FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Illuma Labs

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Illuma Labs

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Illuma Shield provides passive voice authentication for call centers. It elevates the user experience, enhances security against fraudsters, and improves operational efficiency.

Features

  • Elevate user experience with frictionless authentication
  • Reduce average handle time, hold times, and abandon rates
  • Enhance security against fraudsters

Why it’s great
Passive voice authentication is finally within reach for mid-size FI contact centers. It’s cost effective, easy to deploy, and simple to use.

Presenters

Milind Borkar, CEO & Founder
Borkar has over a decade experience spanning R&D and marketing and leads the IP and business development activities for the company.
LinkedIn

Ryan Harmon, Software Developer
Harmon is a software developer at Illuma Labs and has a Masters in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Dallas.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: SpecTrust

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: SpecTrust

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

SpecTrust delivers a no-code risk orchestration, assessment, and mitigation platform, empowering businesses to respond to fraud and identity abuse attacks in minutes instead of months.

Features

  • Saves millions in fraud losses and technical costs while driving new revenue growth
  • Deploys defense strategies in minutes, not months
  • Unifies people, data, and tools

Why it’s great
SpecTrust unifies the people, data, and tools that fight fraud and abuse in a single no-code platform, saving millions while instantly unlocking powerful customer experiences.

Presenters

Nate Kharrl, CEO & Co-Founder
Kharrl spent the last decade fighting fraudsters, scammers, identity thieves, and hackers for eBay, ThreatMetrix, and Akamai before co-founding SpecTrust.
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Patrick Chen, COO & Co-Founder
Chen has helped build and deploy risk solutions throughout his career in payments and risk with companies such as CashEdge, ThreatMetrix, eBay, and Payrix.
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FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Instnt

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Instnt

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Instnt is a fully managed customer onboarding solution for with up to $100 million in fraud loss insurance. It helps businesses sign-up and onboard twice as many good customers without the fraud losses.

Features

  • AI-powered managed service that replaces vendor integration and human orchestrated waterfalls
  • No Code/Low code integration without giving up ownership of user journey
  • Fraud loss insured up to $100 million

Why it’s great
Instnt is the first AI-powered managed onboarding service that replaces human-driven vendor integration and orchestration and is also the only offering in the market with fraud loss insurance.

Presenters

Sunil Madhu, CEO & Founder
As the Founder and previous CEO of Socure and a leader in AI-driven fraud, Madhu has spent over 20 years innovating in the Identity & Access Management, Security, Governance, and Risk and Compliance markets.
LinkedIn

Justin Kamerman, Chief Product Officer
Kamerman has over 20 years experience designing and building high performance distributed systems in the telecommunications, IPTV, identity verification, social media analytics, and IIoT industries.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Sequretek

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Sequretek

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Sequretek offers end-to-end security in the areas of enterprise threat monitoring, incident response, device security, identity, and access governance through its own AI-driven Percept Cloud Security Platform.

Features

  • Enterprise scale, easy to use, and cloud native
  • AI-driven threat detection, protection, remediation and response
  • Quick implementation and integration capabilities

Why it’s great
Percept Cloud Security Platform offers end-to-end security through three products instead of implementing and managing 12 to 15 different cybersecurity products. It reduces the total cost of ownership while simplifying security.

Presenters

Pankit Desai, Co-CEO & Co-Founder
Desai is a veteran of the corporate industry with over 25 years of experience in global sales, operations, and FP&A, with leadership stints at Rolta, NTT Data, IBM, and Wipro.
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Anand Naik, Co-CEO & Co-Founder
Naik has worked in the corporate industry for over 25 years with companies like Symantec, where he was the MD for South Asia. He was also previously with IBM and Sun Microsystems in technology roles.
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Acquisitions, Partnerships, and Pivots: Getting In On the Buy Now Pay Later Revolution

Acquisitions, Partnerships, and Pivots: Getting In On the Buy Now Pay Later Revolution

From partnership to acquisition, the Buy Now Pay Later revolution shows few signs, if any, of abating any time soon.

Apple, one of the Big Tech companies that has been aggressive in its expansion into fintech and financial services, recently announced that it is teaming up with BNPL company Affirm Holdings to offer new, interest-free financing options for qualifying Apple customers in Canada. The new program enables consumers to finance iPhone purchases over a 24-month period and iPad and Mac purchases over a 12-month period, both with 0% APR.

The new initiative comes a month after Apple announced that it was teaming up with Goldman Sachs to help introduce its own Buy Now Pay Later service – ostensibly to rival companies like the aforementioned Affirm. The offering will reportedly be called Apple Pay Later.


And filed in the “if you can’t beat ’em, buy ’em” folder is the news from London, U.K.-based Buy Now Pay Later company Zilch. The firm agreed this week to acquire San Francisco, California-based debt funding platform Neptune Financial as part of setting up shop in the U.S. “We’ve been exploring growth options in the U.S. for some time and following the additional funding,” Zilch founder and CEO Philip Belamant said. “Now was the perfect time to take another meaningful step towards our U.S. launch.”

Zilch’s acquisition news comes less than a month after the company secured $110 million as part of an extension of its Series B round. One of the first Buy Now Pay Later firms in the U.K. (founded in 2018), Zilch enables consumers to pay for purchases using their virtual Zilch card by splitting their transaction into four, interest-free payments over a six week period. The company has raised more than $200 million and boasts 150,000 new sign-ups a month for its BNPL services.


One of the more interesting pivots in the BNPL space of late was an internal one as Canada’s Scotiabank announced that it will convert its credit card repayments into BNPL plans. The new arrangement will give cardholders the ability to pay off their debt balances in fixed installments over three-, six-, or 12-month periods.

“Our customers told us that they’re looking for more options to help them manage their finances,” Scotiabank SVP for Credit Cards and Lending Brett Mooney explained. “This new credit card feature offers our customers more flexibility in how they pay for purchases, in addition to the convenience, rewards and lifestyle benefits that our credit cards already provide.”

The new service is called Scotia SelectPay and can be accessed via the Scotia mobile banking app as well as online. Purchases of more than $100 are eligible for the new financing option, which requires no additional credit check or application.


Photo by Kaboompics .com from Pexels

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: unitQ

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: unitQ

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

unitQ’s product quality platform empowers fintechs and banks to take a data-driven approach to product quality so they can fix the right quality issues faster.

Features

  • Leverage a single source of truth for product quality
  • Determine what’s impacting your product right now
  • Identify, prioritize, and fix the right quality issues faster

Why it’s great
Staying on top of product quality is hard. unitQ empowers your organization to take a data-driven approach to product quality.

Presenter

Anthony Heckman, Head of Business Development & Growth
Prior to unitQ, Heckman was an EIR at XSeed Capital. He graduated from the University of Southern California and University of Pennsylvania Law School.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Perch Credit

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Perch Credit

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Perch helps you get and build your credit with everyday payments and subscriptions. It helps you earn credit by starting with the recurring payments you’re already making – your rent and subscriptions.

Features

  • Quick and easy setup: start credit building in as little as 5 minutes
  • Automated credit building: increase your credit score as you continue to pay
  • All your information is kept safe

Why it’s great
Perch is on a mission to financially empower all.

Presenter

Michael Broughton, CEO & Co-Founder
Broughton is a young entrepreneur who studied business at the University of Southern California. Coming from a military family, he grew up in the Far East, living in South Korea and Japan.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Bambu

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Bambu

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Bambu is the next-generation, B2B robo-advisory platform for financial and technology institutions, enabling companies to make saving and investing simple and intelligent for their clients.

Features

  • Enable and empower small and medium RIAs to scale up and increase AUM
  • Avoid complex technology that prevents RIAs from adopting the platform
  • Save on cost with no integration and developer cost

Why it’s great
Bambu GO 2.0 is a turn-key digital investment platform.

Presenters

Ned Phillips, CEO
Phillips has over 20 years of fintech experience. He is on a mission to improve the wealthtech industry with a robo-advisory platform.
LinkedIn

Michael Larsen, Head of Sales, Americas
Larsen is an experienced Head of Sales with a demonstrated history of working in the SaaS and financial services industries.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Amplify Life Insurance

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Amplify Life Insurance

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Amplify helps people build wealth through permanent life insurance. They’ve built an intelligent customer journey with frictionless policy customization, pre-underwriting, and in-force policy management.

Features

  • Delightful customer journey for life insurance investment products
  • Policy customization and pre-underwriting for accurate quoting and fast decisions
  • API infrastructure and ecosystem connectivity

Why it’s great
Bespoke life insurance investment products can now be customized and purchased instantly D2C or through an advisor via Amplify’s platform.

Presenters

Hanna Wu, CEO & Co-Founder
Wu’s family has been in life insurance for over 30 years. Prior to Amplify, she built a financial planning agency with three locations and placed over $2B in life insurance coverage over five years.
LinkedIn

Qiyun Cai, President & Co-Founder
Cai started her career in venture capital and found her passion in early stage software startups that make an impact on how we work and live. She is a graduate of Harvard Business School.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Automated Financial Systems

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Automated Financial Systems

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

AFS, a leading commercial lending solution provider, will demonstrate the ability to add and utilize new Custom Data Fields to the system in real-time, with no programming.

Features

  • Respond to market, product, and regulatory demands immediately
  • Define, label, and create data fields
  • Use the fields as soon as they are created

Why it’s great
Commercial lending technology is behind in moving to digital. AFS will demonstrate that commercial lending solutions can be agile and responsive to technology innovation and customer/market demand.

Presenters

Brenda Alek, Director of Client Strategies
Alek is responsible for working with financial institutions to evaluate workflows, review operations, and develop new business models/transformations.
LinkedIn

Derrick Wise, Director
Wise brings over 20 years of experience in the financial services industry. His expertise is with financial software design and implementation.

Jerry Cooper, AFSVision Solution Architect
Cooper leads the design and development of new products and features in the AFSVision platform.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: txtsmarter

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: txtsmarter

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

txtsmarter is a communications surveillance service for messaging and social platforms to capture, encrypt, and archive previously inaccessible data for compliance requirements in the financial space.

Features

  • Archive iMessage, Android SMS/MMS, and WhatsApp
  • Comply with FINRA, SEC, FDIC, MiFID II, Dodd-Frank, and FCA regulations
  • Adhere to privacy regulations

Why it’s great
txtsmarter is an API-driven Intelligent Communications Surveillance Service. Once activated, it requires no user interaction, is OS and device-agnostic with full compliance coverage, and directs data to an eDiscovery platform.

Presenters

Nuri Otus, CEO & President
Otus drives the strategic direction for txtsmarter as the company establishes itself as a market leader in the communications surveillance and compliance space.
LinkedIn

Sabine Zimmerhansl, Director of Compliance & Product Development
Zimmerhansl is focused on developing txtsmarter’s line of products and services for customers while assuring compliance with global regulations and anticipating the impact on business.
LinkedIn

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Berbix

FinovateFall 2021 Sneak Peek: Berbix

A look at the companies demoing at FinovateFall on September 13-15, 2021. Register today and save your spot.

Berbix is an identity verification solution for building trusted relationships online by instantly and accurately validating a user’s identity.

Features

  • Increase new account signups
  • Reduce cost of acquisition
  • Reduce fraud

Why it’s great
Berbix is the most accurate and reliable ID verification solution – 4x more accurate than legacy providers.

Presenter

Eric Levine, Co-Founder
Co-Founder of Berbix, Levine currently leads the engineering, product and design efforts. Prior to Berbix, he led the Trust & Safety engineering team at Airbnb.
LinkedIn