Defacto goes live on Mambu Payments with SEPA links

Mambu has gone live with Defacto on Mambu Payments with SEPA connectivity, supporting payment flows for Defacto's receivables financing product.

The implementation gives Defacto real-time visibility across payment flows and automates disbursements and repayments. It also lets the lender avoid building direct bank integrations in-house by using a single API connection for SEPA payments.

Defacto is an ACPR-licensed B2B lending platform focused on short-term credit for small and medium-sized businesses. The payments setup helps it meet the operational and regulatory requirements of its institutional banking partners while keeping its existing banking relationships in place.

That means Defacto can continue operating through accounts held with its institutional banking partner, rather than shifting to a model that requires new accounts with a provider's custodian bank. Mambu said the architecture is already being extended to a second institutional partner.

Payments layer

The arrangement supports Defacto's receivables financing programme and reflects a wider push by fintechs to simplify the infrastructure needed to work with regulated financial institutions. Payment connectivity has become a central issue for lenders and embedded finance providers seeking to bring products to market without building bespoke links to each banking partner.

Since its launch in 2021, Defacto has financed more than €1.5 billion for more than 25,000 SMEs across five European markets. Its products include invoice advances, supplier payments, a six-month credit line and a business credit card.

Defacto moved from initial product scoping in July 2025 to a beta launch in November 2025, before putting the system into full production in January 2026, according to Mambu. The timetable suggests a relatively fast rollout for a payments integration tied to institutional banking relationships.

Jordane Giuly, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Defacto, outlined the company's rationale for the integration.

"Working with institutional banking partners requires payments infrastructure that is secure, reliable and built for scale. Mambu Payments allowed us to focus our engineering efforts on delivering value for our customers rather than building and maintaining complex banking connectivity. The result is a flexible payments foundation that supports our current programmes while giving us the confidence to expand to additional partners in the future," said Jordane Giuly, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Defacto.

Institutional focus

The deal also reflects how lending platforms are trying to keep control of their existing bank relationships while adding automation on top. Traditional banking-as-a-service structures can require fintechs to open new accounts through a third-party setup, complicating operations for firms that already work with established banks.

For Defacto, retaining its current account structure appears to be a key part of the project. The company can automate the operational payments layer while leaving the underlying banking relationship unchanged.

Mambu, founded in 2011, provides software used by banks, lenders, credit unions, fintechs and retailers for services including core banking, deposits, lending and payments. It serves more than 260 customers in over 65 countries, according to the company.

The Defacto project adds to Mambu's payments activity in Europe, where fintechs and financial institutions are seeking ways to modernise payment operations without committing large internal teams to custom integration work. In this case, the focus is on enabling lending programmes to connect to the infrastructure of a major French financial institution through SEPA rails.

Victor Mithouard, Vice President of Payments and Strategy at Mambu, said the project illustrates a broader shift in the market.

"As more financial institutions embrace embedded finance, payment infrastructure becomes a real differentiator. Defacto's implementation demonstrates how modern, API-first infrastructure enables fintechs to launch faster and scale institutional partnerships without building bespoke bank integrations. By automating the underlying payment layer, Mambu Payments provides the real-time connectivity that allows Defacto to deploy its own lending programmes directly into the infrastructure of one of France's leading financial institutions," said Victor Mithouard, Vice President of Payments and Strategy at Mambu.