Fintech Startup, Mynt to Integrate AI in Expense Management with New Smart Card Funding
Swedish fintech startup Mynt has raised $23 million to develop smart expense cards for small and medium sized businesses. According to TechCrunch, Mynt smart card funding will enable the startup to develop an AI-powered platform for its corporate cards.
Mynt’s customer base has reached 12,000 businesses, up from the 3000 the company served a year ago. To date, Mynt has raised a total of €50 million. The latest SME expense funding has pushed its valuation up to about $210 million.
Range of Services
Mynt offers businesses a range of financial services. The fintech startup has partnered with Visa to issue Mynt corporate credit cards to small and medium-sized businesses. Users get access to a range of expenditure management tools and automated integrations to leading accounting applications.
After setting up, Mynt users can automatically manage their business expenses. They can match receipts, virtual cards, and budgets automatically. The company provides users with a mobile app to enable them manage their expenses on the go. The application comes with analytic tools to help users understand how their budgets are being used.
Mynt has developed an API that integrates seamlessly with third parties. The API powers its corporate card services, facilitating enterprise resource planning for businesses as well as fuel, bank, and fleet providers. The company designs its financial services for businesses with a workforce of 2 to 500 employees.
Expense Management Painpoints
Founded by CEO Baltsar Sahlin and CPO Johan Obermayer in 2018, Mynt was developed to alleviate the challenges small businesses experience in managing their expenses. The co-founders worked at Swedish telco giant, Ericsson where they experienced these challenges first hand.
“I experienced this myself, how difficult it is to issue cards and do expense management. The pain points were really the driving force for Mynt,” said Sahlin.
When the fintech startup started operations, very few solutions were available for SMEs.
“For us, it was more about being between the banks and accounting systems, providing a solution that solves that problem for SMEs,” Sahlin added.
Mynt co-founders worked with a systems engineer to fix these gaps for Nordic businesses. Initially, the fintech focused on SMEs in the European market because of the uniqueness of the Nordic eco-system when it comes to payment and accounting processes.
Competition Landscape
Mynt is currently facing fierce competition from large entities within and outside Europe. Danish fintech, Pleo has gained ground in expense management for small and medium-sized enterprises. In 2021 when it raised $200 million, Pleo’s valuation was estimated to be $4.7 billion. Earlier this year, the fintech took on a $42 million debt. It’s not clear how this debt affected its valuation.
Another huge competitor that Mynt is facing in the expense management market is Fornox. This publicly traded fintech company develops financial management tools, including expense management tools, for small and medium sized companies. Although these, and many other companies compete with Mynt, there is space for more fintechs in the European market.
Currently, there are over 26 million small and medium sized businesses in the EU alone. This means that the 12,000 businesses that Mynt is currently serving represents a small portion of the market. Since expense management continues to be a big pain point for businesses world over, demand for Mynt corporate credit cards is set to grow. The latest Mynt funding round was led by Vor Capital.
