Revenue Moment
Growing through product in fintech
28 October 2026 · 53 min
The conversation is in French, and the summary and article on this page are translated from French.
In this episode of Revenue Moment, Nawfal Laghzali, CEO of Mateerz, welcomes Jordane Giuly, co-founder and president of Defacto, to discuss fintech go-to-market. Defacto provides short-term credit to SMEs. According to Jordane, outbound, a direct sales approach, requires recruitment and a substantial organisational structure. Defacto’s API-first product makes every action accessible through a programming interface and integrates in particular with Pennylane and Qonto. In his view, content helps secure a place on a shortlist when a prospect is choosing a provider. He describes a tension: platforms seek conversion, while the lender must collect information and reject certain applications. Jordane sums it up: “the specific thing about lending is that you have to know how to say no”.
Jordane believes that banks broadly target companies with more than €10 million in revenue, whose credit lines absorb costs more effectively. For smaller SMEs, he presents partner distribution as a more efficient approach. According to Defacto, more than 20,000 SMEs had been financed for more than €1.5 billion cumulatively as of 30 June 2026, and the workforce numbers fewer than 30 employees. According to Jordane, LTV, customer value over time, depends on usage, the length of the relationship and the cost of risk. Regulation, he believes, constrains first and then protects.
What’s covered
- 00:00:00 Introduction and presentation of Jordane Giuly
- 00:06:15 Betting on embedded lending
- 00:09:13 Signing the first partners
- 00:13:20 Orchestrating a dual-target GTM
- 00:15:55 Optimising conversion and credit risk
- 00:22:20 Scaling through distribution and AI
- 00:26:10 Moving from API-first to agent-first
- 00:38:43 Building trust internationally
- 00:42:09 LTV, regulation and AI
A closer look: growing through product in fintech
Nawfal Laghzali, CEO of Mateerz, welcomes Jordane Giuly, co-founder and president of Defacto, a short-term lending company for SMEs. He introduces a discussion devoted to the go-to-market strategy of a fintech. Jordane Giuly advocates betting on embedded finance distributed indirectly through referral platforms. He believes that lending requires knowing how to decline certain applications, that agents, AIs that carry out actions, can operate across business workflows and that trust is built over time, through the brand and with each new geography.
1. Introduction and presentation of Jordane Giuly
Listen to this excerpt (00:00:00)
1.1 Defacto and working capital financing
Jordane Giuly, an engineer by training, says he has co-founded companies three times, including Spendesk, created in 2016, before leaving the company in 2020. Spendesk became a unicorn in January 2022. Defacto was founded in 2021 by Jordane Giuly, Morgan O’Hana and Marc-Henri Gires. Its president explains that this licensed financing company builds its creditworthiness models in-house. It addresses working capital needs, created by the gap between purchases, invoicing and collections. Jordane Giuly estimates that these needs amount to 700 billion euros in France and 3.2 trillion euros across Europe, with less than half covered by banks.
1.2 From Spendesk to lending fintech
About a year separated his departure from Spendesk and the launch of Defacto, Jordane Giuly says. He believes he had completed one cycle, then wanted to launch another company and choose its go-to-market angle with his co-founders. According to him, the trio chose an old, broad European market: lending has existed for 3,000 years. Open banking, meaning authorised access to accounts, makes it possible to read customers’ bank transactions, he argues. Defacto can therefore provide an eligibility decision in 30 seconds and two clicks, he says, whereas a bank application would take several weeks.
2. Betting on embedded lending
Listen to this excerpt (00:06:15)
2.1 Moving away from the traditional outbound model
Nawfal asks Jordane Giuly about the first go-to-market choices, between prospecting and winning the first customers. Jordane recalls that Spendesk sold procurement management software through outbound sales, meaning proactive telephone prospecting. BDRs, salespeople responsible for prospecting, contacted companies, then account executives, salespeople who close deals, conducted demonstrations and completed sales, he explains. According to him, this model requires recruiting at scale and structuring teams quickly. For Defacto, the founders therefore tried a different approach.
2.2 Building an API-first platform
Jordane presents this choice as “the bet that tomorrow’s finance will be embedded finance”. By this, he means lending within third-party software. SMEs already use invoicing, accounting and management tools, to which payments, cards and lending can be added, he argues. Defacto therefore prioritises distribution through platforms that acquire their users directly. Its platform is API-first, with every action accessible through a programmable interface, so that it can be integrated into the user journeys of Pennylane, Malt and Qonto. Pennylane has more than one million customers, according to him.
3. Signing the first partners
Listen to this excerpt (00:09:13)
3.1 Activating the existing fintech network
Nawfal asks how Defacto earned the trust of its first partners, given that the platforms likely to integrate the offering seem few in number. Jordane explains that his time at Spendesk shaped their conviction about embedded finance: the company had added accounts and cards to expense management software. He describes a model combining subscription-based software, or SaaS, and transaction revenue. Defacto therefore initially turned to the SME fintech ecosystem that its founders knew, he says, with experience that was already relevant to these platforms.
3.2 Becoming a reference through thought leadership
Jordane says Defacto devotes time to raising awareness of embedded finance through expert communications, so that it is identified by platforms seeking to monetise their customer base with financial services. According to him, the company is already among the leaders in embedded lending in France and Europe. Nawfal compares this approach with SEO, search engine optimisation, and GEO, visibility in AI-generated answers. Jordane believes that an API integration often leads to an RFP, a request for proposals, and a competitive process. A platform cannot be forced to prioritise this project, he argues: “you want to be on their radar”. He cites conferences, panel discussions and case studies, first in France, then in Europe and soon in the United States.
4. Orchestrating a dual-target GTM
Listen to this excerpt (00:13:20)
4.1 Serving platforms and referral networks
Jordane Giuly describes a commercial model with two target groups. The first brings together referral partners, meaning partners that recommend lending: vertical SaaS providers, accounting platforms, brokerage firm networks, accountants and other economic agents. According to him, some of these players have no technology platform at all but already distribute lending solutions. He believes Defacto must first gain visibility with these partners.
4.2 Capturing inbound demand from SMEs
The second target group consists of SMEs, which Defacto intends to reach through its partners as well as directly, Jordane Giuly explains. He says the founders initially prioritised an indirect go-to-market approach, in response to their experience at Spendesk, then began seeing inbound requests through a self-service lending application journey that takes a few minutes. “Their number one job is to make sure they have the resources to grow,” he says of business leaders and CFOs facing working capital financing needs.
4.3 France first, Europe next
According to Defacto’s help centre, the borrower must be established in France and receivables may originate from five countries. According to Defacto, more than 90% of its activity takes place in France. Jordane Giuly says that Defacto is present in France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain and Germany, while stating that no active marketing is conducted outside France. On 30 June 2026, Defacto announced that it had filed an application for a credit institution licence with the ACPR, the French banking supervisor, and the ECB, the European Central Bank. He links the European commercial launch to the licence sought for mid-2027, while Nawfal Laghzali identifies London and Frankfurt as two fintech hubs.
5. Optimising conversion and credit risk
Listen to this excerpt (00:15:55)
5.1 Reducing friction without undermining eligibility
Nawfal asks Jordane Giuly about the challenges of indirect distribution. Jordane cites integrations with Pennylane and Libeo, where the challenge is to encourage users to apply for a loan through a simple and complete journey. He explains that the platform seeks to maximise conversion and eligibility, meaning the proportion of applications deemed financeable, while Defacto must select the risks it takes on. “The specific thing about lending is that you have to know how to say no,” he says. The required information creates friction and, according to him, requires bringing partners towards a sustainable balance between eligibility and risk.
5.2 Becoming the one-stop shop for short-term lending
Nawfal asks Jordane about the structure of the European and UK markets. Jordane believes banks still carry most lending, while Defacto offers several options for the same cash flow need: financing sales invoices, paying purchase invoices and, more recently, a credit card. He presents this range as a one-stop shop for short-term financing. According to him, this coverage also enables partners to offer several lending products without leaving the same environment.
5.3 Lending in the United Kingdom
Jordane observes that national lending markets are very deep and dominated by regional champions, with few players operating across several countries. In the United Kingdom, a loan granted to a company can be made without a licence. He therefore considers the UK market relatively less regulated than continental Europe, especially regarding prudential requirements and risk coverage. The Basel rules, raised by Nawfal, are linked by Jordane to the limits imposed on leverage after the 2008 financial crisis. The Basel III standards were developed by the Basel Committee after that crisis. These constraints would reduce the possible volume of business while strengthening stability, he argues, whereas UK players seem more willing to take risks, with every risk having a price, according to him.
6. Scaling through distribution and AI
Listen to this excerpt (00:22:20)
6.1 Serving SMEs with under €10 million in revenue
Nawfal asks what levers Defacto activates once its position in France has been established. Jordane replies that the company is entering an existing market, where it needs to understand why to act now and what options customers have. “The main alternative for SMEs was nothing,” he says. According to him, acquiring, assessing and managing an SME loan costs banks too much, so they focus roughly on businesses exceeding €10 million in revenue. For smaller businesses, he presents platforms and partners as Defacto’s distribution channels.
6.2 Automating lending operations
Jordane mentions a favourable convergence between Defacto’s launch and the rise of LLMs, large language models. He explains that the company deploys AI agents across its business workflows and operates, according to him, at a fraction of banks’ cost. As of 30 June 2026, Defacto stated that it had financed more than 20,000 SMEs for a cumulative volume exceeding €1.5 billion, with fewer than 30 employees. Jordane says that unit economics, the profitability per customer, are good and that the challenge is now to increase the number of customers.
6.3 Turning technology into an offering for banks
Jordane explains that the technology designed to finance businesses directly is also becoming an offering sold to banks. He mentions Société Générale Factoring, which Defacto equips to enable it to serve micro-businesses at a lower cost. In March 2026, Société Générale Factoring launched Avance Facture, a solution based on Defacto’s technology.
7. Moving from API-first to agent-first
Listen to this excerpt (00:26:10)
7.1 Industrialising agents across business workflows
Nawfal asks about how AI is reshaping fintech, including the prospect of agents with cards. Jordane considers projections very difficult, because Defacto had not begun these initiatives three months earlier. For credit risk and fraud analysis, he presents machine learning, meaning automated learning from data, as a mature practice when transaction data is structured. LLMs are initially used for note summaries and support, he explains, before moving into document analysis and debt collection. According to him, the API-first architecture gives agents access to the system’s data and actions, unlike banking systems without cloud infrastructure or APIs, which require a prior access layer.
7.2 Preparing agentic financial products
Jordane describes the move from diagnosis to execution: an agent can detect a future cash flow gap from an SME’s purchases and contracts, then take out a loan to cover it. Paying requires a payment method, notably a card, he argues. Software that concentrates companies’ financial context will become the starting point for these decisions, he believes. Fintechs must therefore offer products that can be queried and consumed by agents, he maintains. “We used to say API-first, now we need to be agent-first,” Jordane says. Defacto is the first to do so, according to him.
7.3 Breaking down tasks and specialising experts
Nawfal asks whether it is possible to build a unicorn with a single founder thanks to the automation of processing workflows. Fintech brings together distinct fields, from lending to compliance and from payments to debt collection, Jordane explains. He cites rebuilding a billing engine to collect interest and building a debt collection agent. Agents deliver better results within a narrow scope, with a defined ability to act, he argues, because too much context produces approximations. Work is therefore broken down into elementary units managed by risk, compliance or payment experts, according to him. One person equipped with AI is equivalent to a team, but a solo unicorn remains impossible in fintech, he believes. This view leads Nawfal to value specialists supported by concentrated data.
8. Building trust internationally
Listen to this excerpt (00:38:43)
8.1 Investing in brand and customer experience
Nawfal asks Jordane Giuly whether the commercial playbook built by Defacto can be replicated outside France. In response, Jordane says that the challenge for a fintech is first to create trust among the platforms integrating its financing and among SMEs. In his view, integrating a lender commits both parties to a lasting relationship, while business leaders seek long-term partners for their working capital needs. He therefore says he invests in the brand, despite the difficulty created by the diversity of target audiences.
8.2 Adapting the playbook to each geography
Jordane explains that this effort multiplies with every new geography, because the company starts from scratch there, or even with a trust deficit when faced with a foreign solution. He argues that the Choose Europe initiative potentially reduces this disadvantage compared with American players, without removing it. According to him, brand, marketing investment, product experience, virality and referrals must be activated continuously to earn this local trust.
8.3 Not being right too early
Jordane considers agents capable of independently taking out a set of financial products to remain a future prospect, even if technology can already make them possible. He observes that users are still barely connecting their data, especially their messaging, to AI tools. In the meantime, Jordane believes people will be assisted in identifying and diagnosing a need, but will continue to choose their own solution. He says he is preparing the product, the team and the company for these uses, while summarising the risk: “If you are right too early, you are wrong.”
9. LTV, regulation and AI
Listen to this excerpt (00:42:09)
9.1 Modelling LTV, risk and acquisition cost
Nawfal asks Jordane Giuly about LTV, customer lifetime value, in lending. Jordane replies that the issue remains difficult and has not been fully settled: in SaaS, it is calculated from monthly revenue and the average relationship duration, while Defacto follows a pay-as-you-go model. Interest is charged daily, he explains, for example for 42 or 54 days of borrowing. It is therefore necessary to estimate frequency of use, then deduct the cost of risk, meaning losses from defaults, from the interest collected. According to him, a fixed upfront fee paid to a lead provider requires control over conversion and LTV, otherwise acquisition becomes a leaky bucket. Compensation indexed to revenue limits this duration risk, but not the risk related to usage or defaults.
9.2 Turning regulatory constraints into an advantage
Asked by Nawfal to reflect on his career, Jordane describes a fintech where risk analysis, compliance and payments intersect. Regulatory and capital constraints make it harder to launch, he says, but they also protect established players because they require a licence, equity capital, refinancing providers and a specialised ecosystem. Access to capital has become more selective and securitisation more demanding, he argues, making it harder to create a lending company. Defacto states that it has used securitisation since 2023, meaning the sale of receivables to investors. Jordane observes that customers now expect immediate services, while regulators primarily seek to preserve financial stability. He compares this situation with healthcare, where the use of personal data also remains heavily regulated.
9.3 Accelerating in a defensive fintech market
Jordane considers that AI can neither provide funds to lend nor obtain a licence, which limits the direct threat it poses to fintech. “I’m not afraid that overnight, Claude will become a bank,” he says. He sees it instead as a lever for automating and personalising services at scale. According to him, fintechs adopt and deploy these technologies faster than the rest of the market, as if on a two-speed treadmill. Nawfal takes up this image to close the discussion.
