Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
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Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
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Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#2Hey there, I'm Brian Merritt, the CEO of SEED. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. You can also email me at brian at seed.co.
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#3Hey there, I'm Brian Merritt, the CEO of SEED. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. You can also email me at brian at seed.co.
One of the key elements of business banking is short/medium term credit (e.g. overdrafts and small business loans). These are typically offered by a company's main bank (as this bank has complete info on the company's past cash flows).
Do you intend to offer loans and/or overdrafts, either yourselves, or in partnership with other companies?
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#4Read the article, visited the website, read the docs -- still don't know why this exists or what the value proposition is; however, I'm not a business owner and don't do business banking. That said, I don't think I'm all that far off from the target audience as I do deal with billing, account balances and money transfers through third party api's.
As an aside, someone needs to 'disrupt' the home mortgage loan process from top to bottom. Super opaque and really annoying to go through (even the information gathering phase) when compared to almost everything else I've experienced as an adult.
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#5Hey there, I'm Brian Merritt, the CEO of SEED. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. You can also email me at brian at seed.co.
One of the key elements of business banking is short/medium term credit (e.g. overdrafts and small business loans). These are typically offered by a company's main bank (as this bank has complete info on the company's past cash flows). Do you intend to offer loans and/or overdrafts, either yourselves, or in partnership with other companies?
Short answer, yes. We have a lot of ideas about how to offer credit and lending products, both ourselves, and with partners. We're spending a lot of time talking to companies to understand the current pain points, and we'll be able to share more soon.
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#6Read the article, visited the website, read the docs -- still don't know why this exists or what the value proposition is; however, I'm not a business owner and don't do business banking. That said, I don't think I'm all that far off from the target audience as I do deal with billing, account balances and money transfers through third party api's. As an aside, someone needs to 'disrupt' the home mortgage loan process…
Our API offering is directed at a niche audience, but we'll be offering more products in the future, such as traditional online business banking, lending, and so on.
+1 to someone fixing home mortgages. Super painful.
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#7Hi Brian! I've read your API docs, and all this is pretty intriguing. As I understand it, you're offering this service so other people can write consumer apps for banking, and companies can integrate the API into their internal systems. I have just a couple of questions..
1. What are your thoughts on dealing with fraud? While ACH is often reversible, wire transfers tend not to be. Established banks often have convoluted wire procedures (that often involve showing up in person at a branch) precisely because a fraudulent transfer -- even if the fraud was the user's fault because of phished credentials -- often results in the bank eating the losses. How will your company handle losses where somebody's API credentials got hacked, their balance transferred to Romania, and the victim notices and reports the fraud 59 days later?
2. One of the biggest limiting factors in bitcoin's growth right now is that exchanges struggle to get and keep relationships with traditional banks. No-doubt fraud prevention has a lot to do with this, but any bank that steps up to the plate could charge its partner exchanges huge fees and still be swimming in business. Have you thought about being that bank?
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#8Read the article, visited the website, read the docs -- still don't know why this exists or what the value proposition is; however, I'm not a business owner and don't do business banking. That said, I don't think I'm all that far off from the target audience as I do deal with billing, account balances and money transfers through third party api's. As an aside, someone needs to 'disrupt' the home mortgage loan process…
Our API offering is directed at a niche audience, but we'll be offering more products in the future, such as traditional online business banking, lending, and so on. +1 to someone fixing home mortgages. Super painful.
Can you toss out a few use cases where I'd kill to have you guys over a traditional bank?
I'm curious how you pitched yourself to YC. Did you say you were going to be a sort of venue for people looking to build custom financial services on top of your API?
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#9Hey there, I'm Brian Merritt, the CEO of SEED. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. You can also email me at brian at seed.co.
What are the current rates for international payments. I'm very interested in the pricing structure here since it's an area that could certainly use some disruption!
Re: Seed (YC W15) Wants to Reinvent Business Banking
#10How does this compare to Standard Treasury? It looks like maybe Seed is more on the consumer/business side and ST would be seen as a wholesale banking provider (one level up in the bank chain)?