This Week in B2B: AI at Work and the Partnership Effect

B2B innovation doesn’t move slowly, it gets slowed down — mostly by complexity.

While entrenched corporate cultures and legacy workflows hinder innovation, businesses typically cling to them as a hedge against the growing sophistication and nuance of B2B payments in the digital age.

But change is happening.

In the past, you could measure a week’s worth of B2B innovation in years. Today, you can measure years’ worth of advancement in weeks.

As the monthlong PYMNTS event “B2B Payments: Outlook 2030” revealed, the transformation of B2B payments is being led by four themes that have come to define the conversation: the digitization of B2B payments; cash flow and treasury enablement; automation for optimization; and the growing role of technology and new payments innovations.

The themes that this week’s innovations centered around were twofold: choosing the right partner to build better together and unlocking greater growth through artificial intelligence for B2B.

IBC Bank launched a collaboration Tuesday (Nov. 5) with commercial lending FinTech Finanta designed to bolster digital banking. Meanwhile, property management platform ExactEstate announced a new partnership Monday (Nov. 4) with Payabli, a payment infrastructure platform, allowing the former to offer payment services to its users.

Digital payments platform Checkbook said Monday that it is joining the J.P. Morgan Payments Partner Network. The partnership will enable J.P. Morgan’s corporate clients to send digital checks.

Mastercard and NatWest partnered Tuesday to introduce a mobile virtual card payment tool for businesses in the United Kingdom. Approval2Buy is the first service in Europe to use Mastercard’s mobile virtual card app. A day earlier, Mastercard launched a tie-up with B2B payments company PayMate.

As far as acquisitions, digital commerce company Zaelab acquired B2B-focused digital commerce and marketing solutions agency Trellis Monday.

Meanwhile, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau filed an enforcement action Oct. 31 against VyStar Credit Union. On Tuesday, PYMNTS unpacked how ensuring appropriate safeguards are in place is crucial to the success of technology projects between banks and FinTechs.

The PYMNTS Intelligence report “How GenAI Is Reshaping Strategic Decision-Making and Staffing for CFOs” took a deep dive into the impact AI is having on key business functions.

Nations are also taking notice. The United Kingdom said Wednesday that the government is providing a platform to help businesses assess and mitigate AI risks as the technology’s use becomes more widespread. The platform is described as a “one-stop-shop” for guidance and resources to equip businesses to conduct their own impact assessments and evaluations when developing and using AI products and services.

Elsewhere, veterinary care company Bond Vet launched a partnership Monday with spend management provider Coupa. The collaboration will see Bond Vet clinics employ Coupa’s AI platform to manage their finances and supplies.

Rajiv Ramachandran, senior vice president of product strategy and management at Coupa told PYMNTS in an interview published the same day that AI’s effectiveness relies on the volume and quality of data it processes, making platforms that aggregate and analyze data from diverse sources a critical investment for finance leaders, as opposed to solutions that merely automate within silos.

“To truly unlock the power of AI, especially in a B2B world, you really need to have tremendous amounts of real-world business data to train the AI,” Ramachandran said.

Read also: Lend, Don’t Break: How Mid-Size Banks Can Overcome Digital Lending Growing Pains

Not every news item fits into the same box, and that’s the same for the working capital solutions banks must offer corporates.

According to the PYMNTS Intelligence report “The 2024-2025 Growth Corporates Working Capital Index,” commissioned by Visa, chief financial officers and treasurers want it to be clearly understood that they are looking to their banks for financing and comprehensive, relationship-based support that aligns with their unique cash flow needs and strategic growth goals.

Meanwhile, tax compliance software provider Sovos introduced a new solution Wednesday (Nov. 6) called 1099 Professional, designed to help small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) simplify the process of preparing, filing and mailing their tax forms.

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