KeyBank expands Qolo partnership with minority investment

Melinda Huspen

BOCA RATON, Fla. — Key Bank has taken a minority investment in Qolo, an omnichannel card and payment fintech, the bank said Monday at American Banker’s Digital Banking conference.

“For the past 10 years we’ve developed this muscle around fintech partnerships,” Diana Welch Howell, head of alternative and fintech strategies for KeyBank’s commercial bank, said in a panel discussion at the conference. “One of the core components of that, after we’ve co-developed a product that meets clients’ needs and we’ve shared the best of both worlds culturally, is being able to deepen that relationship with an equity investment. It’s really just the cherry on top of making sure our destinies are aligned.”

Welch Howell didn’t give details on the size or the cost of the investment.

The investment expands the Cleveland-based bank’s partnership with Qolo. In March 2024, KeyBank announced KeyVAM, a virtual account management platform developed with Qolo for treasury clients, at American Banker’s Payments Forum.

“Last year we announced this product that we worked together on, and now this year we’re excited to announce that KeyVAM is up and running with clients on the platform,” Qolo Chief Executive Patricia Montesi said.

KeyVAM has processed more than $8 billion in transactions since its formal launch in October of last year, according to KeyBank. The $189 billion-asset bank credits Qolo with the success of the VAM platform.

“The success of KeyVAM and subsequent development of new capabilities are a result of our collaboration with Qolo,” Bennie Pennington, head of embedded banking at KeyBank, said in a statement.

The industry knowledge of Qolo’s team was highlighted during the conference panel by both speakers. Montesi said that she herself had 20 years of experience in payments and banking before founding Qolo.

“The Qolo team knows how to talk to banks,” Welch Howell said. “That is one of the key things that makes this partnership, or really any fintech partnership, work. The technology can be beautiful, but if you can’t get the risk and compliance teams to understand it and have a team that can speak that language, you can’t make it happen.”

The extended partnership with Qolo is the latest in KeyBank’s strategy of working with multiple fintechs to expand the bank’s tech services.

“We have 10 active fintech partnerships across companies that we are invested in,” Welch Howell said. “With other commercial partnerships, we have dozens of those.”

In February, KeyBank partnered with Treasury Prime, a BaaS middleware and embedded banking provider, to expand its embedded banking capabilities and diversify its commercial client base.

In embedded banking, banks allow companies outside the financial industry to offer financial products or services within their software, websites or apps. For example, in-app wallets for brands like Starbucks or Uber use embedded banking technology.

KeyBank has multiple existing fintech partnerships and would be forging more through the Treasury Prime network, Pennington previously said.

Treasury Prime connects its fintech clients and its bank clients for partnerships. The company has said it has more than 15 banks in its partner network and its platform hosts more than 70 fintechs and corporate clients.