LeapRate Exclusive… Many companies are opening up for projects involving artificial intelligence nowadays – ArtuData added to Intel’s NERVANA Artificial Intelligence startups program back in 2017; Credit Suisse launched an Artificial Intelligence Sentiment Index using RavenPack AI algorithms; Clearstream teamed up with the Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust (SnT) at the University of Luxembourg to explore potential of Artificial Intelligence; last year Dukascopy Bank announced that it wants to become an artificial intelligence hub.
With over 16 years in the financial industry (Easy Forex, Traders Education and Traders Group) Ran Cohen, the CEO and founder of AI powered payment management platform Bridgerpay, has seen first-hand the challenges FX brokers face when it comes to payments.
Ran Cohen joins LeapRate today to talk about the Bridgerpay platform and the power of AI technology.
LR: Hi, Ran and thank you for joining us today. Could you tell LeapRate’s readers how did you came up with the idea for an AI powered payment management platform in the first place?
Ran: With the proliferation of tech modernizing other industries, payments have, and remains antiquated in many ways and payment systems have never been optimized for payment flow purposes. Yet, payment providers have a world of data at their fingertips that is not readily available or shared with merchants.
Not only are payments as a whole difficult to understand, but there are also so many different variables to consider that are relevant only to the payments industry, such as: rules and regulations,terminology, payment providers, integrations, data formats, alternatives, pricing and more.
I will quote McKinsey & Company here, affirming that:
By using data to generate insights into consumer purchasing behaviour, and coupling these insights with an understanding of emerging macro trends, payment firms can provide better service to customers — from fraud detection to spending insights.
Over the course of the last year, my team and I worked alongside many leading online and point of sale merchants to better understand their payments strategy and operations.
One common theme that many merchants communicate is:
How can I get a global view of all my online and point of sale transactions and payment data, so that we can make informed and business critical decisions utilizing that data?
With the understanding of what the trading platforms in our industry can or cannot do, we know how difficult it is for merchants to access their data. Some of the new payment providers do this better with robust API’s but limit it only to their platform. Others haven’t updated their platforms in years and don’t offer an easy way for merchants to access their own data.
Further to that, having access to the data is one thing, however knowing what the data means and making business critical decisions as a result of that data is another thing all together and yet equally important.
This is something that unfortunately is not available for FX brokers or any online merchant in the market today.
LR: Knowing what the data means and making business critical decisions – this is where AI technology comes in?
Ran: We believe that AI will take a big part in bringing transparency to the online businesses. It will change how they manage and optimize their payments, their conversion and the complete experiences of their end users.
Imagine a software that can consider billions of possible hypotheses at scale. One of those hypotheses can be your next breakthrough. Instead of manually testing a hypothetical outcome against a dataset, Using AI, you can automatically analyze massive amounts of data and shift it through a range of clarifiers – equations, definitions sentiments, locations – to build the best predictive model with a measurable business goal in mind. As the data changes the model adapts using adaptive machine learning algorithms.
LR: Tell us more about the platform itself.
Ran: BridgerPay is the result of the technology knowledge and experience we’ve gained over the years together with the detailed feedback from Brokerages and online businesses whom we’ve worked closely with this past year.
Bridger is an AI powered payment intelligence and data management platform, harnessing the power and performance of AI to create the most advanced payment learning software in the world.
We’re solving payment flow challenges to deliver game-changing payment intelligence by providing easy and secure access to your processor, your gateway and your order management data, to break the numbers down for you.
Bridger Platform has a truly “one stop shop” for your payments:
Bridger cashier is our proprietary smart cashier software. Allowing you to add various payment providers and methods across different countries in a unified payment experience and in a customized cashier.
Bridger admin is the merchants “Source of Truth” where they can manage and optimize their payments, their PsP providers and their data in an all-in-one dashboard with the ability to easily make changes and optimize in real time.
Bridger router allows you to route specific volumes to desired payment solutions. Set your own rules and restrictions according to your preferences; block or allow countries, currencies, methods of payment, or use our built-in routing models.
Settlement calendar – it’s never been easier to manage your settlements. With a monthly snapshot of all your ongoing settlements, as well as those in the pipeline from all of your payment providers and processors, you gain an unparalleled overview in real time.
LR: What is your goal for 2019?
Ran: By making payments easier-to-understand and more transparent, we hope to empower FX brokers and online merchants to make more informed business critical decisions to accelerate their growth whilst saving both time and money with a more streamlined and efficient payments operation.
We’re proud of what we’ve built as a team and look forward to continuing the path in reshaping how online businesses utilize their payment data.
We are a team of creators, technologists and payment enthusiasts and our mission is to create a bridge between artificial intelligence and payments.