Wharton FinTech Podcast

Anirudh Singh sits down with Matan Bar, Co-Founder and CEO of Melio. They discuss the thriving startup ecosystem in Israel, building a streamlined B2B payments product for SMBs, Matan's personal guiding principles when building a company, and much more! Matan Bar: Matan is the Co-founder and CEO of Melio. Before founding Melio in 2018, he was the GM of the PayPal Consumer R&D center in Tel Aviv and led PayPal's Consumer Peer to Peer Payments Group globally, responsible for over $50B in payment volume annually. Matan joined PayPal through the acquisition of his first company (The Gifts Project) by eBay Inc in 2012.

On today’s episode, ’21 host Ryan Zauk comes back to the show to host Andrei Cherny, Co-Founder & CEO of Aspiration, a budding financial services platform for people who want to save the planet by trying to neutralize their carbon footprint. Their mission is massive, with around 5 million members trying to help make a difference in the fight against climate change. Aspiration provides numerous products, including deposit balances completely divested from fossil fuels, a round-up feature like Acorns to plant trees with your purchases, 2-day early access to wages, carbon offsets for car mileage of its users, cashback on mission-focused retailers, and more. They also are a burgeoning b2b platform for carbon offsets, helping people like Drake calculate the planetary impact of their businesses and offset it. Andre and Ryan cover a great deal in today’s episode, and special shoutout to Ami Naik of Radicle Impact for setting up this episode! They cover: - How Andrei’s op-eds in Harvard’s student newspaper landed him a job with Bill Clinton - How Aspiration works and what inspired him to start the company - Why identity banking is the future of financial services - How they divested completely from fossil fuels - Raising his company’s minimum wage to $25 during a pandemic - And so much more. Also at the end, Andrei mentions it being Ryan’s last show…it will actually not be his last, but it’s getting very, very close! Stay tuned for his finale. Disclaimer: This episode is not securities advice in any way, and this is recorded solely for the educational purposes of Wharton Fintech. --- For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Ryan's Twitter: twitter.com/RyanZauk LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/

Anirudh Singh sits down with Rohit Mittal, co-founder and CEO of Stilt. They discuss the difficulties Rohit faced when looking to rent an apartment in New York City, why United States immigrants are an underserved but creditworthy population, and how Stilt has approached solving this problem. Rohit Mittal: Rohit Mittal is the co-founder and CEO of Stilt. Rohit has extensive experience in credit risk analytics and data science. He spent years building credit risk and fraud models for top U.S. banks. In his current role, he defines the overall business strategy, leads debt and capital fundraising efforts, leads product development, and leads other customer-related aspects for the company. Stilt is backed by Y Combinator and has raised a total of $275M in debt and equity funding to date. Prior to founding Stilt, Rohit started his career at Verisk Analytics using big data to optimize credit risk. He went on to become the founding member of the data science team at Popsugar, helping the company build its analytics framework for data science efforts. Rohit has a Bachelor's degree from Delhi College of Engineering and Master's degree from Columbia University.

Gabriela Ariana Campoverde sits down with Harshul Sanghi, Founder and Global Head of Amex Ventures. Harshul has over thirty years of operating experience, and for the past 10 years has led the venture arm of American Express and oversees global investment activity across the company. To date, Amex Ventures has invested in 80+ companies and has offices in New York, San Francisco, and Boston. He has led investments in Abra, Better.com, Bill.com, Boom Supersonic, Boxed, Instacart, Learnvest, FalconX, Finix, Next Insurance, Philanthropi, Plaid, RetailNext, Stripe, Toast, and Turo, among others. Amex Ventures now has a portfolio valued at over $1 billion dollars. In this episode you will hear about: - The birth of Amex Ventures - 10 years of investing - What differentiates Amex Ventures from other corporate VCs - Investment-worthy trends in the payments space - Harshul Sanghi’s career - And much more! About Harshul Sanghi Harshul Sanghi founded Amex Ventures in 2011 to accelerate the digital transformation of American Express by investing in and partnering with innovative start-up companies. Prior to joining Amex, Harshul was Managing Director of Motorola Mobility Ventures and has over 30 years of operating experience. About Amex Ventures Amex Ventures invests in and partners with start-ups to accelerate innovation for consumers and businesses. For additional information on Amex Ventures, please visit www.americanexpress.com/us/business/american-express-ventures For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Gabriela’s Twitter: twitter.com/byGabyC Gabriela’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gcampoverde

Anirudh Singh sits down with Xochitl Cazador, Head of Ecosystem Growth at Celo. In this episode, they discuss: - Social impact through blockchain technology - Disrupting blockchain through diversity at She(256) - Creating an open financial system through Celo - The $100M Defi for the People initiative And much more! Xochitl Cazador: Xochitl Cazador leads Platform and Builder growth at Celo Foundation. She has extensive experience shaping strategy into execution to drive growth and scale operations. Prior to cLabs, Xochitl spent 15 years driving growth at Cisco, where she managed a $1 billion investment portfolio and led the expansion into 26 emerging markets resulting in 30% year over year growth. She previously served in leadership positions in the Americas, Europe, and Asia where she held roles in product and portfolio management. Xochitl is the granddaughter of Mexican migrant farmworkers and one of the first in her family to graduate from college. She understands firsthand how access to basic financial tools can change lives. Xochitl holds a master’s degree from Stanford Graduate School of Business. For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/ WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Anirudh's Twitter: twitter.com/avsingh_24

Gabriela Ariana Campoverde sits down with Jimmy Chen, CEO of Propel, a software company dedicated to helping low-income Americans improve their financial health. Propel’s mobile app provides Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP, benefits users with the ability to check their benefit balance -- which was only previously available over a 1-800 number, and more recently offers users a checking account and debit card. In this episode we discuss: - Propel’s app which today has 5 million active users - Propel’s vision to become a one-stop-shop to manage government benefits and other income, side-by-side - The ways in which the company stood by their users during the pandemic - All about the company’s culture - And so much more! Jimmy Chen Jimmy is the Founder and CEO of Propel. Previously, Jimmy was a Product Manager at Facebook, where he led product for Facebook Groups and prior to Facebook worked at LinkedIn. He is passionate about making America's safety net more user-friendly. He is a graduate of Stanford University, where he studied Symbolic Systems. Propel Propel builds software dedicated to helping low-income Americans improve their financial health. For additional information on Propel, please visit joinpropel.com and www.joinproviders.com | Twitter: twitter.com/joinproviders For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Gabriela’s Twitter: twitter.com/byGabyC Gabriela’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gcampoverde

Anirudh Singh sits down with Aaron Schumm, Founder and CEO of Vestwell. In this episode they discuss: - Aaron's first company, FolioDynamix - Launching Vestwell 6 days after selling FolioDynamix - The small business retirement landscape in the U.S. And much more! Aaron Schumm: Aaron is the founder & CEO of Vestwell, the engine powering modern-day workplace savings and investing programs, such as 401(k) and 403(b) plans. Our cloud-based digital recordkeeping platform provides the underlying architecture to support financial services and payroll partners, who are rapidly working to serve the 30M small businesses in the country. Prior to founding Vestwell, Aaron co-founded FolioDynamix, a wealth management fintech platform. At FolioDynamix, Aaron oversaw the strategy, revenue, marketing, customers and product development. FolioDynamix was acquired by Envestnet (NYSE: ENV). Outside of Vestwell, Aaron has served on the board of directors and the advisory board for several fintech companies, including Quovo (acquired by Plaid), Vestorly, OfColor, and Chalice Financial Network. Aaron holds a B.S. degree in finance from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and an M.B.A. degree from Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. He was included in InvestmentNews' 40 Under 40 and WealthManagement.com's "10 to Watch." For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/ WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Anirudh's Twitter: twitter.com/avsingh_24

Gabriela Ariana Campoverde sits down with Ryan George, Chief Marketing Officer of Docupace. Founded in 2002, Docupace is a solutions provider focused on digitizing and automating operations in the financial advice and investment industry. For close to two decades, this company has served wealth managers and helped them to work faster, more securely, and with fewer errors. The platform is composed of client onboarding, document management, advisor transition, and regulation business intelligence features. In this episode you will learn about how Docupace empowers its users to do more in less time, the types of users the company works with, the importance of back office innovation and Ryan’s fifteen-year career in Financial Services. Ryan George Ryan George is the Chief Marketing Officer of Docupace. Prior to joining Docupace, Ryan was in various marketing positions at GuideStone Financial Resources, 1st Global, and U.S. Global Investors. He has spent over fifteen years of his career in Financial Services and is a proud Texan. He is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied Public Relations. To follow him on Twitter visit twitter.com/RealRyanGeorge1. About Docupace Docupace is a technology company built for the wealth management industry. They’ve been on a mission to eliminate paperwork since 2002. For additional information on Docupace, please visit docupace.com | Twitter: twitter.com/docupace For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Gabriela’s Twitter: twitter.com/byGabyC Gabriela’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/gcampoverde

Anirudh Singh sits down with Sherwin Gandhi, co-founder and President of Jeeves. In this episode, they discuss: - Sherwin's early career in financial services - Launching Jeeves to provide borderless business banking for startups and SMEs - Expanding Jeeves internationally and the search for global talent And much more! Sherwin Gandhi: In 2019 Sherwin Gandhi founded Jeeves, which offers a suite of cross-border B2B financial services including payments, loans, and expense management software. In the past 14 months, Sherwin has raised $88mm of equity and $100mm of debt from Y Combinator, Andreessen Horowitz, CRV, Tencent, Silicon Valley Bank, and other investors, while launching in over 20 countries and reaching a valuation of $500mm. Jeeves has thousands of customers globally and is nearing $10mm of revenue - and was recently named one of The Information's 50 Most Promising Startups to watch. At Jeeves, Sherwin is unlocking globalization by architecting the future of global business banking so that entrepreneurs can focus on growing their businesses by having access to non-dilutive capital and true cross-border banking solutions. Prior to Jeeves, Sherwin founded two companies and led go-to-market, finance, engineering, regulatory, and product at two unicorns - AppNexus and Viagogo. Before becoming a Silicon Valley founder, he was a trader and investment banker on Wall Street, where he issued $17bn of multicurrency fixed income and equity derivatives at JPMorgan and was a hedge fund manager of a $200mm global fund. For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/ WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Anirudh's Twitter: twitter.com/avsingh_24

Anirudh Singh sits down with Mike McFadgen, Partner and Co-Founder of Element Ventures. In this episode, they discuss: - Mike's early career at Barclays - Launching Element Ventures to focus on B2B fintech investing - Cultural differences that drive European fintech - Element's portfolio companies And much more! Mike McFadgen: Mike is a Partner and co-founder of London-based B2B fintech venture capital firm Element Ventures. Mike made his first fintech investment in 2009 and since has had 12 years investing experience working with Barclays and Euclid Opportunities (the CVC fund of NEX Group). He currently represents Element on the boards of Hepster, Billhop, Minna Technologies and Coincover. He holds a Masters in Finance from London Business School and lives in London with his wife and two small children. For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/wharton-fintech-club/ WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Anirudh's Twitter: twitter.com/avsingh_24