Wharton FinTech Podcast

John MacIlwaine, Co-Founder & CEO at Highnote, discusses the complexities of payments processing, Highnote's approach as an embedded platform, insights into their latest Credit Issuing product, the future of issuer processing, and their strategies for navigating the competitive fintech industry.

Jeremy Tsui, co-founder and CEO of Finley, discusses the inspiration behind Finley, trends in private credit, and the ways Finley helps companies manage their debt. He also shares his views on AI in fintech and his experience with Y Combinator and venture capital fundraising.

Stacy Greiner, DailyPay's COO, discusses the mission of providing employees with on-demand pay access. Topics include revenue model, competitive position, future of earned wage access, risk for employers falling behind, impact of wage compression in healthcare, and strategic priorities. Stacy also shares her journey to COO and offers career advice.

Rob Straathof, CEO of Liberis, discusses embedded finance and small business lending. Topics include Liberis' platform, business funding options, working with regulators, and the applications of GenAI in business. Rob also reflects on his career and emphasizes the importance of pursuing passion and building relationships.

Arad Levertov, Founder and CEO of Sunbit, discusses starting Sunbit, the future of his company and buy-now-pay-later, and building a mission-driven company. He also highlights the integration of powerful machine-learning models and the impact of rising interest rates on the fintech sector. The podcast concludes with book recommendations and mentions that Sunbit is currently hiring.

Anthony Noto, CEO of SoFi, discusses the company's trajectory, the SoFi stadium naming rights deal, becoming a top 10 financial institution, and his leadership style. He also shares his personal journey, including financial difficulties and the influence of sports and family.

Joshua Benadiva hosts Bill Capuzzi, the CEO of Apex Fintech Solutions. They dive into the history and evolution of broker-dealers, the inefficiencies of the traditional brokerage industry, opportunities in wealth-tech, Apex's role in driving innovation, expanding globally, and advice for business school students interested in fintech and entrepreneurship.

Urvashi Barooah, Principal at Redpoint Ventures, shares her journey from Wharton to venture investing. She discusses her transition from consulting to venture capital, her investment philosophy, and advice for aspiring VCs. They explore the potential of vertical SaaS in various industries and the challenges of staying grounded in VC. They also discuss the qualities of an empathetic investor and supporting the fintech community.

“We build the monetisation engine for Google. We build the entire stack that moves money and we do it at Google scale. The reason we have to build it internally is (because) at our scale and with all our different business models and products that we support at Google there is not really one product out there that does it all. You have to piece together multiple different things and some of that is very unique to the way Google runs and its scale and reach… billions of users, hundreds of countries and territories. So that’s why we do what we do.” Sonal Goyal and Kareem Itani host Kan Liu, VP of Product for Payments Platform at Google, which provides fast, easy and trusted payment solutions to Google’s businesses and their end users. Kan has been at Google for almost two decades where he previously led Google Desktop and Chrome OS. In this episode, they discuss Kan’s career journey, everlasting product principles, balancing innovation with regulatory compliance, Google’s big bets in digital payments, advice for fintech and product enthusiasts, and much more!

Zoey Tang hosts Kevin Zhang, partner at Bain Capital Venture. At BCV, Kevin partners with inception-stage entrepreneurs at the intersection of business software and financial services, with particular emphasis on finserv enablement, productivity & automation, and data infrastructure. During our conversation, we delved into Kevin's professional trajectory, his initial attraction to fintech, and the transition from operations to investment. We then discussed his specific criteria when it comes to evaluating founders in the early stage, as well as the decision-making process he and his colleagues employ at Bain Capital Ventures. Lastly, our conversation concluded with Kevin's interests outside of work, including his revelation of a political figure with whom he would be eager to share a dinner table. About Kevin Zhang Kevin Zhang is a partner at Bain Capital Ventures, leading early-stage investments in financial technology and developer products. Previously, he has invested in companies including Argyle, Column Tax, Alloy Automation, Hightouch, and others. Prior to Bain Capital Ventures, Kevin was the first business hire and Head of Product at Fundera, a lending marketplace acquired by NerdWallet (NASDAQ: NRDS). Kevin built the initial content and acquisition marketing efforts, before leading roadmap, user research, and analytics as Head of Product. During Kevin’s tenure, Fundera grew from 5 to 65 employees, raised $20M+ of venture capital, and was ranked #69 fastest growing company on the Inc. 5000 in 2018. About Bain Capital Ventures Bain Capital Ventures is the venture capital arm that operates within the larger Bain Capital ecosystem. With a focus on investing in early to growth-stage startups, BCV has built a strong reputation for backing innovative and disruptive companies across various sectors.