This Week in B2B: Financial Infrastructure Innovation Gets Its Due

B2B payments are no longer just about moving money — they’re about unlocking new financial infrastructure possibilities for businesses worldwide.

Today’s innovations in financial infrastructure are transforming how businesses operate, compete and grow. From embedded finance to real-time treasury technology, companies must prioritize adaptability and simplicity to thrive in today’s B2B landscape.

Businesses are increasingly finding that outdated finance and payments systems, once tolerated as a necessary burden, are no longer sufficient. Instead, they are turning to advanced tools and technologies that promise to eliminate inefficiencies, reduce costs and enhance their ability to adapt to market changes.

The transformation of financial infrastructure is far from over. As the top trends this week reveal, with businesses continuing to adopt tools that prioritize adaptability and simplicity, the focus is increasingly on integration — ensuring that these technologies work together seamlessly to support broader business goals.

Financial Innovations Streamlining Operations and Cutting Costs

One of the most immediate impacts of financial infrastructure innovation is operational efficiency. By digitizing invoicing and payment workflows, companies can work to reduce administrative overhead and speed up cash flow cycles.

Treasury departments, too, are seeing the benefits. By the end of 2024, Bank of America’s corporate clients will have made over $1 trillion in payment approvals on the bank’s CashPro App, the financial giant said Tuesday (Dec. 10).

“Clients say they start their day and end their day with CashPro,” Jennifer Sanctis, head of the CashPro App and personalized technologies in Global Payments Solutions at Bank of America, told PYMNTS. “The mobile app has become an instrumental part of their workflow.”

Many companies continue to depend on complicated and error-prone manual accounts payable (AP) workflows that cause widespread disruption throughout the business, according to the PYMNTS Intelligence and Finexio collaboration, “The Strategic Role of AI in Accounts Payable.”

Against that backdrop, FISCAL Technologies and Proservartner partnered to offer tools and consultancy services designed to help organizations reduce payment errors, supplier fraud and inefficiencies within procure-to-pay (P2P) processes. The collaboration brings together FISCAL’s artificial intelligence (AI)-driven forensic software and Proservartner’s expertise in process automation and operational transformation, the companies said Friday (Dec. 6).

News also came Thursday (Dec. 12) that Mesh Payments has selected SoFi Bank as its sponsor bank and continues to partner with SoFi Technologies-owned Galileo Financial Technologies as its longtime payments processor. This partnership integrates Mesh Payments’ expense and card infrastructure with SoFi Bank’s financial framework and Galileo’s customizable API-based payments processing platform.

Elsewhere, payment technology company FlexPoint has launched an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered system that processes automated clearing house payments the same day instead of the typical five-day wait, using AI to assess transaction risks. The system connects to the Federal Reserve’s FedNow® Service infrastructure to process ACH payments, FlexPoint said in a Thursday (Dec. 12) press release. The expansion of same-day ACH capabilities could impact small- to medium-sized businesses that rely on electronic transfers for their operations.

Empowering SMBs Through Financial Innovation

Tools designed with simplicity and affordability in mind are enabling SMBs to access capabilities once reserved for large enterprises.

Mynt, a spend management solution focused on Nordic small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), raised 22 million euros (about $23 million) in a Series B funding round. It will use the capital to fuel its next phase of growth and its planned expansion into the United Kingdom and other European markets, the company said Wednesday (Dec. 11).

Elsewhere, Intuit’s QuickBooks will become Amazon’s preferred partner for financial management solutions integrated directly into its site, where Amazon sellers manage their businesses. When integrated into Amazon Seller Central, QuickBooks will help these sellers manage their finances, stay compliant, access capital and grow their business, the companies said Monday (Dec. 9).

News broke on Wednesday (Dec. 11) that financial platform Loop, in collaboration with EQ Bank, launched the Loop Global Visa Card to enable small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) to spend and settle credit balances in multiple currencies.

It is one example of firms looking to expand internationally turning to currency matching to do so, which was why PYMNTS unpacked how innovations in currency matching, as well as a shift toward virtual cards, are emerging as a critical lever for companies looking to unlock competitive advantages in the high-stakes arena of global expansion and growth.

Dynamic B2B Workflow Innovations

As financial systems become more agile and interconnected, the competitive landscape is shifting. Companies that embrace these innovations may be those that find themselves better positioned to respond to market disruptions, improve customer experiences and drive long-term growth.

A PYMNTS Intelligence report, “CFOs Want Virtual Cards in Their Toolkits,” explores how companies plan to increase their use of virtual cards in the next year, driven by a need for managing unplanned expenses and managing economic uncertainty. More than half (56%) say virtual cards are key for managing financial flexibility.

As it relates to other innovations, micropayments that leverage embedded finance or pay by bank for high-frequency, low-value transactions are emerging as an attractive alternative to traditional rails that are ill-suited to the economics of smaller payment volumes.

Savvy B2B executives are also wising up to the idea that artificial intelligence (AI) is emerging as a force in procurement. Yet, for all its promise, one critical factor can be overlooked by firms rushing to slap the latest technology on their procurement workflows: data quality.

Still, with innovation comes risk, and the increasing digitization of financial infrastructure has drawn the attention of cybercriminals. As 2025 nears, embracing a consortium approach to data sharing is emerging as a way to beat back a rising tide of cybercrime and bank fraud.