Australian Open Banking platform Basiq has received an equity investment from Visa, continuing the trend for card schemes to invest in technology that threatens to bypass their traditional payment rails.
Visa joins existing investors Salesforce, NAB Ventures, Westpac Reinventure, Touch Ventures and Plaid. The value of the investment was not disclosed.
The Basiq platform currently provides a bridge between 100 banks and 150 fintechs, providing access to financial account data for lending, digital banking, investment, BNPL, and account-to-account payments.
Julian Potter, group country manager, Australia, New Zealand and South Pacific, Visa, says: “Visa is known for money movement, but moving digital money is fundamentally about moving data. We’re extending our network capabilities and expertise into data movement, and our investment in Basiq is a great example of how we’re supporting the rise of the open data economy in Australia.”
As part of the investment, Cietan Kitney, head of strategy, Asia Pacific at Visa joins the Basis board, alongside new member Kareem Al-Bassam of Touch Ventures.
In June, Visa acquired European Open Banking platform Tink for €1.8 billion, filling a Plaid-shaped hole in its portfolio after a $5.4 billion deal to acquire the US data sharing outfit was scapped following pushback from regulators over concerns that the card scheme was attempting to snuff out a competitive threat to its debit card business.
