News
High Peaks Announces Investment in TxCore, Inc.
High Peaks Venture Partners is pleased to announce its recently closed investment in New York-based TxCore, Inc. TxCore is an early-stage software company that is developing a revolutionary platform and toolset for the branded prepaid debit card industry. High Peaks partnered with Village Ventures and existing TxCore investors in this $2.5 million financing.
The prepaid market is experiencing a period of explosive growth, with new types of card programs proliferating rapidly. Amongst the most common types of prepaid programs are retail gift and rebate, health savings account, corporate payroll, travel, incentive, and general purpose reloadable cards for the unbanked. TxCore will be a significant enabler of continued growth and innovation in the prepaid market, with solutions that directly address significant pain points that are driven by the shortcomings of existing prepaid processing platforms and are common to managers of prepaid programs.
TxCore was founded in late 2006 and is led by CEO Anil Aggarwal and President / CTO Carl Ansley. Anil and Carl had previously built Clarity Payment Solutions into one of the leading technology providers and transaction processing companies in the prepaid card market. In 2004, they successfully sold Clarity to TSYS, a $5.6B market cap NYSE company and one of the global leaders in the credit card processing market. Since then, Anil has been an active participant and leader in the rapid growth of the prepaid market. He founded Prepaid Media–the leading trade media property for the prepaid market, which included the largest industry trade show and conference. He also founded and serves as Chairman of the leading trade organization for the prepaid market. Anil and Carl are widely accepted as true leaders in this rapidly growing and evolving industry. With TxCore they are once again joined by the key players from the original Clarity team to build a company that will fundamentally change the way that technology is delivered for prepaid card programs.
The vast majority of issuers and program managers in prepaid today rely on third-party, shared platforms to process their card transactions. TxCore has an entirely new and revolutionary solution. TxCore is driven by the team’s knowledge that managers of prepaid programs are increasingly frustrated by the lack of control, customization, and protection of intellectual property offered by today’s third-party processing model. As the prepaid industry has evolved, the desires of program managers have begun to outstrip the capabilities of existing processing systems and solutions – technology has gone from an industry strength 5 years ago to an industry weakness today, and a limiting factor on the growth of the industry.
TxCore now allows prepaid card issuers and program managers to overcome these frustrations by deploying proprietary, scalable processing systems that provide full control over functionality and release timing as well as infrastructure and service levels. TxCore offers an approach that best manages the complexities of prepaid, providing tremendous benefits usually only achievable with vertical integration, but without the challenges in-house processing can entail. To achieve this balance, TxCore provides clients with platform creation tools and templates so they can deploy customized processing platforms. This new model will enable TxCore to redefine the way prepaid programs are designed and delivered, and fundamentally change the dynamics of the industry to the betterment of program managers and end users a like.
Concurrent with this investment, High Peaks Managing Director Brad Svrluga and Village Ventures Managing General Partner Matt Harris have joined the TxCore board of directors.
About High Peaks Venture Partners
High Peaks Venture Partners is a venture capital firm focused on investments in market leading, early stage technology companies. High Peaks closed its inaugural fund in 2004 and is actively investing in New York City and throughout Upstate New York, focusing primarily on companies in the digital media, internet-enabled business services, telecomm, advanced materials, and medical technology markets. High Peaks is one of 15 affiliates of Village Ventures, a nationwide network of regionally focused, early-stage venture capital funds.
About Village Ventures
Village Ventures is an early stage venture capital firm investing in exceptional entrepreneurs building technology and life science companies in emerging US technology centers. Village Ventures identifies these investment opportunities in partnership with its proprietary nationwide network of early stage venture capital funds that are focused on these markets. Recognizing that venture capital is a local business, Village Ventures has built its enterprise around the deeply integrated local VC who knows regional entrepreneurs and opportunities. The Village Ventures structure allows local VCs to utilize a national framework of world-class services and investment support. Because capital alone does not ensure success, Village Ventures also offers back-office support for the fund network and growth resources for entrepreneurs.
