Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Jeremy Almond, CEO of PayStand (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: My question also is, what is the value proposition versus direct deposit?

Jeremy Almond: In the US, you have effectively three ways to get paid if you’re a business. All three of these are systems that were built before the internet. The first way is paper check. As consumers, we don’t use them anymore.

The second is through direct deposit. That system is also built before the internet. It has many days of delay. It doesn’t connect into the financial system. It’s not automatically connected to ERP or other financial systems. It’s prone to fraud and compliance issues.

The third way is credit cards. Credit cards are probably the most problematic. What we do is we take all of the advantages of a modern >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Jeremy Almond, CEO of PayStand (Part 1)

The B2B digital payment space is changing. Listen to Jeremy discuss the developments.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself as well as PayStand.

Jeremy Almond: I’m the Founder and CEO of a company called PayStand. PayStand is a B2B digital payment network. What Venmo does for consumers, we do for commercial transactions. We believe that there is a huge transformation that’s going on in the commercial side of financial services. We’re bringing about change in three clear ways. We call it no paper, no fees, and no monopoly.

Sramana Mitra: When you say B2B payment, could you elaborate on how you’ve gone to market. What segments >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Levi King, CEO of Nav (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Is there any dynamic that you see in people seeking credit versus not seeking credit by industry sectors?

Levi King: The answer probably won’t surprise you. There are certain industries where your credit comes into play way more often than others. My first business was an electric sign company. I would get 50% downpayment from the customer. I had to manufacture and install the job. I was a lender to my customer for 30% to 40% of the job because our margin was only 10% to 15%.

In those industries, you use your credit all the time to get financing. There are some industries where the credit is way more >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Levi King, CEO of Nav (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: These hundreds of thousands of customers that you have through the channels, do you directly touch them or do you deliver your software through those channels?

Levi King: We do directly touch them, but they may or may not know that because it can be white-labelled or a co-brand. If it’s a co-brand, they know that it’s us powering the solution. In a white-label scenario, they probably attribute the value to the partner that’s offering it up.

Sramana Mitra: What is your business model? >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Levi King, CEO of Nav (Part 1)

Levi King offers a unique perspective into small business lending in this TLFT interview.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself as well as Nav.

Levi King: We started the business about six years ago. My business partner is an attorney. We offer free credit and financial education to small businesses in the US. Eventually, we’ll move to other parts of the globe. Small business owners can sign up and see their personal credit, business credit, and their checking data through an educational lens that helps them understand how >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Luvleen Sidhu, President of BankMobile (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What is your business model? Are you acquiring customers on behalf of banks or are you acquiring customers on behalf of yourselves?

Luvleen Sidhu: We are acquiring customers on behalf of ourselves.We have two strategies. The first is a direct to consumer one that is pursued through PR, marketing and word of mouth. The second is a B2B2C strategy, where we collaborate with companies and institutions that have an employee or a customer base that they would like to provide access to financial services to and we become the bank they partner with. We sometimes co-brand. Let me give you an example.

We have partnered with 800 colleges and universities around the country. We are solving a pain point for them. These

>>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Luvleen Sidhu, President of BankMobile (Part 1)

This interview is an interesting window into how financial technology is addressing specific niches within the banking sector.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself and BankMobile.

Luvleen Sidhu: I’m the Co-Founder and President of BankMobile. BankMobile is the largest and fastest-growing digital bank that serves the underserved and low middle income Americans and has a strong overlap with millennials as well.

Sramana Mitra: What kind of lending are we talking about? Is it peer-to-peer? >>>

Thought Leaders in Financial Technology: Yossi Peretz, CEO of Stox (Part 4)

Yossi Peretz: Blockchain is much more secure at the moment, but it has a lot to evolve. Even in the basic tools for developers, the concept itself is very advanced but the tools are just at the beginning. That’s part of the approach of sharing knowledge. Once people continuously share knowledge, this field will definitely keep evolving.

Part of the problem of explaining what Blockchain is that it’s not part of our lives. It’ll be like going back 30 to 40 years and explain what is the internet. If you’re not accustomed to it, it’s very hard to explain but the acceleration today is much faster than the fast. In one or two years, we’ll start seeing applications. It will start being part of day-to-day lives either in finance or >>>