i2c Announces Processing Partnerships, Product Launches

Digital payment and banking technology provider i2c on Wednesday (Jan. 27) announced partnerships and product launches with Archa, Community Bank of the Chesapeake (CBTC) and Credit Sesame, according to a press release.

The company said in the release that these collaborations are all emblematic of the ways modern issuing-processing platforms have changed the game in terms of ways to use credit cards.

Archa, based in Australia, wanted to address a gap in the country’s corporate card market, the release stated. The company wanted to solve the problem of banks not underwriting corporate cards for small businesses. Now, Archa’s platform gives small businesses instant credit on a functional platform, allowing for integration with existing businesses without a personal guarantee.

CBTC, the release stated, wanted to tackle an issue in the Southern Maryland and Fredericksburg regions through introducing a credit program for businesses and consumers to compete with larger companies, intending to “level the playing field.”

And credit wellness program Credit Sesame, which works with artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to help consumers find ways to be financially free, wanted a partner to take its digital banking business to market, according to the release. The company wanted to boost growth and expansion across services geographies.

i2c said the new partnerships share similarities in the relative ease in how the products were put together to address various opportunities, speed to market and the options for expansion later on.

i2c CEO and Founder Amir Wain said in the release that the three new partners “each embody in their own way the democratization of product innovation in financial service, and particularly in credit — a product class notable for its complexity and dominance by the top five issuers.”

Wain wrote in a PYMNTS post earlier this month that his biggest wish going forward is “a heightened realization for how truly interconnected we all are.”

He wrote that companies should be thinking about agility and how they can work with other businesses to innovate.