Good for customers, good for brands – Engaging embedded finance in a meaningful way.
Embedded finance is a strong and fast-growing market that will reach a market cap of 7.2 trillion US dollars by 2030, according to a report by Mambu. That is twice the combined value of the world’s top 30 banks. What drives investors and businesses to invest in embedded finance, and what specific opportunities does this phenomenon create? We took a look into the industry’s key findings and interviewed two of our customers Engel & Völkers Smart Money and VR Bank Bad Salzungen Schmalkalden eG.
First off, what is embedded finance?
A growing number of companies are integrating financial services into their product portfolio, while retaining complete control over the customer experience. These services and products encompass, but are not limited to, banking, payment, insurance and lending. A famous example of embedded finance are Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) models as used by large retail companies such as MediaMarkt Saturn or IKEA. The boom of the BPNL market has not gone unnoticed and is expected to further grow up to $20 billion by 2028, according to ResearchandMarkets.com.
How can non-financial services companies and financial services companies benefit?
Companies from different industries have already proven that embedded finance can improve customer relationships by integrating convenient and customer-centric products and services into the entire value chain. Branded credit cards, for example, not only function as a payment method but also as an instrument to collect loyalty points or earn cash back at certain merchants. Issuers benefit from additional data insights to better serve customers in their moment of need.
Customers show high acceptance rate for embedded finance
It is no surprise that the growth of embedded finance is highly driven by customer demand. According to a survey by Solarisbank, up to 24 percent ofrespondents would use a credit card from a well-known brand such as Amazon. Interestingly, across various providers and financial services, 61 percent of respondents can imagine using an integrated financial service, e.g. a branded credit card.
“A conversion potential of 61 percent […] shows a significant acceptance rate already today. The conversion potential is particularly high among younger age groups, so an increasing demand over time is to be expected.”
What products already exist to support businesses on their endeavour to participate in embedded finance and to satisfy the needs of their customers? finleap connect provides embedded finance solutions in cooperation with our partner Solarisbank. Our white-label frontend is called “Digital Bank” and is for non-financial services and financial services alike.
To further understand what the intention and strategy companies have, we interviewed our Digital Bank customer VR Bank Bad Salzungen Schmalkalden eG:
“We see embedded finance services as an opportunity. We can use our many years of experience and expertise to develop new business models and reach new customer groups. […] We see the mix of our many years of experience, the modern technical infrastructure of finleap connect and the strong brands of our partners as decisive success factors.” Sebastian Born, Sales Management VR Bank Bad Salzungen Schmalkalden eG
It confirms that embedded finance is unquestionably a unique opportunity for financial institutions and non-financial services companies to win new target groups. To participate in this growth opportunity, we are convinced that companies need open platforms and systems that are easy to set up and maintain. Engel & Völkers Smart Money, licence partner of real estate giant Engel & Völkers, highlights the benefits of such an ecosystem:
“With Engel & Völkers Smart Money, we want to focus on investment solutions related to real estate in the future. […] At the same time, the banking offering acts as an anchor in the customer relationship. In this respect, we value the opportunities offered by this FinTech ecosystem, as it gives us simple and fast access to banking services and a modern white label banking platform” Philipp Schemel, CCO of Engel & Völkers Smart Money
Are you interested in embedded finance products and services? Then we are the right partner to support you on this endeavour. Read more about our product here and contact us for any questions here.
Download our latest White-paper: Good for customers, good for brands – Engaging embedded finance in a meaningful way here!
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