Venmo, PayPal & other services disrupting payment processing in 2021

• The fintech industry is moving every year. Throughout 2019, fintech startups globally scooped up $34.5 billion in funding.
• But as more and more fintech companies pour into the space, it can be tough to sift through them and identify the largest fintech companies.
• Do you work in the Fintech industry? Get business insights on the latest tech innovations, market trends, and your competitors with data-driven research.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sped up our transition to digital, causing many businesses to turn to online technology for money management.

As more companies infiltrate the payments space, we’ll share which models have been successful and why, to help you stay of stay ahead of Financial Services industry trends, and soar above the competition.

Insider Intelligence has put together a list of the top payments fintech providers and startups, including not only widely-used companies such as Venmo and PayPal, but also some rising stars.

Dwolla

Dwolla, Inc. has gained popularity for their seamless technical integrations, which have generated cost savings, more efficient processes and greater security. In fact, competitors should aim to emulate Dwolla’s secure confirmation process, which verifies that account information matches up with the coinciding ACH network.

Venmo

While Braintree acquired Venmo back in 2012, it has since has grown to become a household name, offering seamless and real-time P2P payments. Venmo users enjoy interacting with others on their social-style newsfeed equipped with emojis, an easy-to-use mobile interface, and a simple way to find others by name or QR code. This makes this app a good fit for transactions between those who know each other personally.

PayPal

While PayPal was initially known as the payments provider for eBay, they have since gained recognition for being able to support both merchant sellers who accept payments, and shoppers and buyers at online and physical stores. They also offer international transactions, which has helped them to span 200 countries worldwide, and have higher limits for those wanting to make large transfers.

Unlike Venmo, PayPal is more specifically targeted to those who don’t know each other as well. They offer protection for sellers and buyers, as well as small business tools that are not available in Peer ton Peer (P2P) focused models.

Paydiant

Paydiant is a PayPal-owned cloud-based platform that helps merchants and banks deploy their own mobile wallets under their own brands, within their own apps. This drives consumer engagement through mobile payments, loyalty, and prioritization of preferred payment types. Paydiant has a similar approach to PayPal, in that Merchants can use any mobile payment technology that makes sense for their business.

AZA Group (also known as BitPesa)

BitPesa is a digital foreign exchange and payment platform that was founded in 2013. It uses blockchain settlement to reduce the cost and increase the speed of global digital business payments. BitPesa accepts Bitcoin and delivers currency across borders to countries like Tanzania and Nigeria, powering African businesses.

WorldRemit

WorldRemit is an online money transfer platform that is currently available in more than 150 countries, focused on remittances and transfers up to $10,000. They are the best fit for users looking to make personal and individual transfers. They pride themselves in offering speedy transactions and for having 25% cheaper rates than companies such as Western Union and Moneygram.

Stripe

Stripe is a global online payment processor that has been used in over 120 countries, and is trusted by prominent technology companies, such as Google, Amazon, and Microsoft. Stripe.js is a standout security feature that allows credit card data to be entered into a payment form to be sent directly to Stripe, rather than on a server. This makes Stripe automatically PCI compliant, and offers more protection from credit card breaches. While other companies like PayPal have developed similar security features, Stripe is reported to reign in this area.

Braintree

Braintree was acquired by PayPal in 2013, but they have since been recognized as the more tech-forward company of the two, with a robust suit of developer tools, that are customizable, scalable, and compatible with existing platforms.

While their offerings are comprehensive, their pricing structure is quite simple and transparent. Braintree also limits the risk for fraud, by providing their customers with their own dedicated merchant account, rather than depositing their funds into a provider-held aggregate account.

Klarna

Founded in 2005, Klarna is one of Europe’s largest banks, used by 85 million consumers across 205,000 merchants in 17 countries. They aim to change the way customers buy by offering a “buy now, pay later” approach to online shopping. Consumers can pay for their purchases through interest-fee installments, pay the entire amount within 30 days, or even finance their purchase for six to 36 months.

Chase Pay

Chase Pay officially debuted its app on November 21, 2016. It is unique in that it allows you to store loyalty cards so that you can apply any offers or discounts as you check out. Chase Pay allows customers to earn the same credit card rewards when making payments online, as they would have with their Chase credit cards.

Azimo

Azimo is a platform that offers inexpensive and quick transfers to users in over 200 countries around the world. It is praised for allowing multiple payment methods, including credit cards, debit cards, and bank transfers, and the fact that you can send small amounts of money regularly. However, their lack of phone support and limited availability of online customer service, may present an obstacle if time-sensitive issues arise.

Xoom

PayPal acquired this international money transfer company on July 2, 2015. It offers many payment methods, and delivers consistent text and email notifications to keep customers in the loop about their transfer activity. While they pride themselves on being a cheaper option than Western Union and MoneyGram, customers may incur additional transfer fees depending on how the payments are funded and a customer’s payout method.

iZettle

iZettle is a financial technology company founded in 2010, which is now owned by PayPal. The iZettle app works with an external card reader to process credit and debit payments, regardless of whether there is an internet connection. iZettle accepts both cash and card payments, and even Near Field Communication (NFC) payments like Apple and Google Pay.

Square

Square was founded back in 2009, and has served as more of an end-to-end payment processor than a standalone payment gateway. It capture payments information at the point of sale, and works with credit card payment gateways to safely send payments to the right place.

Square allows customers to choose when they want to receive their funds, offering standard and customizable transfer schedules. They also offer instant and same-day transfers for a 1.5% fee per transfer.

Adyen

Ayden means “start over again” in Surinamese, which is exactly what its founders intended to do when they disrupted payment processing by forming this fintech company in 2006. Their aim was to connect businesses with international card networks and local payment methods.

The company allows shoppers to use their preferred payment types, and personalize their checkout experience, regardless of their device or their location. They specifically cater to big, international companies, such as eBay and Uber.

ShopKeep

Founded in 2008, ShopKeep now has more than 25,000 customers nationally, and is the top customer rated iPad POS. It is an affordable option and a reliable point-of-sale solution for small businesses that don’t require online store integration or robust features.

Remitly

Remitly is an online international money transfer service that allows users can send money fast and affordably from UK, US, Australia, Canada, Ireland, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Finland, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore and Sweden to over 50 countries worldwide.

Users can have transferred money deposited into their bank accounts in their local currency, can have money sent to the mobile wallet on their smartphone, and can even pick up their money in cash from any of its 140,00 agent locations.

TransferWise

Transferwise moves over $5 billion every month, and saves people and businesses $3 million in hidden fees every day. It is best known for its transparency when it comes to transfer rates, as opposed to other providers that add a markup to the exchange rate in addition to their fees.

Its topnotch security technology keeps customer information safe, with security questions that prevent fraud when an account is accessed in another country. Transferwise also conveniently allow customers to enter email addresses if don’t know the recipient’s account number.

More to Learn

This comprehensive list of fintech companies merely scratches the surface of the fintech industry, which is growing in unprecedented ways.

And here are some related Financial Services reports that might interest you:

1. The Banking-as-a-Service Report, which looks at five major BaaS providers, ranging from fintechs to 20-year-old legacy providers that we think represent a proper cross-section of approaches to offering BaaS.
2. AI in Banking, which identifies the most meaningful AI applications across banks’ front and middle offices.
3. The Global Neobanks Report, which explores how the neobank market has grown rapidly, and what’s in store as the industry pivots from hyper-growth to sustainability.