Deserve, a Palo Alto-based credit-card-as-a-service startup, has recently scored a major infusion of capital from Visa. Visa hopes to help spread Deserve’s network to more banks and other financial institutions, which in turn would expand Visa’s reach in this new battleground in digital payments.
Deserve has won major acclaim with its embedded, API-driven software that is meant to help people quickly and easily fill their digital wallets with both new and traditional digital purchasing tools. As Deserve CEO Kalpesh Kapadia explained, “We’re transforming credit cards into software that lives on mobile devices, not in wallets.” Small wonder that Visa has maintained interest in the startup for some time, having previously featured Deserve as a member in its 2020 FinTech Fast Track program.
Visa is hardly the only major player to seek inroads in credit-card-as-a-service. Deserve has already secured investment capital from rivals including Mastercard and Sallie Mae, and has drawn considerable attention through a partnership with BlockFi. The startup has also pioneered the concept of a credit card that returns cryptocurrency as a user reward, a feature in which Visa has expressed great interest.
