The Fintech Times Bi-Weekly News Roundup serves up a dose of the latest fintech news from around the world this Tuesday.
Company updates
Emirates NBD, a banking group in the MENAT region, has launched a mega foreign exchange customer promotion, with more than 9000 prizes on offer. As a part of the three-month promotion, customers making any foreign exchange transaction, across DirectRemit transfers, currency conversions and remittances, can win 100 daily prizes.
Danish fintech PayProff has received a payments licence from the Danish FSA. The platform was created in 2019 by a Danish used car trading platform, for its own needs of payment options. It can now offer its secure escrow service to private individuals and companies trading online.
PalmPay, a fintech innovator aiming to make digital payment more accessible and flexible, has launched a 35-day campaign offering users of its in-app Gold Rush game the opportunity to share a N300million cash giveaway. The giveaway also marks PalmPay reaching the milestone of 10 million users in Nigeria.
FinaMaze launches new product – US Rates Protect Smartfolio – in the wake of rising inflation and interest rate hikes. It is designed to to generate profits if interest rates continue increasing. Clients can also exit for zero fees, at any time.
Acquisitions
Cornerstone FS, the cloud-based provider of international payment, currency risk management and electronic account services to SMEs, has agreed to acquire the entire share capital of Pangea FX, a specialist FX and treasury consultancy for up to £200,000. Pangea co-founders Joe Jones and Stuart Plummer will also join the Cornerstone team.
ConnectWise has acquired Wise-Sync, an integrated payment automation platform. The acquisition will pair ConnectWise’s IT solution provider software and services platform with payment processing and invoicing automation functionality. Partners using ConnectWise Sell now also have access to Wise-Pay as a payment processor.
Job moves
B2B payments company Mondu has appointed two senior hires. Julian Kurz is named CCO while Lauren Hoehlein Joseph is CPO. The appointments follow the company’s $43million Series A round earlier this year. Mondu hailed the new additions as it also continues to expand internationally and introduce new products.
Kani Payments, the data reconciliation and reporting platform, appoints Dan Clappison to chief operating officer to drive operations across the company as it continues to grow and scale. Clappison joins Aaron Holmes, CEO, Melissa Beckett, CMO and Steven Licciardi, CTO in the new senior leadership team.
Security firm Barracuda has unveiled Chris Ross, as its new chief revenue officer. Ross previously joined Barracuda in 2015 as senior vice president of international sales. As CRO, Ross will focus on accelerating the company’s current growth trajectory across its geographic sales regions.
LifeSearch, the UK life insurance broker, has appointed Sam Stafford in the newly created role of chief data officer. Most recently Stafford as head of digital data science at Admiral Insurance. The new position is part of the broker’s plan to build on its digital transformation and invest in customer journeys.
Lookout, a provider of data-centric endpoint and cloud security solutions, has unveiled Deborah Wolf as its new chief marketing officer (CMO). Wolf will lead the global go-to-market functions for Lookout, as well as its team of business development representatives. Wolf’s hire comes as Lookout accelerates its commitment to design and deliver digital security solutions for the intersection of enterprise and personal data.
Boutique investment bank DAI Magister appoints Risana Zitha to lead its Africa branch as managing director. He joins following several years at Renaissance Capital. Zitha also spent 18 years with Morgan Stanley.
Finally, events brand Money20/20 has appointed former M&C Saatchi and Omnicom marketing and growth leader, Geraint Jones, as global VP marketing. Geraint is responsible for the vision, leadership, strategic direction and performance of Money20/20’s marketing.
Funding and investments
Emonovo (formerly MARJ3), the MENA ed-tech platform, has raised an undisclosed bridge round by strategic angel investors from US, Europe, and MENA and follow-on investment from Flat6Labs. The platform utilises technology and data to match MENA youth to the best-fit majors and universities worldwide.
Ark Kapital triples valuation six months post-seed with a €15million acceleration round. The data-driven precision finance company’s latest funding round attracted Swedish banker Annika Falkengren. Investors also included LocalGlobe and Creandum.
Startup company Raftt, the cloud-based platform for creating and sharing development environments, has come out of stealth with $5million in seed funding. The $5million seed round was led by Aleph VC and Cardumen Capital.
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