LIFETIME OF ACHIEVEMENT
JACK MANGNALL
CO-FOUNDER OF PAYMENTS STARTUP SHAPE
As one of two Co-founders of UK payments business Shape Technologies , Jack Mangnall is aiming to use his experience in startups to drive value for PSPs
After almost a decade in sales and client account management roles , Jack Mangnall was appointed Head of Partner Growth at payments fintech Cardstream in August 2020 . He spent nearly two years in the role , before joining Acquired . com as a Senior Partner Manager for ISV in May 2022 .
Now , the British entrepreneur is aiming to leverage that experience as he embarks on a totally new venture : the launch of his own payments business , Shape Technologies . “ Our mission is to get payments businesses to market quicker ,” he tells FinTech Magazine , “ delivering a dynamic payments-platformas-a-service ( PPaaS ), which is fully customisable for PSPs the world over .
“ My experience in payments enabled me to identify gaps within the industry – for example , payfacs struggling to build technology , gateways with poor UI , acquirers with legacy platforms and processes . I don ’ t mean to demean what specific companies in those areas have achieved ; in fact , in order to achieve success , these companies have had to neglect their merchant-facing interfaces in favour of building out core processing capability and global connectivity .
“ But that is where we saw our opportunity . I believe that Shape ’ s modules used in various combinations can add value for so many PSPs and enable them to provide their partners and merchants with a full merchant journey they ’ ll be proud of .”
The founder experience in challenging times There is no easy time to start a business – but , perhaps , these last few months have been harder than most . In the UK , where Shape is based , the headline rate of inflation is – at the time of writing – hovering just below the 7 % mark , three percentage points or so higher than in the US . The International Monetary Fund ( IMF ) predicts that the UK will have five more years of high interest rates , as well as the slowest growth of all G7 economies .
16 November 2023