Payment Expert’s Fintech Unwrapped delivers the latest and developing news that has shaped the sector over the course of the week.
This week, Airwallex is entering the competitive billing payment sector after its acquisition of OpenPay was announced. Also, Klarna followed its IPO launch in the US by confirming the rollout of the Klarna Card across Europe.
Airwallex to compete in billing sector with OpenPay acquisition
On September 3, Airwallex announced the acquisition of OpenPay, a billing platform which offers payment orchestration, subscription management, and revenue analytics.
A core focus for Airwallex is to integrate OpenPay’s billing capabilities to its global platform, with the company stating this will enable it to strengthen its position against other billing companies such as Stripe Billing and Recurly.
“Most billing systems are locked in the past, they were never designed for a global, multi-currency world. That’s the gap we’re closing,” said Jack Zhang, Co-Founder and CEO of Airwallex. “By bringing OpenPay’s subscription management, orchestration, and analytics capabilities into Airwallex, we’re creating the first truly global billing platform.
Airwallex aims to “redefine” billing by utilising OpenPay’s AI-driven retention tools to meet its clients demands for hybrid and usage-based billing options in order to unlock new revenue streams for future growth.
Klarna Card comes to Europe
Klarna is launching the Klarna Card in Europe following a successful rollout in the US in July 2025.
Announced on September 2, the debit-first card enables users to either pay in total or pay in instalments at the physical point-of-sale. Cardholders can choose to either Pay in 3, Pay Later, or spread costs across months in a long-term finance planner for costlier purchases.
The Klarna Card can be accepted at more than 150 million Visa merchant locations across the globe and has been adopted by more than 685,000 Americans. The initial European rollout will include countries such as France, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Spain, with plans to launch in other countries down the line.
The debit card launch in Europe comes off the back of Klarna launching its long-awaited IPO in the US this week.
Stripe’s opportunity for digital payments in Japan
Stripe launched Stripe Terminal in Japan on September 3 to support Apple Tap to Phone and PayPay QR code payments across the country.
Also supporting payments from WeChat Pay, Stripe will provide Japanese merchants with its latest Reader S710 module which enables merchants to accept payments offline.
With payment volume on Stripe devices increasing 40% last year in Japan, and with more than 9,000 Japanese merchants integrating Stripe Billing for subscription payments, the company sees an opportunity in an emerging market to grow its point-of-sale services.
Zopa’s Rvvup acquisition to boost POS process
Zopa confirmed the acquisition of Rvvup on September 2 to increase its retail finance offering at merchant checkouts.
The UK digital bank will implement Rvvup’s AI Payment Agent to automate the payment process at checkout. Zopa believes this addition to its point-of-sale payment services will help merchants choose the most optimal payment method, while also benefiting from a faster payment process and ease-of-use integration.
The acquisition is Zopa’s second, having also acquired point-of-sale finance technology and lending platform DivideBuy in 2023.
Billingbooth helps telcos with GoCardless backing
Billingbooth will integrate the full range of GoCardless’ bank payment solutions to provide telcos solutions to bill payment processing and recover bad debt.
GoCardless announced the Billingbooth partnership on September 3, confirming the implementation of Instant Bank Pay to Billingbooth’s infrastructure, as well as its Open Banking-powered payment solution and Success+, its AI-driven tool to automate payment retries.
“This expanded partnership with Billingbooth brings our best-in-class technology to a sector that is perfect for bank payments, providing a seamless solution that solves their biggest billing and payment pain points,” said Tom Metcalfe, Director, Global Partnerships at GoCardless.
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