Wharton FinTech Podcast

In our latest episode of the Wharton Fintech podcast, Miguel Armaza is joined by Laura Spiekerman, She’s the Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer at Alloy, an operating system for identity in financial services, including KYC, AML and fraud. Laura Spiekerman is a cofounder and CRO at Alloy. Alloy's API enables financial services companies to better manage their digital onboarding and identity requirements, increasing conversion and reducing fraud for banks and fintechs alike. Alloy works with both fintech companies and banks, including Marqeta, Petal, Brex, Radius Bank and others. Alloy was recognized on the recent Forbes' Cloud 100 Rising Stars list and as one to the global Venture Radar Top 10 RegTech Startups. Prior to Alloy, Laura led Business Development & Partnerships at an ACH payments startup and was on the Research & Investment team at Imprint Capital Advisors (acquired by Goldman Sachs). Laura is a proud Barnard College alumna and lives in Oakland, California. Alloy is an operating system for identity in financial services, including KYC, AML and fraud. The Alloy API allows its clients to customize which data sources they access and the rules applied, to validate an identity in real time so that 98% of users will be automatically decisioned upon onboarding, increasing conversion, lowering fraud, and reducing manual reviews. Alloy has been working with both fintech companies and banks since it launched in 2016, and has a client base of ~80, including institutions like Radius Bank, KeyBank, Brex, Marqeta and others. In this interview, Laura shares: - Her background and how she got started in the industry as employee #1 at Kopo Kopo, a Kenyan fintech company. - What inspired Laura and her co-founders to build Alloy and how they crafted a successful strategy to secure their first customers. - The strategic reasons why Alloy's products are attractive for fintech startups, community banks, and large banks alike. - Company Culture. Why it's important to hire people that are different from each other and why Alloy emphasizes celebrating differences and being bold. - Her experience as a female fintech leader and why men should take on more responsibility to recruit and cultivate women in the industry. - COVID-19's impact on Alloy and its clients- as fraud and cybersecurity attacks have increased in the last few months, Alloy has taken steps to help their customers combat these attacks. - Lessons for founders! Why learning how to sell is the most important skill to learn for entrepreneurs.

In today's episode of the Wharton FinTech podcast, Miguel Armaza is joined by David Gurle, Founder and CEO of Symphony, a financial services communications company that's helping individuals, teams and organizations of all sizes improve productivity, while meeting security and compliance needs. David Gurle is an author, inventor and visionary. David's ideas have influenced the major trends in consumer and enterprise communications and most recently secure collaboration technologies over the past two decades. He founded and ran Microsoft's unified communications products (Skype for Business) and as Global head of collaboration services at Thomson Reuters, introduced the first consumer-to-business federated communications to the financial services industry. After the sale of Skype to Microsoft where he was the GM of Skype's Enterprise Business, David founded and sold Perzo before founding Symphony. David sits on the Monetary Authority of Singapore's International Technology Advisory Panel, is regularly featured on global broadcast (CNBC, BFM, Fox News) and print media (TechCrunch, Le Monde, Wall Street Journal) and is a sought-after keynote speaker on the future of the digital workplace, collaboration technologies, workplace diversity and all matters related to privacy and information security. In January 2020, he received the Légion d'Honneur, the highest French order of merit for military and civil service. Symphony transforms the way users communicate effectively and securely with a single workflow application. Forging a new path in the financial services industry, Symphony is designed to help individuals, teams and organizations of all sizes improve productivity, while meeting complex data security and regulatory compliance needs. Symphony was founded in October 2014 and is headquartered in Palo Alto, CA, with offices in New York, Hong Kong, Singapore, Tokyo, Stockholm, Sophia-Antipolis and London. In this episode, David shares: -The powerful influence of his international upbringing and how it influenced him to pursue a career in telecom at ETSI, France Telecom, Microsoft, and Skype. -How being an intrapreneur earned him the title of "great, but unmanageable" by his first supervisor. -The key role he played in Microsoft's surprising acquisition of Skype. -The thought process that helped him identify a problem in secure persistent communications and how he devised a winning strategy for Symphony. -Challenges and anecdotes of Symphony's early days. -The importance of building a no-trust, end-to-end encrypted system, and why that has made a big difference between Symphony and other similar solutions. -Why it's critical to give users control of their data and the reason he thinks Apple has taken the wrong approach. -Symphony's recent explosive growth of 300%-400% in light of COVID-19 and how they have quickly become one of the top mission critical applications for their customers. -His vision of a post-COVID world and the steps Symphony is taking to implement a flexible work policy. -Valuable entrepreneurial advice and achieving childhood dreams.

In this episode, Ryan Zauk sits down with Stuart Sopp, Founder and CEO of Current. Current is a leading U.S. based challenger bank enabling access to affordable and premium financial services to people traditionally overlooked by the banking industry. After explosive growth serving essential workers during COVID-19, Current raised additional funding from Foundation Capital and is expected to reach 2 million customers by the end of 2020. From 1999 - 2014, Stuart spent his career as a senior trader developing financial systems and trading at Morgan Stanley, Citi, and Deutsche Bank. He started Current after recognizing that the growing inequality gap could be addressed through innovation in technology to improve financial outcomes for everyone. In this episode, Stuart discusses: - Current’s crucial contribution to the pandemic's frontline workers - Why banks have historically overlooked Current’s customers - What’s wrong with the phrase ‘choosing your investors’ - His view on the extremely competitive FinTech space and Current’s key competitive advantage - How he switched an NYC team to fully remote in a pandemic - And much more...including a surprising quarantine hobby For more insights and analysis from FinTech leaders, follow us below: Medium: https://medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: https://twitter.com/whartonfintech Ryan's Twitter: https://twitter.com/RyanZauk LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/

On today’s episode of the Wharton FinTech Podcast, Ryan Zauk sits down with Ras Asan, Co-Founder of BREAUX Capital. BREAUX Capital is the first fintech built by and for Black Male Millennials. It is a cooperatively owned and operated financial technology company that provides a software platform and membership community to increase the financial wellness of Black millennials. They accomplish this through savings goals, dividends & revenue sharing, co-investing opportunities, education, community building, and much more. Ras and his team have been: - Named to INC Magazine’s 30 under 30 - Featured in The New York Times, Black Enterprise, The Associated Press, Time Magazine, BET, The Chicago Tribune, American Banker, CNN, Huffington Post, and more - Successfully pitched and secured investment from FUBU Founder and Shark Daymond John - And just announced a partnership with Lenovo In this episode, Ras discusses: - His background and motivations for starting BREAUX Capital - The obstacles his team faced along the way as young, black, first-time founders - How BREAUX Capital's financial and social sides work - Aspects of systemic inequality in the US that have destroyed black wealth creation including over-policing, redlining, and the GI Bill - And much, much more For more content from BREAUX Capital and their team, we encourage viewing Ras's Co-Founder, Derrius Quarles in his Ted Talk on YouTube, "Derrius Quarles: How banks are failing African-Americans," or their website, BREAUXCapital.com. For more insights and analysis from FinTech leaders, follow us below: Medium: https://medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: https://twitter.com/whartonfintech Ryan's Twitter: https://twitter.com/RyanZauk LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/

In our latest podcast, Peter Jankovsky (WG'20) is joined by Frank Young, President of Vertical Market Software Solutions at Global Payments, a leading worldwide provider of payment technology services. In this role, Frank is responsible for guiding and directing the firm’s efforts to leverage software and services to deliver the next generation of digital commerce solutions on a global basis. He leads the company’s efforts in achieving business results through software-led solutions in all of our markets around the world.   In this extensive interview, Frank shares: - Major themes in the payments industry observed over his ~30 year career, including the evolution of e-commerce and the staying power of the major networks - His view of how COVID-19 is impacting the payments industry - The opportunity that he sees for embedded fintech, and how this represents a natural evolution from "knuckle-busters," electronic terminals, and integrated payments - His views on Big Tech's ambitions in financial services and how those will evolve going forward - Career advice for those beginning their career in FinTech   Prior to joining Global Payments, Frank served as the Global Lead of Payments Partnerships at Google, managing a team of professionals developing and delivering innovations to support Google’s in-store and online commerce goals. Previously, Mr. Young served as Senior Director of Business Development for Qualcomm, a worldwide leader in telecommunications products and services, where his responsibilities were to manage the development of mobile payments and commerce initiatives. Prior to that, Frank held senior roles at Mastercard and Accenture. He began his career with Chase Manhattan Bank.   Franks holds an MBA from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, where he was honored with the Dean's Award for Excellence, and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics from Rutgers University.

In our latest episode of the Wharton Fintech podcast, Miguel Armaza (WG’21/G’21) is joined by Susan French, Head of Product at BBVA Open Platform where she leads the design and development of Open Platform’s suite of white-label, banking-as-a-service APIs in the US. About BBVA Open Platform BBVA Open Platform offers API-driven, white-label banking and payments solutions for the enterprise. Open Platform enables companies to embed end-to-end banking and payments services into their brand to create engaging and intuitive customer experiences . Founded in 2016, BBVA Open Platform works with industry leading companies, at the forefront of digital innovation, to optimize their user experience through API-powered banking and payments solutions provided by leading U.S. bank BBVA USA, Member FDIC. For more information, visit Open Platform at https://bbvaopenplatform.com/ Susan French Susan is Head of Product at BBVA Open Platform. She lead the design and development of Open Platform’s groundbreaking suite of white-label, banking-as-a-service APIs in the US. Susan is a payment, digital commerce and financial services expert, with an unparalleled understanding of what fintech companies navigating this landscape want from an API platform – and how to deliver it. Susan has been working in the financial services sector for more than 25 years, most recently leading the team that created and launched Visa’s Developer Program, a suite of APIs that opened up Visa’s network to all developers, from startups to large financial institutions. A former CTO, Head of Enterprise Architecture and Technology Strategist at Visa, Susan also worked as Chief Operating Officer at Euphorion, a website design and development startup in Silicon Valley, and started her own independent consulting business. In this interview, Susan shares: - Her journey through the financial sector and what led her to BBVA - How BBVA positioned itself as one of the leading proponents of fintech innovation - Some of the reasons why the US has been slower than Europe to adopt Open Banking solutions and why the COVID-19 is forcing the US to catch up - Some of the startups benefiting from BBVA Open Platform’s services such as Azlo, Wise, Catch, and Jet. - The importance of a unified regulatory environment and some of the opportunities currently being developed in the US

In our latest podcast, Peter Jankovsky (WG’20) is joined by Charlie Olson, CEO and co-founder of Pando. Pando is an innovative new income pooling solution that allows people in high volatility careers to pool their career risk. Since inception, Pando has signed hundreds of professional athletes into income pools and has raised a Series A from top fintech investors. In this extensive interview, Charlie covers a number of topics, including Pando’s value proposition for different customer segments and how it has grown; the challenges Charlie has overcome as an entrepreneur; and his views on how careers will change, especially as a result of the current pandemic. Pando was founded after Charlie and his co-founder, Eric Lax, graduated from Stanford GSB in 2017. Prior to his time at the GSB, Charlie worked for Cheyenne Capital, a private equity firm based out of Jackson, WY. Concurrently, Charlie worked in search fund investing for Professor David Dodson and was a speechwriter and policy analyst for two governors. Charlie also holds two other degrees from Stanford, including a B.A. in International Relations and an M.A. in US History. Charlie was named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30 in 2019.

In our latest episode of the Wharton Fintech podcast, Miguel Armaza is joined by Hernan Kazah, Managing Partner and Co-Founder of Kaszek Ventures, the largest venture capital firm in Latin America, with over $1 Billion dollars of raised capital. Kaszek was launched in 2011 and has invested in more than 75 startups, including at least 5 unicorns. Prior to Kaszek, Hernan co-founded MercadoLibre, the largest technology company in Latin America which is also listed on the NASDAQ Stock Market with a current market cap of over $43 Billion. Here, he worked for 12 years, nine as COO and three as CFO. Hernan received an MBA from Stanford University, and graduated magna cum laude in Economics from the University of Buenos Aires. In this fascinating interview, Hernan shares: - His entrepreneurial journey from zero to a Nasdaq IPO. What led him to Co-Found MercadoLibre with Marcos Galperin and some of the major challenges they faced along the way. - Almost 40% of Kaszek's portfolio is concentrated in Fintech companies and they continue to be extremely bullish on the industry. Technology has opened new opportunities for the financial sector, which has allowed fintechs to vastly expand in a sector with historically-low customer penetration. Tech has also allowed some of their portfolio companies, like Nubank, to build widely scalable platforms. - Kaszek's investing approach. Why the founding team is the most fundamental piece of a startup and why a third of the teams from Kaszek's first fund would not make the cut today. - COVID-19's impact on their portfolio. Why most Fintechs haven't been too affected nor have greatly benefited by this crisis. - Fintech sector focus. The main reasons why Kaszek is interested in backing Financial infrastructure companies and why this sector presents one of the biggest opportunities in Latin America. - Peculiarities and challenges of VC investing in Latin America and Emerging Markets. - And much, much more…

In this episode, Ines Gonzales Del Mazo sits down with Jalak Jobanputra, Founding Partner of Future Perfect Ventures to discuss her investing career across FinTech, software, and the blockchain. Jalak Jobanputra is Founding Partner of Future\Perfect Ventures, an early stage venture capital fund in NYC focused on next generation technology such as blockchain and machine learning. FPV’s portfolio includes Abra, Blockstream, Bitpesa, Fusemachines, Everledger and Blockchain. Jalak was awarded Institutional Investor’s Most Powerful Fintech Dealmakers from 2016-2018. In May 2018, Jobanputra was awarded Microsoft’s VC Trailblazer Award for “her early and bold” investments in the sector. She has been listed as a 100 Most Influential Fintech Leader of 2016 and 2017 based on her investment strategy at FPV. In 2017, she was cited as a “Top 5 Investor Powering the Blockchain Boom” and Crunchbase noted FPV as one of the top VC funds in blockchain “before it was cool.” Since founding the firm, she has spoken on blockchain technology, IoT, and artificial intelligence at many global conferences, including the Milken Global Institute, Dutch Development Bank/FMO Annual Meeting, and The Economist Buttonwood Gathering. She also founded Collective Future, an organization to foster diversity and inclusion in the nascent blockchain sector. FPV’s incubator FPV Labs was selected by the NYC Economic Development Corporation in January 2019 to operate the NYC Blockchain Center, a unique private-public partnership formed to serve as an access point to the growing blockchain ecosystem and collaborate with elected officials on policy initiatives. Prior to FPV, Jobanputra was the Director of Emerging Market Mobile Investments at Omidyar Network, a philanthrocapitalist fund started by Pierre Omidyar, co-founder of eBay. Previously, she worked at Intel Capital investing in enterprise software in Silicon Valley from 1999-2003, as well as New Venture Partners and the NYC Investment Fund where she formed one of NYC’s first seed funds and helped establish the Fintech Innovation Lab in 2010. She started her career as a media/tech/telecom investment banker in NYC and London. Jobanputra is also active in supporting education reform and social entrepreneurship. She served as a Trustee of Achievement First Bushwick Charter Schools (Brooklyn). She is on the Board of Directors for the Center for an Urban Future, Advisory Board of L’Oreal’s Women in Digital Initiative, member of Mayor DeBlasio’s Broadband Taskforce, and former Access to Capital Committee member of the US Secretary of State Clinton Women’s Leadership Council. She is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, with a B.S. in Economics (concentration in Finance) from The Wharton School and a B.A. in Communications from the Annenberg School. She received her MBA from Kellogg in 1999. Her full bio can be found here, and she has been active on twitter since 2007 at @jalak.

In our latest episode of the Wharton Fintech podcast, Miguel Armaza (WG’21/G’21) is joined by Marc Weiser, Founder & Managing Director of RPM Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm. Marc is also a board member of NASA and the James Beard Foundation. Marc Weiser is the Founder and Managing Director of RPM Ventures, a seed and early stage venture firm where he focuses on investing in mobility and autonomous vehicle companies. Over the last 15 years he has served on over 20 boards of directors and currently sits on the boards of: BountyJobs, the leading contingency recruiting marketplace; Mobi, a machine learning, multi-modal, dynamic route planning system; and Polysync, a platform for delivering safe and reliable autonomous vehicles. Prior to forming RPM, Mr. Weiser was an internet and software entrepreneur. He co-founded and led technology development at QuantumShift, a provider of web-based business-to-business technology and services focused on corporate telecommunications needs. He was also an early employee at MessageMedia (acquired by DoubleClick) where he pioneered some of the original methods for e-commerce and helped lead the company’s IPO. In addition to his board roles for RPM, Marc serves as Vice-Chair of McKinley, Inc., and the Board of Trustees of the James Beard Foundation. Previously he was the founding member of the Board for the Center for Entrepreneurship (CFE) and Wolverine Venture Fund at the University of Michigan, where he was adjunct professor. He is the recipient of the University of Michigan College of Engineering Alumni Distinguished Service Award for his efforts in founding the CFE, the TechArb (student accelerator), and the Masters in Entrepreneurship (a joint program between the College of Engineering and Ross School of Business). Additionally, he and his wife led the creation of the Mary H. Weiser Food Allergy Center at the University of Michigan. This Center provides national leadership in food allergy research and a path to a cure for those that suffer from food allergies. Marc graduated cum laude from the University of Michigan with a BSE in aerospace engineering and an MBA with highest honors. In this interview, Marc shares: - His background and how he landed the role of employee #1 at MessageMedia (acquired by DoubleClick), the first online payments system company in the early 1990s. - Why he decided to Co-Found QuantumShift, a SAS company, in 1996 and the reason why he calls this experience a "successful failure". - Launching RPM and the challenges of starting a Venture Capital fund in the year 2000. - The reason why after several years of operations, RPM narrowed its scope to invest only in Mobility and Fintech. - His conviction that most startups that win are the ones that generally fall over in the right direction and then pick themselves back up and then fall over again in the right direction again. The ones that do this process faster are the ones that win. - His fascinating journey as an early stage investor and advisor of SoFi. - What an RPM entrepreneur looks like. Hint: “We look for entrepreneurs that can run up the beat at the machine gun nest while simultaneously biting the heads off of chickens.” - The importance of investing in companies that have no rational chance of success. - His journey to becoming a board member at NASA and why this is his proudest personal achievement. - Going from restaurant investor to board member of the James Beard foundation. The devastating effects of the COVID-19 crisis on the industry and how the James Beard foundation is helping save the restaurant industry.