Visa is partnering with Fundbox, an embedded working capital platform for small businesses, to strengthen Fundbox’s platform with the power of digital payments.
The first step in this collaboration is the launch of the Fundbox Flex Visa Debit Card, issued by Pathward, N.A., which helps small business customers better manage their cash outflows.
In addition to the Fundbox Flex Card, Fundbox and Visa said they will work together in the coming months in an effort to introduce a series of new payment products, including a buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution for small businesses looking for flexible payment options when making purchases, and a push-to-card transfer option for instant fund disbursement through Visa Direct, Visa’s real-time money movement network.
Fundbox Flex Pay is a spend management solution that helps business owners manage payables while providing flexibility around how and when to fund expenses.
The company said it has seen significant growth and quick adoption of the product, and reports payment volume increasing over 80% quarter-over-quarter, and the median active customer using it over five times a month.
The companies pointed to the latest U.S. Census data, which showed a record 5.4 million new business applications were submitted last year. They said small business owners are increasingly turning to digital payments as a means to help them grow and thrive. According to Visa’s Global Back to Business Study, 73% of small businesses surveyed see accepting new forms of payments as fundamental to their business growth, and 59% said they already are, or plan to, use only digital payments within the next two years.
Jack Forestell, chief product officer at Visa, said, “Small businesses that embrace digital tools tend to be more resilient and better able to compete. As Visa continues to work towards digitally enabling 50 million small businesses by 2023, we’re excited to be teaming up with Fundbox to bring a range of new, digital offerings to the market from cards to instalments to disbursement.”
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