Shamir Karkal, Co-Founder/CEO of Sila – Pioneering and Reimagining Financial Innovation
Miguel Armaza sits down with Shamir Karkal, Co-Founder and CEO of Sila, a banking and payments platform that aims to break open the Financial System and make it easy for any company to offer out-of-the-box financial services. Shamir is also a true FinTech pioneer and legend, having played a crucial part in building the infrastructure that would pave the way for online banking. In 2009, he co-founded Simple, the first digital bank of its kind in the US, and later headed the Open Platform group at BBVA. In this episode, we discuss - Shamir’s fascinating background and how in fact he comes from a long line of Indian bankers - The story behind Simple and the ups and downs they faced launching the first independent digital bank in the US and what led them to an eventual acquisition by BBVA - Launching Sila and his approach as a second time fintech founder - Why’s so excited about the future and is convinced these are the early days for the industry - Founder lessons - And a lot more! Shamir Karkal A true FinTech pioneer, Shamir Karkal played a crucial part in building the infrastructure that would pave the way for online banking. In 2009, he co-founded Simple, the first bank of its kind in the United States, and later headed the Open Platform at BBVA. Shamir was drawn to serve smaller companies, co-founding Sila in 2018 with the goal of empowering financial innovations. Shamir studied physics and computer science at Bangalore University and is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business. He lives with his family in Portland, Oregon, and enjoys jiu-jitsu, long-range target shooting, and studying history whenever possible. About Sila Sila is a banking and payment platform for software teams building the next generation of financial products & services in regulated and unregulated industries. The Sila API enables white-label ACH payment processing, money transfer, digital wallets, bank account linking, and identity verification of business and individuals. We power any web, desktop, or mobile application with built-in compliance. Sila was co-founded in 2018 in Portland, Oregon by a diverse team of fintech, legal, and financial experts. For more information visit silamoney.com. For more FinTech insights, follow us below: Medium: medium.com/wharton-fintech WFT Twitter: twitter.com/whartonfintech Miguel's Twitter: twitter.com/MiguelArmaza Miguel's Substack: https://bit.ly/3jWIpqp