Novo Rolls Out Invoicing, Budgeting With SMB Banking Offering

Small business banking platform Novo has introduced new capabilities to help small firms throughout the U.S. better monitor and control their funds, according to a Monday (March 15) announcement.

Novo’s new features include Novo Invoicing for making and controlling a limitless quantity of invoices. Another new feature is Novo Reserves for setting aside funds for a rainy day or bigger capital investments. Additional functionality includes self-service capabilities for adding a Novo card to a digital wallet, asking for a new Novo debit card and disputing transactions.

Novo’s new functionality also includes Square, Shopify and Stripe integrations for monitoring monthly sales statistics and the status of payouts from Square or Shopify to Novo accounts.

Michael Rangel, the chief executive of Novo, said in the announcement that those features collectively “are an important step towards our vision of not just offering a business checking account but building a financial platform that will help small business owners simplify their finances and optimize their cash flow as they begin recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Novo processed more than $600 million in client transactions last year, according to the announcement.

The news comes after it was reported in February that Thrive is nearly ready to roll out a new small business banking account for Australian small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs). CEO Michael Nuciforo referred to the offering as a “CFO in your pocket.”

“People start a business to control their own destiny, but the reality is they become a slave to financial admin,” he said, according to a published report.

Thrive will roll out with functionalities such as tax estimates, cash flow outlooks, reconciliation and digitized spend categorization.

“For every sale, there is an invoice to fill, a staff member to pay and an expense to be reconciled. In fact, small businesses spend over 42 days a year on financial admin,” Nuciforo said, according to the published report. “Our mission is to end that.”