EmFi is going to go through its second cycle; eye towards profitability, specialisation and regulatory prudence. The HSBC JV allows them to cross-sell additional transaction banking services. I would hazard a guess a sub-par product compared to what these SMEs can probably get from non-bank scale fintech providers (e.g. Airwallex, Nium...) who are also entrenched in this segment. I say let them fight it out and let a new generation of EmFi emerge to power a new 'vintage' of startups, software providers...I am working on EmFi 2.0 on the basis of this contrarian view...hopefully luck is on my side :-)
For sure. Agree on all fronts! The timing is perfect for embedded finance offerings that have taken to heart all the lessons from the first generation of companies.
Interesting point on Open Banking companies all eventually becoming payments companies. Yet this is far from a panacea as it's very hard to break even with the A2A business model right now!
It’s my tongue-in-cheek way of saying that just being “dumb” pipes for commoditised banking data isn’t a venture-scale business. I also agree—A2A in most established card markets is going to be a decade-long lift.
EmFi is going to go through its second cycle; eye towards profitability, specialisation and regulatory prudence. The HSBC JV allows them to cross-sell additional transaction banking services. I would hazard a guess a sub-par product compared to what these SMEs can probably get from non-bank scale fintech providers (e.g. Airwallex, Nium...) who are also entrenched in this segment. I say let them fight it out and let a new generation of EmFi emerge to power a new 'vintage' of startups, software providers...I am working on EmFi 2.0 on the basis of this contrarian view...hopefully luck is on my side :-)
For sure. Agree on all fronts! The timing is perfect for embedded finance offerings that have taken to heart all the lessons from the first generation of companies.
Interesting point on Open Banking companies all eventually becoming payments companies. Yet this is far from a panacea as it's very hard to break even with the A2A business model right now!
It’s my tongue-in-cheek way of saying that just being “dumb” pipes for commoditised banking data isn’t a venture-scale business. I also agree—A2A in most established card markets is going to be a decade-long lift.
Great one!