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Finovate Blog
Tracking fintech, banking & financial services innovations since 1994
Global payments platform Nium unveiled a new payments solution.
The new solution helps international banks increase the speed and reduce the cost of settling transactions to select U.S. brokerages.
Leveraging the tool, financial institutions can save up to 90% in settlement fees.
Global payments platform Niumunveiled a new payments solution that will help international banks increase the speed and reduce the cost of settling transactions to select U.S. brokerages. As a result, international financial institutions will be able to more easily invest in U.S. equities.
“AtNium, we are constantly seeking to empower growing businesses with global reach to move money in smart, fast, and safe ways,” said Nium Chief Revenue Officer Frederick Crosby. “Our new payments solution for FIs that send money to brokerages allows their retail customers to invest in U.S. equities – fast and simple.”
The new payments tool saves Nium clients up to 90% in settlement fees when compared to SWIFT. “Nium’s new solution dramatically lowers the expense of these transactions, allowing FIs to either share cost savings with their customers or re-invest profits in the business,” added Crosby.
Additionally, the tool increases the potential for new clients by leveraging Nium’s network, decreases investment friction for end users, and does not require Nium clients to undergo new technology integrations.
Nium’s new release comes at a good time. The new decade’s digital-first customers now not only expect to conduct most of their financial activity online, they also expect things to be near-instant. Additionally, retail investors have expressed an increased desire to invest in overseas markets.
Singapore-based Nium was founded in 2015. The company serves over 130 million end customers and helps businesses pay out in more than 100 currencies to over 190 countries– 85 of those in real time.
Billpay platform doxo has raised $18.5 million in Series C funding.
The round was led by Jackson Square Ventures and featured participation from existing investors.
Headquartered in Seattle, Washington, doxo will use the capital to grow its platform and expand its team.
In a round led by Jackson Square Ventures, billpay platform doxo has secured $18.5 million in Series C funding. The capital will help the Seattle, Washington-based company further expand its platform, grow its workforce, build out its billpay provider directory, and accelerate its doxoDIRECT platform to enable billers to receive swift and cost-free direct electronic payments.
Valuation information was not immediately available. The Series C investment takes the company’s total funds raised to $37.3 million according to Crunchbase.
“People are shifting to more customer-centered, secure payment methods and billers are looking for ways to improve their payment experience and boost customer engagement,” doxo co-founder and CEO Steve Shivers said. “By meeting these needs, doxo’s growth has accelerated significantly this past year. We’re very pleased to have Jackson Square Ventures as our partner as we continue to scale to meet demand and expand the benefits we deliver to consumers and billers alike.”
doxo’s flagship solutions, doxo and doxoPLUS, enable consumers to send payments to more than 120,000 partnering billers from a single account. Consumers can use a variety of payment methods including credit and debit cards, Apple Pay, as well as their bank account, and payment information is not shared with billers. The technology enables users to set bill reminders, get real-time status updates, and monitor all of their payment history from a single location.
Available as both a free service and as a premium version for $4.99 a month that adds doxo’s Five Protections package (identity protection, overdraft protection, late fee protection, credit protection, and Private Pay protection), doxo’s technology helps consumers save money as well as improve their financial health.
doxo also offers doxoDIRECT for businesses that do not have billpay on their websites, compelling their customers to use other channels – such as mail, bank payments, and cash payments. doxoDIRECT for businesses enables companies to enhance customer engagement and payment convenience by closing this “gap” with a service that enables fast, free direct deposit payments. The company also publishes doxoINSIGHTS, an analysis of U.S. billpay statistics and bill payer behavior.
“We see doxo not just as a best-in-class billpay solution for both consumers and billers, but as an integral part of the overall ecosystem that will modernize the $4.61 trillion billpay industry,” Jackson Square Ventures co-founder and Managing Director Greg Gretsch said.
A Finovate alum since 2011, doxo most recently demonstrated its latest innovations at FinovateSpring 2019. At the conference, doxo showed how its doxoPay with overdraft protection – powered by fellow Finovate alum Plaid – enables users to track their bank account balance as they pay their bills. This helps consumers to better manage their cash flow and avoid overdrafts. Since then, the company has forged partnerships with energy delivery company National Grid, and payments technology company InComm Payments, and earned spots on Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500, and Inc. Magazine’s 5000 Fastest Growing Private Companies rosters.
Open finance company Plaid and money management solutions provider Green Dot entered into a partnership this week.
Green Dot will help its GO2bank customers connect to more than 6,000 apps and services powered by Plaid.
The partnership leverages Plaid Exchange, the company’s open finance API solution.
Open finance expert Plaid and money management solutions provider Green Dot have teamed up this week. The two are tapping the power of open finance to offer GO2bank customers more seamless data connectivity among and between their financial apps.
Leveraging Plaid’s open finance API solution Plaid Exchange, Green Dot will help its GO2bank customers securely connect to more than 6,000 apps and services powered by Plaid. The move ultimately offers end users access to a wider range of financial tools, which is critical for underbanked consumers.
“Our focus at Green Dot is giving all people the power to bank seamlessly, affordably, and with confidence,” said Green Dot Chief Product Officer Abhijit Chaudhary. “Through this partnership with Plaid, we are enabling real change in the industry by delivering an on-ramp for consumers who can benefit from simple, secure access to digital solutions.”
Launched in 2021, GO2bank was created to help Americans living paycheck to paycheck. The digital bank aims to offer a seamless and affordable experience that provides users with tools to serve their unique needs. For example, GO2bank offers up to $200 overdraft protection, high-interest savings accounts, credit building tools, and early wage access.
GO2bank parent company Green Dot was founded in 1999 and has since served more than 33 million customers. The company considers itself a branchless bank with more than 90,000 retail distribution locations across the U.S. In addition to its direct-to-consumer model, Green Dot also offers banking-as-a-service that enables banks and fintechs to leverage its bank charter, APIs, and cash deposit network to build out their own offerings.
With $734 million in funding, Plaid helps 12,000+ FIs offer their customers access to third party financial services via a suite of APIs to connect consumers, financial institutions, and developers. The company also offers a suite of analytics products that provides further insights into transactions. Plaid was founded in 2013 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Financial crime compliance firm Silent Eight raised $40 million in Series B funding.
The investment gives the Singapore-based company $55 million in total capital.
Led by TYH Ventures, the Series B round featured participation from HSBC Ventures, Silent Eight’s latest customer.
Silent Eight, an AI-based financial crime compliance company, has secured $40 million in Series B funding. The round was led by TYH Ventures and included top-up investments from OTB Ventures, Wavemaker Partners, Standard Chartered’s SC Ventures, Aglaia, as well as chairman and general partner of Altara Ventures, Koh Boon Hwee. Also participating in the round was HSBC Ventures, Silent Eight’s most recent customer.
“HSBC has been pleased with the progress made by Silent Eight’s AI platform,” HSBC Ventures’ Ore Adeyemi said. “We look forward to continuing to strengthen our partnership through this investment, and we are excited that my colleague Tom Caine is also joining as a Board Observer to help drive this investment partnership.”
Announced in January of last year, the multi-year partnership between Silent Eight and HSBC will enable the bank to enhance its compliance operations. HSBC will integrate Silent Eight Alert Resolution which investigates and resolves compliance issues as well as a human analyst, but with greater speed, precision, and accuracy.
The Series B investment gives Silent Eight $55 million in total capital and quadruples the company’s previous valuation reported in October 2020. Over the same time period, Silent Eight has realized revenue growth of 6x and tripled its workforce.
“We are here to support our customers and the policy makers of the world by ensuring that the benefits of the most advanced Artificial Intelligence systems are available on the frontlines of crime fighting,” Silent Eight CEO and founder Martin Markiewicz said.
Silent Eight builds compliance platforms for many of the world’s leading financial institutions. Deployed in more than 150 markets, the company’s AI-powered platform enforces economic sanctions and investigates all other financial crime risks – including suspicious transactions, beneficiaries, and customers – in real time. Silent Eight helps businesses understand the risks that may be present in both new and existing customer relationships, identify the payment stakeholder in every transaction, and monitor all transactions for potentially fraudulent behavior.
Silent Eight plans to use the capital to expand technology functions in order to support rapid growth in its customer base. The company also plans to hire additional talent, including more than 150 data scientists, developers, and engineers this year. Headquartered in Singapore, Silent Eight maintains global hubs in New York, London, and Warsaw.
A look at the companies demoing at FinovateEurope on March 15 digitally and live in London on March 22 and 23, 2022. Register today and save your spot.
FISPAN’s contextual business banking platform makes it simple for banks to offer commercial banking services embedded within ERP and business applications.
Features
Integrates banking applications within the standard menus of the user’s ERP
Embeds transaction data in the ERP domain to automate the bank reconciliation process
ACH, Wire, IR, Positive Pay, Check
Why it’s great
FISPAN embeds banking capabilities into ERP and accounting software, successfully enabling bi-directional connectivity between the bank and ERP for a streamlined treasury management experience.
Presenters
Robert Fillmore, VP, Europe Fillmore’s career spans over 25 years in the telecoms and fintech arenas, where he has led the adoption of innovative technologies by diverse companies such as BT, Vodafone, NatWest, HSBC, and BBVA. LinkedIn
Nigel Bateman, Pre-Sales & Account Manager Bateman’s current focus is expanding FISPAN’s footprint to include European tier 1 banks having relocated to Ireland from Vancouver during the pandemic to support this EU growth. LinkedIn
The partnership is the first of its kind, according to both Samsung and Moneyhub, and is designed to provide new payment options for merchants such as quick-service restaurants, retail stores, stadium events, as well as other hospitality-related venues. Customers using the technology will be able to send funds directly from their bank account to the merchant’s account via bank transfer, leveraging a fast and secure payment method that does not require the customer to share credit or debit card information. Using the kiosks is similarly straightforward. Customers simply use their mobile device to scan the QR code on the kiosk’s screen to make their order and manage their payment.
“We are delighted to achieve a world-first with Samsung by bringing the speed, security and cost effectiveness of Open Banking payments to our increasingly fast-paced world,” Moneyhub CEO Samantha Seaton said. “Payments is the new frontier for Open Banking and it is thrilling to see another necessary and impactful business case that brings together the quality of the Samsung kiosk, with the benefits of this new and exciting way to pay.”
The new payment option also will save merchants money by enabling them to avoid the costs associated with credit and debit cards, fees that can consume as much as 5% of their revenue. Open banking payment fees, by contrast, are typically less than 1% of the transaction value. The combination of open banking payments and self-service POS kiosks also helps support businesses’ digital transformation efforts.
Samsung Head of Display Damon Crowhurst highlighted this benefit of the new offering. “Though our partnership with Moneyhub, we are continuing to bring innovative solutions that help our customers navigate the complex landscape of a fast changing business environment,” Crowhurst said. “Implementing the open banking solution on our kiosk platform helps customers drive increased profitability, through efficient, scalable, and cost-effective solutions that are applicable for retail businesses of all sizes.”
A Finovate alum since 2015, U.K.-based Moneyhub began 2022 with the launch of its open banking and open finance front line support service. The new integrated support service, available on both a standalone basis as well as integrated into the clients’ own customer service platforms, provides expert support directly to end-users to help them manage all aspects of open banking and open finance. The company also announced early this year that it was broadening its platform beyond open banking and open finance to embrace open data. The move, which Seaton called “a natural next step in Moneyhub’s journey,” will give clients consensual access to a wide range of cross-industry data including employment, tax, and flexible benefit data, as well as property valuations, identity documents, carbon footprint information, and more.
“We want to put trust, through control of their data, back into the hands of the consumers,” Seaton said, “and in doing so support them in making better financial decisions.”
Samsung made its Finovate debut in 2017 at FinovateFall. At the event, the company demonstrated its Samsung Galaxy S8 smartphone; its biometric authentication solution, Samsung SDS Nexsign; and Samsung DeX which enables users to connect their Samsung Galaxy S8 smartphone to a monitor and keyboard for a desktop experience that supports contextual menus, drag-and-drop functionality, and resizable windows.
A look at the companies demoing at FinovateEurope on March 15 digitally and in London on March 22 and 23, 2022. Register today and save your spot.
InvestGlass is introducing the most powerful automation suite built for banking and insurance.
Features
Increase private banking productivity under MIFID and LSFIn regulations
Reduces KYC remediation overhead
Swiss Digital Sovereign and proprietary CRM and PMS. No surrender to Cloud Act.
Why it’s great
InvestGlass offers an all-in-one CRM-PMS-Automation solution to create a uniquely creative experience.
Presenter
Alexandre Gaillard, CEO Gaillard is InvestGlass CEO, and President of the Swiss-Chinese Chamber of Commerce. He co-founded Swiss Fintech Association, and has participated in +10 Finovates which he considers the #1 fintech show. LinkedIn
A look at the companies demoing at FinovateEurope on March 15 digitally and live in London on March 22 and 23, 2022. Register today and save your spot.
MoEngage is an insights-led customer engagement platform that enables brands to personalize experiences across relevant channels and helps marketers build strong relationships throughout the customer experience.
Features
Unified Customer View
Enhanced customer profile and real-time insight into preferences and behavior
Predictions and RFM – Customer Segmentation with the RFM Model and Predictive AI
Why it’s great
Enterprise-grade platform with scalability, security, and compliance. It processes 1 trillion data points per month, sends 80 billion messages, 1 billion emails, and engages 900 million MAUs.
Presenters
Saket Toshniwal, Senior Director Growth, Europe Toshniwal is a MarTech leader who has worked across CRM, Growth, and Product Management in consumer tech companies in Europe. LinkedIn
Ed Balcomb, Senior Solutions Manager, Europe Balcomb is dedicated to providing enterprise SaaS solutions that make sense to both business and technical teams. LinkedIn
This is a sponsored post by Paul Higgins, EMEA Banking Lead, Mendix, Silver Sponsors of FinovateEurope, March 22 – 23 in London.
Innovation in the banking sector has proven its value to society during the COVID-19 crisis. For example, during times of physical distancing, enabling contactless banking and offering bank employees the possibility to work remotely were particularly relevant. Looking to the future at a post-COVID, post-Brexit world, it’s time to reflect on how the sector has adjusted, the sweeping changes ahead and the challenges those changes present.
The burden of legacy tech
The number of regulators and ever-changing regulations can make the financial services industry a daunting place. Changes must be implemented quickly to ensure compliance and avoid significant fines. This means that IT delivery in a financial institution is often more complex and nuanced than in less regulated industries. Many organizations, particularly the more traditional banks, run on legacy monoliths that aren’t easy to make changes to. Such changes carry the risk of causing outages that can damage the reputation of the bank and can also incur fines. Just last month, Nationwide received negative press because of a payments outage around the time that many get paid and pay their bills.
Can a financial institution risk being left behind by not migrating off legacy systems?
Many banks try to reduce the risk of such outages at critical times of year, usually end of month, quarter, and year, by establishing “frozen-zones” that limit changes to IT systems to only those deemed as essential to the stability of the systems. Additionally, the appetite to replace legacy systems is very low due to the huge complexity and inherent risk involved – often the famous adage applies “if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it”. But you have to ask, can a financial institution risk being left behind by not migrating off legacy systems?
Seeing off nimble fintechs
The pandemic showed how vital digital transformation is for every industry – people needed remote access to services, products, and their jobs. In the financial industry, the consumer-facing part is generally quite far in the digitalization journey, with most customers able to access online and mobile banking. Not so with corporate banking and internal employee access to systems. But according to McKinsey, in the case of remote working, companies moved 40 times more quickly than they thought possible before the pandemic. And the expectation is that the digital transformation journey will continue this acceleration.
In the past, accelerating digital transformation has required large teams of developers working non-stop on a single project for months. The pandemic highlighted that this was simply not sustainable. Tech teams need to be able to juggle between projects, adjusting their priorities as and when required. To do so, they require a different approach to their delivery.
Nine out of 10 IT leaders in financial services believe their firm will need to invest in digital projects over the next two years just to survive in a rapidly changing market.
Low-code provides a compelling answer to this new problem. Low-code platforms enable even the most traditional banks and financial services companies to compete with nimbleness of their fintech rivals. The time to act is now: recent Mendix research found that nine out of 10 IT leaders in financial services believe their firm will need to invest in digital projects over the next two years, just to survive in a rapidly changing market.
The value of low-code
Many banks in Europe have turned to cross-functional, agile teams to provide the collaboration needed to develop the solutions that answer customer needs and drive revenue growth. This requires providing both developers and non-developers with tools that enable them to operate together. And financial institutions that haven’t implemented such agile methods still recognize the value of close collaboration between business and IT.
The Mendix low-code platform is a recognized market leader because it fosters this collaboration by providing two integrated development environments: one for non-technical people, often from the business side, and another for pro developers. This enables non-technical staff to work hand in hand with the development team in creating applications.
Both the technical and non-technical teams use the same visual development language to develop apps, bringing together those that understand the business problems with those that understand the IT landscape, core systems, and services to contribute to the vision of a product. And IT stays in control through built-in governance and guardrails that ensure compliance with the established standards of the organization.
It seems set that low-code will play a vital role in the financial services industry in accelerating digital transformation and increasing the speed of innovation.
A look at the companies demoing at FinovateEurope on March 15 digitally and live in London on March 22 and 23, 2022. Register today and save your spot.
Meniga is a global leader in helping banks create value from digital channels such as customer engagement, loyalty, new customers, and revenue.
Features
Create a trusted, lasting relationship with customers
Drive revenue growth by positioning the right products for them
Achieve return on spent investments in banking services
Why it’s great
Meniga augments the everyday personal banking experience by giving the right information to the right customers, at the right time.
Presenters
Hamza Behzad, Senior Manager of Product Strategy Behzad leads Meniga’s Product Strategy and advises clients on how to bring the best product ecosystem to bear for maximum business impact. LinkedIn
Isabel Moratiel, Director of Sales Operations Moratiel leads Sales Operations at Meniga where she focuses on the overall productivity and effectiveness of the sales organization. LinkedIn
Both an appetizer for the in-person, two-day FinovateEurope conference in London, March 22 and 23, as well as a satisfying main course in its own right, our FinovateEurope Digital Day Kick Off will feature a little bit of everything that makes our Finovate events special.
A specialist in delivering financial services to immigrant communities, Stilt, has closed a $14 million Series A round.
The company also secured a $100 million debt facility and launched a new credit-as-a-service offering, Onbo.
Headquartered in San Francisco, California, Stilt was founded in 2015.
Stilt, a fintech that specializes in providing financial services to immigrant communities, has raised $14 million in new funding. The Series A round was led by Link Ventures, and featured participation from Petrushka Investments, Hillsven Capital, and investor Gokul Rajaram. A number of C-level technology executives were also involved in the funding, including Stripe COO Claire Hughes Johnson, Checkout.com CTO Ott Kaukver, and Superhuman CEO Rahul Vohra.
Along with the funding announcement, the San Francisco, California-based company reported that it also has closed a new $100 million debt facility and launched its new credit-as-a-service offering, Onbo. The new solution enables any business to create and market its own credit product without requiring a bank sponsor. Onbo relies on Stilt’s state lending licenses and compliance framework, managing origination, payments, and credit reporting to free up companies to focus on developing their credit solution. Among the kinds of credit products that Onbo enables are credit building tools, revolving lines of credit, and personal loans. Onbo is powered by a single API to facilitate integration, and also offers companies up to $1 million in debt capital to help them get started.
Additionally, Onbo funds user accounts, deducts payments, and updates reimbursements in real time. The solution features a loan management system that can use both its own built-in accounting tools or accounting tools from third-party solution providers.
“Onbo represents a new path forward for neobanks looking to launch a credit product,”Stilt co-founder and CEO Rohit Mittal said. “We’ve spent five years at Stilt getting state lending licenses, building our credit stack, and refining our risk models. Now we’re opening the entire stack for others to build innovative credit products in just a few weeks. This is the quickest way we can think of to democratize loans and credit building across the board.”
Founded in 2015, Stilt has provided financing to people from more than 150 countries around the world. Specializing in lending to immigrants and other underserved individuals, Stilt does not require cosigners and does not charge prepayment fees. Instead, the company focuses on a “holistic profile” that references a range of indications of financial responsibility such as employment or employability, education, and financial behavior. Loans from $1,000 to $35,000 are available, with repayment terms ranging from 12 months to 36 months.
