Highbeam offers its ecommerce clients a brighter future in international payments

To support its exponential growth, Highbeam paves a path forward for its client base by partnering with Currencycloud to offer an impactful international payment platform offering.

Background

New York-based financial platform Highbeam launched in 2020, offering domestic banking solutions to its US-based ecommerce clients with vendors in the US.

From its launch, Highbeam used the banking as a service (BaaS) platform Unit to serve the payment needs of its domestic clients. Unit enables payments within the domestic US space, but doesn’t support payments outside the US. This was great while Highbeam’s clients were mainly domestic-focused.

As Highbeam grew, their ecommerce clients’ needs grew also, with many having vendors based outside the US. Highbeam also wanted to keep and attract new, larger clients, where the ability to make international payments to vendors and manufacturers efficiently was key to their business growth ambitions. Highbeam had to give these new and potential future clients a compelling reason to sign with them and leave their incumbent banks. And to do this, they needed to offer them the ability to make international payments.

Taking the steps to meet their clients’ needs

It was of critical importance that Highbeam could offer its clients an international payments facility. Highbeam needed a partner who could fill this gap in their services and deliver a complete, seamless and transparent experience.

The Solution

Highbeam looked for a partner to help them achieve their goals and chose Currencycloud. Not only were Currencycloud already partnered with Unit, but Currencycloud also offered a bespoke, white-labelled solution for Highbeam.

When Highbeam partnered with Currencycloud in November 2022 it began by focusing on making the outbound payments merchants paid their international suppliers more efficient and seamless. This was soon followed with a service that enabled their clients to receive funds in 33 currencies and auto-convert these to USD. This primarily helped Highbeam’s clients while allowing Highbeam to recognize revenue from each competitively priced FX transaction.

Results

Highbeam listened to the needs and requests of its increasingly larger clients, for whom the ability to make international payments was essential. Today, over 35% of Highbeam’s clients make international payments to their suppliers and can’t run their business without this facility.

Unlocking larger clients

The new international payments service will make it possible to support larger clients with a $50 – $100 million revenue. Highbeam can now offer them a service which includes international payments alongside existing services such as credit accounts, checking accounts, wire transfers and savings accounts. Highbeam are on a parity with the large incumbent banks, with the added benefit of offering their clients competitive FX and finely tuned customer service.

More competitive with better FX

Highbeam is now able to offer its clients FX at a competitive rate. This rate is highly appealing to their customers who have previously experienced higher FX rates from their legacy banks. These clients want deliverability, which is why local rails are so important as funds arrive on the same or next day, without excessive transaction rates.

Faster onboarding

Because Unit and Currencycloud’s partnership, Highbeam are able to onboard their clients faster as there is only one point of contact.

A competitive player

The ability to offer its US-based clients seamless international payments gives Highbeam a true competitive advantage, as there are only a few financial platforms that offer an equally compelling domestic and international service.

New revenue streams

International payments are now a key source of revenue and growth for Highbeam.

Going forward

At the end of 2023, Highbeam began offering a collections service to its clients who are thinking of moving into wholesale and need ways to effortlessly collect payments if their wholesaler is not based in the US.

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