Product Manager

Approved credit should be usable credit: how Fundbox, Lithic, and Mastercard are accelerating capital access for small businesses. ByFundbox Team 07.20.26 Fundbox, Lithic, and Mastercard are using their infrastructure partnership to give small businesses faster access to the capital they've been approved for, right when they need it most. How it works. Fundbox, Lithic, and Mastercard have built an infrastructure layer that delivers approved credit as a ready-to-use usable virtual card credential. When a small business is approved for a Fundbox credit line, they receive a multi-use virtual Mastercard, issued by Lead Bank via Lithic's platform, ready to transact at the point of purchase. No transfer initiated. No clearing window. Capital available in seconds. Additionally, for companies that prioritize tangible payment methods, a physical card option is provided. This is enabled by Mastercard's Loan on Card program, whose network allows approved credit to move directly into card credentials at the moment of approval, bypassing traditional transfer rails entirely. Lithic serves as the issuer processing design partner, providing the platform through which cards are issued by Lead Bank in real time. Three companies. Three layers. One seamless experience. This isn't a typical partnership. It's a deliberate assembly of three complementary layers of financial infrastructure, each a leader in its domain, designed to work as a unified system. Mastercard brings the global payment network and the vision behind this initiative. Through its Loan on Card program, Mastercard has created a new mechanism that enables lenders to disburse approved credit directly via virtual card credentials, bypassing ACH entirely. It's a network-level innovation designed to modernize how capital moves, and Mastercard selected Lithic as its issuer processing design partner to bring it to life. Lithic is the card issuer processing platform powering next-generation financial experiences. Its programmable APIs and credit ledger technology give lenders the flexibility to build exactly the kind of lending experience this use case demands, one where the card credential is issued the moment credit is approved, ready to use at the point of purchase. Lithic was built for this. Fundbox is the embedded capital infrastructure behind the digital SMB economy, providing fast, direct access to credit through the tools businesses already use. Fundbox contributes the underwriting intelligence and embedded capital platform that makes the credit decision fast and accurate, and the partner relationships that bring this capability directly into the platforms small businesses rely on. Together, these three organizations have built a fully connected experience where a small business applies for credit, gets approved, and receive virtual Mastercard credential ready to transact at the point of purchase. What This Means For small businesses: Capital approval and capital access become the same moment. A business that qualifies for a credit line can spend against it immediately, at a supplier, a vendor, a point-of-sale, without waiting for funds to clear. The financial agility that enterprise companies take for granted becomes accessible to the businesses that historically haven't had it. For platforms: Embedded credit has always had a handoff problem. Approval happens inside your platform; capital arrives somewhere else, later. Virtual card disbursement closes that gap. A user approved inside your product can transact inside your product, immediately. Platforms no longer need to piece together an issuer, card program manager, and capital infrastructure separately. Fundbox's platform brings them together, right out of the box. For the industry: 30 million small businesses represent nearly half of U.S. private sector employment. Shortening the distance between credit approval and usable capital, even by a day or two, compounds across millions of transactions. More businesses can act on time-sensitive opportunities, manage cash flow more precisely, and grow without waiting on the financial system to catch up. A new standard for infrastructure partnerships. Fundbox reached live transactions on the Mastercard network 53 days after contract signing. For an implementation of this scope, spanning card issuing, network connectivity, and embedded capital infrastructure, industry peers typically measure comparable efforts in quarters. It matters because implementation speed reflects infrastructure quality. Systems that take months to connect are systems that take months to fix, extend, and iterate. The pace of this launch is evidence of what the underlying architecture can support. Bo Jiang framed it directly: "Fifty-three days from contract to live cards in the market is not a one-time sprint, it's how we build." For platforms evaluating capital infrastructure partners, that's a meaningful signal. Building the future of small business finance. The best infrastructure partnerships aren't about integrating systems. They're about aligning on a shared belief about how the industry should work, and then building toward it together. Fundbox, Lithic, and Mastercard share that belief: that approved credit should be usable credit. That the gap between approval and access is a problem worth solving. That small businesses deserve the same financial agility that large enterprises have always had. This partnership is a step toward that future. And it's one Fundbox is proud to be building together. Fundbox makes capital available to businesses through business loans and lines of credit originated by First Electronic Bank or Lead Bank. California businesses: Fundbox makes business loans and lines of credit loans pursuant to California Financing Law license 60DBO-48774.All financing is subject to credit approval of a completed application. Fundbox and its bank partners base loan eligibility on their respective credit and risk policies, applicable legal requirements, and other business considerations. Financing may not be available in all states and may be subject to local restrictions where applicable.

Relay secures $50 million USD to bring more small businesses to its banking platform. Toronto FinTech firm aims to build "financial command centre" for self-made small businesses. Toronto-based FinTech startup Relay announced on Tuesday that it has closed $50 million USD ($69 million CAD) from Silicon Valley's General Catalyst to accelerate customer acquisition. This money comes out of General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund (CVF), which Relay co-founder and CEO Yoseph West said provides non-dilutive growth capital tied directly to customer acquisition performance. "This investment is the spark that will ignite our brand footprint and market presence." Yoseph West, Relay West told BetaKit over email that Relay will put this money towards performance marketing, sales, and partnerships that allow the company to reach more small businesses. Meanwhile, it will concentrate its existing capital on product development as it continues to build out its small business banking and money management platform. He said General Catalyst will be repaid from the lifetime value generated by those customer acquisition investments, up to a fixed cap. "The model is designed to align the cost of capital with measurable growth outcomes while allowing Relay to preserve equity capital for product innovation and long-term strategic investment," West told BetaKit over email. This financing comes two years after Relay closed $32.2-million USD ($4.4-million CAD) in Series B funding. The company, which did not share its exact sales, said it is on track to more than triple its revenue since then by the end of 2026. It also closely follows Relay surpassing 150,000 small business customers and $1.3 billion USD in managed deposits through Thread Bank. West said these milestones reflect "not just customer acquisition, but increasing engagement and trust." Founded in 2018, Relay focuses on self-made small businesses in the US market. The company describes itself as a unified financial platform that helps entrepreneurs monitor and manage their cash flow by connecting accounts, bills, capital, cards, and invoices in one place. The 250-person company aims to build what West describes as "the financial command centre for self-made small businesses." "Relay has proven its deep understanding of what small business owners actually need to succeed, with a product that clearly resonates based on the strength of its customer acquisition machine," Andrew Ziperski, partner at General Catalyst's CVF, said in the news release. "We're excited to help them step on the gas with CVF and enable this next phase of growth." According to its website, the CVF helps late-stage companies that have achieved product-market fit acquire new clients without "solely relying on equity or debt." In practice, that means pre-funding businesses' sales and marketing budgets, and getting paid back via capped share of those new customers acquired, allowing recipients to scale without equity dilution, while also owning the downside if things do not pan out as expected. West said "Relay has continued to see strong growth momentum" since closing its Series B, but declined to disclose any specific profitability or revenue figures. During this time, Relay has also expanded beyond business banking and into broader money management and cash flow tools, including its recent launch of Relay Capital term loans, provided in direct partnership with Fundbox and its originating bank partner, Lead Bank. West said that Relay has additional product launches planned for later this year. Feature image courtesy Relay. Roborock Discover the next generation of cleaning innovation. Roborock redefines home robotics with AI-powered systems that sense, adapt, and operate seamlessly in real homes.

Fundbox has renewed its credit facility with ATLAS SP Partners and added funds managed by Blue Owl Capital. The expanded facility deepens Fundbox's partnership with ATLAS whilst establishing a new relationship with Blue Owl, strengthening the company's network of institutional capital providers. The agreements reflect confidence in Fundbox's credit performance, underwriting discipline and ability to scale access to capital for small businesses. The financial technology company provides working capital solutions to small and medium-sized enterprises.