B-to-B payments

With a growing number of banks adopting digital technology to move B2B commercial cards into mobile wallets, JPMorgan is collaborating with Boost Payment Solutions to automate the delivery of single-use and commercial card accounts to clients.

The lack of coordination may be due to functional and cultural differences, or the effect of technology silos, says Nvoicepay's Josh Cyphers.

American Express is integrating its virtual cards with Coupa Pay's corporate business spending platform for clients in the U.K and Australia by the end of 2019, with plans to extend the service in the U.S. in mid-2020.

APIs have opened a window for banks to capture a greater share of business payments, leading JPMorgan Chase to seek partners for faster results.

In launching a new international account for its business clients, Starling Bank is converting the bank's debit card to support payments in either pounds or euros.

Mastercard is aggressively building a business payments ecosystem as it keeps an eye on political headwinds it has little control over.

Flywire is working with Bank of America to streamline cross-border payments for the bank’s higher education and corporate clients, whose foreign transaction traffic is rising along with global commerce.

Mastercard has launched two separate initiatives that touch the health care market — blockchain for visibility in food systems and Mastercard Healthcare Solutions to detect fraud and bring efficiencies in health care organizations.

The online platform lender Kabbage is making the move beyond just providing working capital loans to small businesses, putting it in direct competition with alternative acquirers and payment companies.

Visa is retooling its small-business credit cards by expanding credit card lines, adding travel insurance and product-warranty extensions and making it easier for business owners to integrate card accounts with accounting software.

In seeking to eliminate manual back-office payment processes for long-term health care and social service providers, AvidXchange says it is launching new software to steer providers to digital accounting and B2B e-payments — and eliminate paper checks.

U.S. Bank wants to disrupt the way consumers pay their bills by offering billers a new platform fit for faster payment rails, new messaging formats and digital assistants.

Because such a high number of new cardholders were paying fees for premium cards, Amex is earning subscription-like recurring revenue.

Eliminating checks from corporate payments will take many more years, but Nacha’s latest data suggests the B2B category is playing a key role in Same Day ACH's growth.

Technology companies like Square and Stripe have nimbly captured small-business share from banks that often overlooked the segment. Royal Bank of Canada is trying to respond through a mix of merchant services, tied to the national debit system and incentive marketing.

Making a domestic or cross-border B2B payment should be as easy as a consumer making a payment at a retailer's point of sale. There are plenty of obstacles toward this goal, but also plenty of paths to success.

Intuit has partnered with Visa to enable QuickBooks users to get faster access to funds through Visa Direct, the network’s debit push payments service.

Ripple is collaborating with financial software company Finastra, boosting both companies' reach in the cross-border transaction market.

Companies like Stripe provide a needed source of capital, but should expand lending beyond their existing base, says Become's Eden Amirav.

The card networks are taking blockchain seriously as a means of streamlining cross-border B2B payments. But while they share a vision, they are taking different paths to this goal. Visa has opted for a closed network that it controls, while Mastercard envisages a wider, more open ecosystem.