Nets, one of Europe’s leading processors, and OpenWay, a top-ranked digital payments software provider, have won the “Best Consumer Payments Initiative” award from Paytech for their Universal Digital Lending Platform (UDLP).

The Universal Digital Lending Platform by Nets and OpenWay is an end-to-end solution for all kinds of financial institutions – from banks and retailers to e-money institutions and startups – looking to provide consumers with intuitive and environmentally-aware access to diverse financing options.

Digital lending platforms are one of the fastest-growing aspects of the financial services business, with the Boston Consulting Group predicting that the segment will grow by around 20% per year to 2025, reaching more than US$1 trillion in global value that year. At the same time, the profitability of credit card products is declining year-on-year, meaning that many financial institutions and their partners are looking for a means to pivot quickly – and at low cost – from credit cards to digital lending.

“Our main goal is to make consumer financing as easy and intuitive as possible for consumers. We’ve designed the solution for financial institutions with this in mind, focusing on easy availability of the products. Financial institutions can connect to UDLP easily and start offering lending products within 2-3 months. They can easily onboard both brick-and-mortar and e-commerce partner merchants to the solution, as well as offer direct lending products to consumers, like the possibility of retrospectively converting a transaction as an instalment,” says Tuomas Nenonen, Head of Consumer Management Services at Nets.

Offered to the market by Nets, the UDLP solution is driven by Way4, a leading digital payments software platform developed by OpenWay. Way4’s technology allows financial institutions to create various consumer finance products at any point of the customer journey – before, during or after purchase. The whole process of loan management is automated and performed in real time. The system supports any kind of interest calculation schemes (including Sharia-compliant schemes), as well as reversal management for return purchases. The solution is used by some of the leading banks in Northern Europe.

“We are happy that our joint project with Nets was recognized as the ‘Best Consumer Payments Initiative’ by Paytech Awards. We believe that the deciding factor was how the solution addresses the current growth in demand for digital-only and remote access financial products. Among Nets clients are market leaders and neobanks with high expectations, who need to be convinced that this platform is the best consumer finance solution for them. Way4 allows them to sell credit products and attract new clients not only at bank branches, but also remotely through partnering merchants and digital channels. Its flexible architecture allows the processor to adapt to the unique business model of each client bank and the needs of the bank’s partners,” says Maria Vinogradova, Director of Strategy and Market Intelligence at OpenWay.

Any company can connect to the UDLP, regardless of their existing card issuing and payment processing relationships. Financial institutions can benefit from other payment services offered by Nets, for example they can issue credit cards for customers on top of the issued loan and connect third-party services via APIs to offer enriched customer experiences, including digital wallets, mobile payment and multi-currency services.