Temenos (SIX: TEMN) today announces that SinoPac, one of Taiwan's largest banks, has selected Temenos to advance its digital banking capabilities. Temenos digital banking solution on Temenos open platform for composable banking will enable SinoPac to differentiate in a crowded banking market with seamless and personalized digital banking experiences, helping it attract new customers and grow wallet-share.

SinoPac is already one of the most successful banks in Taiwan for digital account acquisition. Its DAWHO account is the first to combine savings, credit cards, wealth management, mortgages, foreign exchange and securities investment within one app.

What sets the bank apart is a deep understanding of customers' needs and fulfilling their digital journey. With a user-friendly interface, customers can open an account in three steps in just ten minutes. It has garnered around 1.2 million users and has high engagement with over 80 per cent of users active.

Temenos digital banking solutions will enable SinoPac to continue to enhance the digital customer experience while bringing innovation to the market faster and at a lower cost. SinoPac will implement the enterprise suite of Temenos digital banking functionality, covering the entire customer lifecycle from customer onboarding, account opening and servicing.

SinoPac completed an overhaul of its core banking system with Temenos in 2012. Implementing Temenos digital banking on top delivers a complete end-to-end retail banking solution, combining a flexible product engine and world-class front and middle office transactional capabilities.

SinoPac is a top five bank in Taiwan with a net income in excess of NT$11 billion (US$0.37B) and more than NT$2 trillion (US$67Bn) in total assets.

Robert Tsai, CIO, Bank SinoPac, commented: “We chose Temenos to turbo-charge our digital banking initiatives. Customers are showing an increased preference for digital interaction. With our core and digital banking services working seamlessly together on a single platform we can foster innovation and deliver digital experiences to meet our customers' evolving needs and expectations, faster and at a lower cost.”

Craig Bennett, Managing Director – Asia Pacific, Temenos, said: “Temenos has a long-standing relationship with SinoPac and so we are delighted the bank has chosen our digital banking solution to further its digital ambitions. SinoPac has achieved tremendous success with its digital offerings and with Temenos it can take that innovation to the next level. Temenos has built a trusted reputation with leading banks in Taiwan and this new win with SinoPac shows our continued leadership and momentum in the market.”

Cheddar, the bank account-enabled instant payments platform, has announced the launch of its new cashback feature. From today, Cheddar users will be paid cash straight back into their bank account as they spend with partnered retailers.

Following a trial debut at the UK’s biggest food and music festival tour, Pub in the Park, the new feature will allow users to earn up to 50% when making purchases at their favourite retailers both in-store and online. Already a variety of well-known retailers are onboard including Ocado, Joe & The Juice and Sports Direct.

Anyone can sign-up to the app effortlessly for free and use their existing debit or credit cards, Apple Pay or Google Pay to start earning cashback instantly. Once signed-up, users will have access to hyper-personalised offers based on actual spend behaviour from retailers with any eligible cards they’ve linked to the app.

Luke Ladyman, Chief Operating Officer & Co-founder at Cheddar says:

‘As the UK economy heads deeper into recession with inflation soaring to record highs not seen in 40 years, consumers’ shopping and spending habits are changing. At Cheddar it’s important to us, now more than ever, to make everyday spending as easy as possible and our new cashback feature will help our users save money effortlessly while they spend during these challenging times.’

‘For our retail partners, it will help to attract new high-intent customers, increase the loyalty of existing ones, and re-engage lost customers at a time when retail spend is expected to struggle. We’re extremely proud to offer this new win-win solution for both consumers and businesses and are excited to see them reap the benefits.’

Cheddar’s open banking-enabled platform uses customer spend data, via first-party consent, to personalise its cashback offerings for users. The app will track where they spend and how often in order to provide tailored offers from retail partners and ensure maximum benefit for both the retailer and the customer.

As the cost of living crisis deepens, consumers are spending much more cautiously to make ends meet and save money. Cheddar’s new cashback feature will help retailers increase customer loyalty, encouraging them, with monetary incentives, to purchase more frequently.

According to ‘The Tipping Point of Loyalty’ report’ it only takes 13 spends per year, on average, to create a loyal customer which is worth 22x more to retailers than non-loyal customers.

After launching in March 2022, this announcement marks Cheddar’s first expansion of its payments platform offering. Cheddar is also bringing the new cashback offering to Fresher’s Week for students to enjoy at several universities including; University of Bristol, University of Leeds, University of Manchester, University of Nottingham and University of Birmingham.

The new feature is live in the Cheddar app today, which can be downloaded from the Apple and Google Play stores.

Mollie, one of the fastest growing financial services providers in Europe, today announced the launch of Mollie Capital, a fast and flexible way for customers to access funding. The launch marks a pivotal move into the financial services industry for Mollie and improved access to cash for SMEs.

Mollie Capital is a fully integrated business financing service. Eligible customers can apply for cash advances of up to €250,000 based on a variety of factors, including their transaction history with Mollie. They can easily request funding via the Mollie dashboard with just a few simple clicks, and in most cases, funds will be available on the same day. Repayments are automatically taken as a portion of daily sales and a fixed one-time fee is charged. 

Research has shown, including this European Central Bank study focused on access to finances for SMEs, the difficulty young and innovative firms have in accessing loans. E-commerce SMEs are being slowed down by not being able to buy inventory, fund marketing campaigns or invest in business expansion. 

Mollie Capital is an attractive alternative to traditional financing that powers Mollie customers to unlock their growth potential. It helps save time and drives efficiency with the entire funding process managed in the same platform they receive their revenue.

Shane Happach, CEO of Mollie said, “Mollie Capital is a milestone product launch for Mollie. It marks our first step towards becoming a financial services provider, whilst aligning with our goal to help small- and medium-sized merchants compete. At Mollie, we believe in SMEs' success and want to help them grow. With lengthy, cumbersome requirements to get financing, SMEs have been continually underserved by the big banks. Mollie Capital will ensure they can access fast, flexible and easy funding that they need to flourish.”

In preparation for the launch, Mollie Capital was offered to a small group of customers to enable Mollie to refine the offering. One of the first customers was Tom Kapitein at Glamour your Hair, who took advantage of the fully integrated business financing service: “Mollie Capital has transformed the way we access financing as a growing SME. With repayments automatically repaid, we don’t have to worry about scheduling or missing repayments, so we can focus our priority on growing our business.”

Mollie Capital will initially be offered to select businesses in the Netherlands and Belgium, with plans for expansion to other markets later this year. 

nCino, Inc. (NASDAQ: NCNO), a pioneer in cloud banking and digital transformation solutions for the global financial services industry, today announced that Avenue Bank, an Australian start-up digital business bank specialising in serving small and medium-size businesses, is live on the nCino Bank Operating System^®. Avenue Bank deployed nCino’s Commercial Banking Solution to support customer onboarding, origination, credit risk management and customer 360 view—providing their employees with key insights and the automation necessary to deliver faster response and seamless experience for their customers.

“nCino embedded their high-quality solution into our greenfield digital strategy in just over 4 months. With their guidance, we’ve been able to design products and implement best-in-class technology to meet our needs—and the needs of our target customers,” said George Confos, CEO and Executive Director. “As a cloud-based, digital product-led business like nCino, our values and mission make this partnership a win-win for not just our customers, but for our people, too. nCino’s team was highly engaged throughout the entire project, making our team confident that Avenue Bank’s success was their top priority.”

Small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) businesses are a fundamental part of the global economy. nCino’s platform supports both the financial institution and the customer from the very beginning, to deliver an efficient, end-to-end banking relationship, enhancing customer relationships and increasing loan profitability and response time. nCino’s single platform helps drive Avenue Bank’s digital strategy that focuses on making timely, quality decisions and operating within a high-tech, low-touch environment.

“Across the industry, financial institutions can add significant value by adopting digital technologies like nCino to deliver faster customers insights, respond more quickly to new market trends, and scale efficiently to stay ahead of the competition,” said Mark Bernhardi, Managing Director of Australia and New Zealand at nCino. “It’s always an exciting opportunity to partner with another entrepreneurial and progressive organisation such as Avenue Bank and provide new and innovative ways to better serve their customers. Avenue is on a mission to exceed the business banking standards across the Australian market, and nCino’s platform is helping to fulfil that goal.”

Railsr, the leading global embedded finance experiences platform, is partnering with DND Finance (DND), a multinational commercial equipment finance provider, to launch the Score Credit Mastercard.
 
Branded as the Score Credit Mastercard by DND, it is aimed at personal users and business owners with a less-than-perfect credit record including entrepreneurs and students. The card is also Shariah-compliant. DND believes its card will be a key way for users to get their credit records back on track, echoing sentiments articulated by Railsr which advocates the democratisation of finance.
 
DND uses the Railsr platform for its UK Banking-as-a-Service, licensing and card services. It chose Railsr as the issuer because it did not want to manage every single part of the implementation process, including linking to key partner platforms and getting a Bank Identification Number (BIN).
 
DND has created the card based on the knowledge that a good credit record is built when people develop a history of paying bills on time, such as credit cards, lines of credit and loans. With the Score Mastercard, a user decides what limit is best for them, transfers a security deposit to DND, start using their card for everyday expenses and consistently pay their bills on time. That payment history is reported to the UK credit agencies and their credit improves.
 
DND traditionally works with SMEs and entrepreneurial companies in the UK and Canada that are typically ignored by larger lenders. It provides vendor financing programmes to manufacturers and works closely with small-ticket brokers of equipment finance. It also provides loans to professionals, from physicians to accountants and architects.
 

Louisa Murray, SVP, Global Head of Enterprise Customers and Partners of Railsr, said: “We are very excited to be working with the team at DND. Its approach of helping companies and individuals navigate the tricky world of finance aligns very much with our core principles of how the wider financial services sector is there to serve as many people as possible. We look forward to working with them over the coming years.”
 

Rev Dr K Bill Dost, co-founder and Group CEO of the DND, added: “Our services provide a way for underfunded entrepreneurs to finance their dreams – to open a new business or continue the business they have when they need funding. It is great to team up with Railsr, a platform that could offer us the whole package and take away the pain of introducing our product.”
 

“Our purpose with the Score Card is to offer attainable access to a better life for everyone. This is because a bad credit rating used to mean one would not be able to access affordable credit products; today it means that you cannot move into your ideal neighbourhood or your children cannot attend the right school. A good credit rating is a difference between a life of lack and a life of privilege and we choose to offer that life of privilege to anyone that desires it.”

LINE MAN Wongnai announced today that it has raised US$265 million in a Series-B investment round led by GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund, and LINE Corporation. This fundraising round was also joined by BRV Capital Management, PTT Oil and Retail Business Public Company Limited (OR), Bualuang Ventures and Taiwan Mobile.

With this investment, LINE MAN Wongnai has achieved a valuation of over US$1 billion, making it Thailand’s largest tech startup by valuation.

The funding will be used to strengthen LINE MAN Wongnai’s strong position in the food delivery market, expand new service categories, recruit tech talent and improve tech infrastructure. LINE MAN Wongnai aims to be employing more than 450 talented tech professionals by the end of 2022.

LINE MAN Wongnai was established in 2020 from the merger of LINE MAN, Thailand’s No. 1 on-demand assistant app, and Wongnai, a restaurant review platform. The company aims to be the most innovative e-commerce platform for services in Thailand with diverse business portfolios:

●        On-Demand Businesses – LINE MAN services include food delivery, grocery delivery, messenger and taxi. The number of orders made each month through the food delivery service grew by more than 15 times between January 2020 and August 2022, making it the fastest-growing food delivery platform in the country. Now LINE MAN operates in all 77 provinces in Thailand, offering delivery options to 700,000 restaurants, the most among food delivery service providers.

●        Merchant Solutions – Wongnai connects close to 1 million merchants to users nationwide through search and reviews. In addition, Wongnai POS has become the No. 1 point-of-sale solution in the food & beverage industry with over 50,000 merchants.

●        Value-Added Services – Utilizing a large base of customers, riders, and restaurants, LINE MAN Wongnai offers advertising and financial services, among others, to incrementally add value to the stakeholders in the ecosystem.

Yod Chinsupakul, CEO, LINE MAN Wongnai, said “Today’s announcement marks a remarkable milestone for LINE MAN Wongnai. I am grateful to GIC, LINE and other investors who gave us the opportunity to create large-scale impacts and to become a national champion for Food Delivery. Food has been our passion since I co-founded Wongnai and now to be able to connect millions of users with the biggest pool of restaurants we have is a dream come true. We are also proud to create over 100,000 jobs for the riders, most of whom earn more than twice the minimum wage. We are committed to driving Thailand forward. Today, we promise to bring best-in-class and tailor-made products and services to help Thai people live better.”

In Young Chung, Chief Financial Officer, LINE MAN Wongnai, said “The announcement opens the next chapter for LINE MAN Wongnai to grow from a local Thai start-up to a regional tech platform. We thank LINE for embracing us into its deep mobile ecosystem and providing on-going support for our journey. We also thank GIC for not only giving us the trust and capital, but also guidance and insight from its global presence and BRV for its continuous support since Series A lead investment. Our LINE MAN Wongnai team will strive to become the most inspiring tech company through IPO and beyond in coming years, for our society and young generations.”

Eunjung Lee, CEO, LINE Plus Corporation, said “LINE MAN is one of the great success cases, highlighting LINE’s dedication to creating services tailored to the local needs of each market.  With this fundraising, LINE MAN Wongnai solidifies a foundation for its future growth, creating a better, more convenient daily life for Thai users.”

Payment technology company Tribe Payments, today announced it is providing digital bank, Paytend, with both issuer and acquirer processing services. The partnership enhances Paytend’s product offering, enabling them to issue payment cards, allow users to add cards to mobile wallets - including within Paytend’s own mobile banking app - and allow merchants to accept POS and online transactions.

Regulated by the Bank of Lithuania, Paytend provides innovative digital banking services to consumers and businesses in Europe. The digital bank’s offerings span multi-currency accounts, global remittances, and both in-store and e-commerce acquiring. Due to holding issuer and acquirer licences, Paytend was keen to work with a single partner that supported both sides of the transaction with an API-led and cloud-based technology platform.

With its core platform – ISAAC - Tribe now provides Paytend with issuer processing and management for Mastercard and Visa cards, both virtual and physical – including support for mobile wallet payments, also via Paytend’s mobile banking app. Tribe also facilitates authorisations and provides tokenisation, 3DS and transaction monitoring solutions.

On the acceptance side Tribe’s technology powers both in-store POS and e-commerce transactions for Paytend’s merchant customers, which includes restaurants, tax-free shops and cosmetic stores throughout Europe. This incorporates multi-scheme acquirer processing services and supporting capabilities such as acquirer-side 3DS.

“At Paytend we pride ourselves on providing better and more efficient financial collection and payment services for our customers across a wide range of use cases”, said Laimonas Zmuidinavicius, Managing Director at Paytend. “To help us achieve this we needed a payments technology partner that offers the flexibility and expertise needed to ensure our digital banking services are market leading. With Tribe we’ve found exactly that - a proven partner that helps us create compelling issuing and acquiring services.”

“We see a growing demand for businesses who want to be both issuer and acquirer. As fintechs look to differentiate and rapidly launch new services to drive new revenue streams, the ability to address both sides of the transaction is key, not just to seizing the opportunities available but also to gaining more control over business direction, costs and commercial models,” said Alex Reddish, Managing Director at Tribe. “While the opportunity is enormous, the process often isn’t easy. Which is why our job is to take the pain out of that process and offer flexible technology that allows Paytend to offer a powerful end-to-end service for their customers.”

Finances and banking have dramatically changed in recent decades, and technical innovations were the main contributor. Edgy satellite-driven technologies facilitate financial decision-making and open up new business horizons, and the geographic information system (GIS) is among the best novelties.

Geospatial data gives more specific information to banks than any other source. Banks can study market demand, track competitors, and manage agricultural credit risks.

What Is Geospatial Data?

Geospatial data is any information indicating the geographical position (aka georeference). Georeferencing can be more or less specific – from the exact location on the map with the Global Positioning System (GPS) to just a country’s region. It provides a lot of useful information about the questioned area but the greatest thing about geospatial information is data visualization on the map.

For example, GIS software can provide valuable demographic insights on the population density in a certain area, people’s income, or financial services they use. Derived data helps banking institutions analyze the current patterns and understand how trends change over time.

Let’s consider the most essential benefits of location-based geospatial data for the financial sector.

Risk Assessment for Agri-Banks

Agribusiness is a highly vulnerable sphere due to farmers’ yield loss, but satellite-based crop monitoring analytics and custom solutions can help to mitigate the risks. In particular, crop yield forecasting with satellite technologies allow for analyzing credit default probability. In other words, agri-banks can understand if farmers are likely to repay the debt by predicting their future profits.

Yield estimation before granting a loan also includes checking the historical data on the farm’s productivity, historical weather trends, and the current crop state. Before, the task often required physical field inspection by scouts and digging through piles of paper docs. Nowadays, crop yield estimation using remote sensing is easier. EOSDA products and custom solutions provide multiple data on the required location – all in one place.

What Problems Do Banks Have while Working with Data?

While processing the submitted data about the farms, banks face a number of challenges:

• Lack of required data. Proper farm enterprise analysis must be based both on current and historical information that can be missing or lost.

• Credit default risks and payout failures. Clients may fail to pay back the loan.

• Data credibility. Growers can mislead the banks about their farm’s productivity, which complicates data procession and increases the credit default risks.

• Revenue estimation. Crop yield prediction helps lenders understand if prospective borrowers can meet the credit requirements and return the loan.

• Time management issues. Field inspection for data verification often requires additional time and effort.

• Necessity for advanced technology adoption. Traditional methods for risk assessment are often slower and less effective than modern ones.

What Benefits and Results the Banks Will Get

By leveraging satellite-based farming software and switching to modern technologies, banking and financial institutions will be able to improve their workflow in the following ways:

• shorten the application processing time;

• access reliable data for yield prediction;

• reduce repay failure risks;

• save costs for field scouting;

• embrace more clients;

• increase customer satisfaction rate.

Furthermore, EOSDA is about to launch its proprietary EOS SAT, an agri-focused satellite constellation this year, intending to provide even more data precision and improved services to its clients.

Competitor Tracking

When it comes to finances and banking, geospatial data provides far more benefits than better management of risks. With georeferencing, banks can keep ahead of the game by tracking competitors’ activity on GIS maps. Thus, geospatial software can show the exact geographical position of competitors and the density of their institutions in a specific area. GIS mapping also allows for change detection in the specified location, which means banks can analyze their competitors’ geographical movements and business patterns to predict their future behavior over time. This way, financial institutions will improve their own business models and expand the market in the long run.

Logistics Optimization

Banks require cash transportation to and from ATMs, and bank fleet management can be optimized through a geospatial data-based system. Among other functionalities, it can choose the fastest routes by predicting traffic jams, which saves time and resources. Besides, by speeding up cash pickup and delivery time, banks will avoid cash shortages to ensure customer satisfaction.

Thus, geospatial data can assist to improve business processes and facilitate workflow procedures, contributing to new market expansion and the banks’ reputation. By adopting the latest innovations, banks can keep pace with the ever-changing world and enjoy the benefits of advancement.

Shaype, Australia’s only one-stop-shop embedded finance platform, has secured an additional A$33 million in new equity investment in a Series C capital raise.  

Proceeds from the latest investment round will be used to accelerate growth, with a particular focus on expanding the team to support a full pipeline of Australian clients, as well as international expansion. 

Regal Funds Management led the round, which also included family offices. 

Commenting on the raise, Philip King, Chief Investment Officer at Regal Funds  Management said: “We see huge opportunities for Shaype in leading innovation, as well as disruption, in banking and finance. Shaype is at the forefront of a new breed of fintech that  can enable financial services better and more cost-efficiently than any incumbent thanks to  the platform’s control, flexibility, and speed.” 

While global equity markets and in particular the technology sector have undergone a  material re-pricing in valuations this past 12 months, Shaype has successfully closed the  Series C with a significant uplift in valuation. This reflects the core infrastructure that Shaype has built and owns, the team’s consistent track record of execution and delivery, and the resulting full pipeline of new business. 

Shaype will launch solutions for a range of businesses across Financial Services, HR,  PropTech and Government before the end of this year. 

Additionally, in Q4 2022, Shaype will be one of the first payments service providers to live with both Payment Initiator and Payer services on New Payments Platform Australia’s PayTo.  

With 100 employees globally, and offices in Sydney, London, Belfast, Glasgow and Warsaw,  Shaype’s flexible embedded finance platform offers single API access to a full suite of powerful microservices for payments, KYC, data, insights and real-time transaction monitoring.