Beats Expectations, Gradually Expands from Payment to Digital Technology-Enabled Business Services

Yeahka Limited ("Yeahka" or the "Company") (Stock Code: 9923), a leading payment-based technology platform in China, is pleased to announce the interim results for the six months ended 30 June 2021 (the "Reporting Period" or the "first half").

Financial Highlights
-- During the Reporting Period, the Company's total revenue reached RMB1,402 million, representing a YoY increase of 30.2%. Revenue from technology-enabled business services increased rapidly by 86.6% to RMB358 million.
-- The Company recorded net profit of RMB291 million, growing 30.7% YoY; adjusted net profit grew 142.2% YoY to RMB318 million. Earnings per share was RMB 0.71.
-- Revenue of the Company's SaaS digital solutions was nearly RMB27.34 million, an increase of 134.3% YoY.
-- Revenue from fintech services amounted to RMB42.72 million, representing a YoY increase of 18.7%. The total amount of loans that the Company facilitated was approximately RMB537.3 million, with a weighted average tenure of 10.2 months.
-- Precision marketing services revenue was RMB240 million, an increase of nearly 68.5% YoY.
-- The newly launched in-store e-commerce service recorded revenue of RMB44.95 million.

Operational Highlights
-- The total gross payment volume ("GPV") of the payment services has recorded significant growth and exceeded RMB990.4 billion, up 56.1% YoY. Of which, app-based payment services GPV increased by 72.9% YoY, accounting for 61.8% of total GPV, up from 55.8% in the same period of last year. The peak daily count of QR code payment transactions was nearly 42 million.
-- The scale of merchants and consumers traffic within the Company's ecosystem has continuously fueled the rapid growth of technology-enabled business services. The number of technology-enabled business service customers reached 1.69 million representing a YoY increase of 188.9% in the first half of 2021.
-- For the newly established in-store e-commerce platform, the number of paid consumers was more than 1.42 million and the gross merchandise value ("GMV") from the platform exceeded RMB71 million.

Mr. Luke Liu, Chairman of the Board, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director of the Company, said, "The recovery of China's real economy in the first half of 2021 has provided Yeahka a perfect opportunity to expand its business from payments to digital technology-enabled services. With that we continued to innovate and meet the diverse needs of merchants and consumers. Regarding the merchant ecosystem, the number of active payment service merchants increased 30.6% year-on-year ("YoY") to approximately 6.13 million. For the consumer ecosystem, by focusing on small and high-frequency purchases for offline payment services case scenarios, the number of consumers reached via our merchant ecosystem grew by 67.2% YoY to 822.4 million. Through the continuous innovation of our mobile payment and technology-enabled business services, we cater to the needs of merchants and consumers alike. On commercial digitalization, we focus on improving the operating efficiency for our merchants. To achieve this, we continued to optimize and upgrade our self-developed SaaS digital solutions through deployment of a series of upgrade modules which help enhance the stores' economics. Moreover, on top of helping merchants improve their brand awareness through our marketing services, we are also dedicated to improving merchants' sales directly. In achieving this, we launched the in-store e-commerce service, where merchants can now easily create various forms of promotions to connect millions of consumers through our online and offline sales network.

Mr. Liu continued, "Technology-enabled services continued to grow rapidly, the number of technology-enabled business service customers surged 189% YoY, and its gross profit contribution also increased significantly to 43.5%, from 34.9% in the same period last year. The Company's growth of payment traffic has significantly accelerated in the first half of the year through building a diversified channel system and attractive fee rate policies, which support business enablement, consumer insights and outreach. With our full confidence in the Company's growth strategy and focus to incentivize our core talent, the Company recently announced a share purchase program of up to a total of US$100 million. The repurchased shares will be used for the issuance of restricted shares to outstanding employees.

Outlook
We are committed to establishing a commercial digitalized ecosystem with strong self-reinforcing network effect. Based on its favorable initiatives for different brands, merchants, consumers, marketing personnel, advertisers and other participants, the Company conducts cross-selling for participants across its entire ecosystem to maximize monetization and facilitate the growth and success of the digital economy.

In the future, the Company will continue to explore the value of traffic and data derived from payments, led by its experienced production and research team in order to extend the boundaries of its business and promote technology innovation and digital solutions among merchants and consumers. The Company will also strive to become an integrated internet service provider and create sustainable long-term value for shareholders, employees and society.

 ThycoticCentrify, a leading provider of cloud identity security solutions formed by the merger of privileged access management (PAM) leaders Thycotic and Centrify, today announced enhancements to its PAM solution for DevOps, Thycotic DevOps Secrets Vault. The latest version offers certificate-based authentication and the ability to configure Time-to-Live (TTL) for secrets, leading to even tighter DevOps security and easier management. 

“With the latest enhancements to Thycotic DevOps Secrets Vault, we’re continuing our commitment to deliver usable security solutions,” said Richard Wang, Director of Product Management at ThycoticCentrify. “Today’s organizations require a DevOps solution that’s as agile as their development while satisfying the needs of IT and security teams.”

Certificate-based authentication designed for privileged machines 

Thycotic’s DevOps Secrets Vault addresses all scenarios in a DevOps flow where secrets are exchanged between machines, including databases and applications for software and infrastructure deployment, testing, orchestration, configuration, and Robotic Process Automation (RPA). In sync with the high-speed workflow, DevOps Secrets Vault creates digital authentication credentials that grant privileged access to systems and data.  

With the latest release, organizations can use certificate-based authentication for enhanced security and easier management. Unlike authentication solutions designed for people (such as biometrics and one-time passwords), certificate-based authentication can be used for machines – non-human privileged users such as systems, devices, and the growing Internet of Things (IoT) – to identify a machine before granting access to a resource, network, or application. Certificates are stored locally and securely, which alleviates the headache of managing passwords and distributing, replacing, and revoking tokens. 

Time-to-Live eliminates standing secrets for all cloud platforms 

In a DevOps workflow, resources are created quickly and must expire automatically to meet compliance requirements and avoid the risk of standing privilege. When cloud platform administrators, developers, applications, or databases need to access a target, DevOps Secrets Vault generates just-in-time, dynamic secrets. 

DevOps Secrets Vault has long supported automatically expiring secrets for AWS and Azure, and now extends this capability to Google Cloud Platform. Now, no matter which environment organizations choose, they can set a predetermined time for secrets to expire automatically.  

“Security and identity teams are working in lockstep with DevOps to meet the requirements of these high-speed processes,” said Wang. “They require a powerful solution that delivers immediate value while serving the needs of agile innovation.”

Combined with Thycotic Secret Server, the industry-leading vault for digital credentials, DevOps Secrets Vault provides security and IT teams full visibility and control over secrets management throughout an organization. Specifically, DevOps Secrets Vault replaces the need for hardcoded credentials used in the DevOps process and CI/CD toolchains. 

Anderton, an investment company whose shareholder is Gamma Capital Markets - renowned, independent Italian asset managers - announces the launch of the Challenger Impact High Income Fund to raise a minimum of 15 million EUR in its first initial offering period from investors seeking opportunities in early stage companies, focused on innovation and environmental impact. Gamma Capital Markets manages over EUR 1.2 billion of European clients and is present in 5 countries.

- We intend to put investors’ money to work in the world of neutral interest rates. Challenger Impact High Income Fund is one of the first funds that give investors access to private market investment opportunities through subscription to an open-end fund, with potential return on investment significantly beating other asset classes

- says Pawel Osowski, director at Anderton SICAV plc.

-Our investment objective is to achieve mid-term capital growth, with a minimum of 3x cash on cash return on investment, 44% of IRR- with a 3-4 years horizon. Historically PE/ VC industries yield an average of 25~30%, depending on the vintage years – says Pawel Osowski. The Challenger Impact High Income Fund allows investors to achieve absolute returns in the venture capital field, based on short and mid-term investments. The Fund opens doors to opportunistic off-market deals - VC, pre-IPO, minority growth capital - and provides a safe harbor by operating in a licensed and heavily regulated scheme available for subscription through select brokerage houses throughout Europe

- The fund will invest in early-stage global businesses and SMEs within sectors proving above average growth potential. We provide financing to chosen, impactful companies in exchange for an equity share, combined with Revenue Based Investments - working capital in return for a fixed percentage of on-going gross revenues. The fund's investments focus on areas related to biotechnology, medical technologies (including diagnostics), technological innovations in sport, information security, supply chain and the transportation and communications market – says Jasper de Trafford, director at Anderton SICAV plc.

The fund’s impact investment strategy is aimed at investors who seek a capital investment that will make a positive environmental and social impact in addition to its economic objective of midterm high-yield returns – says Jasper de Trafford, director at Anderton SICAV plc. Venture capital is an attractive asset class due to the ability to get early access to potential market leaders of tomorrow, as well as generating strong returns for investors at a comparatively lower risk.

The fund’s impact investment strategy is aimed at investors who seek a capital investment that will make a positive environmental and social impact in addition to its economic objective of midterm high-yield returns – says Jasper de Trafford, director at Anderton SICAV plc. Venture capital is an attractive asset class due to the ability to get early access to potential market leaders of tomorrow, as well as generating strong returns for investors at a comparatively lower risk.

- Venture capital is also not as cyclical as most investors think, providing consistent strong returns through market cycles. Although individual venture capital investments are higher risk than public equity markets, venture capital portfolios are not.In fact, over the past 10 years, venture capital has been less volatile than public markets - says Joanna Stec-Gamracy, former country head for BlackRock and investment committee member at Anderton SICAV plc.

- Alternatives such as PE and VC is the fastest-growing asset class forecasted at 15.6% growth in AUM through 2025, with CEE markets taking the lead. We know these markets very well as we have spent several years advising, investing and starting companies within them– says Richard Piotrowski, director at Anderton SICAV plc. Anderton came up with an innovative idea for tapping an increasing retail demand for private equity and venture capital investments. - We believe the “Challenger Impact High Income Fund” is a creative way to provide eligible investors access to private equity investment opportunities, hopefully giving us a competitive advantage – says Joanna Stec-Gamracy.

The number of similar funds globally is estimated to be around 200. To put this into context just how innovative of a structure this is in VC, there are over 10,000 investors globally classified as “Venture Capital” funds. Despite investing in disruptive and innovative industries, the landscape of VC fund structures has largely remained unchanged. The fund is an open-end investment structure with only 3 years of capital freeze, whereas regular VC investments usually require 8 years of capital lock down. Investors may subscribe for, convert or redeem shares in a sub-fund, based on redemption regulations, directors notice and/or fund performance. Open-end structures make it easier for investors to invest due to the cleaner and more transparent subscription and monitoring process. 

Anderton SICAV plc is headquartered in Malta with significant operations in Warsaw (with a special focus on CEE countries), strategic partnerships in Monaco and Italy, and an outpost in Canada. This gives the company significant leverage, yet flexibility of an agile organization. 

Venture capital is also not as cyclical as most investors think, providing consistent strong returns through market cycles. Although individual venture capital investments are higher risk than public equity markets, venture capital portfolios are not.In fact, over the past 10 years,venture capital has been less volatile than public markets - says Joanna Stec-Gamracy, former country head for BlackRock and investment committee member at Anderton SICAV plc.

- Diversifying our assets from a geographical perspective means that our investment portfolio is spread across many different locations around the world in order to reduce risk and improve returns. We view risk primarily as the prospect of losing our clients’ capital, rather than any shortterm volatility or tracking error. Our target investments selection process is core to the management of risk – says Doreen Micallef director at Anderton SICAV plc

The fund’s Investment Manager and shareholder - Gamma Capital Markets Ltd - has approximately 1,2 bn EUR in assets under management. The group is independent of banks and other financial intermediaries, without any conflicts of interest. Gamma's business is 70% institutional and 30% retail and exposure of the firm's client portfolios accounts for 70% towards alternatives. Anderton, alongside Gamma Capital Markets, employs a proactive, research-based approach to investing. 

Anderton is a company formed and advised by a group of skilled professionals with a broad range of expertise in the area of financial markets, having worked for BlackRock, HSBC Private Bank, GE Capital, JPMorgan, Merck, IBM & Alpha Value. The fund supports portfolio companies in a variety of ways - providing strategic counsel and arranging senior-level development or M&A introductions.

We are very much interested in opportunities in Central and Eastern European Countries. The highly- educated, young, technologically savvy, affordable talent-pool in the CEE means there is yet ample opportunity for investors to get on the next big thing. The emergence of a developing ecosystem has been underscored by investors to date – says Eros Lombardo, CEO of Gamma Capital Markets, Anderton SICAV plc shareholder.

Company recognised as a transparent and reliable vendor that supports security operations aligned with XDR’s vision

ThreatQuotient™, a leading security operations platform innovator, today announced that Frost & Sullivan has presented ThreatQuotient with the 2021 Best Practices Competitive Strategy Leadership Award for excelling in Extended Detection and Response (XDR). Frost & Sullivan strictly reserves this recognition for companies at the forefront of innovation and growth in their respective industries and believes that ThreatQuotient will emerge as a transparent and reliable vendor that supports security operations aligned with XDR’s vision.

ThreatQuotient’s security operations platform, ThreatQ, takes a data-driven approach to simplifying detection and response through high fidelity data management capabilities and near-endless integration options and capabilities. ThreatQ’s open integration architecture empowers customers to embrace XDR by fusing together disparate data sources, systems and teams through its innovative DataLinq Engine™. This adaptive engine imports and correlates external and internal data; curates and analyses data for decision making and action; and exports a prioritised data flow across the infrastructure for accelerated detection and response.

“ThreatQuotient is proud to be recognised by Frost & Sullivan as a leader in the XDR market,” said John Czupak, President and CEO, ThreatQuotient. “XDR is generating a tremendous deal of interest from security operations professionals and is becoming one of the most discussed topics in the cybersecurity industry. We approach XDR differently, as a destination towards which the market is evolving, not necessarily as a silver bullet solution. ThreatQuotient’s platform supports a wide range of use cases, from threat detection, investigation and response, making security operations more efficient and effective.”

Frost & Sullivan’s extensive and ongoing analysis on the XDR space, coupled with stringent award criteria, identified ThreatQuotient as a leading vendor-agnostic solution that aggregates data from a wide range of security controls (e.g., endpoint, cloud, network), enabling security teams to detect, investigate, and respond to threats in a faster and more holistic manner. ThreatQuotient earned the 2021 Frost & Sullivan Global Competitive Strategy Leadership Award in XDR for strong overall performance in all categories: strategy effectiveness and execution, competitive differentiation, executive team alignment, stakeholder integration, price and performance value, customer purchase and ownership experience, and customer service experience.

Mikita Hanets, Frost & Sullivan industry analyst, added, “In contrast to most early XDR offerings, the ThreatQ Platform enables security operations teams to ingest data from a wide array of security controls, whether they are from a single vendor or multiple providers. The company has an extensive list of out-of-the-box integrations that allow ThreatQuotient’s customers to start benefiting from those partnerships in a matter of minutes.”

According to the Frost & Sullivan award write-up, ThreatQuotient’s security operations platform already outperforms most early XDR offerings by enabling the correlation of threat data, integrating with a wide range of third-party solutions, and taking a data-driven approach to automation. Positioned as a company that will power the industry evolution towards the XDR vision, this recognition comes on the heels of two major product updates announced in 2021

What does it take to be successful in business? Why do some people succeed in business, while others stutter, stumble and fail? Successful entrepreneurs come in all forms, shapes and sizes. They don’t particularly fall into any specific categories that make them special. That’s why a healthy, strong and positive mindset is the most powerful asset a business owner will ever have. Successful entrepreneurs will always find a way to beat their inner demons so they can thrive.

Simac Konkader, expert business coach at ActionCOACH Slough, spent 20 years of his career in corporate consultancy, transforming teams and implementing effective systems. He is now passionate about paying back to others in his community. In April 2021, he launched ActionCOACH Slough, providing business coaching to those from Slough to Belsize and the surrounding areas. Simac has recognised the potential when teams are coached to be at their very best and is determined to make his own mark on the prosperity of local business.

Simac wants to share the top 5 demons business owners face and how they can overcome them:

Fear – Fear exists because of failure. The less we know about the outcome of something, the more afraid we are. That’s why the fear of failure is the biggest fear of all when it comes to starting a business or when you are in the middle of a major challenge in a well-established business. Successful entrepreneurs get afraid, but they don’t let the fear stop them. When you’re bold and take positive action in the face of fear, you put yourself in control of the situation and fear will almost always take a backseat. Ever heard “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail”? Setting goals and planning can help to stave off your fears.

Perfectionism – When it comes to business and entrepreneurship, getting started is always better than being perfect. Most people want to have all boxes ticked before they start a business. They want to raise enough capital to rent an office, hire staff and build a great looking website. They want to start at the perfect time and want to start big, or not start at all. There will never be a perfect time to start a business – the key to defeating perfection is to start where you are, use what you have and do what you can.

Lack of belief – You must have a strong and positive mindset to survive the stormy seas of business ownership. A strong belief in the vision and potential of your business is one of the key things investors will look for before they invest their money, while customers will look at whether your values fit with theirs before buying from you. Set out your vision, mission and values for your business from the outset and let them guide you on your path to growth.

Procrastination – Procrastination will rob you of a resource that you can never replace - time lost can never be regained. Procrastination makes you feel like you have a lot of time, which is why we continue to delay, defer, postpone and avoid taking action on our business dreams. There are two main reasons for procrastination – we are afraid to take action and we are stuck in our comfort zone. Because we don’t want to confront our fears, we simply avoid the decision or action and push it forward into the future. The key to defeating procrastination is to always have a sense of urgency. If you have a non-negotiable goal, you can avoid procrastination.

Indecisiveness – Often business owners will put off making tough decisions. The best way to deal with tough decisions is to seek advice from a trusted advisor (who’s also an expert in your area), review your options and then listen to your ‘gut’ to make your move. Once you’ve made your educated decision, move on it as quickly as possible with complete confidence. You won’t always make the right decisions, but you can have peace of mind knowing you made the best decision possible with the information you had available. The life of a business owner can be a lonely one without a mentor or coach as a trusted sounding board.

Synechron Inc., a leading digital consulting firm for financial services, is expanding its Insurance Service practice as it announces the successful certification of more than 105 individuals across their US and India locations in the Retirement Plan Fundamentals (RPF) educational program. Offered by the American Society of Pension Professionals & Actuaries (ASPPA), the preeminent national organization for retirement plan professionals, this RPF certification reinforces Synechron’s capabilities in Retirement Plan Platform services, strengthening their already impressive BFSI credentials and reaffirming their commitment to building capabilities and talent.

With their cutting-edge InsurTech accelerators and the recently announced partnership with Unqork, Synechron is well on its way to accelerate digital initiatives for Insurance services. These RPF certifications allow Synechron professionals to further nuance their expertise in the end-to-end retirement plan market, its plan administrative processes, requirements, intricacies, and best practices. To develop deep domain knowledge across the technical spectrum, Synechron has ensured that the certification covers business analysts, technical delivery leads, developers, project managers, quality assurance analysts, as well as solution and technical architects within their insurance services practices. This specialized knowledge combined with professional development and industry standard certification perfectly aligns with Synechron’s major focus on upskilling its teams and investing in talent.

In addition to enhancing Synechron’s insurance industry domain knowledge and expertise, these milestone achievements will certainly reap manifold benefits for their impressive array of insurance business clients. Following its early successes, Synechron has made the RPF course and certification mandatory for all new hires within the insurance solutions business.

The professional RPF certification process follows an intensive educational track that includes six rigorous modules focusing on the fundamentals of the retirement industry. The training covers topics ranging from the Lifecycle of a Plan, Contributions, Distributions and Loans to Testing and New Business. This self-paced professional learning track is taught through downloadable study guides, online interactive practice activities and resources, along with separate module assessments.

Remarkably, Synechron has achieved this rare feat of RPF Certification for a 100+ individuals within a six-month time frame. This is testament to Synechron’s commitment to providing best-in-class insurance solutions, forming key alliances and partnerships with top digital-first insurance industry technology providers, continuing to attract and upskill top technology talent, and building capabilities across all global offices.

Mihir Shah, Managing Director, Head of Europe, Middle East and APAC at Synechron said, “Synechron has a strong and growing presence in the Insurance services industry and these RPF certifications further enhance our credentials. The advantage of this having been achieved by 100+ individuals across our insurance teams is that it has enabled Synechron’s techno-functional experts to develop a very nuanced and strategic understanding of the changing insurance landscape. This is critical as it allows us to supplement our existing deep domain expertise with even more forward thinking, competitive and resilient solutions for our clients. We appreciate all of our RPF-certified professionals who continue to upskill and deliver unmatched services to our clients.” He added, “This specialized domain knowledge paves the way for our teams to innovate new retirement plan processes and provide critical solutions to insurance business challenges.”

Tiffany Hanks, Director of Education Sales at American Retirement Association said, “We are pleased to offer our RPF Certification program as an outstanding way to educate the retirement plan industry’s broad array of professional participants the fundamentals of today’s retirement plan marketplace. We are equally delighted that Synechron has seen the value in our program and chosen to include that as part of its focus on upskilling its technical talent teams.” She added, “The availability of this program as part of a well-rounded educational curriculum is an essential element of our commitment to develop educational initiatives that meet the need for deeper and broader knowledge opportunities for retirement plan professionals in this complex field, no matter their career ambitions.”  

Currencycloud, the experts simplifying business in a multi-currency world, announced today the appointment of Mark Ledsham as the firm’s new Chief Operations Officer (COO), and Neil Drennan as its new Chief Technology Officer (CTO).  

Previously CEO of XE.com, Ledsham will take responsibility for scaling the global payment company’s underlying compliance and payment infrastructure as the firm continues to grow internationally. Previously CTO at 10X Future Technologies, Drennan has also held roles at BBC Worldwide, Amazon and Virgin Media. He will take on responsibility for the build and development for Currencycloud’s platform and supporting technology solutions. 

Ledsham said of the move: “I’m joining Currencycloud at an incredibly exciting stage in its growth trajectory. This made for a compelling opportunity: to work alongside the best in the business, serving many of the most important fintech and financial services companies in the world. I’m very much looking forward to working with the existing leadership team to build upon a truly global, industry-leading proposition”.   

A veteran business leader across financial services and technology, Ledsham joins Currencycloud from XE.com where he was CEO. Prior to joining XE.com, Mark held senior roles at international payment Fintech OFX, and financial services conglomerate Macquarie Group. Drennan joins from 10X Future Technologies where he was CTO, where he grew the engineering team to 330 from 80, and built a cloud native platform architecture using similar methods as we do at Currencycloud. 

Drennan commented on his new role: “Currencycloud has changed the face of cross-border payments using technology to deliver faster, more transparent and cost-effective solutions for its clients. I am looking forward to working with, and growing, the existing team to continue being at the forefront of the industry.”  

Mike Laven, Currencycloud CEO, said: “Mark and Neil are top-quality talent and we’re extremely pleased to welcome them aboard. These new roles will allow the business to focus on key areas of development as we aim to continue our ambitious growth plans.” 

Drennan’s role will allow Stuart Bailey to turn his attentions to accelerating product development as he takes on the focused role of Chief Product Officer (CPO). 

These senior appointments are the latest in a flurry of growth stories from the firm; the company has hired 100 new employees in the past 12 months and secured 100 new clients in the first half of the year, recently announced a brand refresh, launched a free 12-month start-up accelerator programme - the Bold Academy, and opened a new office in Singapore. The business also saw global monthly transaction volume grow to over $4bn in the first half of 2021: it has now processed over $100bn in transactions around the world since it was founded in 2012. Despite the impacts of the pandemic, the firm also saw 65% growth in revenue in H1 2021 compared to the same period last year.  

Acuant will provide KYC and Identity Verification tech for seamless, compliant financial solutions

Acuant, the leading global Trusted Identity Platform for fraud prevention and AML compliance, today announced a new partnership with Finaptic, Canada’s only end-to-end, white-label Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) provider. As the company quickly expands, Finaptic will leverage Acuant’s fully automated technology for Onboarding with Know Your Customer (KYC) and Document Verification to meet Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulation and compliance standards.

Finaptic is a leading end-to-end banking-as-a-service (BaaS) provider that combines the power of a traditional banking platform with the flexibility of a modern technology stack to create better customer experiences. Located in Canada, Finaptic’s platform allows companies across all major industries to easily offer value-added, fully compliant banking products to their customers and build brand loyalty. Real time, event-driven technology allows its partners to embed a full-range of banking products into their own branded user experiences.

“At Finaptic, our purpose-built platform incorporates cybersecurity, regulatory compliance and data privacy by design, bringing the trust and security which Canadians expect in banking. Our modern, flexible platform is designed to deliver the next generation of banking experiences through the client’s preferred distribution point,” said David Furlong, co-founder and CEO of Finaptic. “We are very pleased to announce this partnership with Acuant; leveraging Acuant’s technology allows us to securely onboard clients remotely while seamlessly meeting compliance needs.”

To provide Finaptic’s partners the most trusted customer experience, Acuant is collaborating with Finaptic to provide its best-of-breed technologies customized to their use case and level of risk. Finaptic is leveraging Acuant’s fully automated KYC and Identity Verification for fast, secure and robust identity proofing.

“We are excited to partner with Finaptic and provide exactly what they are looking for,” said Yossi Zekri, President and CEO at Acuant. “They value the strength of our platform and that they are able to customize solutions to meet their individual use cases, all while being managed via a single API and a single contract. We look forward to their continued growth and success as their trusted partner.”

·         In its first year after becoming a digital “lifestyle” community, imagin has received more than 500,000 new users.

·         According to Smartme Analytics data, imagin is the leading digital financial services app among major neobanks and fintech companies.

·         The community has strengthened its commitment to sustainability through imaginPlanet: the “imaginers” have managed to offset 50 tons in CO2, collect 200 kilograms of plastics, and add 40,000 people to the cause of saving on food waste.

imagin, the digital services and lifestyle platform driven by CaixaBank, Spain´s leading retail bank, has celebrated its first anniversary since its launch as a new digital community concept, adding more than 500,000 new users and reaching a total balance of 3.1 million imaginers. This represents a growth rate at new highs of 20% in a single year. In the band of users over 18 years of age, specifically, growth during this first year has reached over 30%.

This data strengthens imagin's leadership as a digital financial services player. In its first year after the new app was launched to market, the platform ranks as a leader among the top neobanks and fintech companies, with a 15.2% share of active users and a score of 83 out of 100 for mobile performance in the neobanking sector in Spain, as the latest Smartme Analytics study shows. Smartme Analytics Mobile Performance Index monitors financial application usage and values performance on the basis of variables such as number of active users, daily usage time, interaction, and exclusive use frequency.

As well as growing in new users, imagin has also increased the loyalty of those who were already imaginers. During the last year, upwards of 60% of imagin users enter the app more than 3 times a week. A significant figure of volume of activity is the 23 million app accesses recorded in July 2021 in a single month, marking an all-time record of use of the app. At the operational level, use of Bizum through imagin has doubled in the last year, with an average of 4.2 million transactions per month, and mobile payment has catapulted 400% compared to 2020.

According to data from imagin, the most common customer profile is that of a young person with an average of 26 years of age, residing in a large city and operating in a digital environment. At the regional level, 32% of connections to the imagin app are made from the Community of Madrid and 29% from Catalonia.

imagin’s growth comes in response to the user loyalty boosting strategy arising from the creation of digital, financial and non-financial services, which, unlike traditional banking, do not necessarily involve somebody registering as a banking customer. During the past year, a plethora of digital content and services has been launched on the platform that have attracted a great deal of interest among the imaginer community, based on five major subject areas: sustainability (imaginPlanet), music (imaginMusic), video games (imaginGames), trends (imaginCafé) and technology (imaginShop).

Solid commitment to sustainability

Among the imaginer community, sustainability is one of the fields that kindles the most interest, interaction and involvement of users. Through imaginPlanet, this year, imagin has implemented a full line of sustainability-based products, services, agreements and initiatives that create a positive impact for the planet and society as a whole. As a result of such actions, imaginPlanet has succeeded in boosting tree plantations to offset upwards of 60 tons of CO2, collecting 200 kilograms of plastics and more than 40,000 imaginers have joined in saving on food waste through the partnership with “Too Good To Go”.

Initiatives in this area this year include the success of the imaginPlanet Challenge, the programme of entrepreneurship ideas to combat climate change, featuring over 700 participants, and two projects, eCoDeliver and Kidalos, which seek boost the sustainability of the parcel carrier sector and the consumption of toys, respectively.

This commitment to sustainability, which is part of imagin's strategy and is conveyed to its entire business model, has earned the platform a B Corp certification in November last year. This guarantees the company's compliance with the highest standards of social and environmental performance, public transparency and corporate responsibility to balance economic benefit with social purpose.

A year of successful initiatives

Besides supporting environmental causes, one of the most important projects this year and which has had the greatest impact on the imagin community is the recent launch of imaginChangers, the program that enables imagin users to take part in digital volunteering actions through their mobile devices and support charity projects with financial donations.

In June, imaginGames, in partnership with LVP (Mediapro Group), launched the amateur eSports circuit “imagin Arena Masters”, while the imaginMusic content area held several concerts this year over streaming that have been viewed by thousands of imaginers via the digital channels.

Besides the content offering itself, thanks to its open platform business model, imagin continues to commit to incorporating third-party products and technologies through partnerships with other fintech companies and start-ups. Over the past year, imagin has reached agreements to offer its users special experiences and benefits integrated into the app with partners such as Booking, Nike, Airbnb, Hoteles.com, TUI and Zalando, among others. Furthermore, imaging has integrated start-up technologies such as Earthly into its platform to help users offset their CO2 emissions; Aplanet, as a platform for the gamification of digital volunteering actions and financial donations; and Bankify, the “Like&Share” social component that encourages imaginers' interaction with the content available in the app, as well as interaction between different community users.

Digital financial services

At the financial level, the imagin application develops digital products offered to meet the saving and financing needs of users. In all cases, imagin has the key features for the digital native public: mobile only banking (the services are provided exclusively through the app, with no branches and no website, which solely fulfils an informative purpose), with no fees for the user and its own simple and clear language, especially suited to directly communicating with young people.

The imagin offering includes two further applications according to the age of users: imaginKids (intended for children from 0 to 11 years of age and highly focused towards financial education through games), imaginTeens (designed for adolescents between 12 and 17 years of age, with contents and services intended for young people who are beginning to require solutions for their first purchases and to start out in managing their personal finances).