Daily news

Mastercard Acquires Minna Technologies

Mastercard Acquires Minna Technologies
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, MasterCard, Mergers & Acquisitions, Minna Technologies
  • Mastercard has agreed to acquire subscription management platform Minna Technologies. Terms were not disclosed.
  • Minna Technologies offers technology that enables users to manage their subscriptions from within their bank app or website, saving users millions of dollars in spending on unwanted subscriptions.
  • Minna Technologies made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2019. The company is headquartered in Gothenburg, Sweden.

Terms were not disclosed. But Mastercard announced today that it has agreed to acquire Swedish subscription management platform Minna Technologies. The transaction, which is subject to regulatory approval, will bring greater simplicity and clarity to the subscription process and help enhance the engagement between merchants and their customers.

“This is significant recognition of the strength, growth, and impact of Minna Technologies in powering the global subscription economy, partnering with top-tier banks, fintechs, and subscription businesses,” Minna Technologies CEO and Chair Amanda Mesler said. “We look forward to joining Mastercard’s world-class team and helping businesses to empower consumers with control, convenience, and flexibility in managing their subscriptions and recurring payments.”

Minna Technologies offers banks and other financial institutions a subscription management platform that enables users to take control over their subscriptions via an automatically generated overview of all the user’s recurring expenses. Individuals can use Minna to cancel unwanted subscriptions as well as identify and quickly switch to new utility service providers. Mastercard’s acquisition comes as the number of subscriptions globally has climbed to 6.8 billion, with analysts at Juniper Research expecting that number to climb to 9.3 billion by 2028.

That said, the experience of our subscription economy can be a mixed one for consumers. Changing, extending, or canceling a subscription is often much more difficult than it needs to be. Additionally, the proliferation of subscription-based services means that many people have trouble keeping track of what they subscribe to, and when those subscriptions will be renewed. In the U.S., for example, the average person has 4.5 subscriptions. Additionally, more than 85% of Americans say that they have at least one paid subscription that goes unused each month.

Minna provides a payment-scheme agnostic service that empowers subscribers to manage their subscriptions from within their banking apps and websites. Bringing this technology into Mastercard’s suite of offerings is yet another example of how some of the biggest companies in financial services are leveraging acquisitions to add new solutions – from account-to-account payment functionality to enhanced cybersecurity – to their product mix. To that point, just last week, we shared news that Mastercard rival Visa had agreed to acquire fraud prevention company (and Finovate alum) Featurespace.

Founded in 2014, Minna Technologies demoed its technology at FinovateEurope in 2019. Today, the Sweden-based company has connected with more than 22,000 subscription businesses, served more than 120 million retail bank and fintech users, and saved customers more than $1 billion in spending on unwanted subscriptions.

Photo by Shvets Anna

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CRIF Forges Strategic Partnership with Ozone API

CRIF Forges Strategic Partnership with Ozone API
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, CRIF, Daily news
  • Credit bureau, business information, and credit risk specialist CRIF has inked a strategic partnership with open banking API company Ozone API.
  • The collaboration is designed to hep financial institutions enhance data-driven decision-making, streamline operations, and share data safely.
  • CRIF made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope in 2014.

A newly announced strategic partnership between CRIF and open banking API solution provider Ozone API will help financial institutions securely share their data and create new financial solutions that enhance data-driven decision-making, streamline operations, and improve customer satisfaction.

“By partnering with Ozone API, we are combining our strengths to create a seamless and efficient banking experience for our clients,” CRIF Digital Platform Business Development & Ecosystem Strategy Senior Director Andrea Martellone said. “This collaboration aligns perfectly with our mission to innovate and provide advanced solutions that drive growth in the financial sector.”

The partnership combines CRIF’s credit information and decision support systems with Ozone API’s open banking experience and secure, standards-compliant technology. Not only will the partnership assist financial institutions in meeting evolving needs, CRIF and Ozone API will also enable them to provide more personalized and efficient banking services to their customers now.

“This is an exciting partnership for Ozone API, as this will drive financial inclusion by providing the right tools to financial institutions to allow their customers to make more informed decisions about their financial wellbeing and get access to a wider range of financial services,” Ozone API Global Partnership Lead James Bushby said.

Headquartered in the U.K., Ozone API was founded in 2017. The open banking API platform helps banks and financial institutions take advantage of the opportunities of open banking and open finance with its compliant, open API technology. Ozone API’s technology supports all international standards and empowers financial institutions to create real commercial value and monetize open finance globally. The company began 2024 securing $11.3 million (£8.5 million) in Series A funding in a round led by Gresham House Ventures.

CRIF introduced itself to Finovate audiences in 2014 as part of our FinovateEurope conference. The company provides credit information services for business and marketing; business intelligence services, including credit ratings and data analysis; and digital solutions to support business development and open banking. Founded in 1988 and headquartered in Bologna, Italy, CRIF today serves more than 10,000 financial institutions, more than 90,000 business clients, and more than one million consumers. The company operates in 39 countries across four continents.

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Enfuce Selects allpay cards to Manufacture and Personalize Cards for U.K. Clients

Enfuce Selects allpay cards to Manufacture and Personalize Cards for U.K. Clients
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news
  • Enfuce has partnered with allpay cards to enhance Enfuce’s MyCard solution in the U.K., providing customizable card issuance services.
  • MyCard allows fintechs and banks to issue and manage payment cards quickly, simplifies the card issuing process, and offers personalized options like metal, biometric, and sustainable cards made from recycled materials.
  • This collaboration reflects growing trends for modular, cloud-based payments platforms that facilitate a faster time-to-market and improved security for fintechs and banks.

Enfuce and plastic card manufacturer allpay cards have partnered this week. Enfuce has tapped allpay cards to manufacture and personalize payment cards to bolster Enfuce’s MyCard solution for U.K. clients.

“We are thrilled to partner with allpay cards to bring MyCard to market in the U.K. and of course work with them as their selected processing partner,” said Enfuce Co-Founder & Co-CEO Monika Liikamaa. “Our relationship is a true collaboration fostered on trust and well-aligned strategic goals which makes us the perfect pair to deliver card innovation.”

Enfuce launched its MyCard solution in early 2022 as part of their Card-as-a-Service offering. The MyCard platform allows fintechs and banks to issue and manage payment cards quickly and without the need for a large technical team. To simplify card programs, MyCard handles the entire process, including manufacturing, stock management, compliance, and distribution. The tool allows for a deep level of customization, enabling organizations to launch personalized cards, metal cards, biometric cards, vertical cards, and sustainable cards made from corn starch, post industrial waste, and recycled plastic.

Enfuce and allpay cards first linked up in 2023, when Enfuce became allpay’s processing partner. This move, which integrated Enfuce’s modular payments platform for its U.K. clients​, helped allpay enhance its card manufacturing and personalization services.

“We are excited to be supporting Enfuce’s MyCard proposition, particularly as the demand for scalable, secure, and customized card solutions grows in the fintech space,” said allpay cards Head of Sales Emily Lovelock. “By joining forces with Enfuce, we are confident we can deliver a stress-free, high-quality experience for all of their U.K. clients.”

The partnership between Enfuce and allpay cards reflects the increasing demand for customizable, and scalable “-as-a-Service” solutions. Additionally, this collaboration highlights the shift towards integrating cloud-based and modular payments platforms, which allow for faster time-to-market and enhanced security in a fast-evolving regulatory landscape.

Finland-based Enfuce was founded in 2016 and has raised $78 million (€70.5 milion). In addition to its MyCard solution, the company offers card issuance, digital wallets, card program insights, fraud and dispute management, and more.

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QuantConnect Collaborates with TradeStation

QuantConnect Collaborates with TradeStation
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, QuantConnect
  • Online brokerage firm TradeStation has partnered with open source algorithmic trading platform QuantConnect.
  • The collaboration will enable mutual customers to build and automate strategies with QuantConnect, and then execute their trades via their TradeStation brokerage accounts.
  • QuantConnect made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2013. The company was founded in 2011.

Multi-asset online brokerage service TradeStation has announced a partnership with open source algorithmic trading platform QuantConnect. The two companies have integrated their solutions to enable mutual customers to create and automate their trading strategies on the QuantConnect platform, and then execute their trades via API through their TradeStation brokerage account.

“By integrating our personalized brokerage service with QuantConnect’s algorithmic trading platform, we’re providing sophisticated traders with powerful tools to develop, backtest, and automate their strategies, enhancing their ability to identify and execute new trading opportunities,” President and CEO of TradeStation Securities’ parent company, TradeStation Group, Inc. John Bartleman said.

The partnership combines two significant forces in the algorithmic trading tools space. TradeStation Securities provides institutional-grade tools and personalized services, enabling traders to buy and sell a wide range of assets including equities, equity options, and futures. A favorite of advanced retail and institutional traders, TradeStation caters to market participants who often require a more customizable and sophisticated trading experience, especially those who rely on algorithms to make buy and sell decisions. The integration will make the transition from building strategies to executing them in the market that much smoother.

“With this collaboration, mutual customers can create, manage, and analyze trading strategies from the new cross-platform integration,” QuantConnect CEO Jared Broad said. “TradeStation Securities is a well-known self-directed online broker-dealer and futures commission merchant, and it’s exciting to know that QuantConnect’s platform will be available to mutual customers.”

Founded in 2011, QuantConnect made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2013. At the conference, the company demoed its cloud-powered stock market backtesting technology, which can simulate years of stock market data in minutes. The company’s quantitative analytics platform facilitates more than 500,000 backtests per month for a community of more than 300,000 quants and developers. QuantConnect’s platform is powered by the LEAN Engine, an open source infrastructure for algorithmic trading.

QuantConnect’s partnership with TradeStation Securities comes a month after the Miami, Florida-based firm announced an integration with brokerage platform Alpaca. Courtesy of the partnership, Alpaca users can leverage QuantConnect’s technology to design, backtest, and trade algorithmic strategies for stocks, ETFs, options, as well as cryptocurrencies.

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French Regtech Dotfile Secures €6M in New Funding

French Regtech Dotfile Secures €6M in New Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Dotfile, Funding
  • France-based regtech Dotfile has secured $6.7 million (€6 million) in new funding.
  • The round was led by Seaya Ventures. The company’s existing investors Serena and Hexa also participated in the investment.
  • Dotfile made its Finovate debut earlier this year at FinovateEurope 2024 in London.

Fresh off its FinovateEurope debut earlier this year, Paris-based fintech Dotfile has raised $6.7 million (€6 million) in funding. The round was led by Seaya Ventures, and featured participation from the firm’s existing investors Serena and Hexa. In a statement, the regtech innovator indicated that the funding will power its R&D efforts as well as fuel its international expansion plans.

Dotfile leverages AI to enable banks and other financial institutions to automate customer onboarding and ensure compliance with anti-money laundering (AML) regulations. The company’s business verification platform improves upon the traditionally manual, complex, and expensive Know-Your-Business (KYB) process by aggregating dozens of different data sources to produce a comprehensive picture of a business within 10 seconds.

“More than $200 billion is invested in compliance every year, yet 2% of the world GDP is still going through the money-laundering rinse cycle, which is fueling crime,” Dotfile CEO Vasco Alexandre said. “AI could change how effective those policies are and the positive impact for our societies could be massive.”

The investment in Dotfile comes at a time of growing awareness of the importance of compliance in financial services – and the ability of technology to help banks and other institutions meet these obligations. From banks seeking to maximize opportunities in fintech partnerships to cryptocurrency platforms eager for greater clarity on digital asset regulations, institutions throughout financial services are finding themselves in an increasingly dynamic regulatory environment. To help companies better manage their compliance obligations, a new generation of fintechs such as Dotfile have emerged with tools, workflows, and other solutions–often AI-powered–to streamline and enhance verification, ensure accurate auditability, and reduce costs.

“Compliance is costing banks up to 10% of their revenue, 1 out of 4 employees work in a compliance-related position and existing systems are sometimes more than a decade old,” Alexandre said. “With the competition from fintech intensifying, a transition is bound to happen and generative AI is the tipping point.”

Dotfile made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2024 in London. At the conference, the French regtech demonstrated its end-to-end business verification platform that empowers compliance teams to streamline their operations. The company was founded in 2021 by Alexandre and Titouan Benoit, and received major support from startup studio Hexa (formerly known as eFounders). Today, Dotfile has more than 50 customers across 10 countries, including banks, private equity firms, and fintechs. Most recently, the company announced a partnership with private market investment platform Roundtable, helping the firm improve its KYC process to optimize and accelerate customer onboarding.

Photo by Paul Deetman

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Xero Clients Can Now Offer BNPL Payments via Klarna

Xero Clients Can Now Offer BNPL Payments via Klarna
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Klarna, Xero
  • Xero and Klarna have partnered to allow small businesses to offer buy now, pay later (BNPL) options at checkout, giving consumers more flexible payment choices.
  • Under the partnership, Xero’s small business clients will have access to BNPL capabilities that may help boost revenue and enable more large-ticket sales.
  • This collaboration has the potential to help Xero’s small business clients maintain healthy cash flow by getting paid upfront.

Small business accounting software company Xero and global payments network and shopping platform Klarna announced this week that they have teamed up.

The deal is essentially a distribution partnership for Klarna, which will help Xero’s small businesses clients accept buy now, pay later (BNPL) payments from their consumers. Xero small business customers in all regions except Australia can offer Klarna at checkout as a payment option, providing a credit card alternative while still getting paid for the goods or services up front.

“We know that maintaining a healthy cash flow is critical to a successful business, and offering more ways to pay supports increased business growth and getting paid faster,” said Xero SVP Payments & Ecosystem Bharathi Ramavarjula. “In fact, our recent research report shows that if a business doesn’t offer customers their preferred way to pay, they are prepared to take their business elsewhere. By enabling our customers with more ways to pay, including Klarna, we can help them retain customers and increase their revenue.” 

Klarna’s BNPL tools include a four-payment, interest-free installment plan, a 24-month financing option, and a pay-in-30 day option. Before a customer makes their purchase, Klarna verifies their eligibility and offers transparent terms of the payment. Once the purchase is made, the company follows up with reminders to help ensure that shoppers stay current on their payments. According to Klarna, 99% of the financing is repaid and 40% of orders placed are repaid early.

The partnership has the potential to provide BNPL capabilities to small businesses that would normally not be able to offer flexible payments or financing. By offering a more flexible payment option, these businesses have the potential to close more larger-ticket deals. It also has the potential to help businesses maintain healthy cashflow, as merchants using Klarna will receive the payment up front.

“This partnership brings Klarna’s flexible payment options to micro businesses of all kinds so business owners can get paid on time and their customers can choose how and when to pay,” said “Klarna Chief Commercial Officer David Sykes. “This includes businesses where gardeners and landscaping services using Xero can now offer a Klarna BNPL payment option, plumbers and heating engineers using Xero can fix their customers’ boilers and let them spread the cost while small businesses involved in the construction industry could spread the cost of smaller projects over three interest-free installments.”

Both Klarna and Xero have been in the fintech news cycle in recent months for different reasons. Last month, Klarna unveiled plans to cut its workforce in half in favor of AI-driven productivity. And earlier this month, Xero announced plans to acquire collaborative reporting tool Syft Analytics.

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio

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Best of Show Winner Illuma Labs Raises $9 Million in Series A Funding

Best of Show Winner Illuma Labs Raises $9 Million in Series A Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Daily news, Funding, Illuma Labs

Voice authentication technology innovator Illuma Labs has raised $9 million in funding. The Series A round was led by LiveOak Ventures and featured participation from Forefront Ventures, Curql Fund, UsNet, Capital Factory, Connexus, and TDECU.

As the first major investment for the company, the capital will help accelerate the development of Illuma’s voice verification offerings to help banks and other institutions fight fraud, voice cloning, deep fakes, and more. Illuma Labs also plans to leverage the funding to expand its reach to more credit unions and banks across the country.

“While we are excited about the capital infusion to accelerate our development of fraud prevention and deep fake detection tools, we are equally excited about bringing in new partners to fuel Illuma’s continued commercial growth,” Illuma Co-Founder and CEO Milind Borkar said. He praised both LiveOak Ventures and Forefront Ventures for their operational expertise and industry connections and thanked investors Curql Fund, UsNet, Capital Factory, Connexus, and TDECU for their “continued support.”

Illuma Labs offers banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions the ability to replace their traditional, knowledge-based authentication protocols with a secure, real-time voice authentication solution. The company’s flagship product, Illuma Shield, delivers effortless authentication that enhances the customer experience, improves operational efficiency, and prevents fraud in contact centers.

The funding news arrives one month after the identity verification specialist inked a partnership with Americu Credit Union. The New York State-based CU added voice recognition technology to its Member Contact Center courtesy of a partnership with Illuma announced in August. Earlier this year, Illuma announced that SF Fire Credit Union was adding voice authentication technology to its call center via a collaboration between Illuma and fellow Finovate alum Glia.

Headquartered in Plano, Texas, and founded in 2016, Illuma Labs made its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2019. The company most recently demoed its technology on the Finovate stage earlier this month at FinovateFall, winning Best of Show for its latest deepfake detection technology that helps banks fend off a new generation of AI-enabled fraudsters.

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Revolut to Launch Standalone Wealth Management App

Revolut to Launch Standalone Wealth Management App
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Revolut
  • Revolut is spinning out its wealth management offering into a standalone app called Revolut Invest.
  • The move will allow Revolut to attract users outside of its existing bank client base.
  • Revolut counts 45 million users, has 3 million active traders, and 20,000 subscribers to its premium investment account.

U.K.-based fintech Revolut unveiled today that it plans to spin out its wealth management offering into a standalone app.

The new app, Revolut Invest, will feature capabilities from Revolut’s $9.5 billion (€8.5 billion) wealth management business, as well as additional functionality. At present, Revolut offers its users stock trading as well as a roboadvisor tool. The new app will offer much of the same features: access to 5,000 assets, including U.S. and European stocks, ETFs, commodities, and bonds. The app will also come with new products, such as contracts for difference (CFDs). Revolut Invest will offer the option to upgrade to Revolut’s premium subscription tier called Trading Pro that offers reduced commission fees, increased limits, and analytics.

One of the key advantages for Revolut in making its investing services a standalone tool is the ability to attract customers beyond its current user base. New investors using Revolut Invest won’t need to be existing Revolut banking clients, allowing the company to more easily expand its 3 million active traders and its 20,000 Trading Pro subscribers.

New Revolut Invest users will also be given the option to add Revolut’s banking services during the onboarding process. Conversely, Revolut’s banking clients will not need to download the new trading app, as they will still be able to conduct their investing activities within Revolut’s banking app.

Revolut is currently piloting Revolut Invest in Greece, Denmark, and the Czech Republic. The company is aiming to double the number of investments available in the app in the next three months. To fuel this growth, Revolut is scheduled to launch the investment app in other European Economic Area countries by the end of the year and also revealed plans to launch it in the U.K., U.S., Singapore, and Australia, as it already has the licensing in place in these regions.

With more than 45 million retail customers and 500,000 business customers, Revolut supports more than 25 currencies for users in more than 140 regions. The company offers current accounts, savings accounts, and debit cards that feature the ability to pay in multiple currencies. Revolut also has a credit card product in the U.S., Ireland, Lithuania, and Poland.

Last month, Revolut’s valuation was billed at $45 billion, cementing its reputation as Europe’s most valuable fintech. Earlier this summer, the company earned its banking license from the U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), adding deposit insurance for its users in the region. These two factors place Revolut in a good position to go public; and it is likely the company will favor a NASDAQ listing over listing on the London Stock Exchange.

Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva on Unsplash

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FICO and Jersey Telecom Team Up to Fight Authorized Push Payment Fraud

FICO and Jersey Telecom Team Up to Fight Authorized Push Payment Fraud
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, FICO
  • Global analytics software company FICO has teamed up with Jersey Telecom to offer a new solution to combat Authorized Push Payment (APP) fraud.
  • The new offering, the FICO Customer Communications Service Scam Signal, combines real time network data with customer and payment data to identify and mitigate APP fraud as it happens.
  • FICO made its Finovate debut at our developers conference, FinDEVr New York, in 2016.

A partnership between analytics software company FICO and Jersey Telecom (JT) has yielded a new solution to provide direct, near real-time intervention to protect customers from financial crime in general and Authorized Push Payment (APP) fraud in particular.

The solution, the FICO Customer Communications Service Scam Signal, works by identifying the most relevant telephony signals that indicate a scam is taking place. The new offering represents the first real-time combination of telephony data, customer data, and payment data to deal with the problem of Authorized Push Payment fraud.

“Authorized Push Payment fraud is where customers are tricked into sending authorized payments to scammers,” JT Head of Mobile Intelligence Solutions Clare Messenger said. “This type of fraud is growing around the world; 2023 losses in the U.K. alone reached £460 million. To protect customers from being caught by such scams, the new FICO and JT solution enables direct intervention with the customer to quickly determine if a payment should proceed.”

To achieve the new solution, Jersey Telecom worked with the Global System for Mobile Communications Association (GSMA) and the U.K. Mobile Network Operators to access mobile network insights while adhering to a privacy compliance framework that protected customers’ personal information. Meanwhile, FICO uncovered strong correlations between a customer’s mobile phone behavior and the potential that an active scam is occurring. The Scam Signal leverages this combination of real-time network data, customer data, and payment data to identify and mitigate the social engineering tactics that can trick and ultimately defraud account holders.

“The integration of Scam Signal within the FICO Customer Communications Service allows banks to present customers with personalized, omni-channel, and highly contextualized messages that break the scammer’s spell for high-risk activities,” FICO VP of Product Management Adam Davies said.

“These messages can be built into conversation ‘flows’ that respond in real-time to the actions the customer takes,” Davies explained. “For example, if a customer hesitates or looks to progress a payment, additional messages can be sent, and different options offered, such as suggesting delaying the payment or offering to speak to a fraud prevention specialist.”

The new offering is currently available in the Channel Island of Jersey, the U.K., and Spain, and there are plans to eventually expand to additional markets. Nevertheless, FICO reported that “major high-street banks in the U.K.” are already deploying Scam Signal. One institution piloting the new technology said that it had reduced the number of people being scammed by 41%, lowered fraud losses from scams by 44%, and reduced the number of false positives by 55%.

Last month, Scam Signal won the Silver Medal at Datos Insights’ Fraud Impact Awards for “Best Scam and APP Fraud Prevention” solution. The technology has also been shortlisted for the “Anti-Fraud Solution of the Year” award at the 2024 U.K. Payments Awards.

FICO made its Finovate debut in 2016 at our developers conference, FinDEVr New York. Today, businesses in more than 100 countries use FICO’s technology and solutions to defend customers against fraud, advance financial inclusion, boost supply chain resiliency, and more. The company’s FICO Score has become the standard measure of consumer credit risk in the U.S., and is used by 90% of the country’s top lenders.

Founded in 1956 and headquartered in San Jose, California, FICO is publicly traded on the NYSE under the ticker FICO. The company has a market capitalization of $47 billion.

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PNC and Plaid Repair Relationship to Empower Open Banking

PNC and Plaid Repair Relationship to Empower Open Banking
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Plaid
  • PNC and Plaid have partnered to allow PNC customers to connect to and share their financial data with third party financial applications.
  • Plaid will help connect PNC customers to apps, while PNC’s API provider Akoya will ensure that PNC’s customer data is securely shared with third party apps powered by Plaid.
  • Today’s announcement comes five years after PNC blocked multiple data aggregators, including Plaid, claiming they circumvented PNC’s security protocol.

Getting a head start on Section 1033 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform, PNC Financial Services Group announced recently that it has partnered with financial data access company Plaid. The two have signed a data access agreement to enable PNC customers to connect and share their financial data with third party financial applications through Plaid.

PNC will also leverage its API service provider Akoya. Through this partnership, Plaid will help connect PNC customers to apps, while as the API provider, Akoya will ensure that PNC’s customer data is securely shared with third party apps powered by Plaid, without needing to share login credentials.

The collaboration among the three players will ultimately offer a better user experience. That’s because Plaid will help to increase security by eliminating screen scraping and other fraud-prone data collection techniques. The partnership will also allow consumers to access their financial data without having to share their credentials with the third parties themselves. Additionally, Plaid will offer the customer control​ of their own data, allowing them to determine which third party apps may have access to their data.

“Through this new partnership with Plaid, PNC customers will be able to achieve greater data security, privacy, and control while using the third-party financial apps and services they enjoy,” said PNC Executive Vice President, Digital and Payments Natalie Talpas. “PNC’s use of its Akoya-provided API allows for all data recipients, including Plaid, to get connected fast, while also enabling customers to reliably control what financial data they are permissioning without having to share their login credentials with third parties.”

This partnership is notable not just for PNC and its customers, but also for bank customers across the U.S. That’s because PNC’s partnership with Plaid indicates a positive change in attitude toward open banking in the U.S. In the past, PNC has notoriously held a stance against open banking. The bank not only prevented its customers from accessing Venmo in 2019, it also blocked multiple data aggregators, including Plaid, claiming they circumvented PNC’s security protocol.

With today’s partnership, however, the two now appear to be on good terms. “We are pleased to have reached a data access agreement with PNC that further supports their customers securely connecting to applications and services powered by Plaid,” said Plaid Head of Open Finance Partnerships Christy Sunquist. “Moving the industry away from credential-based access is a top priority for Plaid, and our alignment on key principles around security, access and control played a definitive role in establishing this partnership. We look forward to future collaboration for many years to come.”

Photo by Tim Douglas

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Walmart Taps Fiserv to Offer Pay by Bank

Walmart Taps Fiserv to Offer Pay by Bank
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Fiserv
  • Walmart is partnering with Fiserv to enable pay-by-bank payments for online purchases starting in 2025.
  • Benefits to Walmart include lower transaction costs, faster settlement, reduced fraud, and fewer payment declines, while customers can avoid stacked pending transactions.
  • Consumers may face challenges like added friction and lost credit card rewards, but early pilot results have exceeded Walmart’s expectations for pay-by-bank adoption.

Walmart made its latest move in the fintech space this week after announcing it has partnered with Fiserv to offer pay-by-bank for online purchases.

Bloomberg unveiled this week that, while the retailer has offered pay-by-bank via Walmart Pay for a few months now, the payments were routed through ACH payment rails and still took days to clear. Beginning in 2025, however, Walmart will leverage Fiserv’s NOW Network, which will route the payments through The Clearing House’s Real Time Payments network and the Federal Reserve’s FedNow. Launched in 2014, Fiserv’s NOW Network aims to reach as many banks as possible to provide consumers and businesses the ability to send, receive, and access funds immediately while supporting credit push payments.

Starting next year, customers will be able to make online purchases using pay-by-bank by connecting their bank account through Fiserv’s AllData platform. The platform will facilitate authentication and securely link bank accounts. This will be done through integrations with Plaid, MX, Akoya, and Finicity, ensuring a seamless and secure connection to customer accounts.

Leveraging Fiserv to power real time payments is an important move for Walmart as it enters the pay-by-bank game. As Fiserv Head of Digital Payments Matt Wilcox told Bloomberg, “As an industry we believe we need to create this connectivity. FedNow and RTP, they don’t necessarily talk to one another. The NOW Network can play that role in the industry of bringing all these networks together to enable applications like pay-by-bank.”

Walmart stands to receive multiple benefits when consumers choose to pay-by-bank. The retailer will face lower transaction costs by bypassing credit card networks; increased cash flow, since bank transfers settle faster than card transactions; reduced fraud and fewer declines, since the pay-by-bank payments offers direct access to and will authenticate a customer’s bank account; and the potential to reach more consumers who may not have a credit or debit card.

From a consumer perspective, the benefits of pay-by-bank are more difficult to find. Unlike the merchant, they don’t experience any cost savings for opting for pay-by-bank, there is added friction involved in connecting their bank account to Walmart’s platform, they lose out on credit card rewards, and in the event their account is hacked, fraudsters will have the option to make purchases directly from their account, instead of on a credit card that would offer an extra layer of protection while the customer disputes the transaction.

That said, Walmart is touting the ability for pay-by-bank to help consumers avoid stacked pending transactions. “When the transaction processes as a real time payment, customers get immediate access to see that payment come through, I see it hit my account and I can properly budget,” said Walmart Vice President of Emerging Payments Jamie Henry. “It’s not as if I’ve got this phantom payment out there that’s going to take place a couple days down the road.”

And while I remain skeptical on the mass consumer adoption of pay-by-bank, perhaps Walmart’s customer base is more well suited for these types of transactions. Henry said that the initial pilot of pay-by-bank was surprising. “It’s certainly surpassed our expectations of the amount of customers that have registered and actually use the payment type,” he said.

Photo by Marques Thomas on Unsplash

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Oblinor Partners with Open Banking Innovator Neonomics

Oblinor Partners with Open Banking Innovator Neonomics
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Neonomics
  • Open banking solutions provider Neonomics is streamlining and enhancing the deposit experience for customers of Oblinor.
  • Oblinor offers a digital real estate investment platform that enables users to build a portfolio of secured property loans.
  • Based in Oslo, Norway, Neonomics made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2020 in Berlin, Germany.

Digital real estate investment platform Oblinor has turned to open banking solutions provider Neonomics to streamline and enhance the deposit experience. Oblinor, founded in 2018 and headquartered in Norway, has integrated Neonomics’ checkout offering, which will facilitate a faster, more secure process for investors when they deposit funds for their accounts.

“We’re excited to integrate open banking into our platform,” Oblinor Lead Engineer Christopher Maxwell said. “Neonomics has made the transition smooth and effortless, allowing us to offer a faster, more secure, and incredibly user-friendly way to fund investments. This is just the beginning, and we’re excited about the potential to continue driving innovation in financial services alongside Neonomics.”

Oblinor enables individuals to invest in loans to Norwegian property companies and to build a portfolio of secured property loans. Its partnership with Neonomics will enhance the deposit experience by instantly populating details such as account numbers, amounts, and KID numbers, reducing the amount of manual work typically required to enter transaction data. In addition to accelerating the deposit experience, the partnership with Neonomics will provide greater security and less risk of fraud, as well.

“Neonomics is a perfect fit for what Oblinor is building,” Neonomics CEO Christopher Andvig said. “By integrating open banking, we’re adding real value for their users–making it easier, more secure, and more efficient to invest. As the potential of open banking continues to grow, we’re excited to see what’s next in this partnership.”

Founded in 2017, Neonomics made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2020 in Berlin. At the event, the Norway-based fintech showed how its technology can be used to facilitate instant payments and bank transfers directly from an app or website. Today, the company unifies access to more than 2,500 banks and 150 million bank customers across Europe. A licensed payments institution authorized by the Norwegian FSA, Neonomics provides payments initiation and account information services for customers ranging from banks to fintechs to payment service providers and more.

Earlier this month, Neonomics introduced new Head of Growth and Interim Country Manager for Finland, Panu Poutanen. Most recently, Poutanen was General Manager of Finland for European cloud-based payment services provider Viva.com. In August, Neonomics announced a partnership with charitable giving platform company Støtte. The company will leverage Neonomics’ open banking technology to facilitate account-to-account payments for its micro-donation offering.

Photo by Oliver Cole on Unsplash

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