30. Weavr

Founder: Alex Mifsud and Adrian Mizzi

Year founded: 2021
Website: weavr.io

Hailing an Uber. Booking an Airbnb. Ordering a Deliveroo. Have you ever noticed just how seamless it is to go from choosing your route, planning your stay or picking your meal, to paying for it? 

In fact, the way these apps handle your payment processing and sensitive financial details is designed not to be noticed – the goal is for things to be so effortless for the user that they come back to the app again and again.

Weavr cofounder Alex Mifsud was totally struck by the smooth payment processes used by the likes of Uber and Airbnb. “The magical step for me was not having to do anything to make the payment,” he tells us. “Everything happened when it should, and all behind the scenes.” 

Alex and his cofounder Adrian Mizzi realised that many software applications they used – both in their business lives, and as consumers – could be enhanced similarly with ‘embedded financial services’ that create seamless experiences at point of payment.

It all sounds rather simple, but in fact, it can be extraordinarily hard for a software business to source, integrate and support financial services inside their apps. Banks are rightfully demanding around security and compliance, and consumers are hesitant to input sensitive details if they don’t fully trust what’s in front of them. 

That’s the problem Weavr was created to solve. It’s there to make it easy for any digital application to integrate financial services and safe for any financial institution to support it.

By trusting this integration to Weavr, app developers can be assured of all necessary safety and compliance requirements demanded by financial institutions. 

More importantly, they can then focus their own development teams on creating the core of the service or app they want to build, rather than getting bogged down in the complexities of payment processing. After all, if Deliveroo had spent half its time creating a compliant payment funnel, rather than surfacing mouth-watering meals, then there would be a whole lot fewer turquoise delivery bikes on the road today.

Weavr’s simple aim is to provide a friction-free payment experience for both businesses and consumers. This did, however, come with a substantial challenge of bridging the gap between software businesses and financial institutions. 

Low on resources at the outset, the founders inspired their initial partners with a compelling vision. This approach proved successful, leading to crucial partnerships with financial institutions and tech vendors. Weavr shifted its focus to larger, more established companies when venture capital funding for digital startups temporarily dried up. 

The pivot paid off when the firm secured significant deals with major customers. Its client portfolio includes disruptive fast-growth companies, multinational organisations and prominent investors like Tiger Global, QED Investors, and Seedcamp.

In the near future, Weavr aims to become the premier platform for embedded finance, serving digital businesses across major economies worldwide. It’s on a mission to democratise the world of embedded financial services. 

We may not yet know who the next Deliveroo, Uber or Airbnb is going to be. But there’s an exciting chance that the service could be relying on Weavr. If the customer never even notices, then the Weavr team have done their jobs perfectly.