Badge Raises $17M to Shape the Future of Digital Wallets
•February 20, 2026
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Companies Mentioned
Why It Matters
The raise signals strong investor belief that mobile wallets will evolve from payment tools into a core, app‑less customer‑engagement layer for brands, reshaping digital commerce strategies.
Key Takeaways
- •Badge secured $17.1M Series A for wallet platform expansion.
- •Focus on interactive loyalty, rewards, and messaging within wallets.
- •Investors see wallets as foundational layer for real‑time engagement.
- •App‑less strategy reduces friction, leveraging pre‑installed mobile wallets.
- •Funding targets product development, enterprise integrations, and market rollout.
Pulse Analysis
Mobile wallets have moved beyond simple payment conduits, becoming a pivotal component of the embedded finance ecosystem. As smartphones dominate transaction flows, Apple Pay and Google Pay are now pre‑installed on billions of devices, offering brands a frictionless touchpoint that bypasses traditional app downloads. Industry analysts note that this shift accelerates real‑time commerce, enabling faster checkout, ticketing, and increasingly, loyalty interactions—all within a single, secure interface.
Badge’s platform differentiates itself by turning the wallet into an interactive channel rather than a static card holder. By providing APIs for loyalty programs, gift‑card issuance, membership tiers, and instant messaging, the company empowers merchants to deliver personalized offers directly to consumers’ wallets. This app‑less approach reduces user churn and leverages the high‑engagement rates of mobile wallets, which now rival major social media platforms in daily usage. For brands, the ability to push real‑time promotions without additional installations creates a new marketing surface that aligns with the growing consumer preference for streamlined, on‑device experiences.
The $17.1 million funding round underscores venture confidence that wallets are the next digital frontier. Investors such as TTV Capital and Stripe view the technology as a foundational layer for real‑time customer engagement, positioning Badge to capture enterprise demand for integrated, app‑free solutions. As fintech continues to converge with retail and hospitality, the ability to embed loyalty, payments, and communication in a single wallet could redefine customer journeys, prompting more companies to adopt wallet‑first strategies and driving further innovation in the mobile commerce landscape.
Badge Raises $17M to Shape the Future of Digital Wallets
Badge, a digital wallet company, has secured $17.1 million in funding, which will be used to change how people and businesses interact with mobile wallets. The funding consists of a Series A round of $13.8 million led by TTV Capital with co-investments from Stripe, Synchrony Ventures, and Infinity Ventures, along with a previously undisclosed seed round of $3.3 million backed by QED Investors and Infinity Ventures.
Badge was founded in 2023, and it specializes in developing systems to enable businesses to build and control interactive elements in Apple and Google Pay Wallets. The company does not consider wallets to be a simple way to store cards, but instead, an interactive channel, allowing businesses to reach customers and engage them with offers, rewards, and promotions.
Badge is also looking to upgrade digital wallets, which have only been used for payments, tickets and passes. Badge is looking to provide businesses with the opportunity to develop loyalty and gift card programs, and membership functionalities with messaging and real-time communication, as well as provide customers the ability to do all of this within the wallet.
According to Badge co-founder Eric Senn, “More people are leaving their physical wallets at home and relying entirely on their phones to transact.” He believes that this shift provides brands with the opportunity to directly engage with consumers through wallet applications without added app installations.
Why Digital Wallets Matter Now
With regard to how recent investments show a growing shift towards mobile wallets to be more integrated with global payment systems, mobile wallets are capturing an increasing share of both in-store and online transactions.
Industry analytics show there is a growing shift for payments to be more smartphone-based and faster than Senn’s claims. Senn claims that wallets are more of a “new surface” for representations of brands. When an app is created for a brand, the user must download the app, and the user association decreases. However, mobile wallets are already installed on the phone, and user friction is reduced.
He also noted that more people use Apple and Google Wallet today than popular social media platforms, making wallets a critical channel brands cannot ignore.
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Investors See Wallets as the Next Digital Frontier
Investors backing Badge believe wallets are becoming a foundational layer of the digital ecosystem. According to Lynne Laube, venture partner at TTV Capital, Badge wants to be a “foundational platform” for real-time customer engagement via wallets.
With the funding, Badge will improve product development and partnerships and go-to-market strategies, including integrations with major wallet platforms and infrastructure development for enterprise-level customers.
The company’s vision and strategy are focused on the evolving fintech ecosystem of embedded finance, real-time customer engagement, and streamlined app-less customer journeys through wallets.
Investors see the potential of digital wallets beyond payments, especially as wallets become an anchor for real-time services, and businesses will be able to engage customers app-less. With the funding, Badge will be able to help businesses redefine customer engagement as digital payments and mobile commerce continue to evolve.
The post Badge Raises $17M to Shape the Future of Digital Wallets appeared first on Ventureburn.
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