Founding Stories: Synapse

Imagine moving to a new country to start college. Now imagine trying to open a bank account at a local branch without having the traditional forms of identification: no driver's license, no social security card, and so on. You'd think that in 2019, you'd be able to do all of this online, but that's simply not the case. 

This is the situation founder and CEO Sankaet Pathak found himself in. He had just moved to Memphis, TN from Rajasthan, India to start at the University of Memphis. Every interaction with the local bank—from account opening to receiving payments to getting a debit card—was an excruciating, in-person experience with new hoops to jump through.

Motivated by his own experience, Sankaet decided to build a solution. He started Synapse to help other companies build new banks or financial services (like a16z portfolio company Propel, makers of Fresh EBT which helps food stamp recipients manage their benefits). Think of Synapse as banking-as-a-service.

a16z General Partner Angela Strange talks to Sankaet about his founding experience in our latest segment of a16z Founding Stories. Along the way, the two discuss:

- The Synapse founding story
- Who in the world actually needs more financial services?
- Solving the (product) cold start problem
- Winning the earliest customers
- The most creative fintech startup ideas
- Biggest surprises for a first-time technical founder

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