This month marks the launch of a new series of interviews with companies that recently made their debuts on the Finovate stage. I had a great opportunity earlier this month to catch up with a number of companies demoing at FinovateSpring in San Diego, and am looking forward to introducing our blog readers to these innovative fintechs!

First up, we checked in with Joe Steuter, Partner and Chief of Client Strategy with Intention.ly. Founded in 2021 and headquartered in King of Prussia, Intention.ly is a growth consultancy and marketing agency for financial services companies. At FinovateSpring this year, Intention.y demoed its Advisor Brand Builder platform that enables breakaway advisors, fast-evolving firms, and acquiring enterprises to build professional, high-impact grand identities and brand stories.

What problem does Intention.ly solve and who does it solve it for?

Joe Steuter: Intention.ly helps financial services firms grow by solving one of the industry’s most persistent challenges: brand differentiation. Beyond that, the challenge of differentiation with speed to market and thoughtful measurement to trace ROI to marketing efforts. Advisors, RIAs, enterprises, fintechs, bank managers, insurance reps, and asset managers are all competing in a market that can feel like a sea of sameness, where firms often sound alike, look alike, and struggle to clearly articulate why they are different.

That problem becomes especially acute for financial advisors and advisor enterprises. Building a strong brand has traditionally required a long, labor-intensive process with an outside partner that may not deeply understand the financial services industry. The alternative is often a fast, templated website build or brand message that saves time but leaves firms looking, sounding, and positioning themselves like everyone else.

Advisor Brand Builder (ABB) was created by Intention.ly to eliminate that tradeoff. It gives advisors and enterprises a faster, smarter way to build authentic, differentiated brands grounded in who they are, who they serve, and why they matter.

More broadly, Intention.ly solves growth challenges for financial services companies by combining strategy, brand, marketing, technology, content, and execution. We help firms move from ambiguity to clarity, from disconnected marketing efforts to cohesive growth systems, and from generic positioning to a brand presence that can actually support business development.

How does Intention.ly solve this problem better than other companies?

Steuter: Intention.ly solves this problem differently because we combine deep financial services expertise with technology, creative strategy, and execution. We are not a generalist agency learning the industry from the outside. Our team has spent decades building brands, shaping narratives, and helping financial services firms differentiate in a highly complex, highly regulated, and often highly commoditized market.

Advisor Brand Builder, which was the experience shown to the crowd at FinovateSpring 2026, is a strong example of how we approach innovation. The traditional branding process can take months or even years, especially when multiple stakeholders, decision-makers, and rounds of discovery are involved. ABB condenses that process into a guided, AI-backed experience that can build a brand foundation in weeks.

But speed is only part of the story. ABB is not just an automated template. It combines guided discovery, industry-specific intelligence, AI-assisted brand development, and human expertise from strategists, writers, designers, and marketers. The result is faster, but still substantive.

The platform captures the advisor’s authentic story, creates messaging and visual identity, builds a cohesive brand guide, generates assets, and extends that foundation into digital presence and website direction.

That combination of executional speed with truly differentiated campaigns and messaging is where our team stands out. We help firms move faster without sacrificing authenticity, quality, or differentiation. And in an industry that is evolving at a faster pace than ever before, this couldn’t be more crucial to a firm’s growth. 

Who are Intention.ly’s primary customers? How do you reach them?

Steuter: Intention.ly’s primary customers are growth-minded financial services firms. That includes independent RIAs, breakaway advisors, hybrid firms, broker-dealers, custodians, asset managers, fintechs, banks, large insurance companies, and innovative enterprises that support advisor communities.

With Advisor Brand Builder specifically, we are solving for both individual advisor firms and the enterprises that serve them. For an advisor or breakaway team, ABB provides a faster path to a credible, differentiated brand, complete with messaging, visual identity, brand assets, and website direction. For larger enterprises, ABB creates a scalable way to support many advisors without forcing every firm through a slow, custom, one-off branding process.

We reach our customers through a combination of relationships, industry presence, referrals, thought leadership, partnerships, events, and direct engagement with firms that are actively trying to grow. Because Intention.ly is deeply embedded in the financial industry, many of our conversations begin with trust and shared context.

The firms that come to us are usually facing a transition point: launching, rebranding, going independent, entering a new market, scaling advisor support, or trying to create a more modern growth engine. Our value is helping them move from intention to execution with clarity, speed, and confidence.

Can you tell us about a favorite implementation of your technology, or a particularly valuable partnership experience?

Steuter: One recent example is Brick by Brick Wealth Management, a firm moving from a large wirehouse environment into the independent space. That kind of transition requires much more than a new name or logo. The team needed to create a complete brand identity, clarify its value proposition, reframe the value they brought to clients, develop a differentiated story, and launch a digital presence that could support the next stage of the business.

Through Advisor Brand Builder, we helped bring that work together in roughly six weeks. The process started with the concept for the firm’s name and evolved into a full brand story, visual identity, messaging system, brand assets, and website presence.

What made the implementation special was the balance between speed and authenticity. Brick by Brick needed to move quickly, but they also needed a brand that felt real, personal, and credible. ABB allowed us to capture the firm’s underlying story and translate it into something polished, differentiated, and usable.

That is exactly the kind of moment Advisor Brand Builder was built for. We’ve taken more than 25 firms of every size through this system, and it often works most effectively when advisors need to make a major business move, but they cannot afford to spend months stuck in an identity crisis. They need a brand that gives them clarity, confidence, and momentum.

What in your background gave you the confidence to respond to this challenge?

Steuter: My confidence comes from the team I surround myself with and the more than two decades I’ve spent helping financial services firms and startups tell their story. Collectively, as an organization, our confidence comes from having spent decades inside the financial services industry, working directly on the same challenges our clients face. Our CEO, Kelly Waltrich, built the firm to respond to the challenge she saw as most prevalent in financial services: a lack of purpose-led strategy and growth driven by disciplined execution and measurable goals. Every member of our team carries that same extensive industry experience where they’re drawing on years of having built brands, shaped messaging, led marketing strategies, supported advisor growth, launched campaigns, guided firms through transitions, and helped financial services companies tell more compelling stories.

Advisor Brand Builder is just one product of that experience. We have seen firsthand how difficult it can be for advisors to differentiate themselves. Many firms have a powerful story, but they struggle to articulate it. Others know they need a more modern brand, but the traditional process feels too slow, too expensive, or too disconnected from the realities of their business.

Over time, we saw the same pattern again and again: advisors needed both strategic depth and speed. They needed industry expertise, not generic branding exercises. They needed a process that could uncover what made them different and turn it into messaging, design, assets, and a digital presence.

We were not starting from theory. We were translating years of real financial services brand-building experience into a more scalable, technology-enabled process.

You recently opened new offices in Omaha, Nebraska. How does the opening of a Midwest hub drive Intention.ly’s mission?

Steuter: Opening a Midwest hub in Omaha is an strategic step in Intention.ly’s growth and mission. It was also a very personal endeavor for me, as I live in Omaha and understand just how much of a financial hub the city is to this industry. Omaha has a deep connection to financial services, wealth management, fintech, and advisor platforms, and it gives us a strong presence in a market with exceptional industry talent.

Our mission is to help financial services firms grow with more clarity, intention, and impact. To do that well, we need to stay close to the firms, advisors, platforms, and people shaping the future of the industry. Omaha gives us another center of gravity for that work, located in the middle of everywhere. 

It also reflects a belief I’ve always held: innovation in financial services is not limited to the coasts. Some of the most important companies, platforms, and advisor communities in our space have been built right here. Having a hub that is centrally located allows us to deepen relationships, expand our team, and support clients from a place that understands the advisor ecosystem.

You demoed at FinovateSpring in May of this year. How was the experience?

Steuter: FinovateSpring was a great experience because it gave us the opportunity to show Advisor Brand Builder in action to an entirely new corner of the industry. The conference brought together firms in accounting, banking, credit unions, private capital, insurance tech, and other sectors outside our normal realm of exposure (wealth management). Branding can feel abstract when described conceptually, but the demo allowed us to walk the audience through the actual experience: guided discovery, AI-assisted brand development, messaging, visual identity, brand assets, and website direction.

The format was especially valuable because ABB is designed to solve a very specific tension in the market. We were able to demonstrate that there is a better path—one that provides speed without losing substance.

The demo also helped us tell the broader Intention.ly story. We are a branding and marketing growth engine design firm with decades of financial services experience, and ABB represents how we are turning that expertise into scalable technology.

The conversations after the demo were energizing. The feedback reinforced what we already believed: advisor differentiation is a real problem, enterprises need scalable ways to support it, and the market is ready for solutions that combine AI with human expertise.

What are your goals for Intention.ly?

Steuter: Our goal is to become the leading marketing and growth partner for the industry’s top 100 companies. We want to help ambitious firms build stronger brands, clearer strategies, better marketing systems, and more effective paths to sustainable growth.

For Advisor Brand Builder, our goal is to change the equation around advisor brand development. We believe advisors should not have to choose between a long, expensive branding engagement and a generic template that makes them look and sound like everyone else. ABB gives them another option: a guided, AI-backed, human-refined process that creates a differentiated brand foundation in weeks.

At the enterprise level, our goal is to make differentiated branding scalable—quite a contradiction traditionally. Large wealth management organizations need ways to support many advisors efficiently, but without stripping away individuality. ABB gives enterprises a framework for helping advisors show up with more clarity, consistency, and authenticity.

More broadly, Intention.ly is focused on helping financial services firms spend less time stuck in identity, messaging, and execution challenges, and more time earning new business. Stronger brands create more confidence. More confidence creates better growth conversations. And better growth conversations create stronger firms and better-served clients.

That is the work we want to keep leading.

Photo by Aditya Siva on Unsplash

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• Embedded BNPL provider equipifi has raised $34 million in Series B funding to help banks and credit unions offer pay-over-time options directly within their own platforms.
• equipifi’s infrastructure enables consumers to access BNPL through their existing banking app and debit card without opening a new account, filling out an application, or using a third-party provider.
• equipifi’s growth reflects a broader shift in BNPL from a standalone fintech product into embedded financial infrastructure.

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) infrastructure company equipifi has raised $34 million in Series B funding. The new round boosts the Arizona-based company’s total funding to $49 million.

The investment was led by Left Lane, with participation from existing investors Curql, PHX Ventures, New Stack Ventures, SixThirty Fund, Baleon Capital, Rise of the Rest, and SaaS Ventures. New strategic partners, SWBC and the Bankers Helping Bankers Fund, also contributed.

equipifi was founded in 2021 to offer consumers access to pay-over-time solutions from their preferred banking provider, not through a third party. The company’s solution helps banks and credit unions compete in an era when consumers have begun to expect BNPL as an option and crave flexibility without the need for a credit card. equipifi powers BNPL for millions of checking accounts with its tool that natively embeds BNPL options inside the bank’s own platform without requiring the user to fill out an application or undergo a credit check.

“A consumer opens their banking app,” the company explained on its website. “There’s a flexible payment option waiting for them. On the debit card already in their wallet. No new account. No application. No third-party service. They select their preferred term, tap accept, and they’re done. The institution just created a loan in real time, kept the relationship at the top, and gave the consumer something they didn’t think their bank could do.”

equipifi views its embedded BNPL offering as an infrastructure play. The company calls it “infrastructure for modern credit” that places flexible payments options inside financial institutions’ existing platforms. equipifi plans to use today’s $34 million round to bring flexible payments to every financial institution in the country.

The BNPL trend is interesting because when it first emerged over a decade ago, it wasn’t necessarily something customers were looking for. Now, however, BNPL tools have almost become table stakes. equipifi has proven that BNPL is no longer just a standalone fintech product competing against banks. Instead, it can work as embedded infrastructure that banks themselves want to own and integrate directly into their existing customer relationships. In this case, equipifi is positioning itself less as a consumer brand and more as an infrastructure provider powering the next generation of flexible payments behind the scenes.

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• Small business management and accounting platform Xero has launched its live integration with Anthropic’s AI assistant Claude.
• The integration comes less than a month after Xero announced its multi-year partnership with Anthropic. It will enable users to leverage real-time financial intelligence to gain insights into revenue, profit, contacts, receivables, as well as financial health and cash position.
• Founded in 2006, Xero has been a Finovate alum since 2011. Sukhinder Singh Cassidy is CEO.

Small business management platform Xero announced its live integration with Anthropic, the AI company behind AI assistant Claude.

The live integration follows the company’s multi-year partnership announced in March. The goal of the partnership is to integrate Claude’s AI directly into Xero and to bring Xero’s financial data and tools into Claude.ai. The partnership will give small businesses and their accounting and bookkeeping teams the ability to put real-time financial intelligence to work managing their company’s finances.

“Every day, millions of small business owners ask the same questions: Why is cash tight this month? Which invoices are overdue? Can I afford to hire?” Xero Chief Product & Technology Officer Diya Jolly said. “To run their business efficiently, small business owners and their accountants and bookkeepers need to be able to answer these questions and act on them in real time, whether using Xero or Claude. This partnership delivers on that.”

The integration marks the first time that Xero customers will be able to work with their financial data inside an AI platform. It will reduce the amount of time spent doing manual work, from pursuing invoices to compiling cash flow across multiple reports, and will proactively surface insights that would otherwise be time-consuming to discover. The integration will also provide a new way for Claude to power financial workflows for small businesses at scale.

Users with active Xero subscriptions can take advantage of the integration immediately, bringing their financial data directly into their Claude discussions without having to change tools. Insights generated by Claude are delivered directly to Xero customers, enabling them to take actions such as reviewing the complete report or invoice detail to uncover total earnings, discover outstanding payments, and gain visibility into business health via insights into assets, liabilities, and cash flow.

“When customers engage in wide-ranging conversations with Claude about their business strategy or day-to-day operations, they can now use Claude to instantly pull up their cash position, check overdue invoices, or see how profit is tracking, all without breaking their flow of work,” Jolly added. “That’s what it means to have Xero wherever you work, and it’s part of our commitment to ensuring customers can leverage Xero at every point in their decision-making process.”

A Finovate alum since 2011, Xero serves more than 4.9 million customers around the world with its small business accounting platform. The company’s technology offers all-in-one paperless record-keeping, automated bank reconciliation and invoice reminders, as well as smart data and insights such as trend analysis and customizable reporting. The platform connects to more than 1,000 third-party apps to deliver an integrated, streamlined business solution. Sukhinder Singh Cassidy is CEO.

Photo by João Marcelo Martins on Unsplash

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The US Senate Banking Committee unveiled the latest version of the CLARITY Act this week. The Act aims to establish a clear regulatory framework for digital assets.

The CLARITY Act offers enforceable guardrails for digital asset markets in an effort to protect consumers and investors, counter illicit finance and security threats, and support innovation in the US.

The bill is controversial, as it includes provisions to limit liability for decentralized software developers and enters an ongoing debate around whether stablecoins should be permitted to offer yield or yield-like rewards. After more than 10 months of bipartisan negotiations, the Senate Banking Committee is preparing for a key procedural markup. Here are five things you need to know about the new version of the CLARITY Act.

More than crypto regulation

While crypto regulation is making headlines, the Act comes with broader stakes as it also attempts to define who controls the future infrastructure of digital finance in the US. Supporters argue the Act helps preserve a more market-driven and decentralized approach by defining the boundaries of governmental power while protecting the autonomy of private developers and individual users.

This debate extends beyond crypto trading and will ultimately determine who will own and govern the next generation of financial rails. Stablecoins, tokenized assets, and AI-driven financial agents are on the rise, and the rules governing those future financial rails are yet to be settled. The companies and platforms controlling the new infrastructure could hold influence similar to what cloud providers, mobile operating systems, and card networks hold today.

Delineates between securities and commodities

The debate over whether digital assets are considered securities has been around for about a decade. That’s why determining when a token is treated like a security and when it can transition into a commodity is one of the biggest goals of the CLARITY Act. The determination will dictate how exchanges and platforms operate, which regulator oversees it, and what disclosures are required.

Yield is a battlefield

The debate over whether or not stablecoins can pay yield (or yield-like rewards) has been a major sticking point between banks and crypto firms. While banks argue that stablecoin yield products could compete directly with deposits and pull money out of the traditional banking system, crypto companies argue that restrictions would hurt innovation and competitiveness.

The Act does not explicitly use the term “yield” in relation to stablecoins. However, it does establish a regulatory framework that distinguishes between different types of digital assets based on whether they provide a financial return, such as interest. The CLARITY Act implies that if a digital asset provides a right to interest, it would likely fall under the jurisdiction of securities laws rather than being treated as a digital commodity or a permitted payment stablecoin.

While separate stablecoin legislation continues to evolve in parallel in the form of the GENIUS Act, the CLARITY Act intersects with those debates because of how digital assets offering financial return may ultimately be categorized.

About global competitiveness

Supporters of the Act argue that it is less about embracing crypto speculation and more about preventing the next generation of financial infrastructure from being built outside the US. Europe, Hong Kong, the UAE, and Singapore have already moved ahead with digital asset frameworks, and if the US does not create a set of regulatory guardrails within this arena, banks, fintechs, and crypto firms will feel less safe innovating in the digital asset space.

Even if it passes, the debate is far from over

The legislation does not resolve every concern. In fact, there are still ongoing debates around AML protections, DeFi oversight, systemic risk, political conflicts of interest, and consumer protection. So while the CLARITY Act brings more regulatory transparency to crypto, it also accelerates a broader debate about who will govern the future infrastructure of digital finance as stablecoins, tokenized assets, and AI-driven financial systems become more integrated into commerce and payments.

Photo by akbar fathi

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May is Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month. May was officially established as “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month” by President George H. W. Bush in 1990, expanding on a joint resolution signed by President Jimmy Carter in 1978 that had designated the week of May 4-10 as “Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week.” The name of the commemoration was changed to “Asian American and Pacific Island Heritage Month” in 1997 in an effort to make the occasion both more accurate and inclusive.

Here at Finovate, we are happy to celebrate the achievements of our alums who share Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage. Today, we highlight six of these fintech leaders whose companies made their Finovate debuts last month at FinovateSpring 2026.

Anna Joo Fee, Founder/CEO, Goodfin

Goodfin is an AI-native wealth platform that unlocks access to private market investing and accelerates wealth for a new generation of investors. Goodfin’s AI delivers on-demand intelligent analysis and expert-level guidance to accredited investors looking to invest in top pre-IPO companies.

Educated at Harvard University and Harvard Law School, Anna Joo Fee founded Goodfin in 2022. Previously, she was Chief Operations Officer and Chief Legal Officer for Liquidly, a company she co-founded in 2017.

Victor Fu, Co-Founder/CTO, Level

Level is a venture-backed technology company that helps automotive lenders resolve insurance claims more effectively, delivering better outcomes for both lenders and borrowers. 

With degrees from the University of Southern California and UCLA, Victor Fu has interned with the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Tesla. He co-founded Level in August 2023.

Wye Yew Ho, Co-Founder/CEO and Zi Zhang, Co-Founder/CTO, Proximitty

Proximitty helps build autonomous business loan servicing teams for fintechs and banks. Their AI agents monitor loan portfolios and collect commercial loans autonomously with their proprietary agent studio.

Wye Yew Ho was educated at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). He previously worked as a consultant with McKinsey & Company and as a fincrime team leader with Taptap Send. He is currently CEO of Proximitty.

A graduate of the University of Minnesota, Zi Zhang was previously Head of Engineering at ACI.dev and a Platform Security Tech Lead with Bloomberg. Zhang is Proximitty’s Chief Technology Officer.

Marco Ma, Co-Founder/CEO, Ventus AI

Ventus AI transforms raw banking transactions into semantic customer intelligence, enabling personalized experiences, smarter analytics, and human-centered digital banking without changing core infrastructure.

Marco Ma was educated at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business and at Brown University, where he was Entrepreneur in Residence for six years. He co-founded Ventus AI in October 2025.

Caitlyn Truong, CEO, Zengines

Zengines transforms how organizations handle data migrations and legacy system modernization by empowering business users and technical specialists with AI-powered tools. The company won Best of Show at FinovateSpring 2026.

Caitlyn Truong co-founded Zengines in May 2021. Previously, she worked as a Managing Director with Accenture and as Vice President and Partner with Strategy&, formerly Booz & Company. Truong is a graduate of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Photo by Kevin Segal on Unsplash

The post FinovateSpring Celebrates Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage appeared first on Finovate.

• Global paytech Boku announced that it is live and transacting with Pix in Brazil.
• Pix is Brazil’s default payment method with more than 150 million Brazilians—approximately 70% of the population—using the technology. Boku was granted its payment institution license from the Brazilian central bank in April 2025, becoming a Regulated Pix Participant.
• Headquartered in London, Boku made its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2011. Stuart Neal is CEO.

International local payments partner Boku announced this week that it is live and transacting with Pix in Brazil. Boku secured its payment institution license from the Central Bank of Brazil last spring, allowing the company to enable merchants to access local payments. The default payment method for more than 150 million Brazilians, Pix is used by 70% of the Brazilian population and processes more transactions in the country than both Visa and Mastercard combined.

“Boku is now live and open for business in Brazil,” Boku CEO Stuart Neal said in a statement on LinkedIn. “This is an important milestone for our merchants and for any global business looking for a regulated, scalable route into Brazil. Pix has become a must-have payment method in Brazil, and it also reflects a much bigger shift in global payments. Governments, regulators, and consumers are increasingly backing domestic payment infrastructure that is fast, secure, and built around local needs. That movement towards payment sovereignty is reshaping how global merchants need to operate.”

Via Boku, merchants will be able to offer account-to-account (A2A) payments through the Sistema de Pagamentos Instantâneos (SPI) network to millions of Brazilian consumers. Boku will also support one-time Pix payments, with both local and cross-border settlement. Additionally, the launch will make it easier for Boku to take advantage of future innovations in Pix, such as tokenized recurring payments. In its statement, the company previewed further capabilities including Pix Automatico for recurring payments and Pix JSR which enables Pix without redirection.

“By connecting through Boku, merchants can access one of the world’s most successful real-time payment systems through a regulated partner that understands both global commerce and local payment infrastructure. As Pix expands into recurring payments, cross-border flows, and new credit use cases, Boku is well positioned to help merchants capture the next generation of payment growth in Brazil,” Neal added.

Founded in 2008 and headquartered in London and San Francisco, Boku is an international provider of localized payment solutions. With a global payments network featuring more than 200 local payment methods worldwide, Boku offers digital wallets, direct carrier billing, and both account-to-account and real-time payment schemes that reach more than seven billion consumer payment accounts in 60+ countries. Making its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2011, Boku now serves popular brands including Spotify, Meta, Microsoft, Netflix, and Tencent.

Photo by F Cary Snyder on Unsplash

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• Credit tracking platform Credit Karma will offer memberships to credit invisible or “thin file” customers, a new policy from the financial wellness firm.
• In a statement, the company highlighted a number of solutions on its platform that will help these thin file customers build their credit and boost their financial literacy, including its Credit Spark and Credit Builder tools.
• Acquired by Intuit in 2020, Credit Karma won Best of Show at FinovateFall 2008. The company was founded in 2007.

Financial wellness and credit tracking platform Credit Karma has announced that it is offering memberships to the 17 million Americans who do not have a credit score. These “credit invisible” or “thin file” adults have been unable to open a Credit Karma account up until now. A newly announced reversal of this policy will now enable these individuals to sign up for an account and take advantage of Credit Karma’s tools to help them build their credit and enhance their financial literacy.

“As these members begin building their financial identity, Credit Karma will serve as both the starting point and foundation for their journey,” the company noted in a statement. “We’ll help them achieve their first score while building financial literacy and equipping them with the tools to manage and grow their money, access better financial products, and make financial progress year-round.”

Credit Karma’s policy shift comes at a time when millions of American adults are considered “credit invisible” or “thin file.” This means they have no significant credit history and are unable to generate a valid credit score. This can prevent individuals from participating in major financial milestones, from securing a first apartment to buying a car to landing a mortgage for a new home. Credit Karma noted in its policy announcement that credit invisibility is more problematic for individuals who are just beginning their adult financial lives, reporting that nearly half (46%) of 18- to 24-year olds feel at a financial disadvantage because they do not have a credit history.

In its statement, Credit Karma highlighted three tools in particular that will be helpful for these new “thin file” members. These include Credit Spark, a free, automated solution that transforms on-time payments for existing services such as utilities and phone bills into credit history; and Credit Builder, which offers a locked savings account to help members make more consistent payments. Credit Karma also offers credit-building card options such as secured credit cards that provide credit invisibles with a safe, structured way to use credit and build a positive credit profile.

“Until now, individuals who were credit invisible couldn’t access Credit Karma’s tools and guidance to help them start building their credit,” the company added. “Today, that changes. We are proud to announce that credit invisible individuals can now create Credit Karma accounts and take their first steps towards building a credit score and achieving their financial goals.”

Founded in 2007, Credit Karma is among Finovate’s earliest alums, earning Best of Show in its FinovateFall 2008 appearance. Headquartered in Oakland, California, the company today serves more than 130 million individuals with free access to credit scores and reports from VantageScore, TransUnion, and Equifax, as well as daily monitoring, financial wellness tools, tax filing, bill tracking, and more. Credit Karma was acquired by Intuit in 2020 for approximately $7.1 billion in cash and stock, combining Intuit’s tax and financial management tools with Credit Karma’s consumer-based platform.

Photo by Ronan Furuta on Unsplash

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