Tarang Gupta hosts Kevin Greene, CEO and Chairman of Tassat. Tassat is a leading provider of private, permissioned blockchain-based solutions for commercial banks. In this episode you will hear about: - What are private permissioned vs public blockchains - Why focus on minimizing regret when making life decisions - How blockchain is changing the banking industry - Why a business' success depends 95% on testing + execution and only 5% on the idea - Kevin’s proudest basketball moment And much more...
May 22, 2023•29 min
In this episode, our host, Josh Benadiva, engages in a meaningful conversation with Sankaet Pathak, Founder and CEO of Synapse. They discuss Sankaet's journey from establishing the foundation of embedded finance and banking-as-a-service to scaling the company since its inception in 2014. Sankaet shares his insights on creating a startup within the embedded finance sector, his perspectives on hiring and product development, and strategies for centering teams and company efforts around a cohesive ...
May 18, 2023•37 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Stephane Lintner, Co-Founder and CEO of Jiko. Jiko is a bank and broker-dealer with modern trading and ledgering technology that offers real-time programmatic access to Treasury bills, thereby combining the yield and security of T-bills with the flexibility of a bank account. In this episode you will hear about: - Unlocking the power of T-bills for businesses, startups, and consumers - Building a vertically integrated de-levered bank - Why T-bills provide a higher yield than b...
May 15, 2023•32 min
Russell Matambo hosts Dare Okoudjou, Founder and CEO of MFS Africa, a leading Pan-African Fintech company, operating the largest digital payments hub on the continent. They discuss how Dare’s telecom networking experience influenced is journey into Fintech, the importance of mobile money in Africa, MFS Africa's role as a connector of mobile money networks, and much more! About Dare: Dare is the Founder and CEO of MFS Africa, a leading Pan-African Fintech company, operating the largest digital pa...
May 11, 2023•49 min
Tarang Gupta hosts David Frank, Founder and CEO at Stonehaven. Stonehaven is a private capital markets FinTech operating system for investment bankers and placement agents to support companies and investors. In this episode you will hear about: - Pivoting a traditional financial services company into a fintech player - Building a capital markets operating system to automate fundraising and deal execution processes - Running a successful bootstrapped business and the right time to seek venture fu...
May 08, 2023•39 min
Nihar Bobba hosts Angela Strange, General Partner at a16z. She focuses on Financial Services including fintech infrastructure, insurance, real estate, and increasing financial inclusivity. In the Fintech world, Angela is well known for coining the idea that "Every Company Will Be a Fintech Company"— and idea driven by the influx of new, transformative financial infrastructure tools that enable non-fintech companies to derive a significant portion of their revenue through financial products. Toda...
May 04, 2023•32 min
In today's episode, Josh Benadiva sits down with Omry Ben David from Viola Ventures to discuss how Omry identifies top entrepreneurs and how to think about investing in early-stage FinTech companies. Josh and Omry delve into the future of embedded FinTech, the next generation of InsurTech, and so much more. Omry is a General Partner at Viola Ventures. He joined the fund in 2017, bringing with him 15 years of technology-focused experience across investment banking, startup operations, and both in...
May 02, 2023•41 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Stephanie Choo, Partner at Portage. Portage is a global investment platform focused on fintech and financial services with over $2 billion in AUM. In this episode you will hear about: - Stephanie’s career pivots that led her to venture capital - Areas in fintech she focuses on and her contrarian views on consumer fintech - What is embedded infrastructure within fintech - How Portage defines innovation And much more! About Stephanie Choo Stephanie has served as a Partner at Por...
Apr 27, 2023•37 min
The Wharton Fintech Conference, held on March 30-31st, brought together some of the most prominent innovators and investors in the fintech ecosystem, including start-up founders, managing partners of VCs, and Bill McNabb, former chairman and CEO of Vanguard. Join Kailee Costello, Joshua Benadiva, and Tarang Gupta as they discuss the highlights and main takeaways from the conference, covering topics such as embedded finance, Chat-GPT, and more. With so much to learn from the top people in the fin...
Apr 24, 2023•20 min
In today's episode, Andrew Janssens hosts Alex Johnson, the creator of the Fintech Takes newsletter. Alex has been bringing thoughtful takes and commentary on all topics Fintech for many years, and has most recently been working at FICO, the credit scoring company, and Cornerstone Advisors. Alex publishes Fintech Takes, one of the leading newsletters in Fintech, twice a week, and regularly teams up with Jason Mikula (and others) on the monthly "Fintech Recap" podcast. In this episode we cover a ...
Apr 21, 2023•57 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Nick Chandi, Co-Founder and CEO of ForwardAI. ForwardAI provides a full suite of accounting data solutions for banks, lenders, fintechs, accountants, and small businesses. In this episode you will hear about: - Why most SMEs struggle to get funding from traditional banks - How ForwardAI uses data aggregation to predict clients’ cashflow needs - State of the fintech ecosystem in Canada - Nick’s vision for the next 5 years And much more! About Nick Chandi Nick is the CEO and Co-...
Apr 14, 2023•30 min
Kailee Costello hosts Jesse Greif, the COO of OneChronos. OneChronos pioneered the technology to run a unique kind of optimization in electronic trading markets; their approach draws from Nobel prize-winning auction techniques and solves for execution quality outcomes rather than just speed. In this episode you will hear about: - How OneChronos ‘takes speed out of the equation’ and instead optimizes for what the majority of users define as great trading execution quality. - How the Nobel Prize-w...
Apr 10, 2023•37 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Sachin Kumar, Co-Founder and CTO of Clear Street. Clear Street uses a tech-first approach to provide financial institutions with clearing, custody, execution, and prime brokerage tools and services. In this episode you will hear about: - What is the prime brokerage market - How Sachin went about building Clear Street’s tech platform - Sachin's opinion on the rise in retail investing apps - Why he is bullish on embedded finance And much more! About Sachin Kumar Sachin Kumar is ...
Apr 08, 2023•28 min
In today's episode, Josh Benadiva sits down with Dovi Frances from Group 11 to discuss the future of Fintech and Venture Capital. Josh and Dovi discuss how Dovi sees Fintech hitting an inflection point in the near future, how venture capital is ripe for disruption and more. Dovi Frances is a financial services entrepreneur and the Founding Partner of Group 11, a venture capital firm based in Los Angeles, California. Over the course of his career, Frances has invested over $550 million in some of...
Apr 05, 2023•36 min
Kailee Costello hosts Kurt Lin, CEO and Co-Founder of Pinwheel, a leading payroll connectivity API provider. Pinwheel’s mission is to create a fairer financial system, by enabling consumers to share their payroll and income data with financial institutions, which then use this data for direct deposit switching, income and employment verification, earned wage access, and more. In this episode you will hear about: - Pinwheel’s vision to help fintechs and financial institutions to build products th...
Apr 03, 2023•31 min
Andrew Janssens hosts Rex Salisbury, General Partner at Cambrian Ventures. Rex recently launched Cambrian, a solo-GP fund, after three years at Andreesen Horowitz establishing their Fintech team. In his last appearance on the podcast he talked about setting up the Cambrian fintech community (formerly Fintech Devs & PMs meetup). Cambrian is a U.S fintech fund investing $500K non-lead checks in Fintechs at the pre-seed and seed level. The Cambrian community allows Fintech founders and operator...
Mar 30, 2023•51 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Pushkar Mukewar, CEO and Co-Founder of Drip Capital. Drip Capital is a California and India-based fintech company, focused on solving the working capital problem for SME exporters using tech. In this episode you will hear about: - Working capital challenges that SMEs face - Differences in how financial services operate across the globe - Starting up in emerging markets - Value that an MBA added to Pushkar’s startup ambitions And much more! About Pushkar Mukewar Pushkar is the ...
Mar 28, 2023•34 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Dee Choubey, CEO and Founder of MoneyLion. MoneyLion is an all-in-one finance app that gives consumers access to a comprehensive suite of products and personalized advice, making it more engaging to bank, borrow, save, invest, and grow. In this episode you will hear about: - Building a culture of innovation within an organization - How to be successful in B2C vs B2B fintech - Challenges of taking a fast growing private company public - Why starting up is easier than it was a d...
Mar 22, 2023•34 min
Kailee Costello hosts Caesar Sengupta, CEO and Co-Founder of Arta Finance. Arta is a digital family office that offers proprietary AI-Managed Portfolios and gives customers access to alternative asset investments such as private equity and real estate. In this episode you will hear about: - Arta’s mission to give more people access to the ‘financial superpowers of the rich’ and how Arta’s technology differs from other robo-advice and AI/ML personal finance offers - Trust and transparency in fina...
Mar 13, 2023•31 min
Josh Benadiva and Kailee Costello sit down with David Jegen and Abdul Abdirahman from F-Prime Capital to discuss the State of Fintech 2023 Report. Josh and Kailee discuss how David’s lengthy experience in FinTech has informed his perspective on the most recent business cycle, and hear from Abdul about how the Fintech Index got its start and much more. F-Prime Capital is an independent venture capital group that grew from Fidelity Investments. They have been backing entrepreneurs building ground-...
Mar 06, 2023•49 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Neal Desai, CEO & Co-founder of Kafene, a fintech company helping consumers with affordable lease-to-own options for furniture, appliances, electronics, tires, and more. In this episode you will hear about - What is lease-to-own (LTO) and how it is different from the BNPL model - Challenges of disrupting and modernizing a legacy industry - Difference between financing companies holding risk on balance sheets vs those that operate as a marketplace - Not letting fear dictate...
Mar 03, 2023•37 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Todd Schwartz, CEO, Executive Chairman, and Founder of OppFi, a fintech platform that helps everyday Americans gain access to credit with digital specialty finance products. In this episode you will hear about - How observing pawn shops inspired Todd to start OppFi - OppFi's partnerships with incumbent banks to provide services to underserved consumers - Alternate data analysis and how OppFi underwrites loans - OppFi's special 'Turn-up' program to help borrowers find lower cos...
Feb 28, 2023•39 min
Andrew Janssens hosts Michael Gilroy, Co-Head of Growth Investing and Head of Fintech at Coatue. Coatue is a multi-stage technology investor across both private and public markets. In this episode you will hear about: - Michael's investing philosophy - The State of Fintech in 2023 - Coatue's proposed "Rule of 200" for fintech investments - And much, much more! About Michael Gilroy Michael is a thought leader in the fintech space, and recently co-published "Fintech & the Pursuit of the Prize"...
Feb 23, 2023•32 min
Tarang Gupta hosts David Yang, Partner at Activant Capital, a global investment firm that partners with high-growth companies that are transforming commerce. In this episode you will hear about - Escape velocity and hyper growth from an investor’s point of view - What David enjoys about his role as an investor - How Activant thinks about selecting companies to invest in - Segments within fintech are going to boom And much more! About David Yang David joined Activant in February 2021, and brings ...
Feb 20, 2023•27 min
Tarang Gupta hosts John Paasonen, Co-Founder & CEO of Maxwell, a digital mortgage platform providing tech solutions to mortgage lending institutions across the US. In this episode you will hear about - Complexities creating inefficiencies in the mortgage industry - Why John chose to focus on small to midsize lenders - Maxwell's decision to enter the secondary market for mortgage loans - The rising startup ecosystem in Denver And much more! About John Paasonen John the Co-Founder and CEO of M...
Feb 13, 2023•30 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Rob Petrozzo, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer of Rally, a digital platform for buying & selling equity shares in collectible assets. In this episode you will hear about - Rob’s journey from a designer to a fintech entrepreneur - Types of collectibles available on Rally - How Rally selects and price collectibles - Why collectibles must be a part of a 21st century portfolio - Rob’s opinion on NFTs vs physical collectibles And much more! About Rob Petrozzo Born and raise...
Feb 09, 2023•38 min
Tarang Gupta hosts Archie Ravishankar, Founder and CEO of Cogni, a digital platform on a mission to provide easy, transparent and accessible banking and lifestyle services. In this episode you will hear about - What sets Cogni apart from other digital banks - Why Cogni decided to enter the Web3 space - How a non custodial crypto wallet works - Importance of sticking to one’s core values in business - One innovator that Archie admires And much more! About Archie Ravishankar Archie is the Founder ...
Feb 06, 2023•31 min
Tarang Gupta and Nidhi Singh host Alex Harris, Founding Partner at Fiat Growth and GP at Fiat Ventures. Fiat Growth is a growth shop focused on data backed decision making, innovation, iteration and execution. In this episode you will hear about - Alex’s experience of working at high-growth fintech startups - Fiat's belief in supporting founders from underrepresented communities - Interesting trends in the fintech industry - Why Alex prioritized happiness over money in his career And much more! ...
Feb 02, 2023•28 min
Tarang Gupta and Nidhi Singh host Miguel Fernandez, CEO and Co-founder at Capchase, a growth partner for SaaS companies providing flexible and non-dilutive funding. In this episode you will hear about - Miguel’s entrepreneurial journey from Europe to the US - Challenges that SaaS companies face with upfront costs - Why Miguel enjoyed his time at Harvard Business School but still chose to dropout - How Capchase is enabling capital access for small businesses And much more! About Miguel Fernandez ...
Jan 30, 2023•35 min
Andrew Janssens hosts Peter Lord, CEO and Founder of Codat. Peter founded Codat, "the universal API for small business data" in 2017. Codat connects small businesses' consented data from banking, accounting and commerce platforms to fintechs and financial institutions. In June 2022, Codat raised a $100M Series C from investors including: JP Morgan, PayPal, Shopify and Plaid. In this episode you will hear about: - Pete's start in Computer Science and SMB lending, and how it led him to found Codat...
Jan 26, 2023•38 min
