Daily news

Digital Insurance Innovator Ladder Raises $100 Million

Digital Insurance Innovator Ladder Raises $100 Million
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding

California-based insurtech Ladder has secured $100 million in Series D funding in a round led by Thomvest Ventures and OMERs Growth Equity. The company, which brands itself as the first, fully digital life insurance company in operation, will use the new capital to fuel further innovation in accessible, affordable life insurance solutions. The investment will also enable Ladder to expand its team, with a goal of more than doubling its workforce in 2022.

“I know first hand how life insurance can change a life,” Ladder co-founder and CEO Jamie Hale explained. “With our carrier in operation and this new round of funding, we are in the position to greatly accelerate innovation in service of families and communities. I am so excited to see our original vision continue to materialize.”

Ladder offers insurance customers flexible term coverage that can be set up in minutes and save policyholders up to 40%. With coverage of up to $8 million available in all 50 states, Ladder leverages an all-digital infrastructure and real-time underwriting to innovate at every step of the life insurance experience – from acquisition and product design to UX, instant issue, and policy administration. In its funding announcement, Ladder highlighted the fact that this week’s investment comes on the heels of 4x revenue growth in 2020 and in advance of its goal of issuing $30 billion in LadderLife coverage by the end of this year.

“Jamie Hale and his visionary management team are building Ladder into an innovative, market-leading digital life insurance company,” Saar Pikar, Managing Director and fintech lead at OMERS Growth Equity, said. “We are very pleased to count Ladder as OMERS Growth Equity’s first direct fintech investment – as well as our entry in the insurtech space, expanding on the insurtech presence established by our OMERS Ventures colleagues. We believe that the company offers a truly transformative approach, including through its efficient adjudication of risk and enhanced user experience.”

Founded in 2015, Ladder has raised a total of $194 million in funding. The company was named to Fortune’s Best Workplaces for a second year in a row this year and, this summer, appointed eight-year LinkedIn veteran Sanjeev Kapur to the newly created role of President.

Photo by cottonbro from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Interac Acquires Rights to SecureKey Digital ID Services

Interac Acquires Rights to SecureKey Digital ID Services
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions, SecureKey

Two Canadian fintechs have struck a deal this week. Payments network and digital ID provider Interac has agreed to acquire rights to digital ID and authentication provider SecureKey’s digital ID services for Canada.

Interac, which is building a network to help Canadians digitally share and verify their identity credentials, will leverage SecureKey’s digital ID services, along with its operations, technology, and innovation. Ultimately, Interac seeks to accelerate secure online service delivery and offer strong privacy and fraud protections for the digital economy in Canada.

“At Interac, we believe that digital ID is the key to empowering all Canadians to participate equally and safely in the future of the digital economy,” said Interac CEO Mark O’Connell. “Through this acquisition, we are proud to increase our investment in leading identification and authentication capabilities as we work to support businesses and governments across Canada in delivering secure and convenient digital ID experiences for Canadians.”

Both companies will continue to operate as separate entities. Interac will implement Verified.Me, a digital ID verification network built on distributed ledger technology, and Government Sign-In by Verified.Me, a secure sign-in tool to access 280+ government services.

“As the pandemic has made abundantly clear, the way Canadians use their identity documents and how they prioritize accessing services digitally has changed forever,” said Chief Officer of Innovation Labs & New Ventures at Interac Debbie Gamble. “The need to accelerate innovation to provide secure and convenient options for people to transact with their identities is critical.”

This announcement follows Interac’s acquisition of Ottawa-based 2Keys, a company focused on creating secure digital experiences, in 2019.

Founded in 2008, SecureKey has made a couple of key partnerships recently. The company partnered with Onfido in March of 2020 to offer real-time photo ID verification and teamed up with Simplii Financial in May of 2020 to offer Simplii clients with secure access to government services.

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Alloy Earns $1.35 Billion Valuation After Securing Series C Investment

Alloy Earns $1.35 Billion Valuation After Securing Series C Investment
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alloy, Alumni News, Daily news, Funding

One year to the month after Alloy closed a $40 million Series B round, the identity decisioning platform – and FinDEVr Silicon Valley alum – has secured a Series C investment of $100 million that brings the company’s valuation to $1.35 billion.

“Identity and its associated risk isn’t something businesses should be figuring out, it should just be something they install,” Alloy co-founder and CEO Tommy Nicholas said. “As Alloy grows into a multi-product platform for the full customer identity lifecycle, we can not only help make risk easier to understand, but also further industry innovation by making fintech products easier to build.”

The Series C round was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners’ Justin Overdorff and featured participation from current investors Canapi Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, Avid Ventures, and Felicis Ventures. Alloy said that the new capital will enable the firm to “invest” in its team, as well as help expand the company’s product offerings. Over the past year, Alloy’s solution has evolved from a platform that automates onboarding identity decision-making to one that now incorporates transaction monitoring. The company said that it will soon also feature richer data and risk signals to provide FIs with even greater insight into their customers.

Alloy’s API-based platform leverages more than 120 data source products to help companies and banks verify customer identities and monitor transactions. Processing more than 455,000 decisions a day on average, the company’s solution provides both identity verification and risk monitoring functionality in the same place, enabling both developer and product teams to maximize the platform’s resources. The result is a 50% reduction in manual review, and 80% automation rate for new account openings, and an automated customer approval rate of more than 80% for customers such as Novo, Brex, and HMBradley.

Headquartered in New York City and founded in 2015, Alloy was named one of the Best Fintechs to Work for in 2021 by American Banker, and boasts a workforce that is more than 50% female and has ethnic minority representation of nearly 40%. In August, Alloy announced its newest partnership, collaborating with Amerant Bank to automate identity verification in customer onboarding for the $8 billion, Florida-based community bank.

“Providing an exceptional experience for customers, both online and in-person, is at the core of our digital transformation strategy,” Amerant Bank Vice Chairman and CEO Jerry Plush said in a partnership announcement. “With the addition of Alloy, we’ll be able to still meet regulatory requirements, while ensuring a faster and more seamless onboarding and underwriting process that will benefit both customers and Amerant team members.”

Photo by Soloman Soh from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Betterment Raises $160 Million With $1.3 Billion Valuation

Betterment Raises $160 Million With $1.3 Billion Valuation
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Betterment, Daily news

Wealthtech company Betterment has boosted its total funding to $435 million after closing $160 million in growth capital this week. The funds include $60 million in Series F equity and a $100 million credit facility.

The new round values Betterment at $1.3 billion. The equity portion was led by Treasury with participation from existing investors Kinnevik, Bessemer Venture Partners, Francisco Partners, Menlo Ventures, Anthemis Group, Globespan Capital Partners, Citi Ventures, and The Private Shares Fund. New investors Aflac Ventures and ID8 Investments also participated.

The $100 million credit facility comes from ORIX Corporation USA’s Growth Capital group and Runway Growth Capital.

“We are thrilled to have the support of new and existing investors who believe in our business model and are excited by the opportunity to support our growth,” said Betterment CEO Sarah Levy. “We’re using these funds to further cement our category leadership with rapid innovation on top of our already differentiated product suite and unique, multi-pronged distribution model that serves retail investors, advisors and small businesses.”

More specifically, Betterment will use the funds to support its 401(k) offering for small and medium sized businesses.

Founded in 2010, Betterment manages $32 billion in assets for its nearly 700,000 clients. In addition to offering automated 401(k) and IRA options, the company also provides socially responsible investment options, retirement planning services, a checking account, and a high-yield savings account.

Today’s announcement comes after a flurry of news activity for Betterment, after the company appointed Levy as CEO in December of last year. In March, the company acquired the investment advisory business of WealthSimple, partnered with Zenefits to offer 401(k) plans on the Zenefits platform, rolled out a checking account for shared finances, unveiled a co-pilot tool for advisors, and launched pre-packaged tech stack for RIAs.

Photo by lucas Favre on Unsplash

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Starling Bank Expands in Europe with B2B Banking and Payments Services

Starling Bank Expands in Europe with B2B Banking and Payments Services
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news

U.K. digital bank Starling announced plans to expand its banking-as-a-service (BaaS) solution.

Starling launched its BaaS offering, Starling as a Service, in the U.K. in 2018. The company currently has 25 BaaS customers, including Raisin, CurrencyCloud, Moneybox, and Vitesse.

Starling as a Service will expand to the European Union in the first half of this year. Specifically, Starling aims to bring the service to companies in France, Germany, The Netherlands, and Spain.

The BaaS offering will enable businesses to build their own embedded financial products. While the business client offers the financial product to its end customers, Starling handles all technical and regulatory details involved.

Starling CEO Anne Boden described the European markets as a “great fit” for Starling due to the region’s “thriving” fintech scene. “We have seen a consistent and growing demand for digital financial services, further accelerated by extended lockdowns and a shift in consumer behaviors in key European markets,” said Boden, “and it is clear that Starling can power new and exciting opportunities for businesses across Europe.”

Starling as a Service takes advantage of the embedded finance trend that has been building since last year. By leveraging third party fintech solutions, any business can itself become a fintech by offering financial services to its customers. In Starling’s case, Starling as a Service will enable businesses to provide savings and current accounts, digital wallets, data processing, and payment cards.

Today’s news comes after Starling scored $376 million in funding in March and acquired Fleet Mortgages in July of this year. Headquartered in London, and with offices in Southampton, Cardiff, and Dublin, Starling has amassed $922 million in funding since launching its digital bank in 2014.

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Fintech-as-a-Service Innovator Rize Raises $11.4 Million

Fintech-as-a-Service Innovator Rize Raises $11.4 Million
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding

In a round co-led by Alpha Edison and Morpheus Ventures, fintech-as-a-service platform Rize has secured $11.4 million in Series A funding. The company, founded by Justin Howell and Kirk Voltz six years ago as a B2C fintech firm, has since transitioned into a B2B platform dedicated to “making fintech infrastructure simple, accessible, and ubiquitous for all financial builders.”

The investment takes the Arlington, Virginia-based company’s total funding to $13.4 million.

Writing about the investment on the company’s blog, Howell put his company in the same cohort as fintech innovators – and Finovate alums – like Plaid and DriveWealth. These firms, like Rize, started out as consumer plays, but developed into fintech infrastructure companies as their understanding of challenge of “building intuitive financial user experiences” grew. Realizing that there was more to enhancing the user experience in financial services than UI/UX improvements, Howell and the Rize team concluded that the underlying financial infrastructure was the problem and Rize’s “uniquely flexible approach” could be part of the solution.

Rize’s platform leverages Synthetic Account technology to enable banks, fintechs, and brands to build a wide range of financial account types ranging from checking and savings accounts to brokerage, FBO, and business accounts. The technology also supports quick and secure money movement options including ACH and wires, as well as mobile check deposit and physical and virtual cards.

This summer, Rize unveiled its Developer Toolkit, which enables innovators to build a prototype financial services application in less than 30 minutes. The toolkit features a comprehensive suite of technologies – a self-service sandbox, a launchpad, a software development kit (SDK), a command line interface tool (CLI), and a boilerplate app – designed to help developers both focus on the core elements of their solution as well as get their solutions to market as quickly as possible.

“When we set out to become the best-in-class fintech infrastructure platform, we knew that meant heavily investing in the developer community,” the company said in July when the toolkit was launched. “Our mission is to get clients to market faster, with less effort – and that begins with not only providing great documentation, but creating tools that enhance our builder’s experience and significantly cuts down on development time.”

In today’s funding announcement, Howell said that the funds raised in the Series A would enable Rize to continue innovating on its core solutions, including its Developer Toolkit. The new capital will also support other initiatives such as improving the Rize Admin platform, UDAAP monitoring, and security systems. The funding will also support the launch of new offerings including brokerage accounts and new crypto and credit-related solutions.

In addition to Alpha Edison and Morpheus Ventures, Rize counts Raptor Group, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, Third Prime, Red & Blue Ventures, Graham Holdings, Walkabout Ventures, and Rucker Park Capital among its investors.

Photo by Harrison Haines from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Cross Border Payments Infrastructure Innovator Buckzy Payments Inks Partnership with M2P Solutions

Cross Border Payments Infrastructure Innovator Buckzy Payments Inks Partnership with M2P Solutions
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Buckzy Payments, Daily news

Asia’s largest API infrastructure company, M2P Solutions, will leverage the real-time, cross border payments ecosystem developed by Buckzy Payments to enable its customers to offer better payment services in many of the more underserved corridors in the MENA region. Clients such as banks, exchanges, and money transfer operators (MTOs) will be the partnership’s chief beneficiaries; targeted markets include the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Oman.

“We are clearly aligned in our mission to improve global banking and transaction settlement services that unlock the borderless banking and global economic opportunities for all,” Managing Director for Buckzy in EMEA Adrian Brown said. “Combining Buckzy’s network with M2P’s API platform delivers an outstanding customer experience and competitive advantage for customers.”

Buckzy’s network enables real-time, cross border payments around the world. The company’s technology gives both businesses and financial institutions the ability to expand their offerings via white-label solutions on a secure platform. Moreover, Buckzy’s ecosystem also empowers these organizations to make collections and receive payments in local currency. Headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and founded in 2018, Buckzy demonstrated its solution one year later at FinovateFall. At the conference, Buckzy Global CMO Lindsay Mulligan showed how the company’s technology powered instant, on-the-go digital wallet transfers and top ups, as well as multi-currency transfers and instant email money transfers with just a few clicks and without transaction fees.

Business Head of M2P Solutions for MENA, Vaanathi Mohanakrishnan, underscored the importance to the company of opening up these regional opportunities. “A lot of M2P’s strategy hinges on enabling fintechs to deliver solutions leveraging our infrastructure and partner network,” Mohanakrishnan explained. “We are excited to be partnering with Buckzy to deliver frictionless cross border payment experiences to customers in the MENA region.”

Delivering real-time cross-border payments to 47 countries, Buckzy Payments was recently named to the CIX Top 20 Early roster of innovative Canadian technology companies. With offices in the U.S. and India, as well as Toronto, the company has raised $3 million in funding from investors including Dash40 Ventures, Mistral Venture Partners, and Revel Partners.

Photo by Louise Brawn from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Signifyd Collaborates with Capital One To Help Retailers Combat False Positives

Signifyd Collaborates with Capital One To Help Retailers Combat False Positives
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Capital One, Daily news, Signifyd

A new partnership between Finovate alum Signifyd and Capital One will bring the fraud prevention specialist’s Authorization Rate Optimization solution to the bank’s payment ecosystem. The integration will help boost authorization rates and reduce the number of orders on Capital One credit cards that are inaccurately declined due to suspected fraud. This will increase revenue for retailers, as well as enhance customer lifetime value. Capital One will benefit from stronger cardholder loyalty, while cardholders will enjoy a more secure, online shopping experience with less friction.

“We are so pleased to partner with Capital One to solve a strategic issue for the ecommerce world,” Signifyd CEO Ra Ramanand said. “The very largest ecommerce sites globally can work directly with issuers to optimize their auth rates, but what do other merchants do? They come to Signifyd because we can optimize payment acceptance through our deep product integrations across the financial ecosystem.”

Signifyd’s Authorization Rate Optimization technology will be integrated with Capital One’s Enhanced Decisioning Data API. This will give Capital One enhanced data and fraud insights to help establish whether or not a given transaction should be approved or declined at the bank authorization stage. The solution provides identity intelligence across the entire shopper journey, delivering instant insights from the Signifyd Commerce Network at checkout, and helping authorization rates go up and the number of false declines go down.

An increase in false declines are, in some ways, the predicable outcome of the arms race between retailers and fraudsters. As fraud becomes more sophisticated, with more attacks and intrusions taking place earlier in the transaction process, both banks and merchants have found themselves increasingly declining payment at the authorization stage. The Economist reported that up to one in eight e-commerce dollars are currently declined during payment authorization, and the Aite Group reported that 62% of the merchants it surveyed admitted that their false decline rates have gone up in the last two years.

“There is no reason (why) merchants and banks should miss the opportunity to create seamless customer experiences at checkout,” Signifyd General Manager, Payment Solutions Okan Ozaltin said. “Working directly with issuing banks such as Capital One means Signifyd can offer the kind of ecommerce protection that makes life better for merchants and their loyal customers.”

Making its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring in 2013, Signifyd has become a leading, enterprise-grade fraud prevention platform. This year, the company was recognized by G2 in its 2021 Summer Report as a leader in the space as well as being first in market presence. Founded in 2011 and headquartered in Palo Alto, California, Signifyd has raised $390 million in funding, including a $205 million Series E round closed in April that was led by Owl Rock Capital. In addition to its partnership with Capital One – itself an alum of Finovate’s developer conference FinDEVr – Signifyd has teamed up in recent months with B2B payments specialist Adflex and, this spring, launched its Return Abuse Prevention Solution, which helps retailers better manage the $43 billion problem of fraudsters who abuse the refund and return system.

“Unfortunately, fraudsters and a subset of consumers are becoming more aggressive and ingenious when it comes to taking advantage of return policies meant to make life easier for shoppers,” Signifyd Vice President of Product Gayathri Somanath said when the solution was introduced. “Return Abuse Prevention relies on Signifyd’s network data, machine learning models and our new Decision Center module to give retailers the tools they need to stay ahead of this increasing, revenue-crushing trend.”

Photo by Markus Spiske from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

RBC’s Nomi Spend Management Tool Adds Forecasting

RBC’s Nomi Spend Management Tool Adds Forecasting
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news

Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) launched two new capabilities for its NOMI financial intelligence platform. Unveiled today, NOMI Forecast shows users their future cash flow. The app also has increased its security with the launch of two-step verification upon login.

“At a time when Canadians are more conscious than ever of their daily finances, and banking digitally more frequently, they expect solutions that help them confidently manage their money and safeguard their accounts and information,” said RBC SVP Digital Peter Tilton. “With NOMI Forecast, we’re giving clients next generation cash flow advice and insights to take the stress out of balancing their accounts. Equally important, 2-Step Verification will work to provide clients added peace of mind as they navigate this rapidly evolving digital banking landscape.”

NOMI Forecast works by showing users all of the pre-authorized payments they have coming over a seven-day period. By accounting for known upcoming expenses, the forecasting capability offers users better visibility of their account activity and helps them have more control over their finances.

With the two-step verification process, users can select their mobile device as the primary channel to access the account. If they attempt to login with another device, they receive an in-app notification to verify their session. Unlike two-factor authentication, there is no security code delivered via email or text. Instead, the user presses a button to continue their session.

In a press release, RBC said that the two new features demonstrate the bank’s “commitment to add value, enhance security, and create peace of mind” for clients.

Photo by Meghan Schiereck on Unsplash

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Ocrolus Raises $80 Million at $500 Million Valuation

Ocrolus Raises $80 Million at $500 Million Valuation
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Funding, Ocrolus

Financial document automation platform Ocrolus pulled in $80 million in Series C funding today. The round was led by Fin VC and included participation from Thomvest Ventures, Mubadala Capital, Oak HC/FT, FinTech Collective, QED Investors, Bullpen Capital, ValueStream Ventures, Laconia, RiverPark Ventures, Invicta Growth, Stage II Capital, and Cross River Bank.

The New York-based company now boasts $127 million in funding and is valued at over $500 million. Ocrolus plans to use the funds to expand U.S. operations and “more aggressively” build products for banking and mortgage lending.

“Our platform helps lenders automate underwriting and intelligently leverage cash flow and income data for credit scoring,” said Ocrolus Co-founder and CEO Sam Bobley. “By enabling lenders to more quickly analyze diverse sources of financial data, Ocrolus levels the playing field for every borrower, providing expanded access to credit at a lower cost.”

Ocrolus was founded in 2014 to create a document processing automation solution that helps lenders classify, capture, detect, and analyze financial documents to make better lending decisions. To accomplish this, the company leverages AI, machine learning, and human-in-the-loop (HITL) optimization. The HITL component serves as Ocrolus’ key ingredient to differentiation because it ensures an enhanced level of accuracy when analyzing data derived from documents.

The company, which won a Best of Show award at FinovateFall last week for its document analysis technology, has benefitted from the recent acceleration of digitization brought on by COVID. In today’s lending environment, FIs need to offer online options to compete. We spoke with Ocrolus’ VP of Solutions Nicole Newlin last year on the effects of this digitalization.

Ocrolus’ client list is as impressive as it is extensive, including firms such as Brex, Enova, Lending Club, PayPal, Plaid, and SoFi. Accommodating for a recent uptick in demand, the company added more than 75 employees this year and plans to boost its hiring efforts next year, focusing specifically on machine learning and data science professionals.

Photo by Wesley Tingey on Unsplash

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Rent-to-Rewards Specialist Bilt Locks in $60 Million in Funding

Rent-to-Rewards Specialist Bilt Locks in $60 Million in Funding
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Funding

It’s becoming easier and easier to earn awards from everyday – or every month – transactions. Bilt, a fintech that enables renters to accrue points that can be redeemed for rewards, announced this week that it has raised $60 million in new funding. The investment, which included Mastercard and Wells Fargo among its chief contributors, gives the company a valuation of $350 million.

Launched earlier this summer, the company has since introduced its solution to more than two million rental units across the U.S. The company’s founder, Ankur Jain, said that Bilt is the first and only coalition of major property owners to offer this kind of solution and noted that “15 of the top 20 property owners” have become involved.

Also participating in the funding were some of the country’s biggest real estate companies including AvalonBay Communities, The Blackstone Group, Douglas Elliman, Equity Residential, GID-Winsor Communities, LENx, The Moinian Group, Morgan Properties, Starwood Capital Group, and Related.

Tenants can earn points by either renting from a member of the Bilt Rewards Alliance of more than two million rental homes or by making transactions using the Bilt Mastercard. Points can be used in a wide variety of ways, including travel, fitness club membership, paying rent, or even as part of a down payment to help pave the path to homeownership. Via the Bilt Mastercard, cardholders can earn up to 50,000 points a year toward rent, and earn an unlimited amount of points that can be used on other transactions.

Bilt sees major opportunity in a market that consists of approximately 109 million renters who pay an estimated $500 billion in rent every year. The company said that it will use the additional funding to help scale its loyalty program, giving more renters the opportunity to get something more than shelter from what is typically an individual’s “largest expense every single month,” according to Jain.

Photo by PhotoMIX Company from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook

Extend Teams Up with Amex to Bring Virtual Card Solution to SMEs

Extend Teams Up with Amex to Bring Virtual Card Solution to SMEs
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, American Express, Daily news, Extend

A new partnership between American Express and New York City-based fintech Extend will give small businesses in the U.S. new options when it comes to using and deploying virtual cards. Specifically, U.S. companies with eligible American Express Business Cards will be able to use Extend’s technology to enroll and create virtual cards in as little as five minutes.

American Express EVP for Global Commercial Services Dean Henry highlighted the increased use of virtual cards during the pandemic – and the continued interest companies have in using the technology to facilitate contactless payments. “With today’s announcement, our Business Cards can work even harder for our Card Members through this quick and easy virtual Card option,” Henry explained. “This gives our Card Members enhanced flexibility and control across their day-to-day business spending, including for B2B purchases and enabling their employees to pay for expenses.”

The statistics on virtual card use by businesses support Henry’s assessment. A study conducted by American Express indicated that 39% of U.S. businesses expect to increase their use of virtual cards over the next 12 months. With regard to the specific benefits available via the new offering from Extend and American Express, there are at least seven – not including touchless payment ability – worth highlighting. These advantages include fast onboarding, flexibility and ease of use, spending controls due to the use of tokenization, better security and protection against fraud, streamlined expense reporting, automated card issuance, and the ability to earn rewards.

The two companies also noted in their partnership announcement that they planned to offer additional features and expand functionality in the future. Among the new functionalities anticipated is the ability to add American Express virtual cards to mobile wallets to facilitate in-store transactions.

“This market is rapidly growing as businesses realize just how versatile and effective virtual Cards can be,” Extend CEO Andrew Jamison said, “whether it’s managing subscription payments, equipping employees with secure company cards, or developing custom payment solutions with our APIs.”

Founded in 2017, Extend made its Finovate debut two years later at FinovateSpring in San Francisco, California. That same year, the Manhattan-based company raised $11 million in Series A funding in a round led by Point72 Ventures and the FinTech Collective, giving the firm a total capital of $14 million. More recently, the virtual card platform company forged partnerships with Mastercard and TSYS in the fall of 2020, and with City National Bank in January of this year.

American Express joined the Finovate alum club via its 2015 presentation at our developers conference FinDEVr Silicon Valley. At the event, members of the company’s engineering team discussed the evolving role of B2B payments in the e-commerce ecosystem, and how American Express was “bringing commercial payments to the cloud.”

Photo by Budgeron Bach from Pexels

Share this:

Send Post Twitter LinkedIn Facebook