Wharton FinTech Podcast Merge Co-Founder, Shensi Ding - Building the Infrastructure Layer for B2B Integrations
Jun 3, 2025
Shensi Ding, co-founder and CEO of Merge, shares her expertise in B2B integration through a unified API platform. She discusses the essential role of developer empathy and thorough documentation as a competitive advantage. Shensi explores the founding dynamics with her co-founder, emphasizing teamwork and complementary skills. She also sheds light on the challenges of scaling within a crowded API market, fundraising hurdles, and the importance of strategic partnerships, particularly for Fortune 500 companies seeking integration solutions.
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Challenges in Early Integration Work
- Shensi Ding observed that competitors with worse products won deals due to more integrations.
- Their sales team faced frustration from lacking integrations, impacting their company's P&L significantly.
Normalization Simplifies Integrations
- Merge normalizes data models across providers to simplify integrations.
- This approach avoids the complexity of maintaining multiple customized integrations for each vendor.
Early Customer Success Stories
- Early customers like Drata, Vanta, Brex, and Ramp used Merge to quickly add complex HR and ticketing integrations.
- This enabled compliance and expense management without building direct integrations internally.