What Fintech Can Offer Small and Mid-size Business in 2020

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Advanced technology has made it conceivable for small to mid-size businesses to have a hand in markets previously dominated by bigger companies. SMEs and mid-sized businesses now have a prism of opportunities created by Fintech in the latest technological stack. Being a technology-driven evolution, fintech has been virtuous for small-medium size businesses and enterprises, making finance, accounting automation, data analysis, and flexible financing options within reach.

Taking a hard hit due to ongoing pandemic Corona, fintech companies have pivoted their business model in response to it. Most of these companies have taken this outbreak as an opportunity to innovate themselves motivating others. With most of them setting up a task force to ensure business continuity, they have deduced new strategies for small and mid-sized businesses to offer easy finance options through a simple, streamlined and quicker overall process. Technology backed by artificial intelligence, big data, and other deep tech had now landed businesses more tools to save money and become more competitive. They have helped business by

Mobile Payments: With 61 percent of Americans prefer to pay with debit cards or credit cards at local stores, credit and debit cards are quite popular ways of making digital payments across the globe. Along with this, another form of digital payments like mobile wallet, point of sale machine, etc. has given world alternatives for cash. But still for small business its a headache to take. With plug and play option into a smartphone-like credit card readers, mobile payment processing solutions are an easy way to such businesses. Few mobile payment processing options are Square, PayPal, and PayAnywhere.

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Money Transfer: Money transfer is one of the sectors where banks have a monopoly. With hefty transaction & conversion charges and processing fees, it puts a full stop on small and midsized businesses’ ambition of going international. Safeguarding users’ data with encryption and following legal requirements and regulations, Fintech solutions have reduced operating margins for international business. Few solutions to note down are WorldRemit, TransferWise, Kantox and CurrencyFair.

Financial Tools and services: Fintech has proved itself a boon for small and midsized businesses.  With highly scalable cloud-powered software and tools, they have very high availability. These tools and services have

• Replaced exhaustive paperwork thus saving their precious time
• Insights and engagement by analyzing data to improved marketing leading and customer base
• Very intuitive cashflow management system even for beginners helping them to keep track of personal and business taxes, payroll, expenses and payments, deductions, and more.
• AI-driven highly secured systems for accurate and faster detection of malicious activities.
• Biometrics and blockchain are recent additions for enhanced digital security

Lending Opportunity/Open banking:  Funding or lending is made easy by fintech. With hell lot of paperwork and reviews at banks, banks were once the king of the lending kingdom. People often get rejected during this extensive paperwork prone to clerical mistakes. Thanks to fintech, business or even individuals can get a small business loan online now in few simple steps. Even banks have started adopting such solutions to streamline their process with quick outcomes. But now they are not the sole player in the market. Even 88% of legacy banking companies fear losing profits to fintech firms [Source]. PayPal hit a new lending milestone, giving goosebumps to many financial organizations.

Ecommerce: Now small businesses have easy options to sell their products online. With dozens of options eCommerce platforms available with dedicated support and a very small investment, they can go global into the world of opportunities. These small businesses are even adopting new forms of digital payment, like Bitcoin, a cryptocurrency that doesn’t require the seller to pay fees.

With the wave of innovation going strong, fintech space is been Revolutionized. From digital loans to e-commerce payment platforms, from and mobile stock services to digital currency exchanges, this tech-driven fintechs have rooted themselves into digital financial access. With bubbles all around the world constituting from startups, these tech-driven firms have opened new gateways for small and midsized businesses.

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