Meet Ivo Gueorguiev, co-founder and executive chairman at Paynetics
Enjoy our interview with Ivo Gueorguiev, co-founder and executive chairman at Paynetics, where he discusses his lightbulb moment when starting the business, lessons learnt and plans for Paynetics in the next few years.
Can you share the lightbulb moment and insights that lead to you co-founding Paynetics?
It was more of a gut feeling that led us to the intersection of digitalisation, mobiles and the democratisation of payments. Paynetics felt strongly about making moving and managing money right for everyone and started building a platform that covers it all. The explosion of e-commerce pointed us towards digitalisation, and as the mobile phone slowly took control of our daily activities, it made our bet on the future.
Payments have always been considered complex, and the privilege of banks made us look into ways to simplify the process. Paynetics started with card issuing and acquiring before adding bank accounts with access to SEPA and Faster Payments, open banking and digital mobile apps. As we expanded our product offering and the sophistication of our software, so did the partners and end users we could serve. From fintechs and corporates to governments, all needed a new generation of payments.
Why now?
Paynetics saw an increasing shift towards digital payments. Consumer behaviour and expectations around payments and banking was changing, with mobile phones being used for almost everything. We understood the need to create a platform that offered streamlined and user-friendly solutions to the growing demand for modular payment platforms.
The evolving business must emphasise the importance of offering a comprehensive and adaptable payment solution. Paynetics can do that, namely to design, build, launch and operate financial products at speed and scale whilst the business focuses on its core business.
The payments industry is highly regulated. How does Paynetic assist businesses in navigating these challenges whilst delivering payment functionalities?
Paynetics is a dual-regulated e-money institution with EMI licences in the European Union and the UK. We help our customers create and deploy programs internationally, whilst navigating regulation and legislation barriers to seamlessly integrate payment solutions within a business offering.
Anti-money laundering, fraud monitoring and compliance are all part of the offer. Paynetics ensures products and services designed and operated by the client meet the regulatory requirements and conform with local practice. We are experts in transaction monitoring across all channels and types, with the ability to deploy sophisticated fraud monitoring systems and continuous investment in the latest systems and techniques to ensure account holders' funds are kept secure.
Paynetics is well-versed in the complex web of payment regulations. We can guide businesses to stay compliant, avoiding any regulatory hiccups and offer cutting-edge payment technologies, providing businesses with tools tailored to their unique needs.
The rise of fintech and embedded finance has disrupted traditional financial services. From your perspective, how do you see this trend shaping the future of payments?
We’ve passed the tipping point. Fintech and embedded finance are now integral to the financial services evolution, offering convenience and innovation. Fintech is no longer just startups; even established players embrace it, leading to a dual-track advancement. Driving embedded finance's growth is regulation and will pressure more companies to adopt it, opening new use cases across sectors.
Embedded finance will grow exponentially, allowing corporates to offer financial services and advanced tools to small businesses. Fintech's future lies in AI, enhancing customer interactions and security. Personal finance tools will become more sophisticated, and regulatory frameworks will adapt. Open Banking will foster collaboration between fintech and traditional institutions, creating seamless financial ecosystems.
Fintech and embedded finance are transforming payments, promising user-centric, innovative transaction methods in the digital era.
Working with a co-founder can be tricky, so understanding and compromise is important. How have you both found the process of building a business together? What makes it work?
There are a lot of considerations, including being fully transparent and being open to compromise. But at the end of the day, it comes down to chemistry, which is hard to describe or quantify.
The same moral compass and vision as your co-founder while trusting each other are important factors. In our case, what has worked very well is that we are fully interchangeable. We can swap roles, move in and pick up where the other one has left off without interrupting the process or adding stress to the organisation.
What was the journey like when you decided to raise funding for your startup? And what tips would you give to early-stage founders getting ready to take the same path?
At Paynetics, we've taken an unconventional path with our funding. We've self-funded our venture and deviated from the traditional model, which has been both a learning experience and a journey of experimentation. Sometimes our unconventional approach led to success, like our diverse platform creation. Other times, it resulted in resource wastage.
Today's funding landscape has clear stages, almost like a game with evolving rules. Early on, articulating your unique value, competitive edge, market strategy, and team is crucial. Traction becomes paramount in the next stage, and as your business grows, investors demand uninterrupted revenue growth. Despite the inherent volatility in our reality, investors favour clean growth graphs. Founders must adapt their business models accordingly.
What would be your top three tips to fellow entrepreneurs to look after their mental health?
Embrace the adventure: Approach entrepreneurship as a thrilling journey, giving it your all, but remember not to dive too deep. Entrepreneurship often means confronting constant challenges.
Embrace failing as a stepping stone: Understand that failing is a natural part of the entrepreneurial journey, but it's not the destination. Embrace a mindset that treats failing as a stepping stone toward success.
Share the load: Don't carry the weight alone. Invite co-founders, partners, or early employees to join you on the journey. Building a supportive team can lighten the load and make the entrepreneurial path less daunting.
How do you prepare for an AI-centric world?
We still have no idea about the full potential of AI. We know now that AI can analyse customer data, enabling financial services to gain insights into payment preferences, budgeting needs and spending habits. It allows businesses to deliver personalised, fast and engaging customer service by promptly addressing queries and concerns in real-time.
We know it can reduce costs and make processes more efficient. But the reality is that we do not know how it will develop. AI will bring a change of a magnitude not known to mankind. So we need to prepare and be open to exploring new avenues.
Hiring the right team is vital in any business. What are your top three tips for hiring and developing engineering talent?
Seek out individuals with innate talent and an insatiable thirst for knowledge and experience.
Craft a compelling vision that ignites their passion.
Foster their growth by providing opportunities to pursue personal projects, innovative ideas, and self-improvement endeavours.
As the co-founder, what’s your vision for Paynetics in the next few years? Are there any exciting plans or initiatives on the horizon that you can share with us?
We believe the embedded finance trend is only just beginning. It is a trend driven by a powerful fundamental shift in consumer expectations. We predict that the universe of use cases for embedded finance will grow exponentially as companies start seeing it as a competitive advantage. Therefore we’ll continue to upgrade and evolve our products in terms of depth, standardisation, time to market and, most importantly, delivery channels to include BIN sponsorship, API connectivity and fully integrated white-label solutions.
There are two areas of particular interest where we’ll be more active. The first is equipping our PSP partners with the tools to transform their merchant relationship from pure acquiring to a complete banking relationship. The goal is to offer acquiring capabilities, accounts and corporate cards, and working capital, all wrapped with Internet banking and mobile apps. The second one is to support the Independent Software Vendor (ISV) segment, which is perfectly positioned to embed payments and other financial products.
