Wharton FinTech Podcast

In today’s episode, Rhea Advani hosts John MacIlwaine, Co-Founder & CEO at Highnote. They delve into the evolving payments processing space, emphasizing the rise of innovative embedded finance platforms like Highnote. The conversation also unveils insights into Highnote's latest Credit Issuing product. In this episode, you will hear about: The complexities of payments processing and regulatory challenges faced by fintech companies. Highnote's innovative approach as an embedded platform, emphasizing differentiation and flexibility. Insights into Highnote's latest product, the Credit Issuing platform, and its implications for the market. The future of issuer processing, where legacy platforms coexist with cutting-edge solutions like Highnote. Highnote's strategies for navigating the competitive fintech industry and their vision for the evolving market landscape. About John MacIlwaine John MacIlwaine is the the CEO and co-founder of Highnote, an embedded finance company setting the new standard for modern card platform management through differentiated payment experiences. John has over two decades of experience leading in technical and management roles at global financial companies. Prior to founding Highnote, he served as General Manager of Braintree, a leading global payments platform that powers some of the world's most innovative and fast-growing companies, including Uber, Airbnb, and Dropbox. During his tenure at Braintree, John was instrumental in driving the company's global growth and expansion. Before joining Braintree, MacIlwaine served as the Chief Technology Officer of Lending Club, a pioneering online lending platform that connects borrowers with investors. In his role, John laid the groundwork to establish the company’s technical foundation while driving innovation across the organization. Throughout his career, John has been committed to helping businesses move faster and innovate more through differentiated payment experiences. He believes that payments are a critical touchpoint in the customer journey and that businesses must deliver seamless, personalized experiences to stand out in today's competitive landscape. About Highnote Highnote is an embedded finance company setting the new standard in modern card platform management. Purpose-built to realize customer loyalty and engagement through embedded card experiences, Highnote’s fully integrated tech stack provides every service needed for innovative companies to launch new ways to use card payments. Utilizing the developer-friendly Highnote platform, product and engineering teams at digital enterprises of all sizes can easily and efficiently embed virtual and physical payment cards (commercial and consumer prepaid, debit, credit, and charge), ledger, and wallet capabilities into their existing products, creating compelling value for users while growing revenue and building a unique and differentiated brand. The company has raised more than $100 million from leading investors and strategic partners and is headquartered in San Francisco, California. For additional information, please visit www.highnote.com. For more FinTech insights, follow us on WFT Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech WFT Instagram: instagram.com/whartonfintech Rhea’s Twitter: @rheaadvani Rhea’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rheaa/

Nate Gee hosts Jeremy Tsui, co-founder and CEO of Finley, which simplifies and streamlines companies’ debt capital raise and management. In this episode, they discuss: -Finley’s inspiration from innovations in consumer credit and equity capital management -Trends in private credit and Jeremy's original idea for Finley -Jeremy’s views on AI in fintech and beyond -The ways Finley helps companies manage their debt -Jeremy’s experience with Y Combinator and recent venture capital fundraising -And much more! About Finley Finley creates software that provides companies with a range of tools to better manage their debt capital, from automating operations and digitizing credit agreements to providing analytics and performance tracking. About Jeremy Tsui Prior to co-founding Finley in 2020, Jeremy worked in Goldman Sach’s Special Situations Group where he invested across a range of industries. Beforehand, he worked as a strategy consultant for financial institutions at Oliver Wyman. Jeremy grew up in Texas and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin. For more fintech insights, follow us on WFT Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech WFT Instagram: instagram.com/whartonfintech Nate’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nathan-c-gee/

Kailee Costello sits down with Stacy Greiner, Chief Operating Officer at DailyPay. DailyPay offers an on-demand pay solution that helps employers to improve the financial well-being of their workforce. DailyPay has over 1000 enterprise clients, and over 4 million of these company’s employees use the DailyPay platform. In this episode you will hear about: - DailyPay's mission to provide employees with on-demand access to their earnings - Why DailyPay's target market spans across industries, and why DailyPay didn’t start by focusing on a specific industry - DailyPay's revenue model - Stacy's perspective on competitive position, and the importance of truly "earned wage" access - The future for earned wage access - The risk for employers that fall behind in the Earned Wage Access movement - The impact of wage compression in healthcare - DailyPay's strategic priorities over the coming years - Stacy's journey from her marketing roles at Dun & Bradstreet and Cisco to COO at DailyPay, and what Stacy’s role looks like day-to-day About DailyPay DailyPay is on a mission to build a new financial system for everyone. DailyPay delivers an on-demand pay solution with modern, insight-driven pay strategies that help America's leading employers to activate their workforce and build stronger relationships with their employees, so they feel more engaged, work harder, and stay longer. DailyPay works to ensure that money is always in the right place at the right time for employers, merchants, and financial institutions. DailyPay is headquartered in New York City, with operations based in Minneapolis and Belfast. About Stacy Greiner Stacy Greiner serves as Chief Operating Officer, DailyPay. She most recently served as the General Manager of the Sales and Marketing Solutions division of Dun & Bradstreet, where she was responsible for all Profit & Loss. Her experience spans Senior Executive roles at Cisco, IBM, and Accenture where she led globally-diverse Product, Marketing, Engineering, and Data & Analytics organizations. Trained as an Aerospace Engineer at Iowa State University, Greiner also holds an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management. She sits on the board and serves as a member of the Audit Committee of Proto Labs, Inc. For more FinTech insights, follow us on WFT Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech WFT Instagram: instagram.com/whartonfintech Kailee’s Twitter: @KaileeCostello_ Kailee’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kaileecostello/

Rob Straathof, CEO of Liberis - Embedded Finance and Small Business Lending Trevor Prince sits down with Rob Straathof, CEO of Liberis, an embedded finance platform that partners with companies like Klarna, Barclaycard, and Worldpay to empower small businesses with funding solutions. Through analysis of data on its partners' platforms, Liberis provides small businesses with pre-approved funding offers and streamlined access to capital. To date, Liberis has funded over 50,000 businesses with more than £1 billion in funding. In this episode, Rob discusses his path from an aspiring astronaut to leading a global FinTech company, Liberis' platform relative to traditional lenders, as well as business funding options and their impact on small businesses. He also discusses his experience and perspective on working with regulators in financial services, GenAI’s applications in business, and much more. About Rob Straathof: Rob has served as the CEO of Liberis for over 8 years. Prior to Liberis, he led Corporate Development at Wonga.com and worked in Tech and FinTech M&A at JP Morgan. Rob's career journey began early on in his family's delicatessen and catering business in the Netherlands. Rob is passionate about creating value and impact for small businesses and their communities. He earned a Master of Science in Economics from Erasmus University Rotterdam, and enjoys flying as an instrument-rated private pilot.

Joshua Benadiva sits down with Arad Levertov, founder and CEO of Sunbit, a pay-over-time, point-of-sale financing solution for everyday expenses such as auto-repair, dental care, vet care, and more. Sunbit offers a no-fee credit card, as well as a point-of-sale lending option available at over 20,000 service locations. In-line with Arad's founding vision, Sunbit approves over 90% of borrowers, and the company was most recently valued at $1.1 billion. In this episode, Arad shares how and why he started Sunbit, his vision for the future of the company and the buy-now-pay-later model more generally. He also shares some of his secrets to building a mission-driven company, as well as how Sunbit integrates powerful machine-learning models to maximize value for customers. About Arad Levertov: Arad Levertov co-founded Sunbit, where he currently serves as Chief Executive Officer. A FinTech veteran, Arad’s strong leadership skills come from his background as a Major in the Israeli Navy Seals. Arad holds an MBA degree from Duke University Fuqua School of Business. Previous to Sunbit, Arad was COO of Enova International, where he successfully managed an $800M business and led teams across product, marketing, strategy, HR, and operations. Prior to Enova, he ran Operations and Systems Development at Intel.

Russell Matambo hosts Anthony Noto, CEO of SoFi, a member-centric one-stop shop for digital financial services in the US. In this episode you will hear about: - SoFi’s trajectory since Anthony took over as CEO 5 years ago - the background to the SoFi stadium naming rights deal - what it will take for SoFi to meet its goal of becoming a top 10 financial institution in the US - how Anthony’s upbringing and varied professional experiences have influenced his leadership style - and much more! About Anthony: Anthony Noto is the CEO of SoFi and serves on its board of directors. Since joining SoFi in February 2018, Anthony has led the company to double down on its mission to help people reach financial independence and realize their ambitions, by developing and executing a strategy to make SoFi a relationship financial services company that provides solutions for all of the major financial decisions in a member’s life and all of the days in between. The company transitioned to a fully mobile-first full suite of products, launching several non-lending products including SoFi Invest, SoFi Checking and Savings, SoFi Credit Card, SoFi Relay, as well as relaunching Home Loans and introducing college loans. The company has increased its member base from 430,000 members in January 2018 to over 5 million members getting their money right and 8+ million products as of April 2023. Additionally, SoFi has built a financial technology platform business (often called the AWS of Fintech) where it serves over 130 million end-accounts via the Galileo payment processing platform and Technisys Core banking products. Under his leadership, SoFi became a public company in June of 2021 at 3x the value from just three years prior. Before joining SoFi, Anthony served as Chief Operating Officer of Twitter since November 2016, and as its Chief Financial Officer when joining the company in July 2014. Prior to Twitter, Anthony worked at Goldman Sachs from 1999-2007 as a Partner in Equity Research and 2010-2014 as Partner and Co-Head of Global TMT Investment Banking. Before returning to Goldman, Anthony was Chief Financial Officer of the National Football League from 2008-2010. A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, Anthony also holds an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. ----- As always, for more Fintech insights and opportunities to collaborate, please find us below: WFT LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/ WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech WFT Blog: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Home: www.whartonfintech.org Russell's LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/russell-matambo-cfa-a5900039/

Joshua Benadiva hosts Bill Capuzzi, the CEO of Apex Fintech Solutions, a leading provider of custody and clearing services for the financial industry. Apex's powerful brokerage solutions and APIs serve over 300 customers including Betterment, SoFi, and Public.com. Bill is also a partner at PEAK6 Investments, the parent company of Apex Fintech Solutions, and a board member of DTCC, a leading provider of market infrastructure for the global financial services industry. In this episode, Joshua and Bill dive deep into the history and evolution of broker-dealers and trading, from the days of paper tickets and phone calls to the era of digital platforms and APIs. They reveal how Bill leveraged his experience and vision to shape Apex Fintech Solutions, a company that simplifies and streamlines the plumbing of the financial industry. He also shares his insights on the importance of failing fast, taking risks, and making big leaps in your career. Bill gives us a glimpse into his innovation mindset and his passion for wealth-tech, as well as the opportunities and trends he sees in this space. Finally, they look ahead to the future of fintech and what Bill anticipates to see in the next decade.

Zoey Tang hosts Urvashi Barooah, a fellow Wharton alum and Principal at Redpoint Ventures. At Redpoint, Urvashi specializes in early-stage fintech investments, and her portfolio includes ventures such as Dune Analytics, Offchain Labs, XMTP, Flexe, among others. In our conversation, we delved into various aspects of Urvashi's journey. We discussed pivotal moments in her life, including her transition from consulting to venture capital while at Wharton. Urvashi also shared valuable advice for those aspiring to enter the world of venture investment and entrepreneurship. We gained insights into her investment philosophy and her current areas of passion. Wrapping up our discussion, we turned our gaze toward the future, where Urvashi shared her thoughts on her favorite investors and the kind of investor she hopes to become.

“We build the monetisation engine for Google. We build the entire stack that moves money and we do it at Google scale. The reason we have to build it internally is (because) at our scale and with all our different business models and products that we support at Google there is not really one product out there that does it all. You have to piece together multiple different things and some of that is very unique to the way Google runs and its scale and reach… billions of users, hundreds of countries and territories. So that’s why we do what we do.” Sonal Goyal and Kareem Itani host Kan Liu, VP of Product for Payments Platform at Google, which provides fast, easy and trusted payment solutions to Google’s businesses and their end users. Kan has been at Google for almost two decades where he previously led Google Desktop and Chrome OS. In this episode, they discuss Kan’s career journey, everlasting product principles, balancing innovation with regulatory compliance, Google’s big bets in digital payments, advice for fintech and product enthusiasts, and much more!

Zoey Tang hosts Kevin Zhang, partner at Bain Capital Venture. At BCV, Kevin partners with inception-stage entrepreneurs at the intersection of business software and financial services, with particular emphasis on finserv enablement, productivity & automation, and data infrastructure. During our conversation, we delved into Kevin's professional trajectory, his initial attraction to fintech, and the transition from operations to investment. We then discussed his specific criteria when it comes to evaluating founders in the early stage, as well as the decision-making process he and his colleagues employ at Bain Capital Ventures. Lastly, our conversation concluded with Kevin's interests outside of work, including his revelation of a political figure with whom he would be eager to share a dinner table. About Kevin Zhang Kevin Zhang is a partner at Bain Capital Ventures, leading early-stage investments in financial technology and developer products. Previously, he has invested in companies including Argyle, Column Tax, Alloy Automation, Hightouch, and others. Prior to Bain Capital Ventures, Kevin was the first business hire and Head of Product at Fundera, a lending marketplace acquired by NerdWallet (NASDAQ: NRDS). Kevin built the initial content and acquisition marketing efforts, before leading roadmap, user research, and analytics as Head of Product. During Kevin’s tenure, Fundera grew from 5 to 65 employees, raised $20M+ of venture capital, and was ranked #69 fastest growing company on the Inc. 5000 in 2018. About Bain Capital Ventures Bain Capital Ventures is the venture capital arm that operates within the larger Bain Capital ecosystem. With a focus on investing in early to growth-stage startups, BCV has built a strong reputation for backing innovative and disruptive companies across various sectors.