A group of investors, including Mastercard and Banco Santander, have invested $6 million in PayKey, an Israeli startup focused on enabling consumers to make payments through messaging applications.
American Banker reported that the startup traces its genesis to 2014, with a keyboard (a downloadable one) that lets users connect to banks and initiate payments to their peers across apps as varied as Twitter and Facebook. The integration takes place at the API.
PayKey CEO Daniel Peled said in a statement: “As consumers become increasingly comfortable conducting financial transactions on mobile through social apps, it’s essential for banks to offer services that cater to these changing behavior patterns in an easy-to-use, secure way.” There were a number of other investors in the latest funding round, including Wharton Asset Management’s Gaby Salem and Digital Lenders Ventures.
Santander said it has had a long-term relationship with PayKey, with a joint effort to bring the latter’s technology and trials to the bank’s markets.
