The Monday Roundup: what we are watching this week | April 22nd

By Puja Sharma

The Monday Roundup sets the scene for the week’s biggest news stories, industry deals, and upcoming events. For Prime subscribers only.

Digital Business Centre

Ant International, a digital payment and financial technology company, has announced that it will establish a new Digital Business Centre in Malaysia, focusing on tapping local tech talent to drive its global businesses.

Ant International’s new Digital Business Centre will move into The Exchange 106, at the heart of the Tun Razak Exchange financial and business hub, by 2025, according to Douglas Feagin, President of Ant International.

CEO of Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC), Ts. Mahadhir Aziz said, “The opening of the new Digital Business Centre in Malaysia by Ant International is truly commended, as such an initiative plays an important role for the local tech talents to thrive in its global businesses in the digital industry. This will create more jobs, and investment opportunities and thus, position Malaysia as the digital hub of ASEAN. This is a testament to their commitment to choosing Malaysia as a preferred country in the mission to propel the digital economy. Congratulations to Ant International for this remarkable achievement and they have our continuous support.”

Revolut, the global financial super app, has launched its new Joint Accounts product in New Zealand, enabling two people to share finances in one place.

Revolut’s Joint Accounts feature will allow customers to create an extra account within the Revolut app to be jointly owned by two people, whether they are partners, family members, housemates, or friends. These new accounts offer customers greater flexibility in managing their finances through pooling resources and the ability to manage a common budget.

Revolut’s Joint Accounts have been designed to increase financial flexibility and inclusion and to suit the needs of all customers and their personal relationships. By providing a frictionless account opening process that can be completed in three easy steps including Revolut’s KYC, Revolut aims to actively remove the barriers associated with creating a joint account with a traditional bank. Joint Accounts are designed to support all types of duos, be it among partners, siblings, roommates, or friends.

Reduce late payments and improve cash flow

Payflows, a France-based SaaS platform for finance teams, has raised €25 million in funding to build an operating system that seamlessly integrates finance teams and workflows. Balderton Capital led the Series A, and existing investors Headline and Ribbit Capital doubled down on their previous investments.

Founded in 2022, Payflows offers finance teams a single source for accounts payable, accounts receivable, customers, suppliers, payments and cashflows, bringing insight to all team members. Using Payflows, CFOs need only pay for the expensive ERP licences they really need while maintaining access for their teams to the data they need to do their jobs efficiently.

Pauline Glikman, CEO, Payflows said, “We designed this platform as the missing piece in the CFO toolkit: a single platform for finance teams to sync and orchestrate data across all their Enterprise Resource Planning tools and financial systems, with automation and collaboration at the core. With Payflows, payment, cash management, procurement and cash collection workflows can be modified in seconds—no code required—directly by the finance team, without the need to hire developers or expensive consultants. We give the modern finance team the real-time control they deserve.”

GoCardless, the bank payment company, has announced an integration in Australia with Intuit QuickBooks’ financial management software.

The new GoCardless app, available in the Intuit Quickbooks Store, will allow Australian QuickBooks users to tap into Direct Debit, helping them to reduce late payments and improve cash flow.

The GoCardless integration will allow Intuit QuickBooks small business users to gain greater control of their finances. On the date an invoice is due, payments are automatically collected directly from their customers’ bank accounts and reconciled on the Intuit Quickbooks platform. Direct debit payments also cost less to process when compared to payments made by credit cards.

What is the buzz

Cashflows, the platform that simplifies payment acceptance for businesses, has announced it is the new Gold Partner for the largest and most inclusive representative body for the UK funeral profession, the National Association of Funeral Directors (NAFD). The Gold Partner status makes Cashflows the NAFD’s payment services partner for its 850+ members.

With funeral directors looking to make the funeral arranging process as easy as possible for bereaved families, Cashflows’ vast range of flexible transaction capabilities makes payment acceptance seamless. Whether it’s conducting transactions online through a virtual terminal after a planning appointment or making payments in person at a client’s home using a mobile terminal, Cashflows empowers a personal approach to payments, accommodating clients in any situation – be it in-person, online, or on the move.

To minimise further stress or worry in the funeral planning process, the NAFD was looking for a payment provider that could guarantee high authorisation rates for its members whose annual payments exceed £1 billion. Cashflows also offers a highly personal approach to helping clients optimise their payment processes on a one-to-one basis.