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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted this📣 We're happy to announce that we've led the $4.7M Seed round into InstaSwitch, with participation from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, Panache Ventures, and executives from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. Every year, approximately 5.4 million U.S. small businesses attempt to switch bank providers. Most never complete the transition. InstaSwitch is the first account activation infrastructure built specifically for business banking. The company helps banks and fintech platforms solve the “last mile” problem in account switching: getting newly opened business accounts to become fully operational - with payroll, income sources, and spend moved over - rather than sitting funded and dormant. Congrats to Founder Daniel West and team! Read more from Forbes below (and Why We Invested in the comments). https://lnkd.in/g5VW6tBFStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch BanksStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch Banks
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Stuart Larkins shared thisFintech has tried to solve activation for years. Daniel’s the first founder treating it like infrastructure—the product actually gets money moving. Congratulations Daniel West, David Roberts and team.Stuart Larkins shared thisIntroducing InstaSwitch! 5.4 million US businesses try to switch banks every year. 60% never finish. $72 billion in revenue disappears into that gap. The next ten years of business banking will be won on activation. The fintechs and banks that close the gap between opening an account and operating one will own the deposit base. Today we're officially launching InstaSwitch, the switching infrastructure that powers business banks to close this gap. We're live with $4.7M in seed funding led by Chicago Ventures, with participation from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, and Panache Ventures, alongside angel investors from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. Couldn't have done any of this without David Roberts and the amazing InstaSwitch team! Short video on why we built this. Full story in the comments.
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted thisSunbit is now generally available on Stripe, embedding its consumer financing directly into the Stripe Dashboard for in-person service businesses across automotive repair, healthcare, home services, veterinary care, and medspas. Unlike e-commerce BNPL, Sunbit is built for high-touch transactions: 90%+ approval rates, 0% interest options, no late fees, and soft credit pulls only. Beta data with Shopmonkey shows a 30% lift in service acceptance and 3x growth in average repair order value across the platform's ecosystem. Sunbit now serves more than 40,000 face-to-face businesses nationwide. Congrats to the Sunbit team. https://bwnews.pr/4ucCEbQSunbit Launches on Stripe, Unlocking Flexible Financing for In-Person Service Businesses NationwideSunbit Launches on Stripe, Unlocking Flexible Financing for In-Person Service Businesses Nationwide
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted thisKin Insurance launched direct-to-consumer home insurance in Oklahoma, expanding to 14 states. It's a deliberate market choice. Oklahoma set an all-time record in 2024 with 152 tornadoes, ranks among the most hail-prone states in the US, and hasn't seen a new home insurer enter in years. CEO Sean Harper put it plainly: that's not a great setup for homeowners. Kin's model is built for catastrophe-exposed states. Rather than pricing on broad assumptions, it evaluates thousands of data points per home and combines AI-native underwriting with human support across quote, policy, and claims. The 14 states Kin now operates in represent more than 50% of the total US home insurance market. https://prn.to/4cQDBjiKin Launches Direct-to-Consumer Home Insurance in OklahomaKin Launches Direct-to-Consumer Home Insurance in Oklahoma
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted thisA year ago, I was on the operator side, focused on one thing: funnel conversion. Where do users actually drop off? Identity → bank linking → funding. That transition is where things break. Now at Aeropay , heading to Consensus 2026 in Miami, I’m looking at the same problem from the other side. A few things that matter more than people want to admit: → The handoff from identity to funding is the highest-friction point in the funnel → Speed is meaningless if your bank rail can’t keep up → Most “solutions” optimize a step, not the system What actually works is infrastructure that connects the full flow: Identity → bank authentication → risk → funding When that’s unified, conversion improves, risk is more controlled, and the experience finally feels like one motion instead of three. The other piece that’s underrated is network effect. When you can recognize users, their banks, and behavior across a network, you remove steps, reduce friction, and improve performance over time. That’s where this category is going. We have some critical clients and partners coming online this year, and the impact of that network is starting to show up in real metrics. If you’re thinking about conversion, funding, or how to actually make pay by bank work at scale, I’ll be in Miami all week
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted thisSunbit has been named to Inc. Magazine's 2026 Regionals: Pacific list at No. 62, the latest in a streak that includes three consecutive @Forbes Fintech 50 appearances and an EY Entrepreneur of the Year award for CEO Arad Levertov. The through-line is sustained profitable growth in a BNPL category where many competitors have struggled to find unit economics. Sunbit has done it without ever charging consumer fees, while maintaining roughly 90% approval rates. The 134 companies on the Pacific list had a median growth rate of 94% between 2022 and 2024. https://bwnews.pr/3O069hRSunbit’s Profitable Growth Earns Another Major Win: Inc.’s 2026 List of the Fastest-Growing Private Companies in the PacificSunbit’s Profitable Growth Earns Another Major Win: Inc.’s 2026 List of the Fastest-Growing Private Companies in the Pacific
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted thisProud to share a big step forward for GoodShip. For years, brokers and carriers have been part of the platform, responding to shipper RFPs and minibids, accessing self-serve scorecards, and working together toward better outcomes. Along the way, many have asked for more comprehensive tools to manage and optimize their own networks. Today, we’re officially expanding GoodShip to better support brokers, carriers, and other logistics service providers with deeper insight and decision support across their lanes, partners, and bid activity, building on the foundation we’ve established with shippers. This also extends access to Laney, the industry’s first AI Transportation Analyst, giving brokers and carriers the same ability to get instant answers, generate real-time insights, and act on recommendations in minutes, along with new pricing and planning tools to respond to RFPs with greater speed and precision. The result is stronger coordination and better outcomes for everyone involved. We’re thrilled to partner with Prime Inc. as an anchor customer in this segment, and excited about the growing roster of brokers and carriers already trusting us to drive better outcomes across their businesses. https://lnkd.in/eu5JaJ8EPrime Inc. Selects GoodShip to Modernize Bid Management and Power AI-Driven Network IntelligencePrime Inc. Selects GoodShip to Modernize Bid Management and Power AI-Driven Network Intelligence
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Stuart Larkins reposted thisStuart Larkins reposted this📣 We're proud to announce that CV has led the Seed round for ILS (Intelligent Legal Solutions!). ILS is building the workflow system for private funds lawyers — starting with side letter management and MFN automation through their platform, ProVision. In just over a year since launch, ProVision is already trusted by 10+ of the world's leading law firms, including Cleary Gottlieb, Fried Frank, Goodwin, Paul Weiss, Proskauer, Ropes & Gray, and Willkie Farr & Gallagher — processing 5,000+ side letters across 450+ matters and supporting $150B+ in capital raised globally. The team behind ILS — Fergus Plant, Jack McCarthy and Stefano Benigni — brings rare combination of deep legal expertise and technical discipline. We're excited to partner with them as they scale ProVision into a unified platform for fund formation teams worldwide. Welcome to the CV portfolio, team! https://lnkd.in/guPSRJAqILS (Intelligent Legal Solutions) Raises $3M in Funding Led by Chicago VenturesILS (Intelligent Legal Solutions) Raises $3M in Funding Led by Chicago Ventures
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Stuart Larkins liked thisStuart Larkins liked thisGreat catching up with Sean Harper at the Kin Insurance office in Chicago last week. Kin is an innovative home insurance platform and a perfect example of how our Figure Connect marketplace enables partners to scale mortgage businesses without the traditional overhead. Kin is focused on insurance, not building a mortgage company. By moving away from legacy systems, they are leveraging our AI-powered architecture to bridge the gap between their front-end insurance operations and our blockchain-native capital markets. This offers better economics, scale and access to instant liquidity. It's a win-win, where homeowners can conveniently access high-quality coverage and mortgage products. Congrats to Sean and the team on the thriving business you're building. We’re proud to support your continued upward trajectory.
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Stuart Larkins liked thisStuart Larkins liked thisInstaSwitch, a NYC-based provider of an account activation infrastructure for business banking, has raised $4.7 million in a Seed funding round led by Chicago Ventures, with participation from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, Panache Ventures, and executives from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. About 5.4 million small businesses in the U.S. try to switch banks each year, but most of them are unable to complete the process, and as more companies enter banking through digital platforms, acquisitions, and fintech expansion, the cost of accounts that are opened but never used continues to rise. Daniel West | Stuart Larkins 🔗 Read full article link in comment #instaswitch #funding #startupnews #businessnews #businessupdate
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Stuart Larkins liked thisStuart Larkins liked thisThe line in the Forbes piece I won't forget: Stuart Larkins said Chicago Ventures usually underwrites a vision, but with InstaSwitch they were underwriting a problem. The problem had data. The data had urgency. That's the right way to think about this category. The activation gap isn't a vision pitch. Every bank and fintech is already losing money to it. We just decided to build the thing that fixes it. Grateful to Elaine Pofeldt for the coverage and to Stuart for that framing. Read the full story here: https://lnkd.in/eEGBpMkTStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch BanksStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch Banks
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Stuart Larkins liked thisStuart Larkins liked this🏦 InstaSwitch has raised $4.7 million in seed funding to build software that turns open accounts into active ones. The round was led by Chicago Ventures, with backing from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, and Panache Ventures, as well as fintech leaders from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. More details 👉 https://lnkd.in/g4NuUZCv Daniel West David Roberts Matthew Gizzi Mark Pettinen Stuart Larkins #ustech #funding #fintech #startups #technology #vcfunding #investment #innovation #bankaccounts #aiInstaSwitch lands $4.7M from Chicago Ventures, 8-Bit Capital to fix inactive business bank accounts with AI — TFNInstaSwitch lands $4.7M from Chicago Ventures, 8-Bit Capital to fix inactive business bank accounts with AI — TFN
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Stuart Larkins liked thisFintech has tried to solve activation for years. Daniel’s the first founder treating it like infrastructure—the product actually gets money moving. Congratulations Daniel West, David Roberts and team.Stuart Larkins liked thisIntroducing InstaSwitch! 5.4 million US businesses try to switch banks every year. 60% never finish. $72 billion in revenue disappears into that gap. The next ten years of business banking will be won on activation. The fintechs and banks that close the gap between opening an account and operating one will own the deposit base. Today we're officially launching InstaSwitch, the switching infrastructure that powers business banks to close this gap. We're live with $4.7M in seed funding led by Chicago Ventures, with participation from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, and Panache Ventures, alongside angel investors from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. Couldn't have done any of this without David Roberts and the amazing InstaSwitch team! Short video on why we built this. Full story in the comments.
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Stuart Larkins liked thisStuart Larkins liked this📣 We're happy to announce that we've led the $4.7M Seed round into InstaSwitch, with participation from 8-Bit Capital, Better Tomorrow Ventures, Panache Ventures, and executives from Unit, Square, PayPal, and Plaid. Every year, approximately 5.4 million U.S. small businesses attempt to switch bank providers. Most never complete the transition. InstaSwitch is the first account activation infrastructure built specifically for business banking. The company helps banks and fintech platforms solve the “last mile” problem in account switching: getting newly opened business accounts to become fully operational - with payroll, income sources, and spend moved over - rather than sitting funded and dormant. Congrats to Founder Daniel West and team! Read more from Forbes below (and Why We Invested in the comments). https://lnkd.in/g5VW6tBFStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch BanksStartup Wins Funding From Chicago Ventures for A Platform That Makes It Easier For Small Businesses To Switch Banks
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