The Architecture of Ambition
Welcome to this week’s edition, where we look beyond the surface of financial transactions to the systems quietly rewriting the rules of the game. In this issue, we dive deep into the “Liquidity Revolution” with Frank Schwab, exploring how a $100 trillion opportunity in tokenized real-world assets is finally moving from theory to transformative practice.
We also sit down for an exclusive Q&A with Eric-Jan Krausch, whose vision for embedded finance is turning corporate payments from a back-office necessity into a strategic engine for scale. Complementing these perspectives, Samarth Shekhar brings us surgical analysis on the firms—Steward and Theia Insights—that are building the data ontologies of tomorrow. Finally, we celebrate a formidable wave of venture financing, highlighting the visionaries who have secured the capital to turn bold ideas into global infrastructure.
Innovation is not just about the tools we build, but the clarity with which we see the future. Join us as we explore the pioneers guiding the way.
A Q&A with Eric-Jan Krausch on Redefining Corporate Payments Through Embedded Finance
Corporate payments are no longer just a back-office function — they sit at the heart of how companies operate, scale, and make decisions. Yet behind most B2B transactions, the infrastructure remains fragmented, manual, and largely invisible.
1-Click Procurement is part of a new wave of fintechs challenging that invisibility. By rethinking how data, payments, and purchasing connect at the moment a transaction happens, the company is quietly reshaping how enterprises interact with commerce itself.
In this Q&A, we explore with Eric-Jan Krausch the thinking behind their approach, the shifts redefining B2B finance, and why the future of corporate payments will be built less around tools — and more around intelligent, embedded systems.
1. Tell us about yourself and your co-founder(s).
Alabbas (CTO) and I (CEO) are a proven repeat team. We spent years together at my first startup, Acomodeo, where we solved complex payment and process issues for over 40 multinational clients, eventually leading to a successful exit in 2021. We aren’t just looking for a problem to solve; we are returning to a pain point we know intimately. We’ve seen firsthand how broken B2B transactions stifle growth, and we have the technical and operational history to fix it for good.
Deal Highlights
Steward targets a high-friction, high-cost problem—AML/ KYC for complex investor structures—where buyers have real urgency and willingness to pay. Its end-to-end workflow it closer to a system of record, which can drive stickiness, recurring usage, and potential data/network effects over time. Given their targets are sophisticated investors, this could be a strong wedge in a segment where generic compliance tools often struggle.
Steward, a New York and London, UK–based AI-first compliance platform, has raised $5 million in funding…Steward is an AI-first AML platform purpose-built for complex investor onboarding and ongoing monitoring. Designed to handle complex investor structures, Steward unifies document collection, screening, risk assessment, and ongoing monitoring into a single workflow. Trusted with over $100 billion in investor assets, Steward enables firms to onboard sophisticated investors—including fund-of-funds, family offices, and cross-border entities—with speed and accuracy. Headquartered in New York and London, Steward serves private markets funds, banks, brokers, and institutional allocators.
Theia addresses a foundational problem in financial markets—outdated industry classification—and aims to build a core data/ ontology layer that could become the standard for research, portfolio construction, and AI systems. It has the potential to get embedded across workflows, especially as AI-driven investing scales, and improve how capital is allocated.
UK deeptech Theia Insights raises $8m Series A…The problem Theia solves is deceptively simple. Financial markets do not have a real-time, accurate map of the economy. Every bank, asset manager and index provider relies on static classification systems that assign each company a single industry label.
A company like Microsoft is labelled “software.” It stays “software” whether it becomes the backbone of global cloud infrastructure, builds a major AI platform, or operates a large gaming ecosystem. In a world where companies span multiple industries simultaneously – and where that changes with every earnings call, acquisition or product launch – these single-label classifications are dangerously out of date.
Read on for more on the founders and investors in the news last week. If you are building or backing “what’s next in finance” and want to spread the word with our network of 20K+, reach out to Samarth Shekhar or Frank Schwab.
Unlocking the $100 Trillion Opportunity – The Liquidity Revolution
by Frank Schwab
The next era of banking growth won’t be found in new products, but in “unfreezing” the old ones.
For decades, some of the world’s most valuable assets—commercial real estate, private equity, fine art, and infrastructure—have been trapped in a “liquidity deep-freeze.” They are valuable on paper, but slow, expensive, and opaque to trade.
As we cross into 2026, the Tokenization of Real-World Assets (RWA) has officially hit its inflection point. We are no longer talking about “crypto experiments”; we are talking about the Digital Transformation of Capital.
VENTURE FINANCING
M1X Global raises $3m to scale on-chain sovereign finance
M1X Global, a sovereign financial infrastructure and technology company operating under a public-private partnership with the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), has announced its public launch and the close of an oversubscribed $3m angel round.
The funding, which spans strategic investments and grants, will support platform development and accelerate institutional adoption of USDM1 — the first fully collateralised sovereign debt instrument issued natively on blockchain infrastructure.
Proceeds will also fund pilot programmes with derivatives and capital markets participants, as well as continued development of M1X Global’s platform for sovereign issuers operating in on-chain markets.
… M1X Global builds infrastructure that enables governments to issue and manage financial instruments natively on-chain while maintaining compatibility with global institutional frameworks.
https://fintech.global/2026/03/25/m1x-global-raises-3m-to-scale-on-chain-sovereign-finance/
Steward Raises $5 Million in Funding
Steward, a New York and London, UK–based AI-first compliance platform, has raised $5 million in funding.
Investors
The round was led by Motive Partners, with participation from Outward VC, Cooley, and several prominent angel investors, including Shai Wininger and Mark Ransford.
Motive Partners is a private investment firm exclusively focused on financial technology and technology-enabled business services companies, investing from early-stage ventures to growth equity and buyouts across North America and Europe. The firm invests across five subsectors: banking & payments, capital markets, data & analytics, insurance, and wealth and asset management. With offices in New York, London, and Berlin, the firm provides differentiated insight, connectivity, and capabilities to create long-term value in financial technology companies.
https://www.thesaasnews.com/news/steward-raises-5-million-in-funding
Stablecoin startup Payy, focused on private transactions, raises $6 million in seed funding
Payy, a stablecoin startup focused on private transactions using zero-knowledge technology, has raised $6 million in a seed funding round led by FirstMark Capital.
The startup pivoted from Polybase in 2023 and now offers a wallet and a Visa card, while developing a privacy-focused stablecoin payments network.
Stablecoin startup Payy has raised $6 million in a seed funding round as it is building a privacy-focused payments network using zero-knowledge technology.
The round was led by FirstMark Capital, an early backer of Airbnb, Shopify, and Pinterest, and included participation from Robot Ventures and DBA Crypto, Payy said Wednesday.
https://www.theblock.co/amp/post/395106/stablecoin-startup-payy-funding-private-transactions
UK deeptech Theia Insights raises $8m Series A
Theia Insights, a Cambridge-based deeptech whose technology is used by global index providers, asset managers, hedge funds and banks, has raised $8 million in Series A funding. The round was led by MiddleGame Ventures, an early-stage fintech fund, with participation from Further Ventures and Unusual Ventures, bringing total funding to $14.5 million to date.
Named after the Greek goddess of sight, Theia was built on a simple premise: that financial markets cannot allocate capital well if they cannot first see the economy clearly.
The problem Theia solves is deceptively simple. Financial markets do not have a real-time, accurate map of the economy. Every bank, asset manager and index provider relies on static classification systems that assign each company a single industry label.
https://www.finextra.com/pressarticle/109301/uk-deeptech-theia-insights-raises-8m-series-a
Ironlight Group Raises $21 Million Series A to Expand Infrastructure for Tokenized Securities
Ironlight Group, Inc. (“Ironlight”), a financial technology company developing infrastructure for tokenized securities, today announced the close of its $21 million Series A financing.
The round was backed by senior Wall Street and financial services executives, including Greg Braca, former President and CEO of TD Bank, alongside institutional investors such as Sei Development Foundation and Laidlaw Private Equity.
Proceeds will be used to scale Ironlight Markets’ ATS which integrates issuance, distribution, and trading, and Ironlight Technologies which provides the platform and settlement options for tokenized securities. Ironlight Markets’ ATS is operated pursuant to SEC Regulation ATS and FINRA oversight.
Worth Raises $30 Million in Series A Funding to Fuel Record Growth
Worth, the fintech platform modernizing onboarding and underwriting Small and Medium-sized Businesses (SMB) for Financial Institutions, has successfully closed a $30 million Series A funding round led by Fulcrum Equity Partners, with participation from Amex Ventures and TTV Capital. The investment underscores the company’s continued momentum as it reshapes the infrastructure powering financial services’ most critical decisions.
Slow, fragmented underwriting and onboarding processes for SMBs can be a challenge when applying for financial services. While consumers can be approved for credit and financial tools and services in seconds, small business owners are stuck in workflows that take days or even weeks. Worth is becoming a leader by solving these pain points with patented crosswalking technology that enables the highest match rates across business identity in real time, allowing institutions to confidently onboard customers in seconds.
After pivoting, Y Combinator grad Glimpse raises $35M led by a16z
Dispute-tracking fintech Glimpse announced Wednesday that it raised a $35 million Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from 8VC and Y Combinator.
Founders Akash Raju, Anuj Mehta, and Kushal Negi, attended Purdue together and were initially building a startup that did Airbnb product placements. That company launched in 2020, but by 2024, the founders pivoted to a wholly new idea: Glimpse, a platform that helps retailers automate financial deduction processes.
It raised a $10 million round last year, led by 8VC, after the business pivot, which it called a Series A round at the time. It is now calling this fresh $35 million a Series A round, and rebranding its previous Series A as a seed round. The company has raised $52 million to date, including funding they raised before they pivoted.
Spade Announces $40m Series B Raise to Build The Data and AI Platform for Modern Finance
Spade, the data and AI platform transforming how financial institutions use transaction data, today announced $40 million in Series B funding. The round was led by Oak HC/FT, with participation by Andreessen Horowitz, Flourish, Gradient, NAventures, National Bank of Canada’s corporate venture arm, and Y Combinator. Spade will use the new funding to further deepen platform capabilities, expand the team and meet growing demand from financial institutions and fintechs that rely on Spade’s foundational enhanced transaction data to power AI initiatives.
Spade was founded in 2021 to help banks and fintechs parse through their messy transaction data so that it can be turned into actionable insights. Every day, banks and fintechs process billions of transactions across card programs, ACH, and wires, yet the underlying data remains notoriously difficult to use.
GeoWealth Extends Series C Round With $42.5 Million Strategic Investment From Goldman Sachs
GeoWealth, a proprietary technology and turnkey asset management platform (TAMP), today announced it has expanded its Series C financing to include a $42.5 million minority investment from Goldman Sachs to support its rapid momentum with an additional growth investment, while also providing liquidity to shareholders. With the latest investment, GeoWealth’s family office owner, The Globe Resources Group, retains majority ownership, while Apollo, BlackRock, J.P. Morgan Asset Management and Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors (sub-advised by Composition Capital) remain minority investors.
Serving registered investment advisors (RIAs) nationwide, GeoWealth attributes its growth to strong demand from large enterprise RIAs, early success with its new custom model portfolio partnerships, and deeper relationships with existing RIA partners.
TradingHub Secures Strategic Investment From Nordic Capital to Accelerate Next Phase of Growth
TradingHub, a leading provider of trade surveillance technology for global financial institutions, has agreed to partner with Nordic Capital which will become the company’s majority shareholder. The investment marks a significant milestone in TradingHub’s journey and provides strong backing to support the company’s continued growth and innovation. Existing investor Summit Partners and TradingHub’s co-founder Neil Walker will continue to hold minority positions in the company following the close of the transaction.
With the support of Nordic Capital, TradingHub will accelerate its expansion across global markets while continuing to invest in the development of its trade surveillance platform. The company plans to further strengthen its capabilities across asset classes, including equities, and continue its expansion into new markets and geographies.
M&A
iCapital Acquires Hexure
iCapital, a NYC-based provider of fintech and investment lifecycle management solutions, acquired Hexure, a Colorado Springs, Colorado-based provider of digital and AI-powered sales automation solutions for insurance and wealth management.
The amount of the deal was not disclosed.
With the deal, iCapital will expand its reach into the insurance ecosystem by creating the industry’s first integrated annuity and insurance technology platform.
Led by CEO Bill Lucchini, Hexure advances digital sales workflows through its FireLight and ForeSight technologies, which automate illustrations and e-applications for carriers and distributors to speed up time-to-market and eliminate paper processes.
Led by Chairman and CEO Lawrence Calcano, iCapital provides a global platform for alternative and structured investments, managing over $1.14 trillion in assets while utilizing AI to streamline the investment lifecycle for thousands of financial professionals.
https://www.finsmes.com/2026/03/icapital-acquires-hexure.html
Forward Motion
As we close this week’s briefing, one thing becomes clear: the “future of finance” is no longer a distant horizon—it is being constructed in real-time by the founders and investors featured in these pages. From sovereign debt on-chain to AI-driven compliance, the friction of the past is rapidly giving way to a more liquid, transparent, and intelligent global economy.
Thank you for being part of this journey. We hope these insights serve as both a compass and a catalyst for your own projects. Until next week, stay curious, stay bold, and keep building the systems that inspire us all.