ACI Worldwide and Solaris Move SEPA Instant Payments Onto a New Infrastructure

Hey Payments Fanatic!

Instant payments are quickly becoming the baseline in Europe. 👀

Solaris has now gone live on ACI Worldwide’s ACI Connetic, moving its SEPA Instant payments infrastructure onto a cloud-native platform that combines payment processing, orchestration, fraud prevention, and payments intelligence.

For Solaris, this is the first phase of a broader payments modernization strategy, particularly important as instant payments become standard under the EU’s new regulatory requirements.

And because Solaris provides banking infrastructure to FinTechs and digital businesses, this isn’t just about Solaris moving money faster. It’s about giving the companies building on top of it a more scalable payments foundation.

That infrastructure story connects nicely with Noah. In Why Every Fintech Is Suddenly Publishing Its ARR, Shah Ramezani looks at why ARR is becoming a key FinTech metric, and why the real story sits behind the headline number: revenue quality, growth, margins, and the infrastructure that creates a durable moat.

Here’s what else is happening in payments today👇

See you on Monday!

Cheers,

Marcel

INSIGHTS

💡 Noah: Why Every FinTech Is Suddenly Publishing Its ARR. In a recent analysis, Shah Ramezani, Founder & CEO of Noah, explains why ARR is becoming a standard headline metric for FinTech companies. Funding and valuation show investor appetite, but ARR and growth rate reveal whether customers are actually paying and how quickly the business is scaling. The important questions go beyond the headline: net vs. gross revenue, contracted vs. usage-based revenue, customer concentration, and - most importantly - whether the company can maintain its margins as pricing pressure increases. Shah also argues that FinTech’s regulatory licences, banking relationships, and compliance infrastructure create moats that are difficult to replicate, while AI can act as leverage on top of that infrastructure rather than replace it. Read the full article here

NEWS

🇩🇪 Solaris goes live on ACI Worldwide's ACI Connetic for SEPA Instant Payments. The licensed German bank has consolidated its instant payment infrastructure onto the cloud native platform for payments orchestration, completing the first phase of its modernization initiative.

🌏 Airwallex is now an official Replit Connector, letting developers use Replit Agent to add payments, invoices, and payouts to apps. The integration builds against Airwallex's latest docs and tests in its sandbox before deployment.

🇬🇧 Checkout.com builds its own agent infrastructure, while backing three rival agentic payment protocols. The processor launched an MCP Server claiming 81% faster integration, while supporting ACP, Google AP2, and Mastercard Agent Pay.

🇩🇰 Adyen partners with Flatpay to power SMB expansion across Europe and beyond. Adyen will provide acquiring capabilities and global infrastructure to support Flatpay's scaling plans across seven European markets.

🇨🇳 Tencent launches TenPayGo, its first mobile payment app built for overseas visitors to China. The app supports cards from seven international networks and plans to connect roughly 60 foreign wallets by year end, giving travelers access to tens of millions of merchants.

🇬🇧 Revolut shakes up the high street with first facial recognition payments and zero processing fees for merchants. The launch introduces biometric checkout as a new in-store payment method and removes transaction fees to drive merchant adoption across its UK network.

🇮🇳 Pine Labs plans to deploy 1 million soundboxes across India to accelerate digital payment acceptance. The rollout targets small merchants and aims to expand audio confirmation of UPI and card transactions at the point of sale nationwide.

🇵🇰 EBANX expands into Pakistan and launches native Apple Pay decryption for global merchants. The move adds Pakistan to the company's emerging market footprint and lets merchants process Apple Pay transactions locally without third party decryption.

🇦🇪 AUSTRIACARD delivers the first Jaywan payment cards to Wio Bank in the UAE. The cards are produced under the national Jaywan scheme and support contactless payments across the domestic network, marking a milestone for UAE payment sovereignty.

🇮🇳 PayGlocal receives IFSCA approval to operate as a payment service provider in GIFT City. The cross border payments firm already holds an RBI licence and a US MSB registration, and will now build international payment capabilities from India's financial hub.

🇬🇧 UK banks complete the first live customer transactions using tokenised sterling deposits. The milestone demonstrates that tokenised commercial bank money can settle real retail payments on a shared ledger alongside traditional rails.

🇺🇸 Oracle expands Digital Assets Data Nexus to help banks operationalize digital money. New capabilities include ISO 20022 payment integrations, configurable wallet controls, and AI enabled oversight for tokenised deposits and stablecoins.

🇬🇧 Midnite partners with BR-DGE to sharpen payments performance and power international sportsbook expansion. The collaboration gives the betting platform access to optimised checkout routing across multiple payment methods and geographies.

🇮🇳 Pine Labs partners with Google Cloud for AI powered commerce. The collaboration will bring Google Cloud's AI capabilities to Pine Labs' merchant and payments platform, enhancing checkout and commerce experiences across India.

🇺🇸 Stablecoin payments startup HIFI raises $37M to scale its infrastructure for enterprise transactions. The funding positions HIFI to expand stablecoin based payment rails aimed at replacing traditional cross border settlement flows.

🌍 IPID raises $16M as instant payments expose a growing blind spot. The funding targets fraud prevention gaps created by the global shift to real-time payments. Read more

🇬🇧 Stripe puts ex-HSBC compliance leader Marc Fungard in charge of its UK business. Fungard has spent three and a half years at Stripe as global head of financial crime, compliance and risk oversight.

🇬🇧 Yellow Card appoints Ross Everett as Group CFO, following leadership roles at Monzo Bank and Deutsche Bank. Everett will lead global finance as Yellow Card scales its stablecoin payments infrastructure internationally.

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