Covera, Drop, Lendesk, Stack & Symend
Check out the December 2016 edition of the Fintech Five.
PayPal gives people better ways to connect to their money and to each other, helping them safely access and move their money and offering a choice of how they would like to pay or be paid.
The Fintech Five powered by PayPal profiles five of the hottest and most promising financial technology companies across Canada each month. The list is curated by Techvibes editorial staff and reflects who is making waves in our nation’s fintech ecosystem right now.
When it is time for renewal, 80% of Canadians allow their home and auto insurance policies to renew without investing the time to shop for alternative coverage. Covera breaks its customers out of this cycle by automating the insurance re-shopping process every year.
Covera builds a detailed profile on the clients’ behalf and, each year, before their policy is set to expire, presents them with curated alternatives that can be purchased in minutes. If they can get smarter insurance coverage with a different insurance provider, Covera does all of the work to switch them over. If they’re already with the best possible provider, Covera keeps them exactly where they are.
Drop is an iOS app that allows users to earn rewards and points on top of what current reward programs already provide. Users link their credit card and/or debit card to the app and every earn points for whenever they spend with Drop’s merchant partners.
The app touts 70,000 millennial users in Canada and is set to launch in the US in 2017. Drop has raised $1 million in funding from US based investors that include ff Venture Capital, White Star Capital, and Rothenberg Ventures.
While fintech startups have grabbed headlines with disruptive new technology, the mortgage industry has yet to see the kind of innovation that other industries are enjoying. Enter Lendesk.
Lendesk wants to improve of the process of securing a mortgage. The Vancouver-based startup acts as a CRM platform for brokers and a loan organization system for lenders. Lendesk is accepting applications for early access to the suite of tools which includes paperless bank statements, native mobile apps, a borrower’s portal, a broker product and a lender product.
While still in beta, Stack wants to “replace fees and charges with rewards and experiences” and reinvent the way millennials think of money. Rather than scold millennials for their poor financial habits, Stack will celebrate the generation’s lifestyle while offering financial IQ through machine-based learning and peer knowledge sharing.
Toronto-based Stack aims to create an open, non-judgmental platform where users can share and celebrate purchases but also learn from one another and gently help nudge themselves in the right financial direction.
The current debt collection system using collection agencies is broken. Agencies take up to 50% of funds recovered and the industry has an annual success rate of only 7%. Over the last five years in the US alone delinquent debt has risen from $150 billion to over $600 billion.
SaaS platform Symend has secured a $1 million seed round from angel investors to create a more efficient process for effectively collecting delinquent debt. Symend will use a combination of automation, predictive analytics, and better positive collection tactics to tackle debt collection, helping both retailers and consumers.
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With PayPal‘s 184 million active customer accounts globally and 6.4 million in Canada, we have created an open and secure payments ecosystem that people and businesses choose to securely transact with each other online, in stores and on mobile devices.
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