Blog

Category: Fintech

F-Prime’s David Jegen on tech disruption in the restaurant industry

Square opened its point-of-sale platform to competitors. There are rumors that IBM will buy Revel.

For anyone following the changes in payments and the restaurant industry, these are interesting strategic moves. Many of us have tried new services, like online food ordering, subscription meals and signing with your finger on a tablet-based point-of-sale system; but the reality is that we are still in the early phases of restaurant industry disruption.

I believe that’s about to change. In a few years we will look back on these announcements as a major shift in the pace of disruption and the time we started to “cross the chasm” into a chapter of rapid deployment, consolidation and breakaway winners.

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Snapsheet Raises $20 Million Series C to License Virtual Claims Processing Technology to Insurance Carriers

Snapsheet, the prominent provider of virtual claims technology and services, today announced the closing of a $20 million series C investment round, led by F-Prime Capital and IA Capital Group, with strategic participation from Liberty Mutual Strategic Ventures, Intact Ventures Inc. and a USAA subsidiary. Snapsheet will use the investment to grow its engineering, marketing and sales head count as it develops its customizable platform for virtual auto claims.

The company now serves over 35 insurance clients, recently adding innovative carriers like Metromile and Turo to its growing list. With the new investment, Snapsheet will begin licensing its virtual claims processing technology, including white-labeled self-service applications and full virtual CRM suite, directly to insurance carriers.

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Vestwell Debuts Industry’s First Full-Fiduciary, White-Labeled Retirement Platform

NEW YORK — Vestwell, the industry’s first and only full-fiduciary, white-labeled retirement platform for the RIA community and beyond, emerged from stealth mode today and announced $4.5 million in funding. The seed round of financing was led by FinTech Collective, with participation from F-Prime Capital, Primary Venture Partners and Commerce Ventures.

“Retirement savings is a $25 trillion market opportunity which we think is still best served by financial advisors. Vestwell’s mission is to provide advisors with a modern platform which reduces fees, increases transparency, and ensures compliance in a quickly shifting regulatory landscape,” said Aaron Schumm, founder and CEO of Vestwell. “We’re thrilled to partner with our deep FinTech-focused investors, who share this vision to build out this essential platform.”

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Recurly CEO Dan Burkhart on how to eliminate subscription friction

Merchants and consumers benefit from relationships that stretch out for a long time, with recurring payments, trust and knowledge of just what the consumer is getting for that commitment. Easier said than done. In the latest Topic TBD, Recurly CEO Dan Burkhart tells Karen Webster what it will take to eliminate “subscription friction.”

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Flywire offers tips to avoid college payment processor scams

If you know a college student — particularly a foreign one — tell them to watch out for “tuition payment processors.” They’ve been targeting non-U.S. students.

There are nearly 1 million foreign students going to U.S. colleges. They’re such a big target for scamsters because they spend more than $14 billion in tuition.

So-called payment processors act as middlemen between students and colleges. But the money earmarked for tuition often doesn’t get to the intended university, according to Flywire, a firm specializing in international payments.

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Flywire on tackling the two Rs of x-border payments

Receivers and reconciliation are two of the biggest frictions in cross-border payments. And it’s especially acute when that receiver is an institution receiving thousands of payments each day. Ryan Frere, VP of global payments at Flywire, joined Karen Webster at PYMNTS to talk about the one thing that can remove the pain.

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Eris Exchange opens London office and announces significant sales and marketing expansion

Eris Exchange announced the opening of a London office and the hiring of Timothy Stack as Managing Director, Head of Europe. Mr. Stack will be based in London and will be responsible for sales, marketing and strategic partnerships in Europe.

Eris’ expansion to Europe follows in the wake of a strategic investment by CBOE in late May, and complements an aggressive expansion of its global sales and marketing team. Geoffrey Sharp joined Eris late last year as the Global Head of Sales, and is overseeing the expansion of the group’s sales and marketing capabilities in London, New York and Chicago.

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Stride Health launches financial health app “Stride Drive” to protect 1099 income

Stride Health, the first benefits platform for independent workers, announced the release of Stride Drive, an app that maximizes independent drivers’ take-home income by easily managing their tax deductible expenses.

With Stride Drive, Stride Health makes a leap into serving the financial health component of workers’ benefits, helping independent workers hit their income goals by maximizing the portion of income that they take home. Stride Drive is an end-to-end solution that enables workers to keep more of what they earn when it comes to taxes and links directly with their benefits.

As one of Stride’s key partners, Uber piloted Stride Drive with more than 20,000 drivers this summer, and is now rolling it out to driver-partners nationally.

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Recurly report offers insights on subscription retail programs

It doesn’t matter if they sell snacks, cosmetics or a collection of nerdy knick-knacks – subscription retail programs have taken the market by storm. There’s not a retailer out there that wouldn’t jump at the chance to automate and optimize the steady revenue that these services provide, but with such eagerness to enter the race, some merchants often forget that while subscription programs may seem easy, they’re far from a set-it-and-forget-it type of doing business.

On the contrary, a new research report from subscription management firm Recurly broke down all the ways retailers are finding their ways in the wide world of subscription retail. To reach its findings, Recurly examined a sample set of 25 million transactions that occurred in 2015. Of these, 24.1 percent comprised B2B sales of subscription plans, while the majority 72.9 percent were B2C (with the remaining 3 percent occupying both categories). The report also found that 90 percent of physical goods transactions are in the B2C category.

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Flywire CEO Mike Massaro on cross-border payments

There’s a global phenomenon afoot that takes the notion of cross-border payments to a new level – the high value-low frequency transactions made by a whole new category of sender – the Global Citizen. These individuals aren’t wealthy by most developed country standards – with annual incomes that hover around $40,000 USD – but are part of the emerging middle class in countries like China, India and South Korea who now have the discretionary income to spend on the things that matter most to them.

Many of those expenditures are in support of family experiences outside of their home country. Things like sending their children to private schools and colleges abroad, or seeking medical treatment for acute illnesses or important but relatively “routine” procedures like hip replacements at institutions with more advanced technologies and medical staff than exist within their own country are regarded as a high priority.

That’s the pain point that Flywire CEO Mike Massaro says his matchmaker is in the business of solving for these Global Citizens. As Massaro explained in this week’s edition of The Matchmaker Is In with Karen Webster and economist and author of “Matchmakers: The New Economics of Multisided Platforms,” David Evans, both senders and receivers need a helping hand when these high dollar, low frequency transactions cross international lines.

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