Finance

Synctera Secures $15 Million to Accelerate Embedded Finance Growth

Synctera, a Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) and embedded finance company, has secured $15 million in new funding, bringing its total funding to $94 million. This investment will help accelerate the company's growth and address the increasingly complex needs of its customers, according to a press release issued on Tuesday (March 11).

Peter Hazlehurst, Synctera's co-founder and CEO, commented in the release, “This is a vote of confidence that allows us to continue driving scalable growth and delivering excellence for our customers and the community of banks we serve.”

The funding round was led by Fin Capital and Diagram Ventures, with participation from existing investors like 1st & Main, Evolution, and True Equity.

Logan Allin, founder and managing partner of Fin Capital, also a member of Synctera’s board, said, “We’ve supported the Synctera team since its early days. Their dedication to doing things the right way and prioritizing banks and end customers is why they've been able to build a world-class banking platform.”

This funding comes at a time when embedded finance is transforming the way banks, businesses, and FinTechs interact with customers. Embedded finance integrates banking, payments, and lending into non-financial environments, such as apps and online platforms, making options like buy now, pay later (BNPL) available at the point of sale, as reported by PYMNTS on March 10.

Smartphones and tablets are increasingly becoming gateways to commerce ecosystems that engage customers while boosting cash flow for businesses and financial institutions. Embedded lending, in particular, is gaining traction among lenders who can use data to target new customers and enhance conversion rates, while also expanding financial inclusion.

A PYMNTS Intelligence report titled “Embedded Lending: From the Lender’s Perspective” revealed that 47% of lenders now offer only embedded lending, and 31% offer a combination of embedded and other lending options. Just 12% of firms do not provide embedded lending solutions.

TECH

MIT Unveils 2025 Breakthrough Tech at SXSW: Implications for the Legal Industry

At SXSW, Niall Firth, Executive Editor at MIT News, unveiled the 2025 list of breakthrough technologies. MIT’s researchers predict these innovations will have a significant future impact based on their long-term value and potential for commercialization.

Top Ten Breakthrough Technologies for 2025:

1. Vera C. Rubin Observatory – A detailed sky survey to explore galaxies and dark matter.

2. Generative AI Search – AI that provides direct, conversational search results.

3. Small Language Models – More efficient AI models for specific tasks.

4. Reducing Cattle Burps – Supplements to lower methane emissions from cattle.

5. Robotaxis – Autonomous taxis improving with each deployment.

6. Cleaner Jet Fuel – Low-emission jet fuel for sustainable aviation.

7. Fast-Learning Robots – Robots that learn tasks by observing humans.

8. Long-Acting HIV Prevention – Extended HIV prevention methods reducing daily meds.

9. Green Steel Technologies – Low-carbon steel production innovations.

10. Lab-Grown Stem Therapies – Advances in stem cell treatments for conditions like diabetes.

CRYPTO

Crypto's Inevitable Cycle: Mapping Bitcoin's 2025 Crash

Bitcoin drives the entire crypto market, and the "halvening" event is what pushes Bitcoin's price. Essentially, Bitcoin's price tends to double because the halvening reduces the issuance of new Bitcoin by half. While there’s always a lot of hype and narrative around the rises—often making them seem more complex.

This supply reduction creates a boom-and-bust cycle: Bitcoin surges upward, then crashes just as quickly.

Looking at the Bitcoin chart, you can see these boom-and-bust cycles clearly. The circled areas represent the price levels I expect Bitcoin to drop to, with the higher values being more likely targets. A drop below $30,000 seems unlikely, though it's hard to predict in such volatile times.