Brite Payments appointed its first Chief Commercial Officer, Luke Trayfoot, in April 2024, and the company’s commercial function is growing strongly, in line with future expansion plans. Trayfoot, who previously built high-performing commercial teams at PayPal and Mangopay, has a deep understanding of the payments sector and internationalisation strategy. Brite has also bolstered its Merchant Solutions and Engineering leadership, as it continues to invest in building its own proprietary instant payments network - Brite IPN - to process payments between consumers and online merchants in real time.

Founded in 2019, the Stockholm-headquartered fintech has pursued market expansion in early 2024, with the launch of Brite Instant Payments in the German market. High familiarity with bank-based online payment methods, combined with lower card penetration compared to other European markets, signals a significant opportunity for Brite’s out-of-the-box Pay by Bank solution. Recent research conducted by Brite Payments and YouGov reveals consumer appetite for better security and convenience for online payment methods in Germany, with security (83.5%) and user convenience (77.8%) ranking as key factors when deciding to use a payment method for the first time.

“The launch of Brite Instant Payments in Germany represents a significant milestone for the company, with our full product portfolio now available in the EU’s largest economy - a market with significant untapped potential,” said Lena Hackelöer, Founder & CEO, Brite Payments. “We will further extend our product coverage through the rest of 2024, which we’re strongly positioned to do, having bolstered our commercial and engineering teams with a number of key hires. All the pieces are in place to drive the next phase of our growth.”

Brite Payments’ recent successes in scaling up, following a $60 million fundraise in October 2023, are reflected by a number of recent industry accolades:

Retail Systems Awards - Alternative Payments Solution & Payments Innovation Awards

PayTech Awards - Tech of the Future: Account-to-Account Payments

Hustle Awards - Most Successful Scaleup

Lena Hackelöer, Brite’s founder and CEO, has received individual recognition, with ‘Founder of the Year’ at the Hustle Awards and ‘Director of the Year’ at the Europe FinTech Awards. Brite Payments was also named on the Sifted B2B SaaS ‘Rising 100’.

“We’ve noticed a significant shift in the market in the first half of 2024; there’s consensus in the wider fintech sector that Pay by Bank - with the growing maturity of open banking acting as a catalyst - is reaching an inflection point,” continued Hackelöer. “Our recent industry recognition has reaffirmed that Brite Payments is firmly at the forefront of these developments as the pace of adoption accelerates, and that we’ve struck the right balance between merchant benefits and a first-class end-user experience.”

Brite Payments leverages Europe’s open banking infrastructure to process instant payments and payouts, which are proving attractive to businesses in a wide range of verticals, especially those where legacy payment methods create unnecessary friction in the payment process or increase fraud risk.