How To Crack Cross Border Finance with Airwallex

This article has been created in collaboration with a sponsoring partner.

Scaling a business is tough, especially when it comes to expanding outside your domestic market into other countries.

Recently, we sat down with Airwallex, a global payments platform, to ask them about what they do, how they help US SMEs scale their business internationally, and the common obstacles businesses face when scaling.

Can you explain what Airwallex does?

Airwallex was built with a single purpose in mind – to create a world where all businesses can operate across borders, and by doing so, propel the growth of the global digital economy.

With our proprietary infrastructure, we take the friction out of global payments and financial operations, empowering businesses of all sizes to unlock new opportunities and grow beyond borders.

Over 100,000 businesses globally including brands such as Brex, Rippling, Navan, Qantas, SHEIN, and many more use our software and APIs to manage everything from global payments, treasury, and spend management to embedded finance.

What part does Airwallex play in global business?

It’s exciting when you start to buy and sell goods and services overseas. However, being aware of the hidden costs of cross-border transactions is critical to realizing international business success. Choosing the right payment solution provider is vital because it can drastically impact your bottom line.

When your business accepts and sends money in various currencies, you may be charged fees for every foreign currency transaction you make, and that can accumulate quickly.

With Airwallex, you can improve your bottom line, simplify your global funds, and expand into new markets quickly and effortlessly.

How does Airwallex help me expand my business beyond the U.S. market?

Airwallex provides a suite of financial solutions specifically designed to reduce friction and supercharge your global growth strategy:

• Global Accounts: Open foreign currency accounts in 12+ markets, giving you a local presence without the administrative burden. Receive payments like a local, reducing delays and saving on FX conversion fees.
• Fast, Affordable International Transfers: Move money in 60 currencies across 150 countries with impressive speed and competitive exchange rates. Say goodbye to the slow and costly processes often associated with traditional banks.
• Expense Management: Issue virtual or physical cards in multiple currencies to your team members worldwide. Control spending, streamline expense tracking, and reduce reimbursement headaches.
• Online Payment Gateway: Accept payments in multiple currencies from customers around the globe by their preferred local payment methods, expanding your market reach and boosting sales.

What obstacles do businesses face when expanding globally?

Businesses are struggling to manage their fragmented payments systems. Businesses accept payments, hold, convert, pay suppliers/vendors and reimburse their employees on disparate systems and find themselves unable to scale across markets they operate in.

Traditional banks and most fintechs in the market offer point solutions, and can only support customers in a few markets. Their fees can be ambiguous and expensive, and money transfers and settlements can take days if not weeks.

Here are some of the key issues businesses encounter:

• Inefficient and costly transfers when you pay overseas suppliers or employees which can add up over time.
• Inability to collect currencies in the place your business operates, or paying for the currency conversion fees unnecessarily.
• Difficulty in reconciling multi-currency transactions with your accounting system.
• Challenges in managing multi-currency expenses such as marketing costs or employee travel.
• Dealing with foreign currency fluctuations that significantly impact the bottom line.

What sort of organizations do you currently work with?

Airwallex is trusted by over 100,000 companies around the world and Airwallex is also proud to partner with a diverse range of businesses across industries and sizes. Here’s a snapshot of the types of organizations we typically serve:

• E-commerce businesses: Airwallex makes it easy to securely accept payments from customers in 180+ countries. Our multi-currency solutions and breadth of local payment options help boost your international sales while eliminating the need for costly FX conversion fees. eCommerce businesses can use their multi-currency balances to make payouts to suppliers and partners across the globe through Airwallex’s extensive local payment network.
• Technology startups and SaaS companies: With our all-in-one financial platform SaaS and tech companies can manage everything from subscription payments, FX, and corporate cards. Our Airwallex’s Embedded Finance solutions enables SaaS companies to build and monetize their own financial products.
• Marketplaces: We simplify payment flows for marketplaces, helping them collect and distribute funds on a global scale.
• Import/Export businesses: If your business operates with international suppliers or distributors, Airwallex streamlines transactions in multiple currencies, saving you time and money.
• Professional services: We help Marketing Agencies, Consulting Firms, Developer Agencies, Accounting and Financial Advisory companies with faster, cost-effective international payments and finance management. With Airwallex, companies can set up multi-currency accounts to get paid by international clients in their preferred currency with no hidden fees and use the same funds to pay staff, contractors, and vendors for each of your project budgets, saving on FX.
• Travel companies: Airwallex enables online travel agents, aggregators and travel tech businesses to pay travel suppliers around the world with speed and accuracy while enabling a globally-optimised experience to accept payments from travellers across the globe.

What is the Airwallex USP? What makes you special?

Airwallex takes a holistic approach to global payments and financial operations, providing businesses, big or small, with everything needed to streamline and enhance their global financial management. Key features include:

• End-to-end payments and financial platform: Airwallex gives businesses the ability to collect, manage, and send funds with built in software for financial workflows such as expense management and accounts payable. Our key competitors offer point solutions (e.g. FX focused, online payments focused) and only provide payments or software, but not both.
• Global reach: Open domestic and foreign currency accounts within minutes, and trade 60+ currencies at interbank rates. Payout to over 150 countries and process payments with all major schemes like Visa, Mastercard and Amex and 160+ local payment methods. We offer $0 fees for Funds transferred by Airwallex network through direct connections with local clearing systems worldwide and instant payouts in 110+ countries and Like-for-like settlement for online payments in 14 currencies.
• Seamless integration: Airwallex integrates smoothly with popular platforms so you can spend less time on manual operations and more on global growth. Save countless hours in bookkeeping with our integrations to Netsuite, Xero and Quickbooks, and simplify your payment flows with our integrations with marketplaces and platforms like Amazon and TikTok Shop.
• We offer a software application suite offering on top of payments (expense management, bill pay, payment links) to help businesses run their financial operations globally from one tool.

Airwallex’s best-in-class security, seamless onboarding, award-winning customer support, and extensive global coverage make it a powerful tool for businesses seeking effective payment solutions that operate well beyond borders.