Fifteen companies from Nordic and Baltic regions took part in the Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV Program Spring Edition of 2022. Lighthouse FINITIV is a three- month startup program that helps Nordic and Baltic fintechs explore partnership opportunities with Mastercard and major Nordic banks like SEB, Danske Bank, DNB, Swedbank, and OP Financial Group. Each year, program partners choose a winner from hundreds of applicants based on criteria that include founder ambition, product potential and progress during the program.

Selected for showing great progress during the program with the result of already being in partnership discussions with Mastercard and multiple banks on providing frictionless payments for mass transit, shared mobility, and electric vehicle charging, Vayapay was named the most promising startup and clear winner in the Norwegian Class by the program’s corporate participants. 15 start-ups took part in spring program. Overall winner was Danish based Vibrant and the most promising Baltic startup was awarded to Tipit who became the country winner of the Lithuanian class.

“The winner of the Norwegian class impressed us with their team engagement and speed at executing. Architecting innovative transit solutions that keep cities moving yet green is at the top of Mastercard’s focus areas now and in the coming years. We are looking into supporting various type of innovation in green mobility. The Urban Mobility Framework sets out by European guidance on how cities can cut emissions and improve mobility is ahead compared to other countries globally. Germany and Sweden have proposed new agreements covering pricing but more important that payment cards should always be offered as a payment method when charging your car. There should be no need for pre-registration or having accounts to charge. We at Mastercard want to support these type of solutions in their go-to-market activities.” says Mats Taraldsson, Head of Innovation, Fintech and Impact-tech Engagement, Mastercard Nordics and Baltics, Mastercard Nordics and Baltics.

“We are proud to be recognized by Mastercard and their partners as a top company in the Nordics and Baltics. Vayapay is committed to providing frictionless payments for urban mobility and the endorsement of Mastercard will help us continue to grow and leverage strategic partnerships”, says Jay Jensen, CEO & Founder at Vayapay“We are proud to be recognized by Mastercard and their partners as a top company in the Nordics and Baltics. Vayapay is committed to providing frictionless payments for urban mobility and the endorsement of Mastercard will help us continue to grow and leverage strategic partnerships”, says Jay Jensen, CEO & Founder at Vayapay

Vayapay has developed a smart payment platform that recognizes and aggregates contactless taps as people use mobility services. This allows people to travel more freely and always be charged the correct amount. Recently they enabled a Tap & Go transit solution for Flytoget, the airport train from and to Oslo, Norway airport solution and all Mastercard cards can be used contactless without any pre-registration needed.

“DNB is please to be part of Mastercard Lighthouse program as it supports our fintech and impact tech broader engagement in the Norwegian market. We are also glad to see that companies see Norway as a good market to enter as in case with Vayapay who have gone into a partnership with Flytoget. We see potential for future collaboration with several companies and look forward to continue these dialogues.“ says Kathy Hao-Hsuan Chang, Senior Strategic Fintech Partnership Manager at DNB.

Other startups that took part in the Norwegian Class in the Spring edition of the program were Lendwill, Stack by.me, Vourity and Zeipt. It has been an incredible journey, and the Mastercard Lighthouse team is proud to have worked with 15 of the top fintech companies in Norway, Denmark and Lithuania. All of them put in tremendous effort and continue to pave the way by bringing innovative solutions to each of their markets. Lendwill, the Norwegian peer-to-peer lending platform, won the Mastercard Lighthouse Circle investor award after receiving the most inbound interest from Investors (investors who are interested in joining the Lighthouse Investor Circle can register interest here).

“Among all the awards to be won, getting the recognition from Mastercard’s investor circle was the most important to us. We’re about to raise our first big round, and this award brings us immense inspiration and a great push forward,” said Anzhelika and Tatiana from Lendwill”, says Anzhelika Osmanova, CEO at Lendwill“Among all the awards to be won, getting the recognition from Mastercard’s investor circle was the most important to us. We’re about to raise our first big round, and this award brings us immense inspiration and a great push forward,” said Anzhelika and Tatiana from Lendwill”, says Anzhelika Osmanova, CEO at Lendwill

Other startups that took part in the Norwegian Class in the Spring edition of the program were Lendwill, Stack by.me, Vourity and Zeipt. It has been an incredible journey, and the Mastercard Lighthouse team is proud to have worked with 15 of the top fintech companies in Norway, Denmark and Lithuania. All of them put in tremendous effort and continue to pave the way by bringing innovative solutions to each of their markets. Lendwill, the Norwegian peer-to-peer lending platform, won the Mastercard Lighthouse Circle investor award after receiving the most inbound interest from Investors (investors who are interested in joining the Lighthouse Investor Circle can register interest here).Other startups that took part in the Norwegian Class in the Spring edition of the program were Lendwill, Stack by.me, Vourity and Zeipt. It has been an incredible journey, and the Mastercard Lighthouse team is proud to have worked with 15 of the top fintech companies in Norway, Denmark and Lithuania. All of them put in tremendous effort and continue to pave the way by bringing innovative solutions to each of their markets. Lendwill, the Norwegian peer-to-peer lending platform, won the Mastercard Lighthouse Circle investor award after receiving the most inbound interest from Investors (investors who are interested in joining the Lighthouse Investor Circle can register interest here).

“Among all the awards to be won, getting the recognition from Mastercard’s investor circle was the most important to us. We’re about to raise our first big round, and this award brings us immense inspiration and a great push forward,” said Anzhelika and Tatiana from Lendwill”, says Anzhelika Osmanova, CEO at Lendwill

The Lighthouse FINITIV Program winner receives an invitation to pitch for Mastercard’s Start Path program. The next Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV Program in the Fall will start in the end of August 2022 focusing on the Swedish, Finnish and the Latvian markets. Read about the fintech trends and solutions of Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV companies in the recently published Mastercard Lighthouse Research Report.