The B2B arena is marked by heady technological change and innovation – yet when it comes to working capital management and real time analytics, much is left to be done, especially for SMEs. Here’s how one CEO, Max Eliscu, with two companies under his command, sees the landscape shifting now and in the future.
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[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row full_width=”” parallax=”” parallax_image=””][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text css_animation=””]It’s a rarity that one executive straddles both movements, but the latest executive profiled in our Commander in Chief series has done just that. Max Eliscu, who is the founder of both LSQ Funding Group, which provides accounts receivable financing, and Viewpost, an online payments and invoice processing firm, spoke to PYMNTS about the need for speed and innovation that drives both of his companies and the B2B industry writ large.[/vc_column_text][vc_separator color=”grey” align=”align_center” style=”” border_width=”” el_width=””][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”1/12″][vc_icon type=”fontawesome” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-comment” icon_openiconic=”vc-oi vc-oi-dial” icon_typicons=”typcn typcn-adjust-brightness” icon_entypo=”entypo-icon entypo-icon-note” icon_linecons=”vc_li vc_li-heart” color=”custom” background_style=”” background_color=”grey” size=”sm” align=”left” css_animation=”” custom_color=”#1c4d0f”][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”11/12″][vc_column_text css_animation=””]
How would you define your company’s approach to innovation?
[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_row_inner el_id=””][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”1/12″][vc_icon type=”fontawesome” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-comments-o” icon_openiconic=”vc-oi vc-oi-dial” icon_typicons=”typcn typcn-adjust-brightness” icon_entypo=”entypo-icon entypo-icon-note” icon_linecons=”vc_li vc_li-heart” color=”custom” background_style=”” background_color=”grey” size=”sm” align=”left” css_animation=”” custom_color=”#1c4d0f”][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”11/12″][vc_column_text css_animation=””]Max: I am the chief executive officer and founder of two companies: LSQ Funding Group and Viewpost. Both take a similar approach to innovation through a few core beliefs. Innovation rarely happens in a straight line; in fact, innovation regularly originates as a tangent pulled from another idea. Also, new opportunities open up when teams feel free to ideate without judgement or risk, and autonomy is a cultural essential. Without autonomy, teams need to be told what to do. But with autonomy, teams act in the absence of direction. Finally, a byproduct of experimentation is failure. It is essential to embrace and support this reality.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column_inner][/vc_row_inner][vc_row_inner el_id=””][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”1/12″][vc_icon type=”fontawesome” icon_fontawesome=”fa fa-comment” icon_openiconic=”vc-oi vc-oi-dial” icon_typicons=”typcn typcn-adjust-brightness” icon_entypo=”entypo-icon entypo-icon-note” icon_linecons=”vc_li vc_li-heart” color=”custom” background_style=”” background_color=”grey” size=”sm” align=”left” css_animation=”” custom_color=”#1c4d0f”][/vc_column_inner][vc_column_inner el_class=”” width=”11/12″][vc_column_text css_animation=””]
What is the most innovative thing that you have introduced into the market, and what value did it deliver to the stakeholder group that was its target?
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Max: LSQ Funding Group uses an innovative service design to not only revolutionize the value it delivers to its small business customers but also to set our employees up for success as a matter of routine. We embed the majority of each employee’s job in IT systems that allow our teams to deliver exceptional service from day one. Our newest innovation, which is approaching launch, simplifies and automates access to working capital financing for small and micro-companies.
At Viewpost, we’re bringing the transparency we have all come to expect from Facebook, Twitter and even FedEx and UPS to invoice delivery and payment.
It is outrageous that business owners can track the delivery of online orders all the way to their office, but they can’t tell if their invoices have been received, approved, scheduled for payment or have been paid. When payment can make the difference between success and failure — or profit and loss — that just isn’t good enough.
We are particularly proud of the work we are doing with U.S. Bank and Fifth Third Bank (and a host of others to be announced soon) to accelerate and simplify B2B payments and improve cash flow management.
In the near future, we’ll begin providing real-time contextual recommendations and an ability to act, smoothing out fluctuations and bringing small businesses everywhere the ability to adapt their cash positions at the swipe of a thumb.
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Where do you look for innovative ideas and why?
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Max: I find that we’re not innovating as a result of a search for innovative ideas. Rather, we identify problems and ask nearly endless questions about why they exist and if they can be fixed.
My experience has taught me that the most innovative ideas often address problems that we have all grown accustomed to accepting. Examples: Waiting in long lines at airport ticket counters for boarding passes, making trips to stores for every manner of purchase, enduring the inconvenience of limited access to taxi cabs.
At LSQ, we solve for access to working capital financing. To make that possible we have built innovative technology that makes the tools of the job easy, and soon we’ll begin delivering near-instant approval and access to working capital on demand. At Viewpost, we solve for lack of transparency in B2B transactions: slow payment, duplication of data entry and the obvious imbalance of liquidity between many buyers and their smaller vendors. In both cases, we are tackling problems that businesses have always assumed are immutable.
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What do you think that most people underestimate about innovating in payments?
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Max: Innovation in payments is challenging for a number of reasons, but it comes down to the regulatory processes that exist to help ensure the flow of payments remains stable, reliable and secure.
Logically, banks are in the best place to solve for faster payment. Unfortunately, the highly regulated nature of the industry makes it difficult to effect change. In part, that is because today’s regulatory environment carries with it a workload that often represents an enormous drain on time and energy, stifling innovation. The effort to effect change within the banking sector is made even more difficult because it requires collaboration, often among players with competing interests.
While we sometimes see renewed effort, the reality is that there are 5,400 commercial banks in the United States, and getting them to agree to anything is a Herculean task. Nonetheless, innovation is happening and is often led by innovators that are willing to accept a degree of personal and career risk to advance the rightful goal of faster payment.
By definition, these people are rare, and as a result, the majority of change coming out of the industry is incremental, rather than transformative.
At Viewpost, we took these challenges into consideration from the beginning, building a team of experts who understood the payment, security, compliance and regulatory challenges of the industry, and then we built an organization and product that is able to support and unlock innovation.
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What person or company do you think “gets” innovation and why?
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Max: Innovation generally begins with the identification of a problem and ends with solutions that feel obvious. Southwest Airlines, Progressive Insurance, Tesla, Uber, SoFi, all recognized a unique problem in the market, from high-priced air fares and inconsistent departure timelines to untenable student debt, and then set out to tackle the problem in ways that were disruptive to the status quo.
Each sought to change the core expectations of their market. Each allowed their teams the freedom to see the world differently and encouraged them to move obstacles that others believed were unyielding.
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Founder & CEO of LSQ Funding Group and Viewpost
Max has been building and scaling businesses in the B2B space for nearly two decades, first as the founder of LSQ Funding Group and more recently as the founder of Viewpost. He is CEO of both companies.
In creating LSQ Funding Group, Max set out to help small to midsize businesses access working capital through quick and efficient invoice financing. Fueled by referral relationships with the nation’s leading banks, including U.S. Bank and Bank of America, LSQ to date has provided more than $14 billion in financing to small businesses. The scale and structure of financing operations at LSQ placed it at the epicenter of the B2B market’s transactional inefficiency. Max saw the opportunity amid the arcane, largely paper-based methods many businesses still use to send, receive and make payment, and launched Viewpost.
Viewpost offers businesses of every size, across AR/AP, a secure business network that removes the barriers to exchanging invoices and payments electronically. The network connects businesses and people to data that is used to improve efficiency, collaboration and cash flow management, while drastically reducing the need for paper-based processes. Recognizing the shared interest between Viewpost and financial institutions, Max and his leadership team forged partnerships with U.S. Bank, Fifth Third Bank and others soon to be announced, aiming to accelerate the elimination of paper invoices and payments for every business, big or small. To date, more than $24 billion has transacted over Viewpost.
To feed the rapid growth of LSQ Funding Group and Viewpost, Max has raised more than $240 million in equity capital over the last three years.[/vc_cta][/vc_column][/vc_row]
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