Meet Balance — B2B Payments Done Right
A year into COVID19 and a decade into the meteoric rise of marketplaces, e-commerce platforms and on-demand apps, writing about the ‘transition to digital’ seems almost trivial. However, the vast majority of these category defining companies is consumer focused while the business to business (B2B) sector remained largely offline and only recently began migrating to digital.
Even digital-first B2B customer journeys that start online often end up with a ‘request a quote’ button and from there, to a manual, back and forth process to finalize the transaction. This actually makes sense when you consider B2B transactions are often much bigger and involve quotes, KYB, price discrimination, invoicing, financing, bank to bank transfers etc. All of which make such transactions much more complex, especially when compared to the frictionless click-click-go we’re all used to as consumers online.
Some companies who take on this massive B2B market opportunity, do so in the form of vertical marketplace for a specific category (EZcater, Faire, Udaan and TripActions are some in the Lightspeed portfolio), while others are building horizontal solutions focused on one side of the transaction (e.g. AP/AR automation, better procurement solutions or supply chain financing).
Team Balance is taking a different approach to this problem by building the world’s first, B2B checkout platform.
When we first met Balance co-founders Bar and Yoni, their pitch resonated with us almost immediately as Balance basically sits at the intersection of two markets we were already betting heavily on: B2B commerce and payments infrastructure. We are familiar with the problems such B2B sellers experience online as they try to stitch together a working solution from the multitude of point solutions out there which are primarily designed for B2C transactions. These problems are not limited to marketplaces or e-commerce players but are also common for most B2B software and SaaS companies.
We believe:
- Any business transaction that can feasibly take place online will take place online
- The B2B market is far bigger than B2C and will generate multiple, billion dollar outcomes in the coming decade
- The shift of B2B online-first approach will only accelerate in the near future
- B2B payments require a holistic, sophisticated and flexible infrastructure to solve transactions end to end.
Team Balance has the right domain experience and a compelling product vision for a one-stop-shop solution that tackles 100% of the heavy lifting on behalf of the customer: from frontend checkout elements, through 3rd party integrations and ‘piping’ (KYB, financing approvals) to backend / offline flows (e.g. request an invoice, buyer side purchase approvals). Effectively, Balance solves with an elegant product, what would otherwise require dedicated team of payment engineers and a meaningful budget.
Balance had already demonstrated their impact working with some very sophisticated B2B tech companies as early customers (more about that in future announcements) who served as additional confirmation for the above.
For many B2B sellers making their first steps online, Balance can level the playing field and enable them to compete effectively online.
For more sophisticated, web-native B2B marketplaces or SaaS companies, Balance offers the flexibility to customize their infrastructure for their unique needs and meaningfully save on costs and time to market.
We are excited to lead Balance’s Seed round and have SciFi (Nellie and Max Levchin) and Stripe join us for the ride. They know a thing or two about payments infrastructure and share our enthusiasm for the future of B2B commerce.
If you are a digital, B2B business owner, I urge you to try out Balance.
Go head and throw your most complicated needs and payment flows at them. Challenge them to help you build the best possible experience for your end users and I promise, you will not be disappointed!
Tal Morgenstern is a Partner at Lightspeed, where he focuses on early stage investments in fintech, SaaS and enterprise software companies including Aquant, Axonius, Candis, Elementor and Testim
Lightspeed is a multi-stage VC firm focused on accelerating disruptive innovations and trends in the enterprise, consumer, and health sectors. Lightspeed has backed 400+ companies globally in the past two decades including Nutanix, Affirm, AppDynamics, MuleSoft, Snap and Nest.
