For Payhawk, this will further its mission to simplify business payments, by accelerating new product innovation and enabling even greater service reliability and resilience for its customers.

Payhawk’s platform provides businesses with smart Visa company cards in multiple currencies, that help companies control spending at scale and save time managing expenses. Customers benefit from Visa's high global acceptance, and Payhawk’s card technology provides proactive spending controls, such as daily and single transaction limits, AI-powered receipt capture and data extraction, and automatic payment reconciliation via native integrations to accounting and ERP software.

The membership grants Payhawk the ability to directly issue Visa cards without relying on third parties and provides Payhawk with greater control of its payment infrastructure. This will accelerate innovation and help to ensure even greater service reliability and resilience.

"With our new Visa membership and our recently granted Electronic Money Institution (EMI) licence, one of our top priorities is further expanding our payment options. For example, we currently offer customers the choice between debit and credit cards in some markets, but we want to offer this flexibility to all our clients," said Hristo Borisov, CEO of Payhawk.

To receive principal membership with Visa, Payhawk had to undergo a rigorous application process and pass an audit conducted by Visa to ensure that the company meets all applicable operational, and regulatory requirements. Payhawk was also recently granted an EMI license, with access to the entire EEA, from the Bank of Lithuania which further confirms its adherence to robust capital, regulatory and security standards.

Hristo Borisov, CEO and Co-Founder of Payhawk says, "We started our relationship with Visa back in 2018, and they’ve been incredibly supportive to us throughout our journey - we are thrilled to now be a principal member of Visa. Together with our EMI licence, we are able to control more of the payment processing stack, and therefore able to move faster and optimise the infrastructure to best address the needs of our clients."

Juha Sillanpaa, Visa, Group Country Manager, Finland and Baltics, comments: “We are pleased to collaborate with Payhawk, recognising it as an innovative fintech combining product development and a customer-first approach. Our partnership will help unlock opportunities for Payhawk clients, underpinned by a robust regulatory framework.”