Startup Roundup: Greeting 2018 With Open Arms

Life gets crazy around the holidays, and it was no different for these startups. Fraud prevention and risk assessment company Emailage backed up retailers in the fight against holiday fraud; wearable wallet firm FitPay announced a major partnership that will support the international rollout of its Garmin Pay product; accounting software FinTech firm Tipalti took some time to reflect on the past year with two studies; and, after a breakneck Q4 2017, payments provider nanopay is gearing up for major global expansion in Q1 2018. Read on for more details in this month’s Startup Roundup.

Emailage

This year, the holiday season started earlier and stronger than in recent years. Emailage knew that meant eCommerce fraud hits would also spike sooner and higher than before. Fortunately, the security startup was prepared. Anthony Enrico, Emailage’s vice president of customer success, said communication was critical leading into the busy season.

Automation played a big role in mitigating risk in categories like same-day delivery and in-store pickup, which do not require customers to provide a shipping address and which must be reviewed within an hour or two of being placed. Since Emailage specializes in risk assessment based on customers’ email addresses, that’s an area in which the startup can really shine. Enrico reported the season went off without a hitch.

FitPay/NXT-ID

These binary startups just announced a partnership with Visa that will grow their joint platform’s international footprint in support of their tokenized payments product, Garmin Pay. Unlike other proprietary Pays, Garmin Pay democratizes mobile and wearable payments by allowing integration to any payments-enabled device.

Michael Orlando, NXT-ID COO and FitPay co-founder, president and CEO, told PYMNTS this could open the floodgates for near field communication (NFC) and contactless payments to start gaining traction and become a significant part of the cashless strategy for card networks, device manufacturers and Internet of Things (IoT) providers.

Tipalti

The San Mateo accounts payable automation startup shared the results of two recent global payment method studies. The first showed a majority of finance organizations believe supplier relationships are vitally important and underscored the significance of facilitating a positive payment experience to help retain long-term suppliers.

The second examined trends and patterns across the $4 billion in transactions Tipalti processes each year. Wire transfer and PayPal proved to be two of the most popular payment methods across the board, with some players beginning to cotton on to the speed and affordability of global ACH. CMO Rob Israch said global ACH represents a significant education opportunity going forward.

Nanopay

Canadian startup nanopay has partnered with local nonprofit interbank network Interac to help businesses manage the complexity of working across borders. Now, any bank account holder in Canada can send to or receive funds from any other bank account in the country, as well as in other countries that are served by nanopay (so far, just India, but this will soon include the U.S. and China as well).

Furthermore, nanopay went live with its B2B processing and cross-border remittances platform focused on those same four countries, which represent the biggest flows of value to and from Canada. CEO Laurence Cooke said the network will soon jump from supporting 5,000 payments per second to supporting 50,000 as more countries are added to its portfolio in Q1 2018.

Briefly…

Amaryllis rode a strong wave of momentum through December, coming off the crest of significant investments secured in November and two strategic hires made last month: a new vice president of business development, and a new head of program management globally. CEO Mark Bishopp hosted his second live CEO chat on Dec. 13, during which he connected with industry professionals to answer the tough questions. Look for more from Amaryllis in January.

Meanwhile, Jewel Paymentech ventured into new territory last month as the Singaporean startup began leveraging artificial intelligence to drive greater onboarding capacity for merchant acquirers. Additionally, Jewel is now working to support unbanked countries in Asia Pacific which are looking for cheap ePayment options like QR codes to drive cashless agendas. CEO Sean Lam told PYMNTS to expect more news about this in January.