• Using open banking-enabled account verification and the fastest payment rails, TrueLayer’s payouts settle in the right account, right away.

• Businesses can programmatically issue payments as an integrated part of their app or service through a simple API integration.

TrueLayer, Europe’s leading open banking platform, today announced the launch of Payouts, a new solution to tackle the issues of slow withdrawals and refunds. Payouts is already being used by TrueLayer clients, including the UK's leading online car retailer, Cazoo, to instantly pay customers when they sell their car via the platform.

Today, customers expect payments that arrive in their account in seconds. The five days it can take for card or Bacs payments to appear frustrates customers and leads to a lack of loyalty. This is made worse when businesses, as part of their due diligence, need to verify new user’s payment details and identity before issuing a payout, stopping customers mid-flow and making the process even slower.

Traditional payout methods require managing multiple reports, endless rows of data, and manually tracking each payment, creating inefficiencies, input errors and complaints from customers whose payouts were never issued.

TrueLayer has tackled the issue of fragmented and slow payout processes by combining open banking verification and the fastest payment rails available to ensure customers are paid to the right account, right away. The open banking-powered verification process works by matching the name provided by the customer with what's on file at their bank to confirm the details are correct. Results are returned in seconds. Gone are the days of asking customers to upload bank statements for compliance teams to review, or using micro-deposits that can be cumbersome for users to confirm.

With the customer’s details pre-populated and verified, payouts are then automatically issued through TrueLayer’s robust infrastructure, connected to thousands of banks in the UK and across the EU through a simple API integration. 

“Businesses today are laser-focused on customer experience, and the post-purchase experience involving customers requesting refunds, or users withdrawing their savings and investments, is critical to build loyalty. We built Payouts to take the pain out of these transactions and enable firms to create a compelling value proposition for their entire customer base - withdraw your funds or receive refunds instantly,” commented Murtaza Bootwala, Head of Payments at TrueLayer. “It is designed with ecommerce, wealthtech and trading, marketplaces, and iGaming in mind, where customers are growing increasingly frustrated by the poor experiences they have to endure as a result of outdated infrastructure. In 2021 it shouldn’t take days, sometimes over a week, to receive a payment.”

TrueLayer is the only provider that can deliver account verification, powered by open banking, with Payouts to deliver payments for businesses that:

• Increase retention and encourage service-switching: granting instant access to funds that settle in seconds, 24/7, without having to go through lengthy verification processes, customers get what they want - their money instantly - compared to five days that cards or Bacs can take.

• Eliminate the cost of lost or failed payouts: using bank-verified account information to automate payment setup.

• Remove manual tracking processes: initiating multiple payouts via a single API, removing errors from the whole equation. 

• Streamline due diligence: using open banking verification, TrueLayer crosschecks the name provided by the end-user during registration with what's on file at their bank to confirm that the details entered are correct. This helps businesses to minimise money laundering risk.

• Improve the customer experience: users don’t need to remember account details, or manually fill any forms. With a simple redirect to their bank they can authenticate their account details using fingerprint or Face ID.  

“TrueLayer is leading the charge to ensure payments processes that truly work for the customer and the business, ditching outdated methods to deliver the best possible payments experience,” added Bootwala. “By verifying the account details before paying out, you can say goodbye to the days of failed or lost payments, and reduce the strain on customer support. And by offering instant payouts, businesses can build customer trust and encourage others to switch over to your service.”

The launch of Payouts continues the expansion of TrueLayer’s solutions built on top of its market-leading open banking network in 2021, following the launch of PayDirect in January.

Harsch Khandelwal moves to Executive Chairman as UREEQA accelerates efforts to protect Creators' work, rights and revenue through its blockchain platform

UREEQA, a blockchain platform for protecting, managing and monetizing creative work, today announced that the company is bolstering its executive core as technology marketing leader Kirk Fergusson becomes the new CEO. Former CEO Harsch Khandelwal rounds out the executive team as Executive Chairman.

Kirk Fergusson

In barely a year, UREEQA has evolved from a compelling concept to a crypto project with a loyal, growing base of believers and Tokenholders as well as a healthy pipeline of clients excited to utilize the company's revolutionary platform. UREEQA will increase its dedicated focus on proactively engaging its core audiences and demonstrating the platform's full potential for helping Creators protect, manage and monetize their work. The organization is making valuable changes to its braintrust in order to maximize its ability to develop in a wide range of fields.

In his new role as Executive Chairman, Khandelwal will focus on strategic development and implementation to support UREEQA's continued growth. Meanwhile, Fergusson - a distinguished technology marketing executive - moves into the CEO role. Altogether, the rearrangement will allow Khandelwal, Fergusson and the rest of UREEQA's highly-esteemed executives to naturally become more keenly focused on their respective wheelhouses moving forward.

"As we've built this company from the ground up, we've learned a lot about ourselves and our place in this constantly changing industry," Khandelwal said. "One thing we've realized is just how important it is to employ the best possible talent across the board. Adding Kirk Fergusson as CEO is a move in lockstep with that approach, and it will enable me to focus on continuing to strategically build UREEQA into an industry powerhouse."

This is yet another critical maneuver for UREEQA from a personnel standpoint. In May, former KPMG director of market relations and versatile industry executive Rakan Aown became UREEQA's new Vice President of Business Development, while former SAS director of consulting services and celebrated business leader Joe Pillitteri became the company's new Executive Vice President. In July, music and entertainment legend Harvey Mason Jr. joined an Advisory Board that already contained Michael Sheresky and Ramses IsHak of United Talent Agency, official Community CEO Kevin Leflar and former SOCAN VP Janice Scott. All of these experts and many others have worked throughout 2021 with Khandelwal to lay down the puzzle pieces. Now, with Khandelwal's oversight, Fergusson will play a major role in putting these pieces together as UREEQA continues to evolve.

With over 30 years' worth of functional experience in marketing, corporate communications, sales/business development, and general management, Fergusson is a black belt in strategic and tactical marketing, solution development, business development/sales, and start-up/scale-up management.

Prior to joining UREEQA, Fergusson led sales operations for SecureKey Technologies, which employs blockchain technology to underpin its innovative identity network. He previously held leadership roles with several Toronto-based start-ups, one of which was focused on deploying a blockchain-based supply-chain management SaaS solution.

While serving as Managing Director of Canada's leading digital medical education firm, MDBriefCase, Fergusson led Canadian business development activities as well as the shared services provided to the company's global operations. And prior to that, he was VP of Corporate Services at Canada Health Infoway, where he led corporate communications and marketing activities for the national electronic health records agency.

Fergusson has also acted as a public relations executive in Ottawa, where he served a multitude of federal government clients including the Copyright Board of Canada, Canadian Heritage, and Industry Canada.

"I'm thrilled to be joining UREEQA at this juncture," Fergusson said. "The team is first-rate and the company has made terrific progress to date. I look forward to helping Creators of all stripes discover our unique platform, and encouraging them to leverage it to the fullest extent to protect, manage and monetize their creative work."

To learn more about UREEQA and the company's executive team, please visit our website: www.ureeqa.com/about-us

• Lightyear, founded by ex-Wise duo Martin Sokk and Mihkel Aamer, combines multi-currency accounts with unlimited access to global markets so customers can invest without hidden fees. 

• The startup tops up their seed round with an additional $8.5 million of funding from Mosaic Ventures, Taavet+Sten, Metaplanet’s Jaan Tallinn and early Monzo backer Eileen Burbidge.

• This takes the total raised pre-launch to $10M, after announcing its first funding round of $1.5M from a cohort of angel investors just months ago. 

• From today, Lightyear will start to onboard customers from its 5,000 strong waiting list as it makes its first move to shake up the European investment landscape.

Fintech startup Lightyear announces today an additional $8.5M of funding alongside the launch of its app as the company starts to onboard UK customers from its waiting list. Lightyear combines multi-currency accounts with unlimited access to global markets so customers can invest freely without hidden fees.

Lightyear is founded by early Wise alumni Martin Sokk and Mihkel Aamer, and pledges to bring a global mindset into the European investment space. Traditionally, if European investors wanted access to international markets they have been hit with a range of various fees such as transaction and custody fees, but most notably foreign exchange fees. After removing the friction of sending money abroad during their time at Wise, the pair are looking to do the same with investing. 

The new investment platform seeks to eradicate the ambiguity and unjustifiable fees levied at retail investors. With platforms charging different types of fees at varying points of the customer journey, they leave little clarity around the true cost of an investment. Lightyear is on a mission to flip this pricing model on its head by giving customers the tools to add, hold and invest money in multiple currencies, removing the need for conversions. With unlimited access to more than 1,000 global stocks, Lightyear’s first iteration of the app (its minimum viable product or ‘MVP’) will start onboarding customers from the waitlist starting today.

Earlier this summer, Lightyear announced a $1.5M pre-seed round from a cohort of fintech industry stalwarts, led by Taavet Hinrikus of Wise and Sten Tamkivi of Teleport and Jaan Tallinn (Metaplanet) of Skype. The round also welcomed Ott Kaukver, the CTO at checkout.com, Wander Rutgers, the former President of Robinhood UK and Kaarel Kotkas, the founder of Veriff.

The new $8.5M in funding was led by Mosaic Ventures alongside existing investors Taavet+Sten (the recently formed investment partnership of Taavet Hinrikus and Sten Tamkivi) and Metaplanet. New angel investors coming in this time include early Monzo backer Eileen Burbidge, Harsh Sinha, the CTO at Wise and Taavi Tamkivi, the CEO at Salv. 

Simon Levene, Mosaic co-founder and partner says: “Compared to mature markets such as the US, retail investment across Europe is still at the beginning of its growth journey. The customer experience hasn’t really been cracked, and the majority of current offerings serve just their local country. Lightyear’s mission is to offer access to global markets for pan-European investors, providing all the necessary data and education they need -- with a simple, transparent business model that removes all the hidden and confusing fee structures. We’re delighted to support co-founders Martin Sokk and Mihkel Aamer, two veteran execs from TransferWise, at the start of their journey to empower retail investors - experienced and new alike - across the continent”

Martin Sokk, Co-founder and CEO at Lightyear, adds: “10 months ago Lightyear was just an idea, so we’re really excited to have raised a total of $10 million, hired a world-class team and to be launching the first iteration of our app. There are more people in Europe investing now than ever before, but there’s still a very long way to go. Our goal is to give all of Europe access to the world’s markets without hidden fees and to make investing cognitively easy. We’re excited to have such a strong group of investors that share this vision with us.” 

Eileen Burbidge, who personally invested as an angel investor in Lightyear, says: “When it comes to investing in an early-stage business, it’s crucial that the team is best in class, that I believe in the sector, and the product has global appeal. We’ve seen more and more people interested in retail investing over the past year and a half, which, combined with this highly motivated, extremely  talented and high integrity team, makes for something special. I’m excited by Lightyear’s commitment to transparency and building a platform that’s approachable and inclusive, where everyone has the best access, tools and confidence to invest.”

From today, Lightyear will be onboarding customers from its waiting list that has been growing since the company came out of stealth mode earlier this summer. With its expansion plans already in play, Lightyear is targeting H1 2022 for a pan-European launch, and this latest funding will enable the company to accelerate its plans to open up transparent and low-cost investing to everyone in Europe. 

Lightyear, founded by ex-Wise duo Martin Sokk and Mihkel Aamer, combines multi-currency accounts with unlimited access to global markets so customers can invest without hidden fees. 

• The startup tops up their seed round with an additional $8.5 million of funding from Mosaic Ventures, Taavet+Sten, Metaplanet’s Jaan Tallinn and early Monzo backer Eileen Burbidge.

• This takes the total raised pre-launch to $10M, after announcing its first funding round of $1.5M from a cohort of angel investors just months ago. 

• From today, Lightyear will start to onboard customers from its 5,000 strong waiting list as it makes its first move to shake up the European investment landscape.

FSS (Financial Software and Systems), a leading global provider of integrated payment products and a payment processor, has been selected to work with Vopy Payments in a partnership designed to support European digital commerce growth through a premium embedded finance approach.

Embedded finance – which supports the integration of financial services into products and business processes of non-banks – is becoming increasingly relevant in Europe fuelled by Open Banking and digital transformation, with global growth predicted to exceed $138 billion in 2026[1].  FSS is among the leading providers of card issuance products globally, managing 800 plus million payment cards for Tier One banks and payment processors and is already helping to support the growth of embedded payments across multiple global markets. Vopy and FSS will collaborate closely, offering greater value to customers by combining FSS’s Unified Card Issuance Platform with particular emphasis on card management, support around 3DSecure adoption with FSS’s Access Control Server and integration of FSS’s Reconciliation Solutions.

Speaking on the partnership Vopy CEO, Kim Forsell said; “Our goal is to fully maximise the embedded finance opportunity with a broad solution set encompassing not only payments but also digital lending, saving and investment applications, leading ultimately to a fully rounded business proposition enriched with unique marketing and business services. We therefore needed a partner who shared our vision and selected FSS because it has a proven and robust payment processing solution and an experienced team of domain specialists to support continual innovation. Leveraging their know-how, we can refine our payment solutions bringing innovative added value services to the market to deliver superior, secure payments experiences.”

The partnership will focus on driving payments excellence for leading consumer brands among telecom providers, social network platforms, consumer tech and other business verticals across multiple markets in Europe, before extending into other markets in other regions.

“The global demand for embedded payments is increasing but none more so from businesses within Europe,” commented Krishnan Srinivasan, Chief Operating Officer FSS PayTech. “It’s testament to players such as Vopy that consumers and businesses across the region are already benefiting from their innovative, robust and secure solutions. We are confident that this partnership will accelerate their development even further and, in turn, contribute significantly to Europe’s digital payments ecosystem.  We are happy that we can play a part in this, as a key contributor and partner to Vopy.”

New York, Toronto, Charlotte, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Dubai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok, Melbourne, Sydney, Auckland, Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad.

Synechron Inc., a leading digital transformation consulting firm focused exclusively on the financial services industry, today announced its formal partnership with Accelex Technology to further drive operational efficiencies for its financial services clients globally by unleashing the power of private investment data. Accelex offers an advanced artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning-led automation system for effective data acquisition, analytics and reporting that can afford tangible benefits to investors and asset servicers.

Synechron has been working with Accelex since 2018 and has successfully leveraged the firm’s innovative AI and machine learning models-based solutions for the trifecta of key data management: data acquisition, analytics, and visual display reporting for clients. This years-long alignment and collaboration underlies the decision to define a more formal partnership with Accelex.

For this project, Synechron Paris participated in developing Accelex’s automation technology tools as it built a cloud-based platform that facilitates the acquisition and aggregation of key data from unstructured formats and displays key metrics for private market investors. The software developed through this collaboration integrates a document crawler to automatically detect and extract desired data from fund manager reports. Document analysis parses unstructured data from different pages/sections and heterogenous fund reports, then applies unsupervised algorithms for targeted data extraction and the screening between global and fund-specific metrics. It then enables the variable layout display of key data, including tables and company names. This automated recognition, extraction, processing, and visual reporting of the data resulted in a significant improvement in the extraction of key metrics from a fund report.

François-Bernard Mizrahi, Managing Director of Synechron France said, “Since 2018, Synechron has been pleased to support Accelex’s innovative and ambitious platform development. This project makes good use of both our software development and AI expertise, built over the years in our Serbian delivery center. The success of our partnership can be seen in Accelex’s growth and achievements.”

Franck Vialaron, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Accelex noted, “Synechron has been a great design partner from the prototyping phase to the release of the platform to our first client. Synechron is allowing us today to scale and support our growing client base”.

UTP Merchant Services,  a provider of market leading credit and debit card payment solutions, has partnered with Visit Pembrokeshire to provide cost savings and advice for their members while supporting the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Trust.

Following the disruption caused by Covid-19, Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) and tourism organisations across the UK have experienced increased demand for specialised financial advice from member businesses, and many have struggled with both with the upturn in demand and complexity of requests.

Visit Pembrokeshire, the first DMO in Wales, has been among these organisations, having been inundated with appeals for guidance and impartial advice on how to implement online and Covid-safe payments.

The partnership will see UTP support Visit Pembrokeshire’s members’ businesses to alleviate the pressures of updating their payment infrastructures.

For every live deal, UTP will donate to the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Trust. The Trust works to protect and conserve the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, promotes outdoor learning, and provides young people with the practical skills needed for access to local employment opportunities.

The partnership was spearheaded by Kevin Betts, Partner Manager at UTP, who said: “During the pandemic, SMEs in all sectors suffered huge disruption and hardship. We initially responded by suspending our fees and working with our merchants to ensure a compassionate and responsible approach to help businesses get back on their feet. However, we felt we could do more.

We knew many DMOs / tourism organisations were struggling to meet their members’ demands for guidance and that we could offer our expertise and services while continuing to give something back. We have put together a special offer for tourist boards and as part of the offer, for every live deal, UTP commits to donating to a local charity so both local businesses and the wider community can benefit.”

UTP terminals provide contactless and mobile payments for businesses looking to become more Covid secure. Their Payment Gateways help businesses that are either restructuring or setting up websites for eCommerce, and their Virtual Terminals support businesses that take numerous payments over the phone. The processing fees of current suppliers are reduced and UTP’s Faster Processing offers same day payments, whether in-store or online.

Michael Ault, CEO at UTP, added: “Our partnership with Visit Pembrokeshire means we can take much pressure off their internal resource, help stimulate the local economy, and with every deal triggering a donation to the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Trust, we can play our part in protecting this spectacular and cherished British coastline.”

 AppSealing, a leading mobile application security solution provider and a service of INKA ENTWORKS, announced the launch of its data encryption solution for Android applications. With this solution, companies can protect a slew of sensitive data like authentication tokens, unique identifiers, and passwords from unauthorized access and modification. The premium addition of this solution to its mobile application protection suite further reiterates AppSealing’s commitment to enabling companies to fend off cyber attackers and prevent illegal application access, theft, deletion, or modification. Companies can now take better control of their data in a much more proactive manner.

The solution offers top-notch encryption architectures and supports AES 256 encryption, the strongest encryption standard in the world. It provides industry security standards like PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard), GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), and HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act). Companies can be compliance-ready instantly without any coding or SDK integration.

James Ahn, CEO with INKA ENTWORKS, explains the relevance of data encryption for fintech companies: “Fintech industry is booming. The global fintech market, which was worth $128Bn in 2018, is expected to touch a figure of $310Bn in 2022. We have been collaborating with our clients to secure their mobile applications. Our latest offering of end-to-end data encryption further strengthens our mobile application security portfolio and leadership position in the market. We are pleased to make fintech, payments, banking, and gaming apps a lot more secure. We are excited to partner with our customers and help them be compliant, protect sensitive data, take relevant actions against hackers, and build their business and reputation confidently.”

“Digital banking enables companies to provide fintech and banking services at the touch of a button. It is a great way for companies to serve their customers, but it also means opening Pandora’s box since attackers are lurking around. Data localization restrictions also put an additional responsibility. With data encryption, we aim to help Fintech companies focus on customer experience, compliance with localization policies, and revenue generation within the safe walls of security,” says Govindraj Basatwar, Global Business Head with INKA ENTWORKS. 

The key features include:

• Whitebox AES 256 & FIPS 140-2 encryption for Android mobile devices, software, and operating systems
• Runtime protection covering encryption keys, API keys, authentication tokens, etc.
• End-to-end support system encompassing legacy native file input/output interface

Companies can thus leverage AppSealing’s data encryption solution to protect sensitive data pertaining to their Android applications. The robust encryption standards ensure 100% coverage of emerging attack vectors, to provide a complete safety net to mobile applications.

The solution offers top-notch encryption architectures and supports AES 256 encryption, the strongest encryption standard in the world. It provides industry security standards like PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard), GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), and HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act). Companies can be compliance-ready instantly without any coding or SDK integration.

James Ahn, CEO with INKA ENTWORKS, explains the relevance of data encryption for fintech companies: “Fintech industry is booming. The global fintech market, which was worth $128Bn in 2018, is expected to touch a figure of $310Bn in 2022. We have been collaborating with our clients to secure their mobile applications. Our latest offering of end-to-end data encryption further strengthens our mobile application security portfolio and leadership position in the market. We are pleased to make fintech, payments, banking, and gaming apps a lot more secure. We are excited to partner with our customers and help them be compliant, protect sensitive data, take relevant actions against hackers, and build their business and reputation confidently.”

“Digital banking enables companies to provide fintech and banking services at the touch of a button. It is a great way for companies to serve their customers, but it also means opening Pandora’s box since attackers are lurking around. Data localization restrictions also put an additional responsibility. With data encryption, we aim to help Fintech companies focus on customer experience, compliance with localization policies, and revenue generation within the safe walls of security,” says Govindraj Basatwar, Global Business Head with INKA ENTWORKS. 

The key features include:

• Whitebox AES 256 & FIPS 140-2 encryption for Android mobile devices, software, and operating systems
• Runtime protection covering encryption keys, API keys, authentication tokens, etc.
• End-to-end support system encompassing legacy native file input/output interface

Companies can thus leverage AppSealing’s data encryption solution to protect sensitive data pertaining to their Android applications. The robust encryption standards ensure 100% coverage of emerging attack vectors, to provide a complete safety net to mobile applications.

UK based Technology and FinTech content marketing agency expands its operations to Europe thanks to high growth in 2021.

15^th September 2021 - Copy House, an award-winning content marketing agency specialising in technology and FinTech, has expanded to Europe with the launch of Copy House Europe. This is in addition to landing a new client with social media giant Facebook.

Copy House has been on the rise since it repositioned its business and specialism during the pandemic. The company predicted a 60% annual growth rate at that time but has since surpassed this, having reached a projected growth rate of 280% for 20/21. Due to this rapid growth of clients and employees, Copy House has grown by 900% since it first launched in 2019.

As 38% of Copy House’s clients are based in Europe, Copy House has launched Copy House Europe. This will help the company better cater to all its European clients, reach new and fresh talent by hiring outside of the UK, expand its collective language pool, and further increase its European clientele.

Kathryn Strachan, Copy House’s Owner and Managing Director, commented: “I’m extremely pleased to formally enter Europe. Although we previously had clients in Europe, expanding our company into Europe allows us to capitalise on the growth we’re delivering.

“We’re excited to welcome the best talent Europe has to offer. Since the pandemic, many skilled workers have returned to their home countries, been made redundant or are looking for fresh starts within the creative industry. Copy House Europe will enable us to reach those people and create opportunities for them as well as those within our home, the UK. In addition to new starters, a large number of our team already have strong links to Europe and, due to our work from anywhere policy, they often work in other European countries, so it would be natural for us to strengthen our focus on team diversity and international culture.” 

Since Copy House first opened its doors, its team has grown from one person to 21 people, and counting. In the last six months alone, Copy House has added 14 new team members and the company has sourced some of the best talent from across the UK to deliver high-quality technology and FinTech content.

Copy House has also added 25 clients to its global client base in 2021. These UK and European-based companies include Klarna, Travelex, Cigna, Nutmeg, FICO and more. The most recent of these large wins is social media giant Facebook. Copy House prides itself on its 56.56% annual client retention rate, which includes projects as well as retained clients.

 Atos has been awarded a position on the 2021 IDC FinTech Rankings Top 25 for the fifth consecutive year.

The breadth and scale of Atos as a leader in integrating financial technology solutions for its global banking, insurance and capital markets client base is central to the continued inclusion of the company in the IDC FinTech rankings.

Over the past year alone Atos has secured a broad range of banking, insurance, pensions, and capital markets contracts across multiple continents. Examples include the selection of Atos by Banque Misr, one of the largest banks in Egypt, to support its transformational journey to become the country’s first digital bank - a minimum 10-year contract with Nest to design and build a future focused pension scheme, and an extended agreement to accelerate transformation with Dutch insurer VGZ.

Adrian Gregory, SEVP, Global Head of Financial Services & Insurance and Global Head Atos Syntel, said: “This recognition reflects the continued success of Atos in partnering with many leading financial services providers to help them prosper in a digital world. It also provides a clear indication of our capability to build secure financial services institutions of the future and of our continued focus on growing our presence and client base.”

The IDC FinTech Rankings categorize and evaluate the top global providers of financial technology based on calendar year revenues from financial institutions for hardware, software and/or services.