Volt, the leading open payments gateway which enables account-to-account payments for merchants and PSPs in the UK, Europe and Brazil, has recruited Stuart Barclay, an open banking established strategist and expert, as its VP of Strategy. 

Stuart brings unique expertise, spanning both the rapidly growing fintech sector, as well as government advisory and big consultancy. Stuart joins Volt after over three years with Swedish open banking unicorn Trustly, where in his previous role as Head of Growth, Financial Services, he drove value propositions, pricing and strategy.

Previously a Senior Policy Advisor in the UK Cabinet’s Open Innovation Team, Stuart led a series of projects aiming to accelerate the government's digital transformation, laying the groundwork for applications of emerging technologies such as blockchain and artificial intelligence.

Prior to that, Stuart led the delivery of strategic projects as a Strategy Advisor in the Department for Education, after having started his career as an analyst with global powerhouse Accenture, where he worked across a range of leading global companies in communications, broadcasting, aerospace, technology and banking.

At Volt, Stuart’s role will focus on mapping out tangible go-to-market strategies positioning Volt at the forefront of open banking, and on contributing to the rising tide of open banking adoption worldwide.

“I was won over by Volt’s collaborative and empowering culture, by the team’s contagious energy, which translates into impressive and sustained speed to market. I have witnessed Volt expanding into new countries and launching innovative products, and I’m excited to be part of this team. Open banking is growing exponentially, with almost 60 countries developing their own instant payment schemes - Volt is building a unified gateway, adding an orchestration layer which brings order to this fragmented ecosystem. My mission at Volt will be to enable merchants and PSPs worldwide to capture the growth opportunities and the transformational potential that open banking unlocks across the world”, said Stuart Barclay.

Tom Greenwood, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Volt, said: “We are delighted to have Stuart onboard at a key time for the business. We pride ourselves on Volt’s ability to attract and nurture some of the best minds in the industry, as we work to deliver on our vision for real-time payments everywhere.”

Finastra and HSBC announced today that they are working together to distribute HSBC’s FX services via Finastra’s FusionFabric.cloud platform under a Banking as a Service (BaaS) experience. This collaboration will take advantage of the best elements of modern API-driven connectivity with licensed institutions’ secure, regulated infrastructure.

The first phase of the rollout will provide both indicative and executable FX rates to regional mid-tier banks via a plug-in to Finastra’s Fusion Kondor, a solution with low maintenance and ownership cost, backed by the liquidity and robust risk management capabilities of one of the world’s largest FX franchises.

Integrating HSBC FX services with mid-tier banks will allow participating banks to deliver a wide range of currencies to their customers through branch networks and other retail channels, without requiring any additional technology integration. It will also provide clients with highly automated FX pricing capabilities, allowing banks to process higher FX volumes, and differentiate themselves while maintaining their own customer relationships. Corporate clients will benefit from increased transparency of pricing and market conditions, improved ease of execution, and simpler currency risk management.

Available in H2 2022, the initial rollout will focus on financial institutions in the Asia Pacific (APAC) with other regions to follow soon after. It will also be made available to embedders who require direct access to FX liquidity and pricing.

Richard Anthony, HSBC’s Global Head of FX eRisk & Precious Metals said: ”We are delighted to be working with Finastra. As one of the world’s leading FX banks, this is another great example of HSBC leveraging our world-class FX eRisk infrastructure to help our clients achieve their business objectives.” Mark Williamson, Global Head of FX Partnerships and Propositions at HSBC added: “We are constantly seeking out strategic partnerships and channels to embed our FX Services and build market-leading customer propositions.”

Angus Ross, Chief Revenue Officer, Banking as a Service (BaaS) at Finastra said: “The ability to integrate FX directly into corporate treasury platforms, as well as competitive pricing and liquidity into a single package will help reduce friction for regional banks and their customers and demonstrates a use case in which BaaS can really make an impact. HSBC is a leading market maker with deep liquidity in the FX market and shares Finastra’s beliefs around the significant potential of BaaS. We’re excited to be co-developing this solution to connect buyers and sellers of FX through a wholesale marketplace.”

Flywire Corporation (Flywire), a global payments enablement and software company, announced that it has completed the acquisition of Cohort Go, an international education payments provider that brings additional students, agents and essential student services to Flywire. The acquisition will build on Flywire’s existing education business to accelerate the growth of its agent focus and team, deepen its commitment to product and payment innovation, and further invest in Asia-Pacific (APAC), a key geographic focus for Flywire.

Cohort Go’s core focus is on providing international students with the ability to make cross-border tuition payments through international agents. Cohort Go’s agent platform is expected to bolster Flywire’s existing agent solutions to deliver even greater value to educational institutions, agents, and students. Additionally, with partner relationships in almost 40 geographies, Cohort Go’s global footprint and penetration in APAC and Latin America also present new growth and expansion opportunities for Flywire.

“Recruiting agencies play a critical role in the international student journey by assisting students in finding placements in higher educational and other institutions,” said Mike Massaro, CEO of Flywire. “Cohort Go has been prominent in this space, with a network of over 1,000 agent partnerships, including some of the most prestigious student recruitment agencies in the world.”

Massaro continued: “As we continue to invest in our Flywire Advantage – the combination of our next-gen payments platform, proprietary global payment network and industry-specific software – we seek opportunities to embed deeper into the workflows of our clients, agents and payers, with the goal of driving more value for them. Cohort Go’s successful agent platform, global footprint and adjacent services complement our existing capabilities and will help us power the higher education ecosystem into the future.”

Growth in international student recruitment indicates a strong secular trend

Recent research suggests that the international education industry is poised for significant growth. According to new data from the market intelligence firm HolonIQ, 8 million international students will be enrolled with foreign higher education institutions by 2030 – 3 million more than were abroad in 2019 – and that their total spending will amount to more than double what it was before the pandemic.

As the demand for higher education accelerates, education agents are expected to play a critical role in international recruitment. Estimates from the international education consultancy, ICEF, suggest that more than 1 million students are placed through agents around the world, and rising. According to a 2021 report from the American International Recruitment Council and the National Association for College Admission Counseling, nearly half (49%) of U.S. colleges who responded were partnered with education agents, which is up from 36% of U.S. in 2017-2018. Agent growth is also on the rise in other popular higher education destination markets like Canada, whose international student population has grown sixfold over the past two decades.

Cohort Go was founded in 2012 by industry experts Mark Fletcher and Paul Jones, who combined their respective expertise in banking and commercial software to enable students to pay for their international education using their local currency, saving on fees and transfer rates. Grounded in their aligned vision to deliver value to the broader education ecosystems, the founders continually sought ways to work with education agents, institutions and students alike, and evolved their single solution into an online platform that offers a tailored experience, with capabilities to reduce costs, increase choice and improve productivity.

Today, Cohort Go partners with more than 1,000 agents globally. Students from more than 180 countries have leveraged Cohort Go, which services more than 60 currencies with local specialists all over the world. The integration of Cohort Go into Flywire’s existing agent platform will enable Flywire to provide even more value to agents, payers, and educational institutions.

Combination of software and payments powers future vertical ecosystems

Cohort Go’s strong regional focus in APAC, global agent relationships, and its existing payment infrastructure will help Flywire bolster its global payment network. Cohort Go’s relationships with payment partners all over the world will add to Flywire’s network of partners, further supporting Flywire’s clients and payers across all vertical industries.

Additionally, the acquisition of Cohort Go also enhances Flywire’s ability to accelerate Flywire’s roadmap to enable a broader suite of financial services targeted to international students and other payers. Already, Cohort Go is improving the way students pay for and save on health insurance, which augments Flywire’s focus on adding more value through its payer services.

“Working with our clients on delivering high-stakes, high-value tuition payments, we’ve continued to discover pain points in the education ecosystem that we believe we’re uniquely positioned to solve,” Massaro continued. “Cohort Go gives us an opportunity to accelerate the investment we have been making to further extend our value proposition to international students. With our Flywire Advantage, we can apply our existing framework of using software to drive value in payments to solve very specific use cases.”

Complements strong organic growth

The acquisition of Cohort Go is a continuation of Flywire’s long-term plan to supplement its strong organic growth and continually expand across all business lines. The acquisition is expected to be modestly accretive to revenue and Adjusted EBITDA. More details will be shared on the upcoming earnings call scheduled for August 9, 2022.

TS Imagine, a global leader in trading, portfolio, and risk management solutions for capital markets, announces the appointment of three new board members to support the firm’s rapid growth. 

The new board members bring significant expertise in core business areas, including digital assets, securities finance, derivatives, and market structure, as the business builds market share in these sectors. The new non-executive board appointments are: 

• Thomas Chippas: Tom brings nearly 30 years of experience working for some of the world's most sophisticated banks and financial technology businesses. Tom was CEO of ErisX and now serves on the board of Eris Clearing, LLC, the cryptocurrency platform recently acquired by Cboe Global Markets. He previously held senior positions at Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, Barclays, and Citi. Tom brings significant crypto expertise to the firm and is based in New York.                  
• Sabrina Wilson: Sabrina is the Chief Operating Officer of the institutional digital asset infrastructure firm Copper.co. She is renowned electronic trading, derivatives, and market structure expert, having held senior positions at JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, and Citi. Based in London, Sabrina brings deep clearing, prime brokerage and digital assets expertise.              
• John Stracquadanio: John is co-founder of a private investment firm, Appia Ventures. He brings over 30 years of banking experience and was previously CEO of Scotia Capital in the US. John brings considerable capital markets experience to the board and is based in New Jersey.  

Rob Flatley, CEO of TS Imagine, said: “Our board appointments bring a wealth of knowledge and experience that will help us to capitalise on our already rapid growth as we look to build our offering and presence in core markets. Our expansion has been driven by robust growth in North America and global demand from sophisticated financial services firms for digital fixed income and multi-asset SaaS capabilities, as well as support in automating, scaling, and executing complex investment models. It is an exciting time for our business, and with leading industry figures on board, we hope to continue our exceptional growth by developing our offering and increasing market share.”

The senior appointments follow TS Imagine’s announcement of strong growth a year after the merger of TradingScreen and Imagine Software, including 100 new hires during the first half of this year.

ClearBank, the enabler of secure accounts, real-time clearing and embedded banking for financial institutions, today announced that it has been selected by Kroo to provide access to all UK payment schemes as well as accounts for its operational funds. Kroo recently secured a full UK banking licence, and ClearBank will continue to support Kroo on its mission to build the world’s greatest fully licenced social bank.

Founded in 2016, Kroo began as an Electronic Money distributor providing a digital-only prepaid card, before being awarded a banking licence in June 2022. At its core, Kroo is a mobile-only social bank focused on app-based transactions, splitting payments and wider sustainable finance initiatives – it has a mission to plant one million trees and plans to contribute five per cent of sustainable profits to social causes its customers to care about. Kroo, which won Best Newcomer at the 2021 British Bank Awards, plans to launch personal current accounts in the coming months.

ClearBank has worked with Kroo for the duration of its journey towards becoming a fully regulated bank, providing the technical and regulatory support to accelerate the process whilst demonstrating the highest levels of operational resilience. Specifically, ClearBank provided operational accounts, access to UK payment schemes and the technical integrations that allowed Kroo to build its banking stack before gaining full regulatory approval. This approach eases one of the burdens of banking licence applications by confirming to regulators that Kroo has a resilient and reliable banking partner for both payments and the safeguarding of client funds.

Andrea De Gottardo, CEO at Kroo said: “At Kroo we are on a mission to build an exceptional digital bank and in order to do that, we are relentlessly looking for like-minded partners with great technology. ClearBank was an obvious choice for us, they have been a great partner on our journey so far and we are excited to continue working closely with them as we approach our public launch.”

Charles McManus, CEO at ClearBank said: “It’s been fantastic to support Kroo on its journey to offering full bank accounts. We’ve had the pleasure of working with the team since 2019, and we’re delighted to continue supporting Kroo as it makes this leap into a new, exciting offering.”

“We understand the importance of regulation and a full banking licence when it comes to garnering trust from consumers and scaling, and we’re proud to be helping innovative, regulated and compliant Electronic Money distributors such as Kroo, evolve into fully fledged banks.”

Mollie, one of the fastest growing payment service providers in Europe, today announced the launch of its new Technology Partner Program. The program aims to help SaaS platforms and technology companies grow their customer base, reach new markets, and improve customer retention. 

Supporting partners at each stage, Mollie’s Technology Partner program is designed to provide the best possible experience to platforms by providing them with tools to grow their business. The Technology Partner Program is tiered, with benefits increasing at each tier. Benefits include:

• Comprehensive support: Access to the best-in-class partner and customer support with a dedicated partner manager.
• Accelerated growth: Go-to-market and co-marketing support and a listing on Mollie’s integrations directory and sales activities. 
• Extensive resources: Access to Mollie’s dedicated partner portal which includes how-to guides, sales and marketing materials and updates on the latest product releases.
• Exclusive perks: The ability to unlock additional revenue opportunities, access to marketing development funds and invitations to VIP events.

By joining the Technology Partner Program, platforms will be integrated within Mollie’s wider partner community. The community includes ERP and accounting integrations, such as Exact and Xentral, subscription and billing services, such as Chargebee and Recharge, and CRM and marketing services, such as ActiveCampaign and LiveChat. In addition to this, Mollie is also integrated into a variety of ‘vertical’ software solutions, which cover booking and reservations, health and sports, ticketing, hospitality and retail.

"We are honoured to be one of Mollie's Platinum Partners,” said Daniel Close, VP Partner Ecosystem at Chargebee. “Through a strong collaboration between Mollie and Chargebee, we have helped dozens of merchants throughout the UK and Europe benefit from the speed and flexibility that our solutions provide. We look forward to enabling the growth of many more subscription businesses together, and we are proud to be in good company as part of Mollie's Technology Partner Program."

The Technology Partner Program is part of Mollie’s wider partner program offering. It recently launched its Agency Partner Program, specifically designed for web and digital agencies. With already 3,000+ agencies onboard, users can gain access to personalised customer support, marketing tools and all the resources needed in order to grow and scale their businesses across Europe.

“Partnerships have always been an important driver of Mollie’s success and our mission to become the world’s most loved payment service provider,” says Shane Happach, CEO at Mollie. “Designed with the input and feedback from our partners, our new program represents our commitment and belief in close collaboration to accelerate growth. We look forward to continuing to build successful partnerships and providing a world-class joint ecosystem to provide the best possible experience for our customers.”

Mollie has a long and successful history of working and growing together with its partners. Earlier this year, Mollie launched Connect for Platforms, designed for SaaS and marketplace platforms. It is the fastest and easiest way for these companies to embed payments and onboard customers. 

Plenitude, the Financial Crime, Risk and Compliance (FCC) specialists today announced a strategic investment from Growth Capital Partners (GCP), the private equity firm focused on investing in outstanding growth companies in the technology and services sectors. The investment will support the further build-out of new capabilities and offerings and will accelerate Plenitude’s expansion plans. 

Plenitude is Financial Crime Risk and Compliance specialist, recently appointed to the Financial Conduct Authority’s Skilled Persons panel for Financial Crime. The firm works with a broad range of financial institutions, professional services and digital asset firms globally, providing deep subject matter expertise, and advisory and transformation services on some of the largest and most complex financial crime initiatives in the industry. 

Alan Paterson, Managing Director, Plenitude comments: “We are delighted to have secured GCP as our investment partner at an important stage of our growth journey and leverage their investment expertise and network to execute on our business strategy. GCP’s long-standing track record of building genuine investment partnerships with entrepreneurial companies along with their understanding of our business and shared vision made them the clear partner of choice.” 

Asad Choudhary, Partner, Plenitude says: “The investment from GCP is a great catalyst for Plenitude and our ambition to be the leading consultancy in FCC advisory, transformation and innovative RegTech subscription products. Given our expansion plans, now is the right time to bring in an investment partner. There is a strong cultural fit between our two teams and we are excited  and looking forward to working with GCP to further the Plenitude market position and brand.”

Founded in 2012, Plenitude has assembled a team of Financial Crime Compliance specialists, with the deep subject matter and transformation experts who are currently supporting engagements across the UK, EU, the Nordics and Asia. Plenitude’s growing suite of technology products includes three leading RegTech subscription products (RegSight, Compass and ClientSight) currently being used by a broad range of organisations in the UK, Canada, Australia, United States, Germany, Italy, Spain, Qatar, Mexico, Ecuador and Lesotho.

GCP’s investment will support the further build-out of new capabilities and offerings, including Digital Assets and KYC Managed Services to support clients’ evolving needs and regulatory developments. It will also accelerate Plenitude’s expansion plans that include establishing a presence in Asia and expanding the current client footprint into new sectors through advisory, transformation services and RegTech subscription products.

Richard Shaw, Partner, GCP says: “We are delighted to have completed our investment in Plenitude Consulting and to be partnering with Alan and Asad and their talented team of Financial Crime Compliance experts. Plenitude’s success over the last 10 years is fantastic, including the relentless focus on exceptional client delivery, trusted advice and innovation across an increasing range of consulting specialisms, international clients and RegTech subscription products. We are excited to now be able to provide this significant investment and strategic support to help to deliver the ambitious growth plans ahead.’’  

CleverTap, the modern, integrated retention cloud, today announced it has partnered with Unocoin, India's first crypto exchange, to optimize, accelerate their user engagement, and provide a seamless omnichannel customer experience.

Through this collaboration, and by integrating CleverTap's solution into its app, Unocoin is now equipped to better understand user behaviour and has the ability to create segments based on user activity, demographics, and other parameters. Unocoin will also be able to create hyper-personalized campaigns to engage with its audience across multiple channels at the right time with precise communication.

"As a platform that helps individuals with investments into cryptocurrencies, we need to be cognizant of the exact needs of our users. Understanding a customer's behavior on our app becomes vital as this helps us provide a tailored experience. Since awareness and understanding of cryptocurrencies at large is at a nascent stage, delivering precise communication becomes all the more important," said Suhas SK, Senior Vice President - Marketing, Unocoin Technologies Private Limited.

CleverTap enables Unocoin to keep track of app activity, in-app purchases, and returning users. Unocoin will also be able to personalize customer experience using real-time behavioural data with precise predictive recommendations, leading to engagement opportunities based on each user's exact needs.

"We are delighted to partner with Unocoin in their journey to make investing in cryptocurrency easy for all. With CleverTap Retention Cloud, Unocoin will be able to hyper-personalize the experience for every investor.

Today, hyper-personalization is crucial at every point in a customer's journey and is a key enabler to growth. We are confident that with our help, Unocoin will be able to grow and offer its customers exactly what they need," said Vikrant Chowdhary, Chief Growth Officer, CleverTap.

Today, the new investment platform Lightyear announces a $25M Series A equity round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners. The company’s seed investors, Mosaic Ventures, Taavet+Sten and Metaplanet also took part in the round alongside a number of new and existing angel investors. 

Joining Lightspeed in this new investment round is the Virgin Group – an organisation that champions driving positive change through new technologies and joins Series A as an investor.  The fresh funding comes at the same time as Lightyear’s expansion into 19 European markets, just nine months after it launched in the UK. 

Lightyear combines multi-currency accounts with unlimited access to global markets so customers can invest freely without hidden fees. The European launch today enables customers from 19 different countries to now access thousands of US and European stocks in addition to Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs). Countries part of this first European rollout include Ireland, the Baltics and most of Western Europe such as Spain, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Netherlands and France. 

Lightyear was founded by ex-Wise duo Martin Sokk and Mihkel Aamer to bring a global mindset to the European investment world. Traditionally, if investors in Europe want access to international markets they are hit with transaction and custody fees, but most notably, hidden foreign exchange fees. With their multi-currency accounts, where you can add, hold and invest in different currencies, Lightyear seamlessly bridges the gaps between international markets for customers. 

Since launching to the UK market last year, Lightyear has tripled its stock universe, launched an industry-first social investment feature - Lightyear Profiles - and added a suite of new products and features to bolster its data and education offering, all accessible in the app for free. From professional analyst ratings and price targets to live news feeds without paywalls, Lightyear customers have access to a wealth of information before making an investment decision. 

The new $25 million in funding supports the company’s plans to expand across Europe. Starting with 19 countries in the Eurozone, Lightyear has become the first neobroker to unlock most of Europe in one move, coming just a few months after the initial UK launch last year. With no trading fees, no account fees and no custody fees, Lightyear is entering most European countries as the most competitively priced investment platform on the market with an advanced product suite and slick app experience. As one of the fastest moving brokerages in Europe, Lightyear also has its sights set on non-Euro countries next including places like Sweden, Norway, Romania, Poland and Hungary.

Nicole Quinn, Partner at Lightspeed says: “Having lived and worked on both sides of the pond, I’ve seen first-hand the pain points for Europeans trying to access the financial markets as easily as their counterparts in the US. Lightyear is trying to fix this with a platform that customers not only love and trust, but one that understands the nuances between different regulations, languages, exchanges and cultural investing norms. There is no single neobroker offering products across the continent right now, and the potential is enormous. Martin and Mihkel have assembled an all-star team to achieve this goal, and we couldn’t be more excited to support them all on this journey.”

Martin Sokk, Co-founder and CEO at Lightyear, adds: “Nine months ago, we launched our app in the UK to initial waitlist. Fast forward to now, and we’ve secured a European licence that enables us to launch across the continent and raised one of the largest Series A rounds in 2022. But, our goal remains the same: to give all of Europe access to the world’s markets without hidden fees and to make investing easy for everyone. We’re so excited to welcome Nicole and Lightspeed, alongside the Virgin Group, onto our strong bench of investors that share this vision with us and have such deep experience in growing successful businesses from the very start of their journey.” 

From today, Lightyear will be onboarding customers from the following 19 European countries: Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia and Spain.