We grouped and analyzed the product launches, strategic partnerships, and subsequent expansion plans that Mastercard made public in the last 15 days judging by a couple of high level topics that distinguished themselves when looking at the big picture.
On 10 October 2022 - Mastercard has announced the launch of cloud-based analytics platform Global Treasury Intelligence. The new analytics platform will reportedly enable organisations to execute more effective and sustainable financial strategies, and support corporate priorities such as cash management, risk assessment, and ESG goals.
The analytics platform will be available to customers in most markets around the world, with users being able to view a digital interactive preview of the service beforehand.
Mastercard Global Treasury Intelligence was developed in collaboration with Robobai, a provider of source-to-settle analytics with nearly USD 1 trillion dollars of spend under management.
Earlier in 3 October, Mastercard announced partnerships to help small business cardholders optimise business operations, increase cybersecurity, and unlock insurance benefits for employees
According to the card scheme, whoever owned or signed up for a Mastercard BusinessCard and World Elite Mastercard for Business, immediately also signed up for benefits from Mastercard partners such as limited-time offers for Adobe Creative Cloud subscriptions, free trials for McAfee cybersecurity tools, discounts for shipping services on Uber Freight or on the Uber Business service, along with multiple other benefits offered by services such as Stride or ShopRunner.
There is a clear indication of a multiple-level approach to customer-centricity when it comes to Mastercard’s client roster.
Just at the end of September, Mastercard announced its desire to ‘how up for America’s small businesses like they’ve been showing up for communities across the country’, through expanding one of its signature small business initiatives into new territory. Mastercard set up shop with Strive USA, a new effort under the Strive banner of global programmes led by the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth.
But the global card scheme did not keep the inclusion programmes within the confines of the US. Most recently, on 11 October, Mastercard has announced a strategic investment in Nclude, a fintech focused VC investment platform launched in partnership with Egypt’s national banks - Banque Misr, National Bank of Egypt and Banque Du Caire - to further boost Egypt’s fintech ecosystem and support the country’s digital transformation journey.
It is no secret that Mastercard has been on top of the opportunity offered by embedded finance this year, with a cited estimated market value set to hit USD 7 trillion over the next 10 years within the same blog post.
Most recently, the way Mastercard acted on riding this wave has been through two relevant partnerships in the field.
Embedded finance platform Railsr and DND Finance, a commercial equipment finance provider, teamed at the end of September 2022 to launch the Score Credit Mastercard.
Branded as the Score Credit Mastercard by DND, it is aimed at personal users and business owners with a less-than-perfect credit record, including entrepreneurs and students. DND uses the Railsr platform for its UK Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS), licensing and card services.
Two days later, US-based fintech Inswitch announced a partnership with Mastercard International to design and deliver digital payment solutions and issuing programmes.
Inswitch would start issuing cards as a Mastercard principal member in Mexico, with plans to expand to key markets in LAC and other regions in the future. Mastercard’s officials said that they are happy to have Inswitch as a Mastercard issuer in Mexico to integrate issuing capabilities and extend the value proposition to all B2C and B2B clients for Inswitch and Mastercard. Inswitch is a company that combines payments, core banking, and issuing products in a single stack that facilities all companies to develop and launch financial services in multiple markets.
Mastercard has been putting a Spotlight on Asia-Pacific for quite a while (which makes sense, considering we are talking about a continent with a credit card penetration of over 50-60% in its Southeast space and Australia.
Global Data estimates that the credit and charge cards market in Asia-Pacific is poised to register a significant growth of 13.7% in 2022, supported by recovery in economic conditions, rising consumer disposable income, and growing preference towards electronic payments. With an estimated USD 12.7 trillion in 2022, the market is expected to grow further at a CAGR of 9.5% over 2022-25 to reach USD 16.7 trillion in 2025.
Late September Mastercard and TripLink have expanded their partnership across the entire Asia Pacific region to provide businesses with convenient cross-border transactions. The two companies will reportedly bolster their partnership from Hong Kong to Asia Pacific by launching a seamless cross-border payment experience for businesses to enhance travel recovery. TripLink can now issue virtual cards for its Asia Pacific businesses and suppliers, particularly when it comes to the tourism sector.
According to traveldailynews.asia cited by The Paypers, the tourism industry is going through a surge of B2B payment needs as sales take place in various foreign currencies. Mastercard’s solution with TripLink aims to simplify the sales process.
Continuing its financial inclusion focus, the regional programme aims to digitally upskill gig economy workers and small businesses in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. The collaboration is part of the aforementioned Strive Community, the global philanthropic initiative developed by the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth and Caribou Digital.
The programme includes the launch of two online business courses for Grab’s driver and delivery-partners aspiring to start new businesses, and small business owners seeking to grow in a competitive digital economy.
The crypto and NFT world in its most legitimate and appealing light has become increasingly hard to ignore as a trend. Especially for Mastercard.
A few weeks ago, hi, a crypto and fiat financial app, has launched a debit card featuring NFT avatar customization, in partnership with Mastercard. As consumer interest in crypto and NFTs continues to grow, Mastercard expressed its intent to make them an accessible payments choice for the communities who wish to use them.
The hi Debit Card is available in six variants with a range of benefits, depending on membership tier at hi. Membership is obtained by staking hi’s token and starts at less than the equivalent of 10 Euros.
But it’s not all NFTs and butterflies. At the beginning of October, Mastercard debuted a new piece of software called Crypto Secure, which helps banks identify and cut off transactions from fraud-prone crypto exchanges.
The system uses artificial intelligence algorithms to determine the risk of crime associated with crypto exchanges on the Mastercard payment network. It relies on data from the blockchain, a public record of crypto transactions, as well as other sources.
Mastercard is launching the service powered by CipherTrace against a backdrop of growing crime in the nascent digital asset market. The amount of crypto entering wallets with known criminal connections surged to a record USD 14 billion in 2021, according to data from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis cited by The Paypers. And 2022 has seen a spate of high-profile hacks and scams targeting crypto investors.
Most recently, Mastercard has partnered with global technical body EMVco to develop the first cards for issuers that are compatible with the new EMVCo contactless specifications designed to protect against attacks from both traditional and quantum computers.
The new cards are designed to remain compatible with existing acceptance, network, and issuer infrastructure and are available from Giesecke+Devrient and Thales. Mastercard mentioned in its official release that it intends to continue to partner with card manufacturers and will work with its customers to set the pace of transition to these new cards in 2023 and beyond.
Mastercard explained that their experts have long been exploring the potential impact of quantum computing, and in January 2021 the company introduced quantum-resistant Enhanced Contactless specifications. To support their strategy, the card scheme cited Juniper Research data according to which the number of contactless payment devices will surpass 12.5 billion by 2027 with the value of contactless payment transactions expected to reach USD 10 trillion globally by that time.
On 6 October, Mastercard and Ravelin, a UK-based machine learning (ML) fraud platform, have joined forces to deliver a new fraud prevention solution.
Incorporating digital identity verification capabilities from Ekata and real-time fraud insights from Ethoca, Ravelin will help merchants validate a consumer’s identity without adding friction to the process.
Combining ML and graph network visualisation, Ravelin helps businesses draw deeper insights from their customer data to detect fraud, account takeover, and promotion abuse, and increase payment acceptance.
Ecommerce card payments are Mastercard’s bread and butter. It fits right that the global card scheme would complete its strategy in the last couple of weeks with partnerships that will expand its presence and product portfolio, especially in the US market.
Co-brand card issuer Chase has partnered with Mastercard and local commerce platform DoorDash in early October in order to launch the DoorDash Rewards Mastercard. The credit card will allow members to save and earn rewards on purchases both on and off the DoorDash platform.
According to Chase representatives cited by mastercard.com, Chase and DoorDash have worked together since 2020, and DoorDash’s first-ever credit card is aimed at clients who want to earn more where they are spending, whether that’s ordering from DoorDash itself or spending in-person at a neighbourhood store.
Simultaneously, ride-hailing operator Uber has partnered up with Marqeta, Mastercard, and Branch to launch Uber Pro Card. An expansion of the Uber Pro driver loyalty programme, the Uber Pro Card offers drivers up to 10% cashback on gas purchases when they achieve Diamond status as an Uber Pro driver.
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