Page 24 - Pay Magazine s2014

companies & people
Innovators’ Spotlight: Lessons Learned
GEttiNG tO KNOw
ClassWallet
SEcrEt SaucE
We love accountability, but we’re not too fond of paper.
Marketplace Names
Kleo Inc. dba ClassWallet
Location
Hollywood, Fla.
Organized
May 2010
Open for Business
January 2013
Line of Business
Edtech/Fintech
Founders
Jamie Rosenberg, Neil Steinhardt
Funding
Venture backed. Notable investors include IdeaBulb, Techstars Ventures, NewSchools Venture Fund, Corigin Ventures
Ownership
Private
Business Model
B2B, SaaS
Something You Might
Not Expect
Our company’s home base
of South Florida has a growing tech scene—with much better weather than San Francisco or New York.
During Jamie Rosenberg’s 12-year tenure as founder and head of an education funding
nonpro t, he saw rsthand the di culties teachers and admini- strators often faced dealing with funding, purchasing and reconcilia- tion. The process of dealing with paper checks and cash, and lling out purchase orders and other forms often caused signi cant delays and high transaction costs. That experience led Rosenberg to join with payments industry veteran Neil Steinhardt in 2014 to create ClassWallet, an end-to-end digital o ering for managing discretionary funding in K-12 education.
Crowdfunding, digital wallet vets get high marks for bringing e ciency
to K-12 education funding.
“The education funding vertical has a systemic need for inno- vation,” says Steinhardt, who previously worked with digital wallet pioneer Skrill. “We saw the
bene ts of a platform that removed paper from the ubiquitous ‘paper trail.’ We knew by doing that, we could increase accountability while improving e ciency.”
ClassWallet’s platform is based
on a digital wallet combined with an online marketplace featuring dozens of merchants and brands, including Amazon, O ce Depot and School Specialty. School dis- tricts and other clients provision digital wallets on the ClassWallet application, into which they them- selves, parents and other funders can allocate funds for a speci c project, a eld trip or general class- room use. Once funds are loaded, teachers can use the wallet to make purchases from the online marketplace. Merchants then re- turn SKU-level data, so school administration and funders get detailed reporting on every item purchased. Meanwhile, vendors bene t from increased sales,
with ClassWallet retaining a commission on each transaction.
In early 2016, the company
added a companion Discover- branded prepaid card managed
by Marqeta, enabling teachers
to make purchases in stores and
at online vendors that aren’t part
of ClassWallet’s e-marketplace
with the same ease and exibility as in-platform purchases.
Although ClassWallet is focused on the education vertical for now, Steinhardt notes that expansion into other areas is possible. “The bene ts of ClassWallet extend to any company or organization that needs to allocate funds and track how they’re spent,” he notes.
22