Marqeta Brings Mobile Payments Prowess to Forbes’ Fintech 50

Demonstrating once again that there’s a lot of innovation going on in the financial technology (fintech) field these days, Forbes recently brought out its annual Fintech 50 list, a list designed to highlight up-and-comers in the fintech field. Marqeta, a card issuer, dropped word our way that it would be appearing on this list itself, thanks in large part to the innovations that it brought to the field with it.

Marqeta has never actually appeared on the list before this year, which it considers a validation of its “…innovation and market leadership” in the field. In explaining some of the facets of the decision process to add a firm to the Fintech 50 list, Forbes staff writer Jeff Kauflin noted that the company looked for “industry-changing innovation,” as well as the regular release of new products and features. Failing that, large-scale strategic improvements were also acceptable, suggesting that Forbes was looking for either one big hit or several smaller hits in its decision making.

This made Marqeta a natural fit, thanks to its new Modern Card issuing system, which is a first-of-its-kind solution that targets not only developers, but other fintech innovators in the field. With Modern Card, businesses can easily issue new cards, whether they be physical, virtual, or even tokenized.

Thanks to the open APIs involved, Modern Card allows for a closer approximation of users’ needs in the field and improve customer experience. Before this, companies that needed a card platform had a tough time finding a way to even launch such a system.

This is another example of selling shovels in a gold rush. Rather than try to get in on a market, Marqeta is opening up the possibility for other firms to try and get in on the market. Firms buy the Marqeta tools and attempt to make a success as best they can. If the firm goes under, Marqeta’s not out anything as it already made its sale. With payment card systems becoming increasingly popular, this represents an excellent stake in a market with massive potential.

Given that Marqeta has already doubled revenues every year for the last three years, it’s clearly already done well for itself. The Forbes Fintech 50 listing is just icing on an already impressive cake.