The New Faces of Fintech — Featuring Paylow

While we may not know exactly how fintech will impact our future, we have an idea as to who will be leading the charge. In the next installments of our ongoing blog series, “The New Faces of FinTech”, we will spotlight some of the emerging leaders in the fintech world to get their thoughts on what the future of the industry will look like.

Their origin stories are different, their paths to entrepreneurship are unique, but their impacts on their respective industries are significant. No one truly knows what the future of fintech holds, but these industry leaders may have an inkling as to what we can expect.

Our next guest is Sagi Avitan, Co-founder & CEO of London headquartered Paylow, which optimizes subscriptions to help people cut expenses, effortlessly.

Sagi, tell us a little bit about your background. What were you working on before founding this company?

Following several years as an Intelligence Officer in the Israeli Military, I worked in Business Intelligence firms and explored some independent ventures.

Tell us a bit about your company? What’s the problem you’re solving?

Paylow optimizes subscriptions to help people cut expenses, effortlessly.

Individuals are increasingly frustrated with the time and effort required to manage recurrent expenses, the lack of transparency in pricing and the cumbersome process of switching services. When the cost of living crisis is undeniable, especially in the UK, we’re proud to provide a solution that actively reinforces the consumer’s financial wellbeing.

What’s the origin story behind your company? How and why did you come up with the idea?

We examined ways to improve the financial lives of common individuals. One of the essential financial bits of advice is taking care of recurrent expenses – not only because they pile up, but since people tend to become apathetic and treat them as inevitable. We looked at the soaring subscription model and found it’s a prevalent unsolved field – working great for businesses, yet not well handled by consumers. Struck by the domain’s richness, we chose to apply a scientific approach to address this pain, aiming to make it both impactful and commercially perfected.

What milestones has your company achieved so far?

We just released our product to a closed group of early users, raised early funds, obtained a license from the UK’s FCA and already signed commercial partnerships.

Can you describe what it’s been like to be part of the FinTech Sandbox community?

Despite our data ask being a bit uncommon (in terms of market), the Fintech Sandbox team introduced us to multiple companies and stakeholders in the UK, which was more effective than doing it independently.

What’s next for your company?

It’s an exciting time for Paylow.

In parallel with refining our product performance and enriching its offering to support our B2B2C strategy, we’re currently in advanced discussions to collaborate with several prominent UK brands for services yet to be seen in the domain.

What is some of the best advice you’ve received as a startup founder?

There’s actually one I remind myself frequently to mentally handle the radical volatility of startups: not evaluate ourselves based on the struggles of a particular day. As long as we keep progress every week or two – we’re on track.

What fintech trends are you most excited about right now?

Hard to choose, though I’ll go with the combination of Open Data and Embedded Finance. 

Leveraging this noble approach with an innovative trend, gradually leads to symbiotic mechanisms which remove barriers for new products and business models to thrive.

What’s the most interesting thing you’ve read recently?

“Brief Answers to the Big Questions”, by Stephen Hawking.