Struck is a founder-first capital for innovative entrepreneurs. It leads seed investments sourced idiosyncratically through its robust network. The firm was founded in 2014 and is based in Santa Monica, California.

Struck Capital

Social Leverage is a Venture Capital firm which specializes in early-stage and seed-stage investments in the Software, Consumer, and Fintech industries.   Their investment selection process combines fundamental business evaluation, supported by two decades of domain experience building, valuing, and selling companies, with a strong deal flow pipeline consisting of top-ranked VC / PE funds, exceptional entrepreneurs and innovative management teams.  Social Leverage uses these value drivers to invest in the best capital light companies with a viable product, serving a large addressable market, and solving a known pain point.  Notable investments include Robinhood, Kustomer, Angellist, Wag, EToro, and Ticketfly.

Social Leverage

Lightspeed Venture Partners is a venture capital firm that engages in consumer, enterprise, technology, and cleantech markets. It focuses on seed, early-stage, later-stage, expansion-stage, start-ups, growth companies, and incubation, and specializes in debt financing for start-ups and growth companies. Lightspeed Venture Partners invests in various sectors that include enterprise, consumer, big data, bitcoin, enterprise technology, cleantech, mobile, internet, financial technology, cloud solutions, e-commerce, storage, media, networking, energy, and software, software-as-a-service, information technology, biotechnology, and social. It mainly invests in countries such as the United States, Europe, Israel, China, and India.

Lightspeed Venture Partners

Sound Ventures is a venture capital firm. The company seeks to invest in the technology sector.

Sound Ventures

Payitoff

Payitoff is a debt infrastructure company that provides a variety of services to assist fintechs, workplace providers, and financial institutions in saving the average customer $240 per month on their student loans.

Payitoff is a consumer debt infrastructure company that provides tools and solutions for financial institutions, fintech companies, and financial wellness providers to help their customers manage debt. The company's platform evaluates loans categorically and develops optimal repayment schedules for borrowers. Its core product is a white-labeled solution that can be embedded into banking and fintech platforms, offering users a comprehensive view of their financial profile. The software enables users to link their debt accounts and receive automated guidance on repayment options. As of 2024, users who link their accounts and qualify for federal repayment plans save an average of USD 323 per month. The platform features end-to-end encryption to safeguard user information and requires only basic information such as phone number, date of birth, and zip code to connect users with their loan servicers. The company has processed over USD 1.5 billion in loan volume across 215,000+ loans.

MyEarnup

Introducing Payitoff's Find My Servicer: Empowering Banks and Fintech to Locate Student Loan Servicers for the 65% of Borrowers Affected by Changes — Payitoff ⟡ Intelligent Debt Guidance Solutions

The student loan crisis is looming. Payitoff can help.

Payitoff ⟡ Intelligent Debt Guidance Solutions

Automating Debt Repayment with Bobby Matson of Payitoff

Fintechs pitch banks with solutions to help consumers deal with debt

Payitoff CEO, spouse became ‘walking testimonial’ for student debt management

Helping employers provide personalized, high-touch, and holistic financial wellness tools to their entire workforce.

Financial Wellness Tools

Array purchases Payitoff to expand private-label portfolio with consumer debt management tools

Payitoff is a consumer debt infrastructure company that provides intelligent debt guidance solutions for financial institutions, fintechs, and financial wellness providers. Founded in 2017 by Bobby Matson in New York City, Payitoff offers API infrastructure and tools to automate debt management, with a primary focus on student loans. The company's technology allows partners to help borrowers save an average of USD 240-USD 340 per month on their debt payments. Payitoff's platform enables users to link their debt accounts, receive personalized guidance on repayment strategies, and take actions to optimize their debt management within their financial institution's app or website. The company's solutions cover various types of consumer debt, including student loans, credit cards, mortgages, auto loans, and personal loans. Payitoff's technology includes features such as loan aggregation, real-time balance updates, and automated enrollment in federal repayment programs. The company has expanded its team to 20 employees working across the US as of 2022.
Key customers and partnerships
Payitoff works with a range of financial institutions, including banks, credit unions, and fintechs. Some of its notable partners include US Bancorp, SoFi Technologies, Bilt Rewards, Splash Financial, and Happy Money. The company also partnered with LendKey to offer a tool for educating federal student loan borrowers on their options. In July 2023, Payitoff introduced its Find My Servicer tool, which allows financial institutions and fintech companies to help their customers locate their student loan servicers quickly.

Payitoff is a consumer debt infrastructure company that provides tools and solutions for financial institutions, fintech companies, and financial wellness providers to help their customers manage debt. The company's platform evaluates loans categorically and develops optimal repayment schedules for borrowers. Its core product is a white-labeled solution that can be embedded into banking and fintech platforms, offering users a comprehensive view of their financial profile. The software enables users to link their debt accounts and receive automated guidance on repayment options. As of 2024, users who link their accounts and qualify for federal repayment plans save an average of USD 323 per month. The platform features end-to-end encryption to safeguard user information and requires only basic information such as phone number, date of birth, and zip code to connect users with their loan servicers. The company has processed over USD 1.5 billion in loan volume across 215,000+ loans.Key customers and partnershipsPayitoff's client base includes major financial institutions and fintech companies such as US Bank, Earnest, and LendKey. In February 2024, US Bank implemented Payitoff's solutions to help its customers navigate student loan repayment options. In October 2023, Earnest partnered with Payitoff to launch its Student Loan Manager, a tool providing personalized repayment plan recommendations. The company also joined Mastercard's Start Path Open Banking and Embedded Finance startup engagement program in June 2023 to support the democratization of financial services.

Based in the UK, Salary Finance offers a comprehensive suite of financial well-being benefits for employees. The company partners with employers to offer a platform that provides employees with access to a range of financial well-being products, including salary-backed loans, earned wage advances, savings accounts, and customized educational resources to help them build and automate savings as well as improve their overall financial well-being.In April 2024, the US operations of Salary Finance merged with the financial wellness benefit platform <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/609722">Finfit</a>. The combined entity now operates under the FinFit brand in the US.Key customers and partnershipsAs of February 2024, the platform was used by 600 employers across the UK, available to more than 4.5 million employees. These include more than a fifth of the companies in the FTSE-100 index. Its notable customers include the NHS, Dunelm, Virgin Active, and Simply Health.Salary Finance partnered with the American financial technology company Chime in July 2021, to launch Save—a new product to incentivize US employees to set up a salary-linked savings account with Chime, and become entitled to a USD 50 bonus and a variable Annual Percentage Yield (APY) of 0.50%.

Salary Finance

Payactiv offers a financial wellness solution, centered around "Earned-Wage Access," allowing employees to access their wages before payday. Employees can instantly access funds for hours worked, with options to transfer to their bank, load onto a Payactiv card, or withdraw cash at Walmart. Its app works as a digital wallet and includes additional features such as AI and machine-learning-based tools for budgeting, tracking savings, managing spending and bills, and obtaining personalized one-on-one financial coaching from trained professionals.The Payactiv app also features a free communication tool—Payactiv Connect—that enables employers and employees to connect for HR communications, company news, alerts, and shift scheduling.Key customers and partnershipsAs of November 2023, PayActiv’s platform was used by employees at over 4,000 businesses from industries such as retail and food services across the US, with some customers in Canada, Australia, the Philippines, and Brazil. Its clients include Walmart, Wayfair, Ibex Global and several others. It also entered into a partnership with US Bank in February 2022, where users of prepaid US Bank Focus Cards for payroll will be able to access their wages early.The company also has working partnerships with payment processors such as <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/23004">Fiserv</a> and <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/13061">Visa</a> to enable real-time transfer of earned wages to bank accounts of employees.

PayActiv

Based In the UK, Wagestream provides a financial wellness platform, offering a range of services including earned wage access, financial education, tools for savings, and pay and spend tracking. Wagestream’s tools are offered to employees through a mobile app, with an analytics platform for employers to monitor participation and financial resilience of staff.Employees can access their earned wages using the app by paying a flat fee of GBP 1.95 (USD 2.50) per withdrawal. The company’s platform has integrations with several payroll and timekeeping systems, enabling organizations to deploy Wagestream into their payroll process.Wagestream acquired 1) Australian earned-wage access startup Earnd in March 2021 to enter into the Australian market. 2) a credit card startup Keebos, in October 2023, to integrate Keebos credit score building platform (that uses open banking data) with Wagestream’s core offerings.Key customers and partnershipsAs of February 2024, Wagestream had a global user base of more than 3 million, which included more than 1,000 corporate customers in industries such as the retail, hospitality, and healthcare sectors. The company has offices in the US, UK, Spain, and Australia and some notable employers include Burger King, Pizza Hut, Crate &amp; Barrel, Bupa, University of Chicago, Popeyes, and National Health Service UK.The company also partnered with French Insuretch provider Wakam in August 2023, to introduce income protection coverage to its users.

Wagestream

Cleo offers tools for budgeting, and provides personalized spending and savings advice by connecting to a user's bank account and applying machine learning algorithms to analyze spending habits and transaction history. The app also provides access to an interactive chatbot which users can query to obtain on-demand suggestions (which has been supported by an in-house large language model since 2023).&nbsp;The platform also offers additional features such as a secured card to build credit score, direct debits, and salary advances.Cleo operates a subscription-based pricing on its budgeting and savings tools, with fee-based pricing on its cash advance offerings targeted at gig workers and workers with poor credit. The platform charges monthly subscription fees in the range of USD 1.99 - 5.99 on Cleo Plus offering and charges USD 10.99-14.99 on Cleo build offering.Cleo’s target market is the Gen-Z segment of the population and as of October 2023, the company had 7 million users, (up from 4 million in December 2020) and had USD 72.3 million annual recurring revenue (which was up 2.4x YoY)

Cleo

FinFit offers a financial wellness benefit platform for employers that uses predictive AI, and includes tools for employees to budget, track spending, set savings goals and obtain personalized financial assessments. The platform also provides access to certified financial counselors to obtain one-on-one financial advice. In addition to financial coaching, the company also offers services such as tools to manage student loan debt, get early access to earned wages, and obtain low-cost short-term loans backed by the employee’s salary. In April 2023, Fitfit merged with the US operations of UK-based financial wellness platform <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/342361">Salary Finance</a>. The two companies aim to launch a combined platform in the US under the Finfit brand.FinFit operates a subscription-based pricing model, and charges employers in the range of USD 0.30–1.00 per employee per month based on the size of the organizations and number of employees. The platform also generates revenue through interest income by charging users interest in the range of 7.9%–24.9% APR on its loans. It charges fixed interest on its lines of credit.As of March 2024, FinFit was reported to be serving more than 500,000 employees (up from 150,000 in 2020).Key customers and partnershipsIn September 2024, FinFit <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/33696">partnered with</a> <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/945256">Sunny Day Fund</a>, a financial support platform, to offer emergency savings accounts for employees through its SafetyNet platform. In August 2024, FinFit <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/32581">partnered with</a> <a href="https://sp-edge.com/companies/493140">isolved</a>, a human capital management platform, to expand product reach.

FinFit

Offers end-to-end financial wellness solutions ranging from educational resources to interactive platforms/tools for managing finances as well as access to registered investment advisors.

Provides a platform for employees, through their employers, to access earned wages or obtain emergency interest-free funds/loans, which are settled through their paycheck.

Provides a platform for employers to provide resources such as tools and advice to manage employee debt (with an increased focus on student loan debt).

Apps and platforms that allow consumers to obtain personalized financial advice, automate savings, create budgets, and track and manage spending.

Offers interactive platforms/tools for employers to provide personalized financial education resources and/or coaching to its employees.

Solutions that enable companies to offer and manage employee-sponsored emergency savings accounts through automated payroll deductions.

Platforms for employers to support employees with other debts such as mortgages, credit card debt, etc. through repayment assistance, refinancing options, and automated administrative processes.

Operates a B2B SaaS model to support employers with offering various fringe benefits to employees

Payitoff

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