International startups pitch Paysafe solutions at JAX Hub kickoff (Courtesy of the Jacksonville Business Journal) — Jacksonville’s private and public sector converged Wednesday morning at the University of North Florida for one of the first tangible components of JAX Hub, a pitch day with worldwide ties.
With international corporate innovation firm L Marks as its spearhead, the partnership behind JAX Hub aims to act as a conduit between the region’s business community and international startup pipeline — driving transformative financial technologies to the First Coast.
“By the end of today, you will have selected the cohort that will come here next month and spend 10 weeks working alongside Paysafe building pilots, validating solutions and developing real pathways deployment,” L Marks CEO Daniel Saunders told pitch event attendees.
Fourteen startups hailing from eight countries, including the U.S., would begin pitching fintech giant Paysafe soon after — a six-hour day planned to wrap around 4 p.m.
Since its origination in late-2024, and public debut about six months later, the whole idea was to link vetted startups and scaleups with Paysafe.
The hopefuls are brought in to solve predetermined problems identified by the fintech company, such as advanced financial services and building the merchant loyalty engine, among others.
“This is how innovation ecosystems are built,” Saunders said. “Not through statements of intent but through action, partnership and implementation.”
The 14 startups brought to Jacksonville this week, both digitally and physically, were selected by L Marks after multiple months of reviewing applications and interviews.
It reviewed more than 600 applications from 16 countries across the world before paring down to the ones presenting Wednesday, Alicia Harrington, an L Marks innovation program manager, said at the event.
After the pitch, Paysafe will help triage the selected startups further, creating a subset of firms that will work directly with the firm.
It’s all the result of a 2023 Memorandum of Understanding signed between the State of Florida and the U.K. government to deepen bilateral trade and economic cooperation.
JAX Hub is the flagship outcome.
“This historic agreement is deepening trade and innovation ties between our communities,” Mayor Donna Deegan said. “That brings us to today, where we are connecting Jacksonville’s financial services sector with local innovators to pilot and scale groundbreaking, transformative fintech solutions.”
Photo courtesy of JAXUSA. Caption: (Left) Hayden Boilini, Director of Financial Services, North America, UK Department for Business & Trade; Aundra Wallace, President, JAXUSA Partnership; Gareth Thomas MP, UK Parliamentary Under Secretary of State and Minister for Services, Small Business and Exports; Daniel Saunders, CEO, L Marks; and Katie Ramsey, Head of Fintech, UK Department for Business & Trade.