Ep. 244: Andrew Jamison - How Fintech is Streamlining Financial Processes

Welcome to Count Me In! Join your host Adam Larson as he dives
into insightful conversations with industry experts. In this
episode, Adam is joined by Andrew Jamison, CEO & Co-Founder
of Extend, a Point72-backed fintech platform that enables virtual
card and spend management capabilities for small businesses. They
discuss how small to medium-sized businesses can leverage fintech
solutions to reshape their financial landscape. Get ready to gain
valuable insights and practical advice from Andrew as he shares
his expertise in the field. Don't miss out on this engaging
discussion that is sure to empower SMBs in embracing the latest
technologies. Tune in for this informative episode!


Full Episode Transcript:
< Intro >


 


Adam:           
Welcome back to another episode of Count Me In. I'm your host,
Adam Larson, and today we have a fantastic guest joining us,
Andrew Jamison, CEO and co-founder of Extend. A fintech platform
that enables virtual card and spend management capabilities for
small businesses. 


 


We'll be exploring how small to medium-sized businesses can
leverage these innovative solutions, to reshape the financial
landscape. Andrew will share valuable insights on the importance
of embracing fintech technologies and how they can drive
efficiency and growth. From the power of data and open APIs to
the role of big partners in mitigating risks. 


 


Andrew will guide us through the key factors and success stories
of implementing fintech solutions. Plus, we'll explore the future
of AI, and machine learning, and finance, and the skills finance
professionals should cultivate for continued relevance. So, let's
get started.


 


< Music >


 


Andrew, I'm so glad to have you on the Count Me In podcast,
today. We're excited to have you here, and we're going to be
talking about fintech, and different solutions, especially, in
the realm of small to medium-sized businesses. To jump right in,
how do you think that the fintech solutions are reshaping the
financial landscape, especially for small and medium-sized
businesses? And why is it crucial for them to embrace these
technologies?


 


Andrew:         Look, I
think we're continuing down a really exciting journey, actually.
Where the prevalence of data, and the ability and accessibility
of technology means that we're finding more and more verticalized
solutions. Which helps on two fronts; one, on the one hand, it
means if I'm very specific in the industry that I serve. I start
to have a solution that actually talks to me, specifically, in my
industry. 


 


And I think the ability for people to access that technology
means that you now have more and more independent developers, who
are exploring how these open APIs can be used, leveraged, and
really brought together to create solutions that are increasingly
targeted, at the different functions that we work in. So I think
that crossroad we're there, and it's only going to explode from
here, in my mind.


 


Adam:           
It's definitely going to explode. You see the different
technology is getting more and more accessible. But sometimes
it's harder when you're in a small to medium-sized business.
Sometimes you're an accounting department of one, or two, or
three people, and it's harder to implement some different types
of technology. What advice would you give to somebody trying to
look into it, saying, "Hey, I want to jump into this, but I may
not have the budget that bigger organizations have?"


 


Andrew:         Look,
what I look at small companies, they want to do more with what
they have. And they're trying to abstract away the complexity
because, you're right, I look at our team, we're a team of 80-odd
employees. And the reality is I have one VP of finance, and he's
only just now gone and hired his right-hand person. And the
reality is that they're jacks of all trade. They're AP, they're
AR, they're essentially all your cash flow management, and they
do all your recording, all in one. 


 


So if I sit down, specifically, with him, it's really all about
seeing how they can leverage existing software for longer. How do
you abstract away some of the challenges with some of the
software that you might have, as you start growing as a business?
How do you leverage other solutions, which are just embedded with
those solutions, so that you don't have to go through a massive
transformation? 


 


Well, I'll give you a great example, and that's Graham Stanton's
Avise. His whole thesis is all about lots of businesses use
QuickBooks, and then quickly you grow up, if you're a successful
company. But do you really want to make the next step to the next
enterprise solution? Which, actually, costs a disproportionate
amount of money more, relative to the benefits that you're going
to get from them in the early years.


 


So there's always that, healthy tension, but we're starting to
see more and more people focus on the abstraction piece. Keep the
ledger the way it is, and then just start adding solutions over
the top that help me run my business more efficiently.


 


Adam:            I
like that. Adapt it to what works for you, as opposed to maybe
doing a whole ERP system that may be too much money or too much
of a spend for you.


 


Andrew:         Yes,
and, again, finance team of one, I came out of the exact polar
opposite world. The first 10 years of my career were in deploying
SAP. So right at the enterprise resource planning side of the
equation, and just a completely different beast, in terms of the
different types of people that you had to go and engage with. And
also just the number of departments that you got to engage with.
Therefore, the resources that were required, just to keep the
engine running for that platform were just completely different.


 


Adam:           
Now, we can't talk about moving to different technologies without
talking about things like fraud, and just the risk there. And
especially if you're a smaller department, or a partner of one,
like in your case, there are two people. How do you protect
against hackers or different things, different emerging threats,
especially, in the fraud space, especially, if you're a
medium-sized business?


 


Andrew:         Look, I
think you have to rely on the bigger partners. You can work,
certainly, to continue to enhance your solutions. But you do have
to lean on some of the bigger partners. We lean on, certainly, on
the AWS infrastructure to help us there because they have so much
more money to plow into this. 


 


Now, obviously, they're a bigger target than we are. But they
also have way more resources to help plug those gaps. So in our
mind, it's also two things; one is it's not really about if, it's
when, it's going to happen. And, then, it's really about how do
you mitigate it in terms of relying on these partners. 


 


Now, clearly, cybersecurity, whether it's through an encryption
or authentication. I think lot of work continues to be done
there. And I think we all experience it, in the consumer world,
which is mor...