Santander CIB partners with Allianz Trade and Two to launch B2B BNPL for global corporates

Santander Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB) has partnered with trade credit insurer Allianz Trade and Two, a B2B ecommerce payments platform, to launch a global B2B buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution for large multinational corporates.

The solution, which the three companies claim is a “first-of-its-kind” partnership, means that corporates will be able to offer business buyers instant deferred payments at checkout.

The partnership sees Two taking care of the payment technology, while Santander CIB is financing upfront payment to seller and credit to buyers, and Allianz Trade is protecting the entire value chain against non-payment risk.

Sellers will have global multi-currency support to reduce the need for complex operating models with multiple providers across technology, trade insurance, and trade credit, according to a press statement.

“Our solution will be distributed worldwide and aims to allow large corporates to develop their online sales by offering deferred payments to existing and new customers, without being exposed to non-payment risks, while benefiting from immediate and guaranteed payments.

“It is a turnkey solution combining the very best of our three firms, easy to set up and improving both seller revenue and user experience,” said François Burtin, global head of ecommerce at Allianz Trade.

Allianz Trade is able to assess credit requests instantly through its application programming interface (API), using its database of commercial, financial and strategic information on more than 80 million corporates worldwide.

Ignacio Frutos Lopez, global head receivables at Santander CIB, said the fact that buyers have to use personal or corporate credit cards is “hindering” B2B transactions.

“Enabling businesses to maintain their payment habits within 30 or 60 days of their invoices, in an ecommerce environment will be a big differentiator for sellers, while adding a major game changer: all concerns about non-payment risk are now removed, and their cash flow is preserved at all times,” Lopez said.

“Additionally, the solution is instant and seamless which makes it really powerful for a firm dealing with huge sales volumes across different countries.”

The new B2B BNPL service complements Zinia, a B2C BNPL solution launched by Santander’s Digital Consumer Bank and implemented in Germany and the Netherlands over the past year.

Going global

Earlier this year, Allianz Trade and Two partnered to offer a B2B BNPL solution for UK SMEs.

Stavros Tamvakakis, co-founder of Two, added: “Business buying is not a one-size fits all and our product streamlines key steps in the journey (e.g. instant onboarding, ordering, underwriting, invoice distribution, payments, reconciliation) so that sellers do what they do best, while we abstract the pain points of drop-offs, working capital tie up, risk, and manual work.

“Our ambitions are at a global scale, so we decided to take our partnership with Allianz Trade further by collaborating with Santander CIB, combining two powerhouses in insurance and banking to create a unique and innovative solution dedicated to large corporates.”