The growth platform for Fintech companies

The Visa Innovation Program is a fintech pilot-centered collaboration platform designed to
help your company scale and engage with Visa, its clients and partners.

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Visa Innovation Program Europe is in search of the fintech companies that have the highest potential to partner and conduct pilot or proof of concepts with Visa clients and partners, therefore your capabilities should be go-to-market ready for the country you are applying to. We can support market expansion needs on a per case basis and other opportunities beyond. Additionally, you will benefit from curated training, mentorship and introductions to selected investors

Core Value Proposition

PoC/Partnership Opportunities

Introduction to Visa and Visa’s clients to fast-track, test, validate and implement your solutions within Visa’s vast network of financial institutions and corporate partners.

Market Access

Access to new client base and business opportunities across Southern Europe (Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Spain, Turkey)

funding

Connect with some of the leading VC funds in Europe backing fintech startups.

Showcasing

Large exposure and access to top fintech and payment conferences as part of the Program.

Powerful Communitiy

Introduction to Visa and Visa’s clients to fast-track, test, validate and implement your solutions within Visa’s vast network of financial institutions and corporate partners.

Tech Stark

Startup perks, essential tools, industry data, tech infrastructure.

Who Should Apply

If your team has already completed a proof of concept related to the proposed challenges or has a market-ready solution,
you are the right fit for the Visa Innovation Program Europe.

Solution

A solution addressing
one of our Challenges.

Team

A solution addressing one of our Challenge

Stage

Startups and scale ups having a market-tested solution

Commitment

Dedication for pilot collaboration with banks and enterprises

The Program In Numbers

Markets

Applications

Shortlisted Fintechs

Selected Fintechs

Hours of Mentorship

Introductions

Successful Partnerships

0m+

Funding Raised

*Funding raised by the participating Fintech companies after joining the program either independently or through connections of Program Managers (Eleven and Tenity)

program managers

The Visa Innovation Program Europe is run by the collective efforts of our local partners in Greece, Cyprus, Malta, Turkey, Spain, Portugal and Italy. They bring their know-how, network, domain expertise and operational resources to make the Program a reality.

Main Program Managers

Tenity is the leading global innovation ecosystem and early-stage investor, with offices in Zurich, Singapore, Tallinn, Madrid, London, and Istanbul. Tenity’s vision is to accelerate the future of finance by bringing together ambitious founders with leading companies, investors, and mentors.

Tenity

Eleven is one of the leading early-stage VC’s in Southeast Europe, investing in startups since 2012. With 150 collective investments over 10 years, Eleven’s team has been instrumental in catalyzing the regional startup ecosystem.

Eleven

Local Ecosystem Partners

Finnovating is the first Matching platform that connects 70K Tech startups, corporations and investors globally. The platform has created the largest community where its members from 125 active countries can easily connect and collaborate with potential partners to lead innovation, as well as find clients and connect with the best service providers and solutions of the ecosystem.

Finnovating

Fintech Solutions is the innovation agency dedicated to build the future of financial services by connecting financial institutions to the fintech ecosystem. Being part of Portugal Fintech, Fintech Solutions has extensive understanding of the European fintech and incumbent ecosystem and how both sides can collaborate.

Fintech Solutions

Endeavor is the leading global community of, by, and for High-Impact Entrepreneurs — those who dream bigger, scale faster, and pay it forward. Driven by our belief that High-Impact Entrepreneurs transform economies, Endeavor is on a mission to build thriving entrepreneurial ecosystems in emerging and underserved markets around the world.

Endeavor

Fintech District is the gateway to the Italian Fintech Ecosystem, gathering the largest Fintech and Techfin community in Italy. It enables connections and innovation opportunities among all the stakeholders in its network- composed by fintech companies, big banks and financial institutions, corporate companies, professional partners, regulators, investors and international hubs – to foster and drive Open Innovation.

Fintech District

The Timeline

Open Call for Applications

12 January – 1 March 2026

Selection

11 March – 19 March 2026

Program Start

April 2026

Discovery Sessions
One-on-one Meetings with PoC Partners

April – May 2026

Workshops
Design Thinking Sprints

May – December 2026

PoC / Pilot Development
Mentoring Sessions

May – December 2026

Graduation Event

November 2026

Themes

We are looking for the best and brightest companies to address our themes. The applicants need to provide proven solutions to drive innovation and technological advancement for Visa and Visa’s clients. If you believe your company addresses one or more of the themes, you are welcome to apply and become part of the Visa Innovation Program Europe family.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Agentic Commerce

Agentic commerce for consumers (e.g. shopping agents, personal assistants)

B2B agentic payment use cases

Financial Agents (e.g. Personal finance and wealth management)

Conversational commerce and next‑gen user interfaces

Tokenized & identity powered checkout experiences

Hyper-personalized finance (e.g. AI-tailored insights including affluent services)

Fraud prevention, security, and risk intelligence (e.g. deepfake detection)

B2B and Money Movement Flows

Stablecoins and digital currencies

xBorder payments and remittances

Finance management platforms for businesses (e.g. B2B payments, expenses, supply chain)

Treasury and FX services for businesses

Government payments (e.g. Financial aid, social benefits, bill and tax payments)

Open Finance and Data

Banking-as-a-service and infrastructure enablers

Embedded finance and payment services

Digital identity wallets, authentication and next-gen KYC/KYB platforms

Hyper-personalized offers (e.g. loyalty and rewards tools)

Alternative Finance (e.g. Instalments, credit scoring, POS financing, BNPL)

Merchant/retail and SMB targeted solutions

Interconnected services for citizens and tourists

Financial education and Literacy

Fintech Companies

Explore All Fintech

Testimonials

“Participating in the Visa Innovation Program before our MVP launch was invaluable. It’s the ultimate program for fintech companies, offering close monitoring and support for you growth, extensive local and international networking opportunities, and streamlined B2B partnerships. A must for any fintech founder. “

Hilmi Kaya, Co-Founder Yancep

“The Program helped us to developed our product for small and medium enterprises with leading experts from San Francisco
and London. A key step in our growth is the opening of our office in Berlin, located next to the Visa Innovation
Center in Germany.”

Hristo Borisov, Co-Founder and CEO - Payhawk

The tailor-made format of the Program and our personal design thinking concierge’s support allowed us to stay focused on our core business while working on a very practical case for Visa Direct’s integration in Foundy’s underlying technology. That’s invaluable when you run a international company and have to deal with multiple challenges as a founder.

Valeria Vahorovska, CEO - Foundy

“The largest value of the program was access to the global network of partners, customers and a startup ecosystem.
Iris Solutions pivoted form B2C to B2B solutions company. We verified a fully new effective business
model and strategy.”

Galya Dimitrova, CEO - Iris Solutions

“The program was pivotal in establishing Glocalzone’s key partnerships with Visa and Visa’s network and entering new markets. What’s more, we grew our customer base from 10 to 150k users and our valuation increased 4 times during the period we were in the program.”

Dogan Turan, Co-Founder - Glocalzone

“The largest value of the program was access to the huge network of partners, custormers and a startup ecosystem. We are able to keep up with the current trends, identify new opportunities and connect with startups and team that are changing the financial world around us. Keep up the good work! “

Konstantinos Vaitsas, Head of Digital Innovation - Alpha Bank

“The Visa Innovation Program team is like family to us! We’ve worked with the Visa team since Divilo was founded, and so far, I can only say good things about them. They have opened doors we would never have crossed if they had not helped us. Thank you! Visa Innovation Program Europe – Spain Edition’22 “

Juan Guruceta, Founder - Divilo

“This program gave us a unique opportunity to accelerate our product to market alongside some of the best mentors and leaders in the business. We also received the partnership with Raiffeisen Bank to build, test and create the future of payments with biometric technologies that have never been done before on the Bulgarian market. “

Mihai Draghici, Founder & CEO - Paybyface

Il Visa Innovation Program ha apportato un valore ineguagliabile alla nostra azienda. Durante la nostra collaborazione con Eleven Ventures siamo riusciti a migliorare la nostra value proposition, adattare il prodotto a diversi tipi di clienti e sperimentare modelli di business. Siamo stati presentati a nuovi clienti, ma soprattutto siamo riusciti a firmare il nostro primo progetto pilota in meno di due mesi.

Catalin Rus, Co-Founder and COO - Prime Dash

“Visa Innovation Program provided us with the support, motivation and partnerships from Visa’s wider network we
needed to overcome the obstacles we faced and eventually launch our product for a PoC in the Greek market.”

Elena Avatangelou, Co-Founder, Service & Product Design - Giving Streets