After a ‘stay home’ e-commerce boom, a quarter of British consumers (25%) say they are going to online shop less as they return to the office, new research from buy now pay smarter payment solution Openpay has found.

Convenience has been king over the last six months, with consumers expanding their loungewear collections, cooking up storms with new kitchen appliances or upgrading running shoes to beat their 5k PB. However, with offices reopening, it appears the dreaded ‘sorry we missed you’ note will again be stuffed through the door of thousands across the country – something which nearly half (46%) said they hadn’t missed during lockdown.

Compounding misery, Openpay also revealed over a third of companies (38%) have a blanket ban on personal deliveries, meaning those forced to send goods home risk rogue couriers hiding packages in bins, plant pots or tucking them under gates.

Pre-lockdown, nosy office neighbours were one of the main deterrents of workplace deliveries, with over a third (35%) of respondents not wanting their colleagues to know what they spend their money on. A similar percentage of respondents (34%) also said it was frowned upon to receive too many personal packages, showing the judging eyes of the office do influence delivery location.

Lugging goods home is also a major stumbling block, with a fifth (20%) saying navigating public transport with a package is a barrier to office deliveries. One in three (33%) said they felt awkward and embarrassed bumping into commuters and stealing seats with cumbersome parcels.

Andy Harding, UK Managing Director of Openpay, said: “Missing a delivery is always frustrating, so it’s easy to see why Brits took full advantage of being home during lockdown. With people returning to work, it is quite staggering that so many post rooms have draconian bans on personal parcels. The traditional workplace is changing now more than ever, so it’s time for offices to meet the needs of workers. Every employee is also a consumer and they require flexibility at every point of their purchase, from payment to delivery.”

Klarna, the leading global payments and shopping service, today announces the launch of its newly redesigned App, elevating the shopping experience for its millions of users across the UK with a greater range of flexibility, control and personalisation while shopping online. 

The new Klarna app has been designed to meet the shifting expectations of consumers as they adapt from shopping in-store to online, a move that has taken place over several years but has accelerated in recent months. The app will cover the entire shopping journey, from inspiration and discovery through to the transaction - all in one place. Content is personalised based upon consumers’ interests, their favourite stores and previous shopping behaviour, offering an unrivalled mobile shopping experience. 

New features of the app will include:

• Wish lists, save the items you love, spark your inspiration with curated wish lists or find the hottest items from your favourite retailers. Wish lists can contain items from any retailer in the UK and can either be kept for private use, or shared with friends and family.  
• Price drop notifications, consumers can set up alerts for the products they love, and only pay for them when they’re comfortable with the price, offering the best value for money on their purchases. 
• Deals, we’ve hunted down the best online deals and have saved them for you all in one place.
• Exclusively curated content from the world of fashion, beauty, and lifestyle.

Following discovery, shopping takes place within the Klarna app on a retailer’s website through an iframe with the option to pay for products either by Klarna (if a retailer has partnered with Klarna) or by traditional methods such as credit or debit card. This seamless end-to-end shopping experience offers consumers complete control, flexibility and personalisation all in one place for the first time. 

Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and co-founder of Klarna commented: “Our mantra at Klarna has always been about creating the smooothest experiences for our users. In the past few months, we’ve seen a shift in shopping behaviour with millions fully embracing digital purchasing for the first time as physical stores were closed. 

Despite the shifting retail landscape, consumers are still looking for inspiration, convenience and value and it’s become obvious that shopping online now goes far beyond just a transaction. The new Klarna app elevates the entire shopping experience, from start to finish by bringing together all the best aspects of shopping in one place, giving Klarna users a unique and personalised experience at their fingertips.”

To enable its customers to fully take their cloud strategies to the next level, Compass Plus has supported Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS) in its cloud-native open development payments platform, TranzAxis.

AWS RDS manages database servers for its users, enabling them to significantly reduce not only the burden of database administration, but their operating costs for database management too. As well as being cost-efficient, it provides autoscaling that enables payment providers to accommodate changing processing volumes without being hindered by hardware, while automating time-consuming administration tasks, thus freeing up the time and resources of payment providers to allow them to focus on their core business and development strategies.

“The extreme scalability and agility cloud-based environments offer, alongside support for quicker innovation and a lower cost of ownership, means that more and more payment providers are turning to cloud-based infrastructures to help grow their business now and drive their strategy well into the future,” said Maria Nottingham EVP at Compass Plus. “TranzAxis isn’t just ‘cloud-enabled’, it is cloud-native so is primed to take full advantage of everything cloud-based infrastructures offer. Our mission is to take full advantage of the ever-increasing technological advancements available on the market today. Unlike many legacy systems, TranzAxis allows our customers enjoy these developments to the full – AWS RDS is just one of the examples.”

Hailed as “a visionary product” by industry experts PayX (Spring 2020), TranzAxis was purposefully built to enable innovators to innovate. The cloud-native nature of the platform provides FIs with the confidence and flexibility to experiment and truly drive innovation, enabling them to launch products and services tailored to their customers quickly, whether a specific segment or wider audience (and painlessly dispose of them if they don’t work out).

Huawei is cooperating with fintech company, TPAY MOBILE to make it easier and more convenient for developers in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) region to monetise their apps on HUAWEI Mobile Services (HMS). The first phase of the agreement will offer DCB services in 10 countries across MEA region, including all mobile subscribers.

Huawei and TPAY MOBILE have been working closely as part of their ongoing commitment to support developers in the MEA region. This partnership will allow local and global developers to monetize their apps and services through HMS’ In-App-Purchases (IAP) kit across the region. TPAY MOBILE’s Direct Carrier Billing (DCB) service offers all Huawei’s HMS customers in the MEA region the ability to pay for their apps and services through their mobile phone number. This will make it more accessible for Huawei and HONOR device users to pay for online services and apps on HMS.

As a result, developers will get 100 percent DCB coverage in the MEA region including Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, and Qatar.

Sahar Salama, the Founder and CEO of TPAY MOBILE, said: “We are very excited to launch this strategic partnership with Huawei which will equip local and global developers with the tools they need to better monetise their services through In-App-Purchases capabilities. This agreement further extends the value of TPAY MOBILE for top global merchants who are aspiring to scale their businesses across our region. Developers and online merchants have now an unparalleled access and local know-how, coupled with a trusted, agile, resilient, and scalable payments platform that they can use to scale up their businesses. During the first phase, we aspire to roll out payments in around 10 countries.”

TPAY MOBILE is the top alternative payments enabler in the MEA region and brings a wide range of capabilities to Huawei’s HMS platform.

Adam Xiao, Managing Director, HMS and Consumer Cloud Service for Huawei Consumer Business Group MEA, said: “We welcome the opportunity to partner with TPAY MOBILE and as a result provide our users with more payment options. By working with TPAY MOBILE we have been able to make it easier for local and global developers to monetize their apps and services to millions more people in the MEA region.”

FSS (Financial Software and Systems), a global payment products provider and processor, has introduced critical increments to its market-leading Smart Recon platform. The new system will leverage ML and automate manually intensive processes and improve the speed, accuracy, and the reliability of the payment reconciliation process.

FSS Smart Recon provides an end-to-end, automated solution for reconciliation management across payment workflows, with built in support for complex, multi-source, multi-file many-to-many reconciliation scenarios. The notable enhancements include:

• Machine learning-based settlement process for improved speed and accuracy.
• Universal Data Wizard and enhancements to General Ledger Tally for improved time to market
• Cloud-enablement for improved scale and cost efficiency 

Collectively the enhancements provide a 40% improvement in time to market for greenfield implementations, a sizable 30% improvement in reconciliation time cycles, and an overall 25% reduction in direct costs as compared to partially automated processes.

Speaking on the developments, Krishnan Srinivasan, Global Chief Revenue Officer FSS, stated: “FSS is a leader in the payment reconciliation space, with 25+ deployments globally. Our Smart Recon solution has been deployed by Tier One banks, neo banks, MNOs and merchant aggregators. Across segments and markets, we are seeing a significant demand for modernisation of back-office operations. Customers  are increasingly pivoting away from in-house payment reconciliation systems with semi-automated processes towards service-based contracts backed by new-age technology platforms.” 

Speaking on the new increments, Sathish N, Dy CPO, FSS stated: “Payment reconciliations have become exceedingly complex and simplicity and speed is crucial for banks and financial institutions in the wake of an ever-increasing influx of transaction data. With our continuous innovation-led model and investment on right technology like Machine learning, AI and cloud computing, banks and financial institutions will benefit from flexible and scalable processes and improved speed and accuracy of reconciliation.”

FSS Smart Recon deploys advanced unsupervised Machine Learning (ML), algorithms for settlement accelerating the reconciliation cycle by dynamically identifying potential discrepancies at source. Algorithm-based settlement processes allow new components to be detected within seconds, lowering process latency, and saving 80% time in performing resolution actions.  

FSS Universal Data Wizard catapults time to market for new implementations by 40%. Across deployments, the initial process of configuring proprietary Core Banking and the Switch file formats is the lengthiest step in the implementation cycle. Data Wizard maintains a meta-repository of Switch and Host file formats for reuse across deployments, saving time and costs on implementation projects. To further optimize implementation cycle time, FSS Smart Recon has enhanced its critical General Ledger Tally process to  support  a generic framework for automation of closing balances between General Ledger and Core Banking systems.

FSS Smart Recon functionality can be accessed from the Oracle cloud providing greater deployment flexibility to customers. The availability via a cloud platform transforms the economics of ownership for financial institutions and neo-banks and customers wishing to migrate from legacy systems, in particular.

Deployed by globally leading banks and payment processors, FSS Smart Recon is a unified system for reconciling digital payments and incorporates data import, transformation and enrichment, data matching, exception management and timely reporting and analytics. The solution supports a wide diversity of payment classes – ATM Recon, Online Commerce, Wallets, Instant Payments (IMPS and UPI), NEFT, RTGS and QR Code Payments -- with built-in flexibility to rapidly onboard new payment channels and scheme-based payments. 

One more time, Path Solutions was announced ‘Best Islamic Technology Provider’ at The Asset Triple A Islamic Finance Awards 2020, after demonstrating remarkable contribution to the digital Islamic banking and finance space across the globe.

The Asset Triple A Islamic Finance Awards are the industry’s most prestigious awards in what has become one of the fastest growing and most promising niches of global finance. The awards recognize the firms that have demonstrated resilience in the face of unexpectedly low growth last year caused by low oil prices, political instability, and COVID-19 pandemic. They have achieved this by capitalising on new opportunities such as the digitalisation of the Islamic banking sector through AI-powered branchless banking and blockchain initiatives.

Sharia-compliant financial assets are forecasted to reach $3.8trn by 2023, up from $200bn in 2003. As the industry matures, The Asset Triple A Islamic Finance Awards represent an opportunity to shine a light on the companies or individuals that are pushing their boundaries and are setting the agenda on the international stage.

During the evaluation process, Path Solutions was commended by The Asset judging committee for its industry-leading digital Islamic core banking platform iMAL which helps full-fledged as well as conventional banks with Islamic windows drive truly digital transformation to achieve frictionless customer experiences, insights-driven interactions and full process automation.

Commenting on the award, Mohammed Kateeb, the Group Chairman & CEO of Path Solutions, said: “We are delighted to receive once again the ‘Best Islamic Technology Provider’ award from The Asset in recognition of our historical and continuous investment in Islamic financial technologies. For over 28 years, we have been a key player in the Islamic finance community providing world-class Sharia-compliant software solutions that have been specifically designed around the customer journey across all business lines. During these unprecedented times, we continue to work relentlessly with our clients in their digital transformation journeys by empowering them with more of our innovative flagship ecosystem. This win reflects our commitment to helping Islamic banks compete, stay relevant in today’s challenging and dynamic marketplace.”

Path Solutions’ iMAL has been architected out of years of experience and offers several powerful and differentiating features making it one of the most comprehensive, flexible and scalable Sharia-compliant platforms available in the market.

Due to COVID-19, this year’s Awards Luncheon is going virtual. The Awards premiere will be broadcasted at 5.00 PM (HKT) on 23 September 2020 on TheAsset.com

The Asset Triple A Islamic Finance Awards’ list has been published at: https://www.theasset.com/awards/islamic-finance-2020-issuer-adviser-awards.

Payments company EBANX, that offers payment solutions from Latin America to global merchants, was named to CB Insights third annual Fintech 250, a prestigious list of emerging private companies working on groundbreaking financial technology. EBANX is in the Payments Processing & Networks category.

“We are proud to, once again, recognize the 250 best private fintech companies globally. This year's Fintech 250 represents 25 countries and spans 19 categories – reimagining everything from retail banking and crypto, to insurance and asset management,” said CB Insights CEO Anand Sanwal. “The previous Fintech 250 class raised more than USD 22 billion in investor financing and saw more than 20 exits after being recognized, and we expect this year's class will have similar success as they continue to transform how people and businesses spend, save, borrow, and invest their money.”

EBANX is one of the six Brazilian companies on the list, and one of the eight Latin Americans. "CB Insights Fintech 250 list is worldwide recognized. We are honored to be in it, and featured among companies that create outstanding solutions. It is a double honor to help highlight Brazil and Latin America to the world through the list, showing the digital revolution taking place within the region, and all the potential we have here," said the co-founder and CEO of EBANX, Alphonse Voigt. Brazilians Gorila, Nubank, QuintoAndar, Xerpa, and Creditas, Argentinian Ualá and Mexican Konfío are also on the list that is available here. 

Through an evidence-based approach, the CB Insights Intelligence Unit selected the Fintech 250 from a pool of 16,000 companies, including applicants and nominees, based on several factors. These factors include patent activity, investor quality, news sentiment analysis, proprietary Mosaic scores, market potential, partnerships, competitive landscape, team strength, and tech novelty. The Mosaic Score, based on CB Insights’ algorithm, measures the overall health and growth potential of private companies to help predict a company’s momentum. 

Cornerstone Brands is pleased to announce the appointment of Julian Wheatland as its new Chief Executive Officer to drive the Company forward in the next stage of its development. The Company is also pleased to announce that, following the completion of the acquisition of FXPress Payment Services Ltd, a provider of advanced payment systems as Platform as a Service to SMEs (“FXPress”), the Company will change its name to Cornerstone FS plc. The completion of the acquisition is subject to FCA authorisation.

Over the past 20 years, Julian Wheatland has established a successful track record in financing, establishing and developing technology companies. Most recently, as Chief Operating Officer/Chief Financial Officer, and ultimately Chief Executive Officer, of SCL Group/Cambridge Analytica, a leading data analytics and digital marketing business, he led the global operations of SCL and built out the US operations. In his roles as Chief Executive Officer of Hatton International, a corporate finance and international project development company, and prior to that as Chief Executive Officer of Consensus Community, a £400m venture capital portfolio, he invested in technology commercialisation and foreign direct investment projects. In between these two roles Julian, as Chief Executive Officer of Cosmos Technology, a technology commercialisation and export development company, he supported the growth of Bulgarian technology businesses and helped them reach international markets.

Speaking about his appointment as Chief Executive, Julian Wheatland said: “I am very excited about joining Cornerstone at this important juncture and to help make it a significant business in the provision of cross border payment services for SMEs. It’s rare that one gets the chance to step into a company where there’s such a congruence of three key elements to deliver success – excellent technology, a great team and perfect market timing.

“SMEs are an underserviced segment by the banking sector, but with our proprietary technology we will be able to take advantage of the Open Banking Initiative and provide them with a suite of products and solutions that will reduce costs and increase efficiency. I look forward to Cornerstone capitalising on this opportunity and becoming a premiere cross-border payment services business.”

Pioneering anti-money-laundering firm SmartSearch has been named in the Sunday Times Sage ‘Tech Track 100’ for a second successive year. The list, published on Sunday, recognises Britain’s 100 private tech companies with the fastest-growing sales over a three-year period.

Earlier in the year, the Yorkshire-based firm also reached 15^th position in the Sunday Times Profit Track list, which focuses on profits rather than revenues.

SmartSearch is the UK’s leading provider of anti-money-laundering (AML) software. Its unique one-stop digital platform means regulated firms can meet all their ‘Know Your Customer’ and due diligence needs.

Full electronic identity verification and AML checks take just seconds to perform and can be conducted remotely, online or via a fully-integrated app, with no need for the customer to provide physical ID documents. For additional security, a passportsor driving licence can be scanned digitally and advanced facial recognition technology used to authenticate customer identity.

SmartSearch has also recently begun piloting its groundbreaking ‘TripleCheck’ technology, which combines electronic verification, biometric facial recognition and digital fraud checks, to create the most robust and secure AML system available on the market.

The firm’s success and continued growth in the UK have recently led to expansion into North America, with the launch of SmartSearch into the US market in July.

John Dobson, CEO at SmartSearch, said: “We have achieved significant year-on-year growth ever since we started SmartSearch in 2011.This is testament to the hard work of the whole team, and it is wonderful to see this recognised in these prestigious listings.

“Never before has electronic verification and anti-money-laundering software been more important. Criminals are developing ever more sophisticated techniques, and global watchdogs have warned that fraudulent activity is on the rise in the wake of Covid-19.

“The restrictions put in place due to coronavirus havemade it more important than ever that the wide range of financial and professional services firms likely to be targeted by money-launderers, have access to the very best technology to combat this threat.

“We have created a solution that is quick, affordable and almost instantaneous – as well as being significantly more reliable than manual document checks.A fully digital AML solution is the only way for firms to stay compliant while working remotely.”

Phoebus Software Limited (PSL), the market-leading lending and deposits servicing software specialist, has entered into an exclusive agreement with Yabber, the contact centre analytics experts. This will allow the Yabber solution to form part of the Phoebus Digital Ecosystem. 

PSL has 26 clients in the UK and Ireland many of which are regulated entities. There are over £60 billion in assets under management running on Phoebus servicing, which has several well-known lenders, specialist banks, building societies and Business Processing Outsourcers (BPO’s) making up its client base.

Yabber was set up by the team at Rockstead, Europe’s leading due-diligence company. The Yabber software solution has been created to complement Rockstead’s usual due diligence activities and, once integrated with call recording software, transcribes 100% of customer telephone conversations. This allows Yabber users to benefit in many areas such as improving customer outcomes and team performance, as well as providing an audit trail to ensure regulated processes are adhered to.

Richard Pike, PSL’s sales and marketing director, comments: “We have known the Rockstead team for many years and are very pleased that they have selected Phoebus Software as their exclusive software partner to offer this new call monitoring product to our clients and prospects. We believe the solution will be ground breaking in terms of assisting due diligence and internal auditing within the lending and banking sectors. We look forward to making the partnership a huge success for both our organisations and our clients.”

Brian Pitt, Group CEO of Rockstead and Yabber, says: “We believe we have developed a game changing piece of software that not only supports our due diligence activities, but opens up new markets for us. Firms are at risk of incurring serious fines from regulators for non-compliance across a number of sectors, but particularly in financial services. Our aim is to help firms monitor compliance, improve customer experience and drive an improvement in standards. In choosing a partner to work with, PSL was an obvious choice, both in terms of the quality of the software but also due to the company’s stature in the loans servicing software industry, and we believe this partnership will only be beneficial to all of our clients moving forward”.