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Payments

Goldfinch Partners and Baupost Closes Acquisition of Western Union Business Solutions for $910 million

Goldfinch Partners LLC and The Baupost Group, LLC announce their milestone achievement by closing the Western Union Business Solutions (WUBS) acquisition for $910 million. WUBS will be renamed Convera as a new standalone B2B global payments company. In 2021, it registered beyond 20 percent revenue gain and payments volume of $170 billion. Patrick Gauthier will be serving as Convera’s CEO.

About this news, Mr. Gauthier shared his words. He says, “At Convera, our purpose is to make global payments so easy that every business around the world can grow with confidence. Convera incorporates the agility of a fintech with the scale, sophistication, and breadth of capabilities of a global financial institution. We plan to bring innovation, value, and exceptional service to our customers with focused investments in our product offerings, technology, and people.”

Convera is known for being the largest non-bank fintech in B2B payments at the global level. Its seamless payment infrastructure makes the cross-border money transfer process stress-free and straightforward, thus allowing its customers to use the platform with ease globally. The payment business significantly reaches 140+ currencies around 200+ countries and 60+ global banking partners. Customers registered with the platform’s usage is recorded to be more than 30,000 from across small and medium-sized businesses, law firms, financial institutions, educational institutions, and NGOs.

We are eager to reach this important milestone in Convera’s next chapter. We’re particularly excited to be bringing Patrick on board, which we have known and admired for years. We have full confidence in his ability to further position Convera for significant growth, with its unparalleled scale, diverse and loyal customer base, and breadth of solutions.”

Bill McNichols, managing partner and co-founder of Goldfinch Partners

Furthermore, Convera will involve multiple veteran fintech professionals to its leadership team, mainly from Amazon, BCG Digital Ventures, BCG, PayPal, and Visa. The names include Dharmesh Syal (Chief Technology Officer), Jodi Krause (Chief People Officer), Drew Weinstein (Chief Commercial Officer), and Jody Visser (Chief Transformation Officer). They are joining the existing WUBS leadership team, including Andrew Summerill (Chief Financial Officer), Michel Foricher (Head of Operations), and Tristan van der Vijver (Chief Compliance and Risk Officer).

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