B-to-B payments

As the gig economy expands, at least some consolidation is inevitable. As a result, companies that already have complex webs of payments, billing cycles and workflows will need a way to merge their systems with those of their acquisition targets.

Business are still reluctant to automate payments and billing, though that can hurt companies financially, writes Daniel Andrew, a vice president at Corecentric.

Boston-based Flywire has made another move to diversify beyond its original cross-border tuition payments niche by acquiring Pace Invoice, a multi-currency invoicing platform enabling clients to more easily link outgoing cross-border invoices with incoming receivables.

FastPay says it will provide digital businesses with a new platform for receiving payments from advertisers and agencies, and also for paying vendors in a timely manner.

American Express has made several attempts to escape its image as a card for the elite, with efforts such as the Bluebird prepaid card and the OptBlue pricing program for small merchants. Its latest move is focused on rewards for small-business owners.

'Gig' companies often run into a snag when trying to integrate payments for a complex network of contractors, freelancers and other small clients, a challenge Jeff Shea hopes open development techniques can conquer.

Procure to pay is an old way to automate the relationship between obtaining supplies and accounting, old enough that it's rarely automated.

Business-to-business payments technology company Comdata has unveiled a new tool to streamline the process for entering suppliers’ virtual credit card details into their systems.

With over five years of experience in handling real-time business-to-business payments, Transpay has learned that there's more to faster payments than just moving funds. The system has to accommodate a cleaner, rapid process for resolving any issues that arise along the way.

The company's original markets are India and China, but it plans to reach 10 major markets for B-to-B cross-border payments in the next year.

FleetCor Technologies, with broad operations in fleet cards and payroll solutions, has announced plans to purchase Cambridge Global Payments, which specializes in cross-border business-to-business payments, for $675 million.

The B-to-B payments market is ripe for digital innovation. Here are some of the most recent moves to bring B-to-B payments up to speed.

Vantiv has agreed to acquire Paymetric, an Atlanta-based company that automates business payments processing.

Two years after launching Bento for Business, a prepaid Mastercard enabling small businesses to manage employee expenses, Bento has announced it’s adopting i2c’s Inc.’s global platform and adding new features.

Mobile apps still account for only about one percent of transactions. There are a few ways to increase adoption, such as targeting payment types that are already tough to make with cash.

The majority of small and medium-sized businesses in the U.S. and Europe express an interest in real-time payments, but very few are aware of the current options being tested and brought to market.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Citi and PNC Bank are the first three banks to adopt the service, which is aimed at customers who use Visa commercial cards to buy supplies from Amazon Business.

With big companies frequently set in their ways for how they make cross-border payments, most innovation is targeted toward smaller shops that make fewer payments to foreign suppliers. But that isn't always the case.

The process of making cross-border payments to global suppliers is a hodgepodge of technology, banking systems and other factors that can lead to high error rates. And for most companies, such payments occur too infrequently to invite improvements to the process.

Businesses are shedding paper checks in favor of electronic payments, but the migration is not as easy as consumer payments.