August 13, 2025 • 24 mins
Stepping into the world of small business banking requires a fresh perspective, and that's exactly what Eyal Lifshitz brought when he founded Bluevine twelve years ago. Having watched his father run a physical therapy practice, Eyal witnessed firsthand the financial challenges small business owners face daily. Today, as Bluevine's CEO, he's transformed that understanding into a revolutionary banking platform serving over 750,000 small businesses across America.
Traditional banking has long overlooked the unique needs of businesses generating less than $5 million in annual revenue. These companies represent half of the U.S. GDP and typically operate without finance departments, leaving owners to handle everything from payroll to invoicing themselves. Bluevine's solution? A comprehensive financial operating system that brings checking accounts, credit products, accounts payable, and receivable management together in one digital platform.
What makes Bluevine truly stand out is its branchless, digital-first approach. While most banks still require small business owners to visit physical locations weekly, Bluevine delivers a fully online experience with no monthly fees and competitive yields on deposits. This approach resonates particularly with younger entrepreneurs who expect the same digital convenience in business that they enjoy in personal banking.
Looking ahead, Eyal sees several transformative trends reshaping small business finance: accelerating adoption of digital-first banking, demand for real-time payment capabilities across all rails, and integration of AI-powered financial guidance.
Listen to Eyal's full interview for insights on breaking free from traditional banking limitations and embracing the future of small business finance.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Leaders in Payments podcast,
where we talk to C-level leadersfrom across the payments
landscape.
We'll be discussing theproducts and services that
impact the payment space today,as well as trends and
predictions for the future ofpayments.
We will also hear stories fromour guests about their journeys
to the top.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello everyone and welcome to the Leaders in
Payments podcast.
I'm your host, greg Myers, andon today's episode we have a
very special guest, al Lifshitz,the CEO of Bluevine.
So, al, welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me.
Well, why don't we start off byhaving you tell our audience a
little bit about yourself, maybewhere you were born, where you
grew up, where you went toschool, a few things like that.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Yeah, I'd be happy to go way back then.
It's been several decades.
Born in New York, my parentsare Israeli-Americans, so we
bounced back and forth from theUS to Israel, ended up spending
my childhood mostly in the USelementary school, middle school
and then back to Israel where Ispent the rest of my teenage
years, started my career there,went to undergrad there and then
(01:00):
, yeah, found myself back in theUS, had a couple back and
forths, again, again, and todayI live in Tel Aviv, married two
kids.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Okay, awesome, awesome.
Well, thanks for sharing that.
Well, let's talk about BlueVine.
So tell our audience whatBlueVine does.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
BlueVine makes financial services more
accessible, affordable and easyto use for small businesses by
making it more intuitive anddigital.
We offer really an end-to-endbanking platform for small
businesses and more and morewe're really kind of like
redefining what banking is forthem and delivering more and
more of a financial operatingsystem, one that is able to
(01:34):
house more of their financialservices, workflows and needs to
allow them to run all theirfinancial operations in one
place.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Okay.
So specifically, when you'retalking about banking, you're
talking about a checking account, lending credit cards, those
types of tools, right?
Speaker 3 (01:50):
So, yes, the heart of our offering is our checking
accounts.
We have a checking account thatwe've been offering for a while
now.
We offer also credit products,so we have a line of credit.
We also offer additional creditproducts through third parties.
We have an integrated accountspayable offering.
That's part of our banking,part of our checking accounts.
We most recently launchedaccounts receivables management,
(02:12):
which includes payment linksand invoicing and more things to
come.
Really, our vision is to allow,as mentioned before, small
businesses to house everythingthey need to manage from a
financial standpoint to managefor their business all in one
(02:33):
place and so one.
There is a lot more that we'relooking to offer and we're
constantly listening to ourcustomers around what they would
benefit from being integratedand kind of part of our broader
platform.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Okay, and what types of small businesses?
Just any small business.
Are there certain verticalssizes?
Maybe talk about the customer alittle bit.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
That's a great question because small
businesses is or sometimespeople call it SMB is such a
wide category.
The traditional definition isless than 500 employees, but the
reality that one two peoplecompany has very little to do
with a hundred people operations, you know they run very, very
different.
So we focus on what we defineas non-commercially banked small
(03:13):
businesses.
There's a size when you get toas a small business or any
business where, with respect toyour banking relationship, you
would be treated as a commercialcustomer.
You know that kind of like wherethat line is is different
depending on the bank, but byand large, if you are generating
less than $5 million in revenue, you are not commercially
banked.
You are banked through theretail arms of the banks and
(03:33):
you're served through thebranches, and so that is really
the segment that we focus onLess than $5 million, all the
way down to zero, because wehave many of our customers that
join us when they're just newand starting out and have zero
revenue and generally have lessthan, call it, 15 or 20
employees, all the way down toone, because you know they just
started and they're the onlyemployees or they may be working
with contractors.
(03:54):
In terms of industries, we aregenerally we are we're very
broad.
Our offering is really kind ofmeant to serve a wide array of
industries.
We're not a specialist and youknow maybe important to say,
because there's a lot of buzzand companies serving
venture-backed and technologycompanies that while we do have
some of these companies that weserve today, that is not our
core focus.
We focus on your traditionalsmall business.
(04:15):
It could be a services company,it could be retail, it could be
construction, it can betransportation.
You know really any traditionalsmall businesses healthcare,
across the board the commondenominator they're small,
they're small and many times theperson dealing with the
finances is the owner or owners.
They don't have a CFO, theydon't have a VP finance.
The person coming into the bankaccount, making sure that
(04:39):
there's enough money there,making sure that they can run
payroll and they have access toworking capital, financing it's
the owner.
And so that is really kind ofour customer, the business owner
, and looking to deliver moreand more value to them.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Okay, Well, I can relate to the one person
business because that's prettymuch what I am.
So, yeah, I do everything right, write the checks and do all
the banking, so I would be atypical customer, I think, in a
lot of ways.
Talk a little bit about how youget new customers sort of your
go-to-market strategy.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
We generate awareness to BlueVine in a number of ways
.
One is we advertise, leveragemultiple channels through
digital advertising, somenon-digital advertising.
Your regular I'd say, yourregular channels, whether it's
Google or Meta or other forms ofmarketing, to make sure that we
are marketing and making oursmall business customers that
are out there aware of all thethings, all the great things
(05:27):
that we're offering.
That is one way we'reincreasingly finding success
with partnering with othercompanies that serve small
businesses.
We have a partnership with Xero, we have a partnership with Zed
Business, we recently launcheda partnership with Wave, and
there's more and more of thesecompanies that are like-minded
in helping the same targetcustomer that we're helping, and
(05:49):
so we're finding ways tocollaborate and having our
products in front of theircustomers and vice versa.
So that's another way that wegenerate awareness to Bluevine
and, funny enough, like thefastest growing part for us is
actually organic, meaning thatcustomers are finding us not
through forms of advertising orthrough other forms of
distribution, but rather they'rehearing about us from their
friends, from going on Reddit,from just word of mouth, and so
(06:09):
that is increasingly happeningmore and more.
Interestingly, we are hurtingcustomers that are finding us
through a lot of the Gen, AI,chatbots, chatgpt, plexity and
others, and they're justbasically searching.
I'm a small business owner.
I need to open a checkingaccount.
What's the best options outthere and they find us and so
we're finding that more and moreare finding us through this
medium.
That used to be a smaller partOverall.
(06:32):
Organic used to be a smallerpart of the mix.
Today it's getting to around40% of customers that find or
get to us completely organic.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Okay, and you mentioned payments and offering
invoicing and payment links, soI think that's a relatively
recent capability.
So maybe talk about that alittle bit if you don't mind.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
Absolutely.
The way we view our broaderplatform is allowing a small
business to manage their entirefinancial operations, and part
of that is making payments andaccepting payments.
We see those things as part andparcel of your banking.
It's not something that shouldbe external to your bank account
, although the reality is, andthat's where traditional banking
(07:10):
falls short.
Generally, small businessesdon't find that as part of their
bank account, they need to goto a third-party provider.
Many times they go to a fintechspecifically for invoicing, for
card acceptance.
All of that we believe thatshould be part of your overall
banking Saves you both time andmoney and certainty and
everything is all in one placeand makes your life easier, and
we've been hearing from ourcustomer that that is a
(07:31):
functionality that they wouldreally benefit from, so that is
something that we launched morerecently, a couple of months ago
, we started with payment links.
We've partnered with Stripe.
Then, shortly thereafter, welaunched invoicing, all to make
it easier for our customers toaccept payments.
Now we launched kind of an MVPversion of that offering and
(07:51):
we're increasingly adding moreand more features and
functionality to make that kindof capability more robust,
because once we launched it, wealready immediately had an
uptick of customers using it.
But the next thing thatfollowed was well, this is great
, but now I need one, two, threeand four that you don't yet
have.
So it's a great experience tobe in a situation when you're
launching something and there'sgreat reception to it, but
equally, we're excited by thefact that customers are telling
(08:13):
us this is amazing, but I needyou, or I want you to do all
these extra things for me, andso that is definitely top of
mind and the things that we'reinvesting in right now.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Okay, and how would you say you differentiate
yourself from your competitorsout there?
Speaker 3 (08:26):
So when you define competitors, it really kind of,
in our view, you need to startbroad, because we didn't invent
banking as a category.
Clearly, banks have been aroundand in the US there are 4,000
banks and they serve smallbusinesses.
Our customers are notunderbanked.
They are certainly underserved,but there is a large number of
banks out there that cater tosmall businesses as part of the
(08:49):
broader audiences that theycater to.
Not necessarily particularlywell, but they do serve small
businesses, and that includesthe large traditional banks.
You know who they are.
It includes the regional banks,but it also includes the
smaller credit unions andsmaller community banks.
Their shortcomings are that theyare not as technology advanced.
Their offering from a digitalperspective is quite lacking.
(09:10):
In most cases, you can't openan account online.
You can't do everything thatyou need online.
You don't have the range ofpayment instruments that you
need online, or the limits orthe funds availability.
Unfortunately, most smallbusinesses still need to go to
the branch at least once a weekto do anything that they need
within their account and thenanything that is requiring more
sophistication, whether it'srequiring software build or more
(09:32):
sophisticated risk management.
Small businesses are findingthat outside of their bank
account.
Just think about where they'refinding the solutions for card
acceptance and credit cardprocessing or bill pay or
invoicing or expense managementand spend management, and so
they're going to fintechs forall these solutions.
Our approach, as described, isvastly different.
(09:53):
We believe that we should offera very integrated banking
platform to include all thethings you need to run your
financials, not just the basicjobs to be done holding money,
moving money and credit to superprime, which is what the banks
do, and so that is our distinctcompetitive advantage.
In addition, we also the valuethat we offer to small
businesses that includes nomonthly fees we don't charge for
(10:16):
a lot of the typical stuff thatbanks typically do, and then we
offer yield on deposits reallysets us apart in terms of the
economic value that we offer tosmall businesses.
So that is really what sets usapart from the traditional
banking industry.
That is, for the most part,that is really the competition.
Now there are other fintechsthat do what we do.
We are the largest bankingplatform for small businesses in
(10:38):
America, so we are certainlythe leader in our category.
What sets us apart versus otherFinTech competitors is the
breadth and depth of ourplatform the breadth in terms of
the wide range of features andproducts that we offer and the
platform, our capabilities, theinfrastructural capabilities
around risk management, theoperational capabilities that we
(11:01):
have that allows us to serve atscale, I'd say those are quite
unique to us and we're moreadvanced than I would say, than
our direct competitors that arefintechs.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Okay, okay, great.
So when you step back and lookat the industry as a whole and I
typically kind of ask thisquestion through a payments lens
, but how about maybe just froma broader financial services for
small business lens, Kind ofwhere do you see the industry
headed?
I mean, you've mentioned thatthey are really interested in
more kind of paymentscapabilities, but I'm sure
they're telling you more thingsso kind of where is that market
(11:30):
heading?
Speaker 3 (11:31):
I think that you will see more and more adoption of
branchless digital first nativesolutions and more adoption of
branchless digital first nativesolutions.
You know, when we think aboutour presence in the market,
we're doing very well andcertainly we're the leader among
the banking platforms thefintech banking platforms for
our category, but we're still adrop in the ocean compared to
the overall market Meaning.
When you look at like what isour market share overall small
(11:54):
business banking, which is $125billion market, we're still
relatively very small.
A couple of basis points we'regrowing very fast but we're
still small.
The large majority of smallbusinesses still bank with a
traditional bank.
And part of that is they're usedto the branch experience.
More and more of them and thisis part of the generational
shift that's happening arebecoming more and more used to
(12:16):
and willing to partner with afintech and, you know, basically
break free from branches, notneeding to go to the branch.
You know today's 20-year-oldbusiness owner 30-year-old
business owner as opposed totheir parent, who is now kind of
like they might be inheritingthe business and you know their
parent, who used to go to thebranch all the time to conduct
their business.
The 20, 30-year-old is aconsumer.
(12:37):
They don't go to the branchanymore they do all their
banking online and so I thinkthat will carry over and you'll
see, you know more and moreopenness to adopting digital
first-only platforms such asourselves.
That, I think, is sort of likethe constant, the broader kind
of generational theme ortechnology adoption theme.
I think within, specificallyaround payments, there's
(12:58):
certainly an expectation ofon-demand real-time payments
happening, Interestingly withsmall businesses.
I think there's some departurewith consumers, Consumers, you
see, all consumers.
Everything's on Venmo or Zelle.
Small businesses, you know,still 50% of payments are checks
.
People forget about that, butstill, you know small businesses
, like the larger businesses too, are still cutting checks.
(13:21):
I think there is a trend forthat requirement for real-time
payments.
We are expecting FedNow to berolled out more broadly.
Even ACH, to be frank, is quiteadequate.
The fact that it takes two tothree days for an electronic
payment to basically get settledit doesn't meet today's
expectation, Definitely not fromconsumers.
(13:42):
But also businesses are lookingfor more real-time and I think
that will generally happen withthe introduction of some of
these new payment rails.
I do think some peer-to-peerpayments, such as Zelle, are
becoming more prominent on thebusiness side as well, Like
you're seeing that kind of likespill over, and then
international payments.
I think that's probably kind ofthe last, maybe frontier.
(14:03):
I think that will happen aswell, where payments are
expecting the time forsettlement, the time for your
recipient to get their money, isexpected to be shortened.
People are expecting the moneyto be really kind of like
transferred in real time.
I think this will be across theboard and all the instruments
that I mentioned.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Okay, Well, it's hard to talk about the future and
not talk about AI.
So how have you seen AIimpacted your business?
Where do you think that'sheaded?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
It is definitely hard not to talk about AI these days
.
Ai is everywhere.
As an organization, we'recertainly adopting AI in several
places, from our developmentprocesses and how we code and we
build products.
Our teams are leveragingCopilot and other AI tools.
We are finding ways to adopt AIwith some of our back office
processes and some of ouradministrative processes.
Right now, all these things areinternal facing.
They're not customer facing yet.
(14:56):
But we are also thinking aboutwhere to introduce AI
functionality for our customers,and I can certainly see a world
where we offer more and morecapabilities to our customers
through AI.
The natural one is clearlywithin our chat functionality.
Today we do have chatbot, butit is mostly template based.
It's not AI driven.
That is something that we'lllikely introduce at some point
(15:16):
more agentic AI capabilities tocreate more of a conversational
experience with a customerthat's using our chatbot and
provide more robust answers andmore self-serve options, and so
that is certainly something thatwe're thinking about.
But then there's certainly likethe next kind of iteration or
kind of set of features that wethink would make sense.
You know, part of this is tocreate more of an not just
(15:37):
somebody to help you or like achatbot to help you with
questions, but really more of anadvisor, giving you advice on
what you should be doing, how tomanage your money more
effectively, how to manage yourmoney more effectively, how to
maximize your earnings on yield,thinking about your capital and
what it makes sense topotentially access capital.
So somebody there to be able toprovide you not just insights
and execution of orders but alsoadvice.
(15:59):
That I think would be reallykind of like the next frontier.
And then we're also thinkingabout features within our
offering that could be betterprovided through AI.
Are there things that we cangenerate with AI that would
benefit our customers?
We are thinking about somefunctionality there.
So no shortage of ideas.
Our team comes up with ideasall the time around.
Oh, we can do that.
(16:20):
We can do this, whether it's tocreate more efficiency
internally or also to createmore value to our customers.
And we are constantlyconsidering our roadmap and how
to embed AI within our roadmap.
Okay, okay, great.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
Well, let's switch gears a little bit and talk
about you.
Maybe walk us through yourcareer background, how you came
up with the idea, started thecompany.
Maybe walk us through thatjourney, if you don't mind.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Yeah, happy to.
So, you know, maybe, startingfrom maybe the not so obvious I
was not in banking before, youknow, and I think maybe
sometimes, like people notworking in a certain industries,
are able to look from theoutside in and potentially
innovate where you know.
There wasn't as much innovationbefore, but wasn't in finance,
wasn't in banking like that.
Starting there, I started mycareer as an engineer.
(17:03):
I studied undergrad electricalengineering.
I started working insemiconductors.
I worked at Texas Instrumentsand algorithms and so very far
away from where I am today.
But as somebody who has startedhis career in technology and
engineering, engineers like tobuild and I still like to build
today.
That's definitely part of myDNA and part of what potentially
grabbed me to or drew me intostarting a company.
(17:26):
It's more of kind of the desireto build.
So I did that.
But then over time recognizedthat while I like technology and
I like building, I am moreinterested in the business side.
At that time I was living inIsrael.
I moved back to the US, I wentto business school, felt like I
wanted to expand myunderstanding and my experience
on more of the business side ofthings.
(17:47):
I worked in consulting for abit in my experience on more of
the business side of things.
I worked in consulting for abit and then afterwards I worked
in venture capital.
I worked at Greylock Israel.
That was a venture capital firmbased in Israel that was
investing in companies in Israeland Europe.
I moved back to Tel Aviv forthat purpose.
Greylock Israel was part ofoverall Greylock Partners, which
is a very well-known venturefirm.
This was their at the timeseparate pool of capital for
(18:10):
Israeli and European startups,and so I worked there for
several years.
That's the time that I reallykind of like fell in love with
fintech or financial technology.
Greylock was a big investor infintech companies.
We had the opportunity andsuccess investing in many
phenomenal fintech companies.
As an example, they investedand I was part of that process
(18:30):
in Marketta's seed round at thetime.
So I had the privilege ofgetting exposure to companies of
that type and at the same time,I was also always fascinated by
small businesses.
My dad was a small businessowner.
He had a physical therapyclinic in New York for over two
decades five employees rightwithin our target segment today.
By the way, around 10% of ourcustomers today are from
(18:52):
healthcare and many of them arephysical therapists, like my dad
so, growing up, had a lot ofvisibility to the pain points of
small businesses knew thatfinancial services is an area
that is not easy for them andthere's a lot of opportunity
from capital to banking, so thatis something that was always
top of mind for me.
So the combination working inventure and learning about
(19:12):
fintech and all theopportunities building fintech
companies plus the fact that Iwas passionate about small
businesses really thatcombination led me to start
thinking about where might wehave opportunities within
fintech to help small businesses, and that's how Bluevine was
born.
That was 12 years ago.
We started the company in 2023.
Started with basically aPowerPoint and an idea, and
(19:35):
that's history.
It's been 12 years since.
A lot has happened.
Over those 12 years We'veexpanded and have grown the
business to almost 500 employeesnow.
We have served over 750,000small businesses.
We managed a billion and a halfdollars in deposits.
We've lent over $16 billion.
We've provided over $16 billionof financing to small
businesses.
So we've done a lot over these12 years and I'm very proud of
(19:58):
the team.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Okay, awesome.
So what is something you'repassionate about?
Maybe one work-related passionand one personal passion.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
With work I mentioned .
You know I started my career asan engineer.
I like to build.
If I wasn't the CEO,no-transcript.
(20:30):
Not just the effort of theproduct team.
There's the broad range of thecompany tech, product, legal,
operations, team, riskmanagement, marketing.
Everybody plays a part in that.
I personally, again, I love thebuilding part and I love the
product part.
So that's something that I'mcertainly passionate about at
work, outside of my broaderpassion about small businesses
and speaking with customers.
That's why we started thecompany.
(20:51):
Personally, I mentioned I'mmarried.
I have two kids, a 13-year-oldand 16-year-old, and years go by
fast.
So whenever I have anopportunity to spend time with
them, whether they like it ornot it's a advantage.
We have a vacation planned inAugust.
We have nowhere else to go, sowe're going to be with them and
for me that is definitely, whenwe have any available time, try
(21:12):
to spend it with the family,okay great.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
So one final question If someone comes to you, maybe
they're right out of college ormaybe they're switching
industries or careers andthey're interested in financial
technology, fintech, payments-what kind of advice would you
give them to help them besuccessful?
Speaker 3 (21:32):
The number one advice I would tell them is join a
startup.
If I were in their shoes, Iwouldn't join a mature
corporation.
And the reason is when you'rejoining a startup and
potentially even a youngerstartup, the visibility that you
gain into the broader set ofconsiderations getting more
depth of understanding aroundthe different functionality
within payments, the market, theproducts and features set I
(21:55):
think you just have a broaderview.
You just have, like, moreability to do more when you're
in a startup versus when you'rea larger corporation that has
more employees and then it tendsto be more specialized and
siloed and so you don't alwaysget full visibility of
everything versus when you're ina startup.
You will learn the full valuechain.
You will learn everything.
The extent of the learningthere, I think, is probably
(22:16):
greater than going for a largerone.
Sometimes it's scary joining astartup, but I think certainly
folks earlier in their careerthe learning is there.
You're just drinking from afire hose and I think at that
time in your career that's whatyou should be optimizing for Not
pay, not necessarily the brandname of a larger company, but
the learnings in there.
It's hard to compete with thelearning in a startup.
It might feel bumpy and rockyand the learnings may not
(22:39):
necessarily be structured.
It's not like structuredtraining but I think you will
come out of it with a lot ofbenefit, that would be my advice
of benefit, that would be myadvice.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Yeah, yeah, I love that advice and I totally agree
with you.
So before we wrap up, I justwant to kind of open the floor,
see if there's anything else youwanted to cover any final
comments.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Before we wrap up the show, I go back to small
businesses.
You know, small businesses arethe heroes of our economy, 50%
of the GDP, the largest employer, unfortunately underserved by
the traditional financial system.
And so, bluevine, we are reallykind of innovating, redefining
what banking is and delivering awhole lot of value to small
businesses.
We have built a lot over these12 years.
(23:17):
We've done a lot, very proud ofwhat we've done, we're only in
the beginning of the journey,maybe kind of top of the third.
So there's a whole lot ahead ofus and I'm really excited for
the next parts of the journey.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Okay, great.
So lot ahead of us and I'mreally excited for the next
parts of the journey Okay, great.
So thank you so much for yourtime.
Thanks for the wrap up there.
I appreciate that and, again, Iknow your time is very valuable
, so I want to thank you forbeing here and again.
Hopefully in a year or two wecan connect again and hear more
of the story about payments.
So again, thank you so much foryour time today.
I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
And to all your listeners out there.
I thank you for your time aswell, and until the next story.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Thank you for joining us this week on the Leaders in
Payments podcast.
Make sure you visit our websiteat leadersinpaymentscom, where
you can subscribe to the showand where you'll find our show
notes.
If you enjoyed listening,please share on your social
channels as well.
Welcome to the Leaders in Payments podcast,
where we talk to C-level leadersfrom across the payments
landscape.
We'll be discussing theproducts and services that
impact the payment space today,as well as trends and
predictions for the future ofpayments.
We will also hear stories fromour guests about their journeys
to the top.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Hello everyone and welcome to the Leaders in
Payments podcast.
I'm your host, greg Myers, andon today's episode we have a
very special guest, al Lifshitz,the CEO of Bluevine.
So, al, welcome to the show.
Thank you for having me.
Well, why don't we start off byhaving you tell our audience a
little bit about yourself, maybewhere you were born, where you
grew up, where you went toschool, a few things like that.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Yeah, I'd be happy to go way back then.
It's been several decades.
Born in New York, my parentsare Israeli-Americans, so we
bounced back and forth from theUS to Israel, ended up spending
my childhood mostly in the USelementary school, middle school
and then back to Israel where Ispent the rest of my teenage
years, started my career there,went to undergrad there and then
(01:00):
, yeah, found myself back in theUS, had a couple back and
forths, again, again, and todayI live in Tel Aviv, married two
kids.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Okay, awesome, awesome.
Well, thanks for sharing that.
Well, let's talk about BlueVine.
So tell our audience whatBlueVine does.
Speaker 3 (01:13):
BlueVine makes financial services more
accessible, affordable and easyto use for small businesses by
making it more intuitive anddigital.
We offer really an end-to-endbanking platform for small
businesses and more and morewe're really kind of like
redefining what banking is forthem and delivering more and
more of a financial operatingsystem, one that is able to
(01:34):
house more of their financialservices, workflows and needs to
allow them to run all theirfinancial operations in one
place.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Okay.
So specifically, when you'retalking about banking, you're
talking about a checking account, lending credit cards, those
types of tools, right?
Speaker 3 (01:50):
So, yes, the heart of our offering is our checking
accounts.
We have a checking account thatwe've been offering for a while
now.
We offer also credit products,so we have a line of credit.
We also offer additional creditproducts through third parties.
We have an integrated accountspayable offering.
That's part of our banking,part of our checking accounts.
We most recently launchedaccounts receivables management,
(02:12):
which includes payment linksand invoicing and more things to
come.
Really, our vision is to allow,as mentioned before, small
businesses to house everythingthey need to manage from a
financial standpoint to managefor their business all in one
(02:33):
place and so one.
There is a lot more that we'relooking to offer and we're
constantly listening to ourcustomers around what they would
benefit from being integratedand kind of part of our broader
platform.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Okay, and what types of small businesses?
Just any small business.
Are there certain verticalssizes?
Maybe talk about the customer alittle bit.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
That's a great question because small
businesses is or sometimespeople call it SMB is such a
wide category.
The traditional definition isless than 500 employees, but the
reality that one two peoplecompany has very little to do
with a hundred people operations, you know they run very, very
different.
So we focus on what we defineas non-commercially banked small
(03:13):
businesses.
There's a size when you get toas a small business or any
business where, with respect toyour banking relationship, you
would be treated as a commercialcustomer.
You know that kind of like wherethat line is is different
depending on the bank, but byand large, if you are generating
less than $5 million in revenue, you are not commercially
banked.
You are banked through theretail arms of the banks and
(03:33):
you're served through thebranches, and so that is really
the segment that we focus onLess than $5 million, all the
way down to zero, because wehave many of our customers that
join us when they're just newand starting out and have zero
revenue and generally have lessthan, call it, 15 or 20
employees, all the way down toone, because you know they just
started and they're the onlyemployees or they may be working
with contractors.
(03:54):
In terms of industries, we aregenerally we are we're very
broad.
Our offering is really kind ofmeant to serve a wide array of
industries.
We're not a specialist and youknow maybe important to say,
because there's a lot of buzzand companies serving
venture-backed and technologycompanies that while we do have
some of these companies that weserve today, that is not our
core focus.
We focus on your traditionalsmall business.
(04:15):
It could be a services company,it could be retail, it could be
construction, it can betransportation.
You know really any traditionalsmall businesses healthcare,
across the board the commondenominator they're small,
they're small and many times theperson dealing with the
finances is the owner or owners.
They don't have a CFO, theydon't have a VP finance.
The person coming into the bankaccount, making sure that
(04:39):
there's enough money there,making sure that they can run
payroll and they have access toworking capital, financing it's
the owner.
And so that is really kind ofour customer, the business owner
, and looking to deliver moreand more value to them.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Okay, Well, I can relate to the one person
business because that's prettymuch what I am.
So, yeah, I do everything right, write the checks and do all
the banking, so I would be atypical customer, I think, in a
lot of ways.
Talk a little bit about how youget new customers sort of your
go-to-market strategy.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
We generate awareness to BlueVine in a number of ways
.
One is we advertise, leveragemultiple channels through
digital advertising, somenon-digital advertising.
Your regular I'd say, yourregular channels, whether it's
Google or Meta or other forms ofmarketing, to make sure that we
are marketing and making oursmall business customers that
are out there aware of all thethings, all the great things
(05:27):
that we're offering.
That is one way we'reincreasingly finding success
with partnering with othercompanies that serve small
businesses.
We have a partnership with Xero, we have a partnership with Zed
Business, we recently launcheda partnership with Wave, and
there's more and more of thesecompanies that are like-minded
in helping the same targetcustomer that we're helping, and
(05:49):
so we're finding ways tocollaborate and having our
products in front of theircustomers and vice versa.
So that's another way that wegenerate awareness to Bluevine
and, funny enough, like thefastest growing part for us is
actually organic, meaning thatcustomers are finding us not
through forms of advertising orthrough other forms of
distribution, but rather they'rehearing about us from their
friends, from going on Reddit,from just word of mouth, and so
(06:09):
that is increasingly happeningmore and more.
Interestingly, we are hurtingcustomers that are finding us
through a lot of the Gen, AI,chatbots, chatgpt, plexity and
others, and they're justbasically searching.
I'm a small business owner.
I need to open a checkingaccount.
What's the best options outthere and they find us and so
we're finding that more and moreare finding us through this
medium.
That used to be a smaller partOverall.
(06:32):
Organic used to be a smallerpart of the mix.
Today it's getting to around40% of customers that find or
get to us completely organic.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Okay, and you mentioned payments and offering
invoicing and payment links, soI think that's a relatively
recent capability.
So maybe talk about that alittle bit if you don't mind.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
Absolutely.
The way we view our broaderplatform is allowing a small
business to manage their entirefinancial operations, and part
of that is making payments andaccepting payments.
We see those things as part andparcel of your banking.
It's not something that shouldbe external to your bank account
, although the reality is, andthat's where traditional banking
(07:10):
falls short.
Generally, small businessesdon't find that as part of their
bank account, they need to goto a third-party provider.
Many times they go to a fintechspecifically for invoicing, for
card acceptance.
All of that we believe thatshould be part of your overall
banking Saves you both time andmoney and certainty and
everything is all in one placeand makes your life easier, and
we've been hearing from ourcustomer that that is a
(07:31):
functionality that they wouldreally benefit from, so that is
something that we launched morerecently, a couple of months ago
, we started with payment links.
We've partnered with Stripe.
Then, shortly thereafter, welaunched invoicing, all to make
it easier for our customers toaccept payments.
Now we launched kind of an MVPversion of that offering and
(07:51):
we're increasingly adding moreand more features and
functionality to make that kindof capability more robust,
because once we launched it, wealready immediately had an
uptick of customers using it.
But the next thing thatfollowed was well, this is great
, but now I need one, two, threeand four that you don't yet
have.
So it's a great experience tobe in a situation when you're
launching something and there'sgreat reception to it, but
equally, we're excited by thefact that customers are telling
(08:13):
us this is amazing, but I needyou, or I want you to do all
these extra things for me, andso that is definitely top of
mind and the things that we'reinvesting in right now.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Okay, and how would you say you differentiate
yourself from your competitorsout there?
Speaker 3 (08:26):
So when you define competitors, it really kind of,
in our view, you need to startbroad, because we didn't invent
banking as a category.
Clearly, banks have been aroundand in the US there are 4,000
banks and they serve smallbusinesses.
Our customers are notunderbanked.
They are certainly underserved,but there is a large number of
banks out there that cater tosmall businesses as part of the
(08:49):
broader audiences that theycater to.
Not necessarily particularlywell, but they do serve small
businesses, and that includesthe large traditional banks.
You know who they are.
It includes the regional banks,but it also includes the
smaller credit unions andsmaller community banks.
Their shortcomings are that theyare not as technology advanced.
Their offering from a digitalperspective is quite lacking.
(09:10):
In most cases, you can't openan account online.
You can't do everything thatyou need online.
You don't have the range ofpayment instruments that you
need online, or the limits orthe funds availability.
Unfortunately, most smallbusinesses still need to go to
the branch at least once a weekto do anything that they need
within their account and thenanything that is requiring more
sophistication, whether it'srequiring software build or more
(09:32):
sophisticated risk management.
Small businesses are findingthat outside of their bank
account.
Just think about where they'refinding the solutions for card
acceptance and credit cardprocessing or bill pay or
invoicing or expense managementand spend management, and so
they're going to fintechs forall these solutions.
Our approach, as described, isvastly different.
(09:53):
We believe that we should offera very integrated banking
platform to include all thethings you need to run your
financials, not just the basicjobs to be done holding money,
moving money and credit to superprime, which is what the banks
do, and so that is our distinctcompetitive advantage.
In addition, we also the valuethat we offer to small
businesses that includes nomonthly fees we don't charge for
(10:16):
a lot of the typical stuff thatbanks typically do, and then we
offer yield on deposits reallysets us apart in terms of the
economic value that we offer tosmall businesses.
So that is really what sets usapart from the traditional
banking industry.
That is, for the most part,that is really the competition.
Now there are other fintechsthat do what we do.
We are the largest bankingplatform for small businesses in
(10:38):
America, so we are certainlythe leader in our category.
What sets us apart versus otherFinTech competitors is the
breadth and depth of ourplatform the breadth in terms of
the wide range of features andproducts that we offer and the
platform, our capabilities, theinfrastructural capabilities
around risk management, theoperational capabilities that we
(11:01):
have that allows us to serve atscale, I'd say those are quite
unique to us and we're moreadvanced than I would say, than
our direct competitors that arefintechs.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
Okay, okay, great.
So when you step back and lookat the industry as a whole and I
typically kind of ask thisquestion through a payments lens
, but how about maybe just froma broader financial services for
small business lens, Kind ofwhere do you see the industry
headed?
I mean, you've mentioned thatthey are really interested in
more kind of paymentscapabilities, but I'm sure
they're telling you more thingsso kind of where is that market
(11:30):
heading?
Speaker 3 (11:31):
I think that you will see more and more adoption of
branchless digital first nativesolutions and more adoption of
branchless digital first nativesolutions.
You know, when we think aboutour presence in the market,
we're doing very well andcertainly we're the leader among
the banking platforms thefintech banking platforms for
our category, but we're still adrop in the ocean compared to
the overall market Meaning.
When you look at like what isour market share overall small
(11:54):
business banking, which is $125billion market, we're still
relatively very small.
A couple of basis points we'regrowing very fast but we're
still small.
The large majority of smallbusinesses still bank with a
traditional bank.
And part of that is they're usedto the branch experience.
More and more of them and thisis part of the generational
shift that's happening arebecoming more and more used to
(12:16):
and willing to partner with afintech and, you know, basically
break free from branches, notneeding to go to the branch.
You know today's 20-year-oldbusiness owner 30-year-old
business owner as opposed totheir parent, who is now kind of
like they might be inheritingthe business and you know their
parent, who used to go to thebranch all the time to conduct
their business.
The 20, 30-year-old is aconsumer.
(12:37):
They don't go to the branchanymore they do all their
banking online and so I thinkthat will carry over and you'll
see, you know more and moreopenness to adopting digital
first-only platforms such asourselves.
That, I think, is sort of likethe constant, the broader kind
of generational theme ortechnology adoption theme.
I think within, specificallyaround payments, there's
(12:58):
certainly an expectation ofon-demand real-time payments
happening, Interestingly withsmall businesses.
I think there's some departurewith consumers, Consumers, you
see, all consumers.
Everything's on Venmo or Zelle.
Small businesses, you know,still 50% of payments are checks
.
People forget about that, butstill, you know small businesses
, like the larger businesses too, are still cutting checks.
(13:21):
I think there is a trend forthat requirement for real-time
payments.
We are expecting FedNow to berolled out more broadly.
Even ACH, to be frank, is quiteadequate.
The fact that it takes two tothree days for an electronic
payment to basically get settledit doesn't meet today's
expectation, Definitely not fromconsumers.
(13:42):
But also businesses are lookingfor more real-time and I think
that will generally happen withthe introduction of some of
these new payment rails.
I do think some peer-to-peerpayments, such as Zelle, are
becoming more prominent on thebusiness side as well, Like
you're seeing that kind of likespill over, and then
international payments.
I think that's probably kind ofthe last, maybe frontier.
(14:03):
I think that will happen aswell, where payments are
expecting the time forsettlement, the time for your
recipient to get their money, isexpected to be shortened.
People are expecting the moneyto be really kind of like
transferred in real time.
I think this will be across theboard and all the instruments
that I mentioned.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Okay, Well, it's hard to talk about the future and
not talk about AI.
So how have you seen AIimpacted your business?
Where do you think that'sheaded?
Speaker 3 (14:35):
It is definitely hard not to talk about AI these days
.
Ai is everywhere.
As an organization, we'recertainly adopting AI in several
places, from our developmentprocesses and how we code and we
build products.
Our teams are leveragingCopilot and other AI tools.
We are finding ways to adopt AIwith some of our back office
processes and some of ouradministrative processes.
Right now, all these things areinternal facing.
They're not customer facing yet.
(14:56):
But we are also thinking aboutwhere to introduce AI
functionality for our customers,and I can certainly see a world
where we offer more and morecapabilities to our customers
through AI.
The natural one is clearlywithin our chat functionality.
Today we do have chatbot, butit is mostly template based.
It's not AI driven.
That is something that we'lllikely introduce at some point
(15:16):
more agentic AI capabilities tocreate more of a conversational
experience with a customerthat's using our chatbot and
provide more robust answers andmore self-serve options, and so
that is certainly something thatwe're thinking about.
But then there's certainly likethe next kind of iteration or
kind of set of features that wethink would make sense.
You know, part of this is tocreate more of an not just
(15:37):
somebody to help you or like achatbot to help you with
questions, but really more of anadvisor, giving you advice on
what you should be doing, how tomanage your money more
effectively, how to manage yourmoney more effectively, how to
maximize your earnings on yield,thinking about your capital and
what it makes sense topotentially access capital.
So somebody there to be able toprovide you not just insights
and execution of orders but alsoadvice.
(15:59):
That I think would be reallykind of like the next frontier.
And then we're also thinkingabout features within our
offering that could be betterprovided through AI.
Are there things that we cangenerate with AI that would
benefit our customers?
We are thinking about somefunctionality there.
So no shortage of ideas.
Our team comes up with ideasall the time around.
Oh, we can do that.
(16:20):
We can do this, whether it's tocreate more efficiency
internally or also to createmore value to our customers.
And we are constantlyconsidering our roadmap and how
to embed AI within our roadmap.
Okay, okay, great.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
Well, let's switch gears a little bit and talk
about you.
Maybe walk us through yourcareer background, how you came
up with the idea, started thecompany.
Maybe walk us through thatjourney, if you don't mind.
Speaker 3 (16:42):
Yeah, happy to.
So, you know, maybe, startingfrom maybe the not so obvious I
was not in banking before, youknow, and I think maybe
sometimes, like people notworking in a certain industries,
are able to look from theoutside in and potentially
innovate where you know.
There wasn't as much innovationbefore, but wasn't in finance,
wasn't in banking like that.
Starting there, I started mycareer as an engineer.
(17:03):
I studied undergrad electricalengineering.
I started working insemiconductors.
I worked at Texas Instrumentsand algorithms and so very far
away from where I am today.
But as somebody who has startedhis career in technology and
engineering, engineers like tobuild and I still like to build
today.
That's definitely part of myDNA and part of what potentially
grabbed me to or drew me intostarting a company.
(17:26):
It's more of kind of the desireto build.
So I did that.
But then over time recognizedthat while I like technology and
I like building, I am moreinterested in the business side.
At that time I was living inIsrael.
I moved back to the US, I wentto business school, felt like I
wanted to expand myunderstanding and my experience
on more of the business side ofthings.
(17:47):
I worked in consulting for abit in my experience on more of
the business side of things.
I worked in consulting for abit and then afterwards I worked
in venture capital.
I worked at Greylock Israel.
That was a venture capital firmbased in Israel that was
investing in companies in Israeland Europe.
I moved back to Tel Aviv forthat purpose.
Greylock Israel was part ofoverall Greylock Partners, which
is a very well-known venturefirm.
This was their at the timeseparate pool of capital for
(18:10):
Israeli and European startups,and so I worked there for
several years.
That's the time that I reallykind of like fell in love with
fintech or financial technology.
Greylock was a big investor infintech companies.
We had the opportunity andsuccess investing in many
phenomenal fintech companies.
As an example, they investedand I was part of that process
(18:30):
in Marketta's seed round at thetime.
So I had the privilege ofgetting exposure to companies of
that type and at the same time,I was also always fascinated by
small businesses.
My dad was a small businessowner.
He had a physical therapyclinic in New York for over two
decades five employees rightwithin our target segment today.
By the way, around 10% of ourcustomers today are from
(18:52):
healthcare and many of them arephysical therapists, like my dad
so, growing up, had a lot ofvisibility to the pain points of
small businesses knew thatfinancial services is an area
that is not easy for them andthere's a lot of opportunity
from capital to banking, so thatis something that was always
top of mind for me.
So the combination working inventure and learning about
(19:12):
fintech and all theopportunities building fintech
companies plus the fact that Iwas passionate about small
businesses really thatcombination led me to start
thinking about where might wehave opportunities within
fintech to help small businesses, and that's how Bluevine was
born.
That was 12 years ago.
We started the company in 2023.
Started with basically aPowerPoint and an idea, and
(19:35):
that's history.
It's been 12 years since.
A lot has happened.
Over those 12 years We'veexpanded and have grown the
business to almost 500 employeesnow.
We have served over 750,000small businesses.
We managed a billion and a halfdollars in deposits.
We've lent over $16 billion.
We've provided over $16 billionof financing to small
businesses.
So we've done a lot over these12 years and I'm very proud of
(19:58):
the team.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Okay, awesome.
So what is something you'repassionate about?
Maybe one work-related passionand one personal passion.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
With work I mentioned .
You know I started my career asan engineer.
I like to build.
If I wasn't the CEO,no-transcript.
(20:30):
Not just the effort of theproduct team.
There's the broad range of thecompany tech, product, legal,
operations, team, riskmanagement, marketing.
Everybody plays a part in that.
I personally, again, I love thebuilding part and I love the
product part.
So that's something that I'mcertainly passionate about at
work, outside of my broaderpassion about small businesses
and speaking with customers.
That's why we started thecompany.
(20:51):
Personally, I mentioned I'mmarried.
I have two kids, a 13-year-oldand 16-year-old, and years go by
fast.
So whenever I have anopportunity to spend time with
them, whether they like it ornot it's a advantage.
We have a vacation planned inAugust.
We have nowhere else to go, sowe're going to be with them and
for me that is definitely, whenwe have any available time, try
(21:12):
to spend it with the family,okay great.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
So one final question If someone comes to you, maybe
they're right out of college ormaybe they're switching
industries or careers andthey're interested in financial
technology, fintech, payments-what kind of advice would you
give them to help them besuccessful?
Speaker 3 (21:32):
The number one advice I would tell them is join a
startup.
If I were in their shoes, Iwouldn't join a mature
corporation.
And the reason is when you'rejoining a startup and
potentially even a youngerstartup, the visibility that you
gain into the broader set ofconsiderations getting more
depth of understanding aroundthe different functionality
within payments, the market, theproducts and features set I
(21:55):
think you just have a broaderview.
You just have, like, moreability to do more when you're
in a startup versus when you'rea larger corporation that has
more employees and then it tendsto be more specialized and
siloed and so you don't alwaysget full visibility of
everything versus when you're ina startup.
You will learn the full valuechain.
You will learn everything.
The extent of the learningthere, I think, is probably
(22:16):
greater than going for a largerone.
Sometimes it's scary joining astartup, but I think certainly
folks earlier in their careerthe learning is there.
You're just drinking from afire hose and I think at that
time in your career that's whatyou should be optimizing for Not
pay, not necessarily the brandname of a larger company, but
the learnings in there.
It's hard to compete with thelearning in a startup.
It might feel bumpy and rockyand the learnings may not
(22:39):
necessarily be structured.
It's not like structuredtraining but I think you will
come out of it with a lot ofbenefit, that would be my advice
of benefit, that would be myadvice.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
Yeah, yeah, I love that advice and I totally agree
with you.
So before we wrap up, I justwant to kind of open the floor,
see if there's anything else youwanted to cover any final
comments.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Before we wrap up the show, I go back to small
businesses.
You know, small businesses arethe heroes of our economy, 50%
of the GDP, the largest employer, unfortunately underserved by
the traditional financial system.
And so, bluevine, we are reallykind of innovating, redefining
what banking is and delivering awhole lot of value to small
businesses.
We have built a lot over these12 years.
(23:17):
We've done a lot, very proud ofwhat we've done, we're only in
the beginning of the journey,maybe kind of top of the third.
So there's a whole lot ahead ofus and I'm really excited for
the next parts of the journey.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Okay, great.
So lot ahead of us and I'mreally excited for the next
parts of the journey Okay, great.
So thank you so much for yourtime.
Thanks for the wrap up there.
I appreciate that and, again, Iknow your time is very valuable
, so I want to thank you forbeing here and again.
Hopefully in a year or two wecan connect again and hear more
of the story about payments.
So again, thank you so much foryour time today.
I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
Thank you so much for having me.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
And to all your listeners out there.
I thank you for your time aswell, and until the next story.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
Thank you for joining us this week on the Leaders in
Payments podcast.
Make sure you visit our websiteat leadersinpaymentscom, where
you can subscribe to the showand where you'll find our show
notes.
If you enjoyed listening,please share on your social
channels as well.
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