Mergers & Acquisitions

OneSpan to Acquire Document Storage Company ProvenDB

OneSpan to Acquire Document Storage Company ProvenDB
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions, OneSpan
  • OneSpan is acquiring blockchain-based document storage company ProvenDB.
  • The purchase will help OneSpan add document storage to its existing product offerings.
  • Terms of the agreement, which is expected to close this quarter, were not disclosed.

Digital agreements security company OneSpan agreed to acquire blockchain-based document storage company ProvenDB. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Australia, ProvenDB was founded in 2018. The company provides a blockchain-based database that enables users to store data, cryptographic signatures, documents, and more. The company also offers a product that adds proof, trust, and integrity to clients’ existing databases.

Under the agreement, ProvenDB will enhance OneSpan’s Transaction Cloud Platform to public and private blockchains. Integrating ProvenDB’s technology into OneSpan’s existing offerings will also add a new product offering that provides customers with secure vaulting capabilities and helps OneSpan secure digital agreements.

“Digital artifacts are simply too easy to fabricate, tamper, or delete in the era of Web3 leading to security breaches and loss of trust in digital information. In this world of evidence tampering and deep fakes, it is critical that we have non-repudiation and copies of the original artifact with an immutable chain of custody throughout the entire customer journey,” said OneSpan President and CEO Matthew Moynahan. “Securing business processes end-to-end leveraging blockchain technology will play an increasingly critical role in preserving the integrity of digital transactions and agreements to fuel this modern digital era. We have an ambitious plan to disrupt the digital agreement market and ProvenDB will accelerate that plan. OneSpan’s mission, the focus of our entire go-to-market strategy, is to restore trust and confidence in today’s most critical customer experiences, such as revenue-generating transactions or customer and vendor onboarding, and ensure that their integrity is never in question.”

The transaction is expected to close the first quarter of this year.

Founded in 1991 and formerly known as VASCO, OneSpan offers a range of digital identity and anti-fraud solutions. The Chicago-based company authenticates four billion users each year and counts 60% of the world’s largest banks as clients. OneSpan went public in 1997 and has a current market capitalization of $540 million. Matt Moynahan is CEO.

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Australian Billionaire Richard White Acquires KYC/KYB Specialist Kyckr

Australian Billionaire Richard White Acquires KYC/KYB Specialist Kyckr
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Kyckr, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • KYC/KYB specialist Kyckr has agreed to be acquired by tech entrepreneur and billionaire Richard White.
  • Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
  • Kyckr is an alum of our developers conference, FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2016, where the company presented “Corporate Identity on the Blockchain.”

Kyckr, a technology company that provides corporations with authoritative real-time data on potential and existing customers and suppliers, has agreed to be acquired by Richard White, an Australian technology entrepreneur. White, who founded Australian technology company WiseTech Global in 1994, will acquire the company via his personal investment vehicle RealWise KYK AV Pty Ltd. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

“The Kyckr team is delighted to have the strategic guidance, support, and vision that successful tech-entrepreneur and founder Richard White provides,” Kyckr CEO Ian Henderson said. “We are embarking upon an exciting evolution of our powerful offering to broaden its scope by building an integrated global software solution to enable businesses to navigate the highly complex and dynamic compliance and counterparty risk challenges that they face in an increasingly interconnected and digital marketplace.”

Kyckr specializes in providing businesses with real-time access to aggregated corporate Know Your Customer/Know Your Business (KYC/KYB) and Ultimate Beneficial Owner (UBO) data from more than 300 company registries and primary sources worldwide. This reach enables Kyckr to conduct real-time due diligence on more than 120 million companies around the globe. White noted that this capacity was especially important in a world with ever-expanding compliance laws and regulations on one hand and innovative financial criminals on the other. He described the contemporary challenge of KYC/KYB compliance as “increasingly high-risk, complex, time-consuming, and costly.”

White’s WiseTech Global bills itself as the “operating system for global logistics.” In a statement, White compared Kyckr’s ability to automate manual processes and aggregate data from real-time sources to the way WiseTech’s CargoWise solution has replaced legacy logistics systems with integrated technology. Both solutions, White indicated, are designed to “drive productivity, reduce compliance risk, and facilitate planning, visualization, and control.”

A Finovate alum since its appearance at our developers conference FinDEVr SiliconValley in 2016, Kyckr has raised more than $18 million in funding to date. The company maintains offices in the U.K., Ireland, and Australia.

Photo by Pixabay

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Fidelity Acquires Equity Management Company Shoobx

Fidelity Acquires Equity Management Company Shoobx
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Fidelity, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Fidelity Investments has acquired equity management company Shoobx, marking Fidelity’s first acquisition since 2015.
  • Terms of today’s deal were not disclosed.
  • The acquisition will help Fidelity expand its offerings for startups and early-stage companies.

Fidelity Investments announced this week it has acquired equity management company Shoobx. Financial terms of the agreement were not disclosed and the deal marks Fidelity’s first acquisition since it purchased eMoney Advisor in 2015 for $250 million.

Ultimately, the move will help Fidelity expand its offerings for startups and early-stage companies. In fact, today’s acquisition contributes to Fidelity’s growing portfolio of tools that support the startup ecosystem. Fidelity Labs, the organization’s innovation arm, has invested in several startups and fintech companies, and has developed its own technology to improve the investment process.

Fidelity will integrate Shoobx’s technology into its Stock Plan Services business, an arm that offers equity compensation plan recordkeeping and administration services. Part of Fidelity’s Workplace Investing division, the Stock Plan Services is a workplace benefits provider that serves almost 700 companies with 2.5 million end users holding $250 billion in plan value.

Shoobx was founded in 2013 and helps private companies streamline compliance related to incorporation, raising capital, and exiting so that they can focus on their business. That’s because Shoobx helps them manage their shareholders, the shares they own, and information such as the share class, the price paid for the shares, and any information on options or warrants.

“Given the success of our commercial relationship with Shoobx and the increasing demand from private companies to support them as they scale and grow, including helping their employees manage their financial well-being, acquiring Shoobx was a natural next step in our relationship,” said Fidelity Workplace Investing Head Kevin Barry. “Together, we will accelerate the development of new and innovative solutions designed to help private companies confidently navigate the complex journey all the way through to an exit or IPO.”

Fidelity and Shoobx first partnered in 2021 to provide an equity management solution to the private market. At the time, Fidelity offered a Shoobx-branded tool that combined Fidelity’s equity compensation and benefits administration with Shoobx’s equity management capabilities, board management tools, and data room solutions.

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Nuvei Acquires Paya for $1.3 Billion

Nuvei Acquires Paya for $1.3 Billion
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Business payments technology company Nuvei will acquire B2B payments company Paya.
  • Nuvei anticipates the purchase will help it add integrated payment capabilities, diversify its business, and grow in the B2B payments space.
  • The deal is expected to close for $1.3 billion.

Payment technology solutions provider Nuvei announced this week it has acquired B2B payments company Paya. The all-cash transaction is expected to close for $9.75 per share for a total value of around $1.3 billion.

Paya’s payment technology helps businesses accept payments and get paid faster and more efficiently. The company’s solutions range from payment acceptance, disbursement, and ACH, to marketing services and developer integrations.

Canada-based Nuvei anticipates the purchase will help it add integrated payment capabilities, diversify its business, and grow in the B2B payments space. Specifically, combining Paya’s integrated payment capabilities into Nuvei’s platform will add value and growth potential. Additionally, Nuvei will be able to leverage Paya’s integrations with 300 independent software vendors and commerce solutions to enter into the software-led market.

“The proposed acquisition of Paya is a powerful next step in the evolution of Nuvei, creating a preeminent payment technology provider with strong positions in global eCommerce, Integrated Payments and business-to-business,” said Nuvei Chief Executive Officer Philip Fayer. “The proposed transaction will combine two people-first, technology-led, high-growth payment platforms. It will accelerate our integrated payment strategy, diversify our business into key high-growth non-cyclical verticals with large addressable end markets, and enhance the execution of our growth plan.”

Founded in 2003, Nuvei offers global card acquiring services, alternative payment methods, crypto payments, fraud and risk management, analytics and more. The company serves businesses across a range of industries in more than 200 global markets, facilitating 150 currencies. Nuvei went public in 2020 and now has a market capitalization of $5.58 billion.

Today’s buy marks Nuvei’s 6th acquisition. The company acquired Smart2Pay and BaseCommerce in 2020, and purchased Mazooma, Simplex, and Paymentez in 2021.

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M&A Monday: Best of Show Winner TipRanks Acquires The Fly; TreviPay Agrees to Buy Apruve

M&A Monday: Best of Show Winner TipRanks Acquires The Fly; TreviPay Agrees to Buy Apruve
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Acquisition, Alumni News, Daily news, David's column, Mergers & Acquisitions, TipRanks, TreviPay

2023 is only a few days old but the merger and acquisition action in the fintech industry has already begun.

2022 featured a number of major fintech acquisitions – from Vista Equity Partners $8 billion purchase of tax compliance specialist Avalara to Technisys’ $1.1 billion acquisition of SoFi to Fiserv’s $650 million deal with Finxact. As the new year begins amid economic uncertainty and a technology industry that is contracting, will 2023 produce more deal-making activity in fintech or less?

With this question in mind, here’s a look at recent year-ending and year-beginning M&A activity from a pair of our Finovate alums: TipRanks and TreviPay.

We learned last week TipRanks had agreed to acquire real-time financial news digital provider, The Fly. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in New Jersey, The Fly is a leading digital publisher that offers a live-streaming subscription service featuring short form stories and content on publicly-traded companies.

“TipRanks is a natural home for The Fly,” company President Ron Etergino said. “Both companies strive to level the playing field for investors and TipRanks’ institutional-grade research tools and data will enhance The Fly’s financial news products.”

With its technology that provides market research tools to retail investors and traders, TipRanks took Finovate audiences by storm in its debut appearance in 2013. The New York-based company won Best of Show at both FinovateSpring in May of that year and again at FinovateFall in September.

More recently, the Tel Aviv, Israel and New York-based company launched a new solution that determined risk factors for publicly traded companies, as well as a tool that analyzes publicly traded companies’ online traffic. In 2021, the company raised $77 million in funding in a round led by Prytek. Last year, TipRanks introduced country-specific websites for Australia, Canada, and the U.K.

TipRanks’ acquisition of The Fly is designed to further the company’s mission of becoming a “one-stop-shop platform for the retail investor,” according to CEO Uri Gruenbaum. “We see a lot of synergy between our companies and are excited that we can expand our offerings to provide breaking news – one of the top requirements of our Enterprise customers and end users,” Gruenbaum said.

Subject to customary closing conditions, the transaction is expected to close in Q1 of this year.

Amid the flurry of year-ending news, one alumni acquisition we missed was TreviPay’s decision to acquire payments platform Apruve early last month. Headquartered in Overland, Kansas, and making its Finovate debut last September at FinovateFall, TreviPay supports B2B commerce with its payments and invoicing network designed to optimize transactions between buyers and sellers. The company’s acquisition of payment platform Apruve is designed to help complement and add to TreviPay’s current order-to-cash technology and merchant invoicing solutions.

“The acquisition of Apruve will accelerate our advancement in the technology manufacturing vertical and expand our geographic reach into key Asian markets,” TreviPay CEO Brandon Spear said.

Terms of the transaction have not been disclosed, but all Apruve employees will be retained post-acquisition. Apruve was TreviPay’s second acquisition of 2022, having purchased B2B invoice payments network company BATON Financial Services in February.

With 90,000 buyers and 80,000 seller locations around the world, TreviPay automates the order-to-cash process via omni-channel checkout options, localized B2B invoicing, managed receivables, and fraud and risk management. The company’s tailored payments and invoicing networks enable merchants and suppliers alike to develop more profitable and enduring trade relationships. TreviPay processes $7 billion in transaction volume across 32 countries and 19 different currencies.

Founded in 1980, TreviPay demoed its Small Business Supplier Network (SBSN) at FinovateFall 2022. The offering gives banks the ability to grow its small business product offerings by enabling them to tap into the small business B2B trade credit market.

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Thoma Bravo Acquires Business Spend Management Firm Coupa Software for $8 Billion

Thoma Bravo Acquires Business Spend Management Firm Coupa Software for $8 Billion
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Thoma Bravo has acquired business spend management software company Coupa for $8 billion.
  • The deal is expected to close in the first half of 2023.
  • The acquisition follows rumors that Vista Equity Partners had planned to acquire Coupa earlier this year.

Private equity firm Thoma Bravo announced this week it is scooping up business spend management software company Coupa for a total of $8 billion. The all-cash transaction will make Coupa a privately held company and is expected to close in the first half of next year.

Coupa was founded in 2006 to offer businesses spend management solutions that help them view and control their indirect spending. Some of the company’s business spend management tools include e-invoicing, travel and expense management, spend analysis, treasury management, and more. Coupa went public in 2016 and has a current market capitalization of $5.98 billion.

“For more than a decade, we’ve been building an incredible Business Spend Management Community and have proudly cemented our position as the market-leading platform in our category. We’re looking forward to partnering with Thoma Bravo and accelerating our vision to digitally transform the Office of the CFO,” said Coupa Chairman and CEO Rob Bernshteyn. “While our ownership may change, our values do not. Every one of us at Coupa will continue to put our customers at the center of everything we do and help them maximize the value of every dollar they spend.”

Today’s report follows last month’s rumors that Texas-based private equity firm Vista Equity Partners planned to purchase Coupa. Vista Equity Partners is not only a well-known investor in the fintech space, it has also made a handful of large acquisitions in the fintech space in the past few years, having acquired tax compliance firm Avalara earlier this year and cloud identity solutions provider Ping Identity in 2016.

Interestingly enough, Thoma Bravo acquired Ping Identity earlier this year for $2.8 billion after Vista Equity Partners exited its investment in the company. Thoma Bravo takes a buy-and-build approach in which it acquires similar companies and consolidates them to create synergies and develop companies with greater scale, scope, and broader service offerings. Among Thoma Bravo’s other investments in the fintech space are Bottomline Technologies, Digital Insight, SailPoint, Ellie Mae, and Kofax.

Regarding the company’s Coupa purchase, Thoma Bravo Managing Partner Holden Spaht said, “Coupa has created and led the large and growing Business Spend Management category. We’ve followed the company’s success for many years and have been impressed by its consistent track record of delivering high levels of value for its global customer base. We look forward to partnering with Rob and the rest of the management team to keep investing in the company’s product strategy while driving growth both organically and through M&A.”

Photo by Matthias Groeneveld

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Small Business Banking Provider Tide Acquires Funding Options

Small Business Banking Provider Tide Acquires Funding Options
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Small business banking platform Tide has agreed to acquire lending marketplace Funding Options.
  • Tide will integrate Funding Options’ loan matching technology into its own business loan comparison site.
  • Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

A rising tide lifts all boats. Or in today’s case, a rising Tide lifts Funding Options. That’s because small business banking provider Tide has agreed to acquire lending marketplace Funding Options. Financial terms of the deal, which was first reported by AltFi News, were not disclosed.

U.K.-based Tide was founded in 2015 to help small businesses save time and money on banking and administrative tasks. The business bank accounts offer accounting tools, expense cards, invoicing, payment collection capabilities, business loan comparisons, and cashflow insights. Tide currently counts more than 450,000 sole traders, freelancers, and limited companies as clients.

By integrating Funding Options’ business lending comparison technology into its own, Tide will be able to offer small businesses a broader set of options when applying for a loan. That said, Tide plans to maintain the Funding Options brand as it exists today. Funding Options CEO Simon Cureton will continue to lead Funding Options and will also be charged with leading Tide’s business loan comparisons.

“With this deal, Tide is aiming to create one of the UK’s biggest digital marketplaces for SME credit, and to make it easier for small business owners to access this vital resource,” Tide CEO Oliver Prill told AltFi. “We know that getting credit is even more important to our members in these challenging times: not just in terms of the rising cost of doing business, but also when high street banks are typically slower to offer smaller businesses loans.”

Funding Options was founded in 2011 and now maintains a network more than 120 lending partners. Since launch, the company has matched small businesses with more than $812 million in working capital in increments ranging from $1200 to $5 million.

Once finalized, the deal will mark Tide’s first acquisition.

Photo by Nuno Obey

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Thomson Reuters to Acquire Tax Startup SurePrep

Thomson Reuters to Acquire Tax Startup SurePrep
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, Mergers & Acquisitions, Thomson Reuters
  • Thomson Reuters agreed to acquire tax automation software company SurePrep for $500 million in an all-cash deal.
  • “The acquisition will support our strategy to empower tax and accounting professionals with the very best technology to simplify workflows, drive insights, and improve efficiency,” said Thomson Reuters President of Tax and Accounting Professionals Elizabeth Beastrom.
  • The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of next year.

Business information services firm Thomson Reuters recently announced it is acquiring tax automation software company SurePrep in a $500 million all-cash deal. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of next year.

Thomson Reuters offers four tax and accounting solutions: Checkpoint, a suite of online research and information; ONESOURCE, tax compliance technology; CS Professional Suite, integrated tax and accounting software; and Onvio, cloud-based software to manage projects, billing, and more. Purchasing California-based SurePrep will enable Thomson Reuters to accelerate its investment in advancing the automation and customer experience of its tax tools.

The two companies first partnered in April of this year to offer solutions for tax and accounting professionals. Once the two companies are combined, Thomson Reuters will bring its client base of tax and accounting professionals a suite of complementary solutions.

“Thomson Reuters sees significant value and opportunities in SurePrep,” said Thomson Reuters President of Tax and Accounting Professionals Elizabeth Beastrom. “The acquisition will support our strategy to empower tax and accounting professionals with the very best technology to simplify workflows, drive insights, and improve efficiency.”

SurePrep was founded in 2002 and has since grown to draw more than 23,000 tax professionals to its client base. The company leverages AI to help accounting firms increase productivity by collecting, processing, and extracting data from client documents. SurePrep then enters that data into firms’ tax compliance software. The company is expected to generate approximately $60 million in revenue this year and grow more than 20% each year for the next few years.

Photo by Nataliya Vaitkevich

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Q3 M&A Highlights: Deal Volume Down, Number Trending Up

Q3 M&A Highlights: Deal Volume Down, Number Trending Up
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Mergers & Acquisitions

2022 is marking the beginning of an economic downturn. Consumers are feeling the pain associated with high inflation, corporations are seeing decreased stock performance, and startups are experiencing lower funding amounts, lower valuations, and lower M&A numbers.

We recently reviewed FT Partners’ Q3 Quarterly Fintech Insights Report to take a look at how M&A activity in the third quarter of 2022 is tracking when compared to years past.

The volume of fintech merger and acquisition activity in the first three quarters of 2022 has so far totaled $116 billion. This is down significantly when compared to the volume the sector saw last year, which totaled $349 billion. In fact, the 2022 year-to-date amount is the lowest M&A volume since 2017, when M&A volumes totaled $90.5 billion.

When it comes to the number of deals, FT Partners found that there have been 998 fintech M&A deals so far this year. This is down when compared to last year’s total of 1,486. However, the deal number is already higher than those in any of the past 10 years. In fact, 2020’s total deal number is only 969.

Below is a list of Q3’s fintech M&A activity:

July

August

September

Photo by Sora Shimazaki

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Bluefin Payment Systems Acquires TECS Payment Systems

Bluefin Payment Systems Acquires TECS Payment Systems
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Alumni profile, Bluefin, Bluefin Payment Systems, Mergers & Acquisitions

Payment and data security company Bluefin Payment Systems announced it will acquire TECS Payment Systems, an omnichannel payment solutions provider.

Once the deal is finalized, Bluefin and TECS will serve a combined 34,000 merchants and close to 300 global partners in 55 countries. And for both Atlanta, Georgia-based Bluefin and Austria-based TECS, the acquisition will expand their geographical footprint.

“We are delighted to welcome TECS’ employees, customers and partners to Bluefin,” said Bluefin CEO John M. Perry. “This combination brings together two companies that focus relentlessly on meeting merchant needs for next-generation payment processing and management as well as the secure exchange of PHI and PII data with PCI-validated encryption and tokenization.”

Bluefin will leverage the purchase to offer its customers omnichannel payments and smartPOS capabilities, which will be integrated into the company’s existing payments and data security suite. TECS clients will benefit from added data security solutions, as well as additional resources for its TECS product and solution suite.

Founded in 2007, Bluefin offers encrypted and tokenized payments for point-of-sale transactions. Additionally, the company’s data security platform, ShieldConex, tokenizes payments, Personally Identifiable Information (PII), and Protected Health Information (PHI) entered online. Last month, the company appointed a new CRO to fuel its growth. And, earlier this fall, Bluefin partnered with commercial hardware manufacturer Sunmi.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

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InComm Acquires Australian Gift Card Innovator The Card Network

InComm Acquires Australian Gift Card Innovator The Card Network
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Daily news, InComm, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Incomm Payments acquired Australian gift card provider The Card Network (TCN). Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
  • The Card Network, founded in 2019, offers a wide range of multi-brand gift cards that aggregate popular consumer brands on a single card.
  • Celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, Incomm Payments made its Finovate debut in 2011 at FinovateFall in New York.

International paytech InComm Payments has acquired Australia-based gift card provider The Card Network (TCN). The acquisition will help InComm create and offer personalized gift card solutions, as well as support the growth of its brand and retail partners. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Available in-store at leading retailers in Australia as well as online, TCN’s multi-brand gift cards aggregate consumer brands onto a single card, giving card recipients greater choice and flexibility. Examples of TCN’s multi-brand gift card products are the company’s The Active Card, which includes athletic and recreational brands such as Nike, Adidas, and New Balance; The Shop
Card, which features retail brands like Calvin Klein, H&M, and peteralexander; and The Baby Card, which aggregates brands like Toyworld, Kidstuff, and BabyBunting.

“TCN is a pioneer of the multi-brand gift card category with a proven record of delivering reliable products to both the gift giver and the recipient,” InComm SVP of Financial Services and Asia-Pacific Adam Brault said. “We could not be more excited to welcome TCN’s expertise and creativity to our global team.”

Founded in 2019 by Nick Sims and Richard Hewitt, TCN also provides Australian companies with gift solutions for loyalty and rewards programs, as well as B2B gifting opportunities. This week, the company announced the availability of new special edition gift cards “for the MATE that always has your back, for the STAR in your workplace, for the CHAMP that’s always up for a yarn, for the CUTIE that makes you smile, or the BESTIE you can’d do life without.” Unveiled for the winter holiday gift giving season, the new cards enable recipients to choose from more than 30 retailers on a single card. The new offering is available courtesy of a partnership with Coles Group Supermarkets, where the special edition cards can be purchased.

Headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, InComm has been a Finovate alum since its first appearance on the Finovate stage in 2011. In the years since, the company has grown into an international payments technology provider with more than 525,000 points of retail and online distribution, and a presence in more than 30 countries. InComm has been active in both Australia and New Zealand since 2010, helping bring international brands to the region’s gift card market. Brooks Smith is CEO.

Photo by Karen Laårk Boshoff

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BNP Paribas to Acquire Currency Management Automation Company Kantox

BNP Paribas to Acquire Currency Management Automation Company Kantox
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Alumni News, Kantox, Mergers & Acquisitions
  • Currency management automation innovator Kantox has agreed to be acquired by BNP Paribas.
  • BNP Paribas will pay $133 million (€120 million) for the London-based company, which made its Finovate debut in 2013 at FinovateEurope.
  • BNP Paribas said the acquisition represents its commitment to building, long-lasting relationships with fintechs.

London-based, currency management automation company Kantox has agreed to be acquired by BNP Paribas for $133 million (€120 million).

The company, which made its Finovate debut in 2011, said that the acquisition will help make its technology available to an even wider range of corporate customers worldwide. The deal is the latest evolution of a relationship between Kantox and BNP Paribas that extends back more than three years.

“We have been serving clients together since 2019 when our technology partnership started,” Kantox CEO and co-founder Philippe Gelis said. “During those three years, we spent a lot of time together in the field, getting the opportunity to understand that together we were stronger and able to bring more value to clients.” Gelis called the union “the best of both worlds, the leading software company in the currency management automation category and the leading bank in Europe.”

Kantox offers a single, API-driven, plug-and-play solution that helps companies optimize their FX workflow. Kantox’s technology gives businesses the ability to automate their currency risk management, build better hedging strategies, and lower costs. With its Currency Management Automation, Kantox enables corporate treasurers to deal effectively with challenges ranging from an over-reliance on manual processes to a fragmented FX workflow due to the absence of end-to-end solutions.

Kantox’s technology will be put to work for the Global Markets business of BNP Paribas’ CIB division, and the business centers of the Commercial, Personal, and Banking Services (CPBS) division. Both small businesses and large corporates will be the target markets for Kantox’s currency automation risk management offering.

Among the premier banks in the European Union, BNP Paribas is active in 65 countries and has almost 190,000 employees. The company’s Chief Operating Officer, Head of BNP Paribas CIB, Yann Gérardin called the acquisition another example of the institution’s readiness to “establish long-term partnerships with fintechs in ever-increasing range of areas.”

Kantox made its Finovate debut in 2013 at FinovateEurope. Within ten years, the company surpassed $15 billion in total corporate foreign exchange transactions. Kantox began this year with news that it was partnering with virtual IBAN and corporate account provider Monneo. This spring, Kantox teamed up with London-based fintech Revving to launch an integrated and embedded finance and working capital solution. Kantox raised more than $43 million in funding prior to the this week’s acquisition according to Crunchbase.

Photo by Min An

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