PFG) to customers worldwide.

Finotta’s Personified platform provides an automated and personalized mobile banking experience. Personified includes a financial coach, a financial health leveling system, automated financial guidance, predictive product referrals, digitized relationship building, the ability to make internal and external transfers, and more. The suite of solutions helps financial institutions address customer needs and respond to them from within the digital banking platform.

Personal finance is often treated as a local concern. However, Finotta founder and CEO Parker Graham put this week’s integration in an international context. “Financial wellness is a global imperative that transcends borders, affecting individuals and communities everywhere,” Graham said. “In partnering with ebankIT, we’re not just future-proofing financial institutions, we’re elevating the financial well-being of users and underscoring innovation as the bedrock of customer loyalty.”

ebankIT CEO Renato Oliveira said that delivering “humanized, personalized, and accessible digital experiences” is a priority for ebankIT “from day one.” He added, “At ebankIT, we recognize that the future of digital banking hinges on seamless omnichannel capabilities and enriched user experiences.” Oliveira called the partnership with Finotta “an extension of that commitment.”

Founded in 2014, ebankIT is headquartered in Portugal. The company has been a Finovate alum since winning Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2015. The company most recently demoed its technology at FinovateEurope earlier this year. At the conference, ebankIT introduced a new range of features on its digital banking platform. Among these features was a tool to help banks and credit unions better anticipate customer needs.

Over the summer, ebankIT announced a strategic partnership with digital transformation and cybersecurity consultancy, Online Business Systems. More recently, the company teamed up with Home Trust. Via the partnership, ebankIT helped the Canada-based mortgage broker launch its new digital banking platform.

Founded in 2018, Finotta is a newcomer to the Finovate stage. The Overland Park, Kansas-based company made its debut last year at FinovateFall 2022. Finotta announced in August that its Personified platform increased user engagement to an average of 13 minutes per month. Graham credited the difference between Finotta’s Personalized Financial Guidance platform and traditional personal finance management solutions.

“To better capitalize on existing digital banking investments and increase share of wallet all while lowering acquisition costs, banks need to shift their focus away from PFMs and instead embrace Personalized Financial Guidance,” Graham said. “By focusing on guiding customers through their financial journey, they increase the amount of time users spend in the app.”

Photo by Daniel Frese

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Payments Infrastructure Innovator Finzly Locks in $10 Million in Funding

Payments Infrastructure Innovator Finzly Locks in $10 Million in Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Finzly, Funding
  • Payments infrastructure company Finzly secured $10 million in Series A funding this week.
  • The round was led by TZP Growth Equity. Finzly will use the capital to accelerate expansion.
  • Finzly won Best of Show for its demos at FinovateWest and FinovateFall in 2020.

Payments infrastructure innovator Finzly has raised $10 million in funding. The Series A round was led by TZP Growth Equity. Finzly, which won Best of Show at FinovateWest and FinovateFall in 2020, will use the investment to accelerate expansion.

“Throughout Finzly’s history, we have carefully invested in disciplined and organic future growth by developing products and solutions that deliver value to our customers by simplifying their operations,” Finzly founder and CEO Booshan Rengachari explained. “This capital raise will enable us to further invest in our product roadmap built around the theme of providing real-time financial services demanded by today’s real-time economy, scaling our product delivery to maintain our high customer satisfaction rate.”

Finzly made its Finovate debut in 2019 and returned to the Finovate stage the following year. The company won Best of Show in the spring of 2020 and again in the fall. Finzly’s technology connects FIs with customers through a modern, digital banking experience and an efficient, real-time payments hub. The company’s “payments core” is a single platform that consolidates all payment rails, simplifying back-office operations and the customer journey. Finzly’s high automation rates enable banks to reduce operating expenses and offer friction-free payments. The company was among the first to offer an API connection to FedNow, the Federal Reserve’s new instant payment service.

Shamit Mehta, TZP’s lead partner on the investment called Finzly “a catalyst in the transition towards more agile and customer-centric banking experiences.” Further, Mehta added that Finzly was “well-positioned to drive significant advancements in how banking and financial services operate and will become a category-defining company.” As part of the funding, Mehta will join Finzly’s board of directors.

Finzly’s investment news comes in the wake of the company’s latest partnership. Metropolitan Commercial Bank, a New York-based financial institution with assets of more than $6 billion, turned to Finzly to enhance its payment operations for ACH, Fedwire, and FedNow. Earlier this year, banking platform Mode Eleven partnered with Finzly to transform its wire and ACH operations.

Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, Finzly was founded in 2012.

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J.P. Morgan Payments Taps Trulioo for Identity Verification

J.P. Morgan Payments Taps Trulioo for Identity Verification
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Trulioo
  • J.P. Morgan Payments has selected Trulioo for identity verification tools.
  • Trulioo’s Person Match and Identity Document Verification will offer verification of consumers and businesses.
  • J.P. Morgan Payments processes more than $9 trillion in payments each day in over 160 countries and 120 currencies.

Trulioo announced today that J.P. Morgan Payments has tapped it for fraud prevention. JPM Payments will leverage Trulioo’s consumer and business verification tools.

“We chose [Trulioo] because of its breadth of personally identifiable data sources, impressive match rates, and global footprint,” said J.P. Morgan Payments Managing Director- Global Head of Trust & Safety Ryan Schmiedl. “Trulioo has the trusted authentication and verification experience we want to offer clients and additional layers of protection from fraud during the onboarding experience and beyond.”

JPM, which processes more than $9 trillion in payments each day in over 160 countries and 120 currencies, will leverage Trulioo’s global payments and trust and safety models. Specifically, JPM will use Trulioo’s Person Match and Identity Document Verification to offer verification of both consumers and businesses.

“With real-time access to hundreds of government registries, public records, data sources and document types, we can verify people and businesses globally, leaving no space for bad actors and, ultimately, help J.P. Morgan clients adhere to the highest of standards, no matter where their clients operate,” said Trulioo CEO Steve Munford.

Canada-based Trulioo, which was founded in 2011, helps organization navigate compliance by offering real-time verification of more than five billion people and 700 million business entities worldwide. Last month, Trulioo added intelligent transaction routing to its identity verification orchestration platform. The company has raised $475 million.

Photo by Eren Li

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Statement Raises $12 Million for AI-Powered Treasury Tools

Statement Raises $12 Million for AI-Powered Treasury Tools
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding
  • Statement has raised $12 million in Seed funding.
  • The funds come from Glilot Capital Partners, Citi, Mensch Capital Partners, Titan Capital, and Operator Partners.
  • The company will use the funds to bolster its market launch strategies, speed up product development, and hire additional employees.

Cash flow intelligence company Statement has raised $12 million in Seed funding this week for its cash flow management platform. Today’s funds come from Glilot Capital Partners, Citi, Mensch Capital Partners, Titan Capital, and Operator Partners.

According to TechCrunch, which broke the news, Statement will use the $12 million to bolster its market launch strategies and speed up product development. To fuel this growth, the New York-based company said it plans to expand its team to 35 employees by the end of 2024.

Launched last year by co-founders Idan Vlodinger and Shahar Lahav, Statement offers what it calls a “Cash Intelligence Platform” that provides enterprises a single, cohesive overview of their financial data in real time. The platform, which automatically categorizes transactions, connects with multiple banks and ERP systems to reflect real-time cash positions, show working capital analytics, automate accounts receivable reconciliation, and forecast cashflow using AI.

“Statement saves the office of the CFO hundreds of hours per month on manual data collection and enrichment, and hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars by being able to manage their money faster and better,” Vlodinger told TechCrunch. “CFOs deserve to work with great software, with a fantastic user interface, that has real-time data, and have the systems ‘speak’ to each other with true data reconciliation, so they can focus on growing their businesses.”

Armed with increasingly powerful AI-tools, more companies have been operating in this treasury management space, which used to be thought of as simply business financial management (BFM). Other companies offering financial management tools include Kyriba, international cash management provider Neo and HighRadius, which reached unicorn status in 2020.

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Fraud Prevention Platform Darwinium Secures $18 Million in Series A Funding

Fraud Prevention Platform Darwinium Secures $18 Million in Series A Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Darwinium, Funding
  • Fraud prevention platform Darwinium raised $18 million in Series A funding this week.
  • The company positions its fraud detection processes on the network perimeter to provide better visibility, coverage, and agility.
  • Recently relocated to San Francisco, California, Darwinium made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope earlier this year.

Digital security and fraud prevention platform Darwinium raised $18 million in Series A funding this week. The investment was led by U.S. Venture Partners, and featured participation from seed investors Blackbird, Airtree Ventures, and Accomplice. The Series A takes the San Francisco-based company’s total funding to $26 million. Darwinium will use the additional capital to scale its solution globally.

“AI capabilities have given fraudsters the upper hand of speed, scale, and greater efficiency,” Darwinium CEO and co-founder Alisdair Faulkner explained. “This is why we designed Darwinium to deliver the visibility and coverage of a security tool, the context and insight of fraud solutions, with the agility of AI. It’s the platform that will future-proof organizations against the most complex attacks.”

Darwinium offers two innovations to help companies fight fraud. First, Darwinium moves fraud detection processes to the network perimeter, to “the edge,” as the company refers to the strategy. This gives businesses a comprehensive view of the customer journey at every digital touchpoint, making it easier to distinguish trusted from risky behavior. This approach also gives the technology an advantage over API-based fraud protection solutions. These solutions, according to Darwinium, are not sufficiently agile and lack the context to adequately respond to evolving fraud threats.

Second, Darwinium leverages a SaaS approach to data protection, encrypting and anonymizing data on “the edge.” Any customer data that is subjected to analysis is stored within the business’ own infrastructure with their own digital keys. Darwinium’s technology then uses the anonymized version of this customer data. This enables the information to be processed without being exposed to fraudsters. Darwinium’s approach to securing customer data makes it easy for businesses to comply with consumer privacy regulations such as the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

Founded in 2021, Darwinium made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope earlier this year. At the conference, the company previewed its fraud prevention platform that leverages individual digital signatures to make sure that website visitors and customers are who they say they are. The company introduced its Continuous Customer Protection platform this spring, simultaneously announcing the firm’s expansion to the U.S. and relocation of its corporate headquarters to San Francisco.

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Mahalo Banking Launches Credential Assurance Technology to Combat Credential Stuffing

Mahalo Banking Launches Credential Assurance Technology to Combat Credential Stuffing
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Mahalo Banking
  • Mahalo Banking launched a new solution to combat credential stuffing.
  • The new offering, Credential Assurance Technology (CAT), augments the sign-in process to make credential stuffing impossible.
  • Mahalo Banking won Best of Show in its Finovate debut last month at FinovateFall.

Mahalo Banking, a Credit Union Service Organization (CUSO) that took home Best of Show honors in its Finovate debut last month, has launched a new tool to fight credential stuffing. Mahalo’s Credential Assurance Technology (CAT) augments the traditional account sign-in process, disrupting bot functioning and rendering credential stuffing impossible. Importantly, the technology does not require the use of friction-creating methods such as CAPTCHAs.

“With CAT, credit unions can confidently safeguard member accounts and help prevent the attacks that come at a high cost,” Mahalo COO Denny Howell said. He referred to CAT as a result of Mahalo’s “unwavering commitment to producing innovations that address the all-too-common obstacles faced by credit unions to redefine the digital banking experience.”

In a study by the Identity Defined Security Alliance, 84% of respondents said their organizations had experienced a data breach, which often leads to compromised credentials. Cybercriminals can direct automated bots to use this data to hack login credentials  – such as those of credit union members.

“If your credit union has not been targeted yet, it’s just a matter of time,” Mahalo President and CEO Jim Stickley said. He noted that it was important that new security measures be as inobtrusive as they are effective. “It was important to use to create a solution that would resolve this issue without adding new barriers or disruption for credit union members,” Stickley said. “What we have created has simply changed the game. When our CAT solution is enabled, credential stuffing simply does not work.”

Founded in 2018, Mahalo made its Finovate debut last month at FinovateFall, earning Best of Show honors from our attendees. At the conference, Mahalo’s Howell and Chief Technology Officer Dan Domek demonstrated how the CUSO had integrated comprehensive neurodiverse functionality directly into its platform. This enables the platform to better serve members that may have unique needs due to autism, dyslexia, epilepsy, color-blindness, or other conditions.

In August, the Troy, Michigan-based fintech announced an expansion of its partnership with fellow Finovate alum Larky. That same month, Mahalo partnered with Providence Federal Credit Union to enhance both online and mobile banking experiences for the credit union’s 16,000+ members.

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Nova Credit Lands $45 Million in Funding for Alternative Credit Scoring

Nova Credit Lands $45 Million in Funding for Alternative Credit Scoring
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding
  • Nova Credit has received $45 million in Series C funding in a round led by Canapi Ventures.
  • The investment boosts Nova Credit’s total funding to $79 million.
  • Today’s funds will be used to broaden its product offering and scale its cash flow underwriting and income verification tool Cash Atlas.

Borderless credit data company Nova Credit has brought in $45 million in Series C funding this week. The investment– which was led by Canapi Ventures with participation from Kleiner Perkins, General Catalyst, Index Ventures, Y Combinator, Avid Ventures, Geodesic Capital, Harmonic Capital, Radiate Capital, and Socium Ventures– boosts the company’s total raised to $79 million.

The company will use the funds to broaden its product offering beyond cross-border credit reporting and scale its cash flow underwriting and income verification tool Cash Atlas. Along with Cash Atlas, Nova Credit also offers Credit Passport, an API that translates an international credit report into a local-equivalent credit score to allow newcomers to the U.S. to use the credit score of their home country.

To power these two products, Nova Credit leverages open finance to analyze consumer-permissioned transaction data for underwriting purposes. With insight from a prospective borrower’s cash flow, the company can underwrite the more than 60 million new-to-credit, new-to-country, and other thin-file consumers.

“Open finance data has been available for decades, but the industry has failed to assemble it into a suite of products that lenders can easily use to improve their customer onboarding and credit workflows,” said Nova Credit Co-founder and CEO Misha Esipov. “For years, Nova Credit has pioneered the use of consumer-permissioned data to enable the world’s most reputable businesses to approve more customers without compromising their risk and compliance standards.”

Nova Credit has seen growth in terms of revenues, partners, and geography since closing its $50 million Series B round in 2020. In the past three years, the California-based company has grown its revenue 10x and has added HSBC, Verizon, Scotiabank, Earnest, and Yardi to its partner roster, and has expanded its product reach to 20 countries outside the U.S., including Canada, the U.K., the UAE, and Singapore. 

In the future, Nova Credit plans to introduce new solutions ranging from new-to-credit and thin-file underwriting to customized KYC and verification solutions. “While cross-border credit remains critical to our strategy, we’re excited to broaden our offering and tackle a new set of industry challenges long unsolved,” explained Esipov. “This new capital fortifies our position to continue being a dependable partner to the many banks and lenders we serve and accelerates the pace of innovation in an industry very much in need of change.”

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Anodot Unveils CostGPT to Help Businesses Better Manage Cloud Costs

Anodot Unveils CostGPT to Help Businesses Better Manage Cloud Costs
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Anodot, Daily news
  • Analytics and monitoring solutions company Anodot has launched CostGPT to help businesses monitor cloud costs.
  • Anodot’s CostGPT leverages AI to enable business managers to learn about and manage their cloud costs data conversationally via chat.
  • Headquartered in Virginia, Anodot made its Finovate debut last year at FinovateEurope in London.

Advanced analytics and monitoring solutions provider Anodot has unveiled its latest solution, CostGPT. The new AI-powered offering enables cloud users to access accurate and personalized analysis of their cloud costs. With CostGPT, users will be able to better address everything from complex pricing models to cloud resource allocation with a simple query.

In addition to being able to ask the platform questions about cloud costs via chat, CostGPT provides optimization recommendations to help users better understand their cloud spending. The technology helps businesses avoid unnecessary costs, optimize resource utilization, and leverages real-time, intuitive data visualizations to make analysis, planning, and decision-making easier.

“This feature enables users to interact with their cloud cost data conversationally, making it more accessible and effortless than ever before,” Anodot Head of Product Limor Tepper said. “It’s all about ensuring that our users have the answers they need at their fingertips. And it doesn’t stop at text responses; it supplies the answers with graphical results that are easy to understand at a glance.”

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Ashburn, Virginia, Anodot made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2022. At the event, the company demoed its Payments Monitoring Tool. The technology leverages AI to monitor and correlate payments activity and business performance. This enables Anodot to spot potential issues and provide users with actionable alerts and forecasts in real-time. Businesses use Anodot to monitor a wide range of operations from front end applications to APIs to payments. Anodot says it has helped companies cut the time-to-detection of revenue-critical issues by up to 80%.

Anodot has raised $64.5 million in funding from investors including Alicorn Venture Capital and Redline Capital. Also last month, Anodot announced a “long-term strategic partnership” with DevOps and FinOps services Automat-IT. The partnership is designed to help consumers maximize their deployments on Amazon Web Services (AWS). Over the summer, Anodot released its annual State of Cloud Cost survey. The report highlighted trends such as the rise of third-party solutions and the challenge of cloud cost transparency.

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