B-to-B payments

Even given the huge jump in digital transactions from e-commerce, card brands are holding out for COVID-19 vaccines as a path out of the payment declines that have accompanied 2020’s health and economic crises.

As the pandemic transforms the way corporations pay suppliers, many banks are watching nimble fintechs rush in with streamlined solutions customized for remote workforces. U.S. Bank didn’t want to risk getting cut out of that equation.

While we can’t know what the post COVID-19 landscape will look like, we do know that business expenses will ramp back up, and with them, higher expectations for digital payments from both suppliers and vendors, says Wex's Jay Dearborn.

The person-to-person network is being used more often for purchasing, with consumer payments to small businesses up sharply.

Even as consumers shift more spending away from cash and the market for personal travel picks up, the coronavirus pandemic is still exerting a heavy toll on Mastercard's consumer and corporate spending.

Global expansion is challenging even under the best of circumstances – but payments don’t have to be, says Rapyd's Eric Rosenthal.

Artificial intelligence technology captures invoice data in any format and from any source, creating opportunities for myriad benefits in the organization, says Kofax's Michelle Trapani.

A California startup and a century-old Missouri bank, which began using The ClearingHouse's real-time payments network this summer, say businesses have embraced the technology to pay suppliers and gig-economy workers and quickly close real estate deals.

Two smaller banks with strikingly different roots — a startup financial institution in Irvine, Calif., and a century-old Missouri-based bank — are seeing similar trends emerge around demand for real-time payments.

Several large mobile point of sale projects are hitting the market at once to reach financially troubled retailers, with JPMorgan Chase making use of a three-year-old acquisition to push back against the technology firms that have been gobbling up small-business clients.

Most organizations simply can’t afford slow processes that are riddled with bottlenecks, says Kofax's Michelle Trapani.

With the realities brought on by COVID-19, going digital is no longer optional—it’s necessary.

Payments provider B4B Payments has been authorized to become an e-money institution in the U.K., and is seeking a license in Lithuania so the company can advance its prepaid card business throughout Europe.

The pandemic has caused a massive shift in corporate expenses, turning the company dime upside down as plane tickets give way to home office equipment. It’s a complication for those who track, approve and pay for these expenses, requiring a new approach in the back office.

Tipalti, whose platform supports cross-border B2B supplier payments, has raised $150 million in its latest funding round, bringing the total it’s raised from outside investors to $280 million.

With travel spending still largely sidelined by the coronavirus pandemic, Amazon is looking to harness more of the spending that small and medium-sized businesses are focused on for recovery.

Longtime finance entrepreneur Jackie Reses, who led Square Capital for the last five years, is leaving the company at the end of the month. Square has not yet named a successor.

For suppliers, getting paid by card is the fastest way to get their money in the bank. On the buyer’s side, virtual cards are the most secure payment method, and they can also generate rebates, says Nvoicepay's Kristin Cardinali.

Swift is working with more than 20 banks in its network to test a service designed to help consumers and small and medium-size companies send low-value cross-border payments with the same speed and transparency benefits larger banks enjoy on Swift rails.

Following compliance policies and respecting the requirements of the regulator is a good foundation for effective marketing communication, says Aximetria's Dmitry Ryzhkov.