Strands

Strands

Founded	2004
Headquarters	Barcelona Miami Buenos Aires San Francisco Singapore
Area served	Worldwide
CEO	Erik Brieva
Key people	Dr. Marc Torrens (Founder & CIO) Pau Velando (General Manager, Strands Finance) Paul Kaye (General Manager, Strands Retail) Jordi Teixido (COO)
Employees	100+
Website

Strands is a software house founded in 2004 in Corvallis, Oregon and headquartered in Barcelona that develops software for banks & retailers. Strands Finance Suite provides white-label products including Personal Financial Management (PFM), Business Financial Management (BFM), and Card-Linked Offers (CLO). In 2008, Strands deployed the first PFM in Europe.^[1]

Strands' software employs artificial intelligence techniques such as machine learning, collaborative filtering, pattern recognition, automatic categorization and predictive analytics.^[2][3] In 2007, Strands organized a Summer School on Recommender Systems, which led to the creation of the ACM Conference on Recommender Systems.^[4] Its patent portfolio in music recommendation algorithms was acquired by Apple in 2011.^[5]

Products and services

• Personal Financial Management (PFM), a white label digital money management application. In 2008 Strands deployed the first PFM in Europe with BBVA and since then Strands PFM has been implemented by other institutions, including Barclays, PostFinance and the Bank of Montreal.^[6][7][8][9]
• Business Financial Management (BFM), a white label business banking platform for designed for SMEs.
• Card-Linked Offers (CLO), a marketing platform that enables retailers to target relevant deals to card-holders through digital banking channels.
• Strands Loop,^[10] an all-in-one digital banking platform that combines Business Financial Management (BFM), Card-Linked Offers (CLO) and Personal Financial Management (PFM).
• Strands Discovery,^[11] a business intelligence application for bank marketeers to deliver personalized recommendations through digital banking channels.
• MoneyStrands, the B2C product of Strands PFM that won the 14th Annual Webby Award for "best banking website"^[12]
• MusicStrands, a system that offers music recommendations based on playing behavior.^[13]

Clients

From its Barcelona HQ and offices in San Francisco, Miami, Buenos Aires, and Singapore, Strands serves market leaders like Barclays, Deutsche Bank, BBVA, BNP Paribas, PostFinance, AIB, Bank of Montreal (BMO), Banco de América Central (BAC), Commercial Bank of Africa (CBA), The Walt Disney Company, Carrefour and Panasonic.^[14][15]

References

1. "White-Label PFM's BBVA's White Horse". Bank Technology News. Retrieved 2016-04-08.
2. "LinkedIn Strands Company Page".
3. "CrunchBase Strands Company Page".
4. "The ACM Conference on Recommender Systems". Retrieved 2007.
5. "Apple Acquires MusicStrands Patents". Patently Apple. October 24, 2011.
6. "White-Label PFM's BBVA's White Horse". American Banker. December 1, 2009.
7. "BMO taps Strands Personal Finance for PFM service". Finextra. February 1, 2011.
8. "PostFinance E-cockpit, votre outil personnel d’analyse financière". 24 Heures. 2011.
9. "BBVA’s Tú Cuentas Shows What Next-Generation Online Banking Will Look Like" (PDF). Forrester. July 14, 2009.
10. "Strands Launches Loop to Combine PFM and Card-Linked Offers - Finovate". Finovate. Retrieved 2016-04-08.
11. "FinovateEurope 2016 - STRANDS - Finovate". Finovate. Retrieved 2016-04-08.
12. "MoneyStrands Wins Webby Award for Best Banking Website". PR Web. May 5, 2010.
13. "Finding your tunes - Technology". The New York Times. June 7, 2006.
14. "Clients - Strands Finance". Strands Finance. Retrieved 2016-04-08.
15. "Clients – Strands Retail". retail.strands.com. Retrieved 2016-04-08.