Mastercard, Zeta Team on Next-Gen Credit Processing for FIs, FinTechs

Zeta, a provider of credit card processing to financial institutions (FIs) and FinTechs, and Mastercard, the global tech company in the payments industry, have inked a five-year global partnership, according to a Monday (March 7) press release.

Under the terms of the agreement, the firms will jointly launch credit cards with issuers worldwide on Zeta’s application programming interface-ready credit processing network.

“With Zeta’s next-gen credit card processing platform, we are fundamentally rewiring how issuers launch credit card programs by offering new paradigms over legacy mainframe systems,” Zeta CEO Bhavin Turakhia said in the announcement.

In 2018, the two companies’ initiated their collaboration in the Asia Pacific when Zeta joined Start Path, Mastercard’s global startup engagement program. Zeta recently joined Engage, Mastercard’s developers partner network.

Through Engage, Zeta said it will have access to the Mastercard network to bundle products and services, including Mastercard’s Digital First and Fintech Express programs. The programs are designed provide instant customer KYC and verification, instant digital card issuance, provisioning, and usage.

Nearly one year ago, Zeta raised $250 million in a Series C funding round backed by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, giving the startup a valuation of $1.45 billion. The funding marked the biggest backing by a single investor in the banking tech startup space worldwide, Zeta said. Previous investor Sodexo also participated in this round as a minority backer, and Avendus Capital was the financial advisor.

Read also: Zeta Closes $250 Million SoftBank Funding At $1.5 Billion Valuation

That latest infusion of capital was earmarked for expansion across the U.S. and Europe, including building out operations and adding to Zeta’s workforce. The overall cloud-native platform also will be upgraded to support the growing customer base, according to the release.

Zeta’s Omni Stack aims to streamline the process, offering everything banks and FinTechs need to develop the new products and services, the company said.