We are so excited to announce the 12 startups selected for the inaugural class of the Techstars Payments Program. These promising, early-stage companies are focused on innovative fintech solutions addressing gaps across the payments infrastructure in emerging and underserved markets in categories like lending, investing, payments, personal financial management, financial literacy and infrastructure. 

This program is the first Techstars accelerator to have a physical presence in Latin America. We will be running a hybrid program and spending one week in Dallas, one week in Mexico City and one week in Miami. The three month mentorship-driven program is bringing together founders from across Latin America and the US from Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Brazil.

These startups will be supported by our amazing partners, Stellar and MoneyGram. These two organizations came together as they saw an incredible opportunity to build a robust payments and fintech ecosystem across LatAm and other emerging markets.

“The opportunities for fintech innovation and financial inclusion across underserved markets and LatAm are endless,'' said Managing Director, Tricia Martinez. “Consumers and businesses are waiting for disruptive solutions that solve their problems - high fees, inefficient systems, broken infrastructure, and unstable currencies. Our 12 portfolio companies for Techstars Payments are spearheading innovation in these markets and solving real financial problems.”

Members of the 2023 Techstars Payments powered by Stellar and MoneyGram are: 

• Banca.me is for Latam's unbanked population that lack access to personal loans within the financial system. We provide cheap, fast and easy loans right from your phone.

• Bundil is making investing easy for the average retail investor, by taking the spare change from everyday card purchases and investing into crypto and stocks and promoting healthy investment habits with our gamified fee structure.

• College Cash is using everyday behavior to reduce student loan debt in a unique manner — including user-generated content campaigns — to engage with brands in a way that allows funds to be earned as early as the first year of high school, helping everyday people in a new way.

• Lenme is the first subscription-based, fully automated, peer-to-peer lending platform offering short-term and crypto-backed loans. We serve and connect borrowers with financial institutions, lending businesses, and individuals all via an app.

• Mica is solving the biggest pain points for tenants. It allows them to: - Rent the apartment they desire - Have their bill payments automated - Have financial flexibility, reduced move-in costs, and access to an emergency credit (BNPL) - Improve their credit score month by month.

• Moneo is for Consumer Product Goods brands (CPGs) that need to identify and profile their consumers, we operate a cash back rewards platform that helps them to incentivize sales in physical stores and to collect shopper data. For consumers, we provide a new source of income.

• Mox is the infrastructure that connects financial entities to consumers and their paychecks. We interconnect a variety of HR and ERP systems and provide a universal Payroll API. Our use cases include: income and employment verification, direct deposit switching & paycheck linking.

• Oinc is for young adults that have a problem with saving and investing, Oinc enables users to do it effortlessly, by setting up rules that run on autopilot. Thus, finally building wealth and achieving their financial goals.

• Ola is an open-source identity orchestration platform that helps fintechs and banks integrate 100s of identity verification vendors and automate their decisioning process with a single API.

• Pactta is for the underserved consumers in Latam that send small amounts of money everyday, but struggle to understand crypto neobanks. We are a super UX friendly app that allows them to pay in one transaction, using blockchain as backend, to enable more efficient cross-border payments.

• Uils is providing financial solutions for people that work with mobility apps that do not have access to credit. We solve this problem through a mobile wallet that provides loans using driving history as credit score. Our loans are accessible, paperless, immediate and available 24/7.

• Zumma is an investment platform that guides Latin American women through their financial journey. Latin American women are saving but not investing. Only 0.8% of Latin American women are investing, making women investors only 20% of all investors. Zumma is changing this.

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