Bank access API provider and money transfer system, Dwolla, is powering identity verification and money transfer for Tanda, Yahoo!’s new social savings app.
Tanda is designed to help individuals achieve their financial goals without racking up more debt. Using Dwolla’s API, it will connect to the user’s bank to move money, store funds, validate their identity, and verify their bank account. Last year, Dwolla relaunched its API to offer a more ‘inclusive, white-labeled API’ that rolls in additional features such as a wallet functionality.
Launched last week, the Tanda app is intended to be used as an alternative to credit cards or short-term loans. It divides users into groups of five or nine to pool money and save for short-term savings goals. Each circle member periodically contributes a set amount into a shared pool with one member then taking the full amount every month. The process repeats over time — each member chips in, one member then takes it all — until everyone gets a full payout. The concept comes from a rotating savings and credit association (ROSCA).
Founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Des Moines, Iowa, Dwolla is focused on building the ideal platform to move money, allowing businesses of all sizes to connect the U.S. banking system. It provides platforms with a ‘simple, fast, and robust’ service for bank transfers (i.e. ACH transactions). It enables customers to use branded or white label APIs to verify bank accounts instantly, transfer payments, keep balances, or route funds directly to bank account and routing numbers. To date, the company has raised more than $39.4m in funding, with investors including Union Square Ventures, Foundry Group, and Andreessen Horowitz.
In the identification/ID background checks space, European payments firm Worldline recently bolstered its digital identity capabilities by partnering with RegTech 100 company iSignthis. Newly launched RegTech startup Velix.ID, which is using blockchain to enable frictionless identity verification, also recently announced plans for a token sale to fund its platform.
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