Mollie
Democratising the Digital Economy

Almost two years have passed since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the economic turbulence spurred by it continues to have a devastating impact on the retail sector. On and off lockdowns, as well as in-store customer restrictions, have pushed many brick and mortar retailers to the brink, and at the same time, dramatically hastened the importance of e-commerce sales. Making this transition, however, was easier said than done. One of the critical setbacks was setting up an online payment processing system quickly. Especially for SMEs, this challenge was quite real as they had to find a way to operate without a dedicated IT team or an expert eCommerce department due to budget constraints. Fortunately for many SMEs, Mollie—the fifth-largest fintech unicorn of Europe— came to the rescue.

Our mission is to democratise the digital economy. As part of that, we enable small and medium eCommerce businesses to compete on equal terms with established retail giants,” says Ken Serdons, Chief Commercial Officer at Mollie. To this end, Mollie offers its clients API-based online payment gateways that unify different payment methods on a single interface and can easily be integrated into an eCommerce business’s existing infrastructure hassle-free. Drawing on the power of APIs, eCommerce businesses can integrate the payment gateway with leading platforms such as Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento. Additionally, Mollie’s offering comes with no lock-in contracts, transparent pricing, and no increasing fees and margins, making it an ideal choice for SME businesses.

Notably, Mollie’s payment gateway focuses more on paving ways for localised payments, i.e., allowing consumers to pay with the payment options specific to a country or region. “For example, you can be an eCommerce business based out of Germany who wants to sell products in the Netherlands. But since these countries have different payment methods, it was previously difficult for the German business to gain sales traction in the Netherlands.

We have proactively solved that issue with the easy integration of different payment methods within our solution,” comments Serdons. Mollie’s payment gateway facilitates straightforward online transactions through a myriad of payment methods, such as iDEAL, PayPal, Sofort, Bancontact, and many more. This optimisation of the payment step removes the friction of doing business with consumers across Europe.


But it is not only about hassle-free payments. Mollie’s payment gateway allows eCommerce businesses to create a uniform checkout experience for the end-user, thereby increasing a sense of trust. Online retailers can thus make online transactions effective and easy to navigate for the end-user with the help of Mollie’s payment solution. When end-customers are making payments, the solution ensures that they stay on the customer’s branded eCommerce platform during the entire transaction process rather than being redirected to a new page. Notably, these efforts to replicate a physical shopping experience for the end-users have helped Mollie’s customers increase their conversion rate by up to 7 percent. Besides that, Mollie offers best-in-class partner integrations and fast and easy onboarding.

Mollie’s prowess can be best explained through its recent success story. A prominent plus-size clothing retailer in the UK was looking to expand its operations across other countries in the EU. The company started with an English-speaking audience in the U.S. and Australia, and then Germany being their first foreign language venture. Mollie’s focus on localisation made a big difference for the client. While the client already saw a significant increase in their sales conversion from 4 percent to 8 percent by using websites in target audiences’ native languages, Mollie’s ability to bring in diverse payment methods also helped the client to further increase their conversion rate by an additional 2 percent.

The Road Ahead for Mollie

Having already carved a niche for itself as one of the most loved payment processing companies for eCommerce businesses in Europe, Mollie has recently closed its Series C funding round. With such favourable wind under its wings, Mollie is now looking to expand both its technical capabilities as well as their geographic footprint. In this regard, Mollie has recently opened its new product development centre in Lisbon, Portugal, earlier this year to accelerate its development speed and capabilities. “Eventually, we want to expand our product portfolio from processing payments to offering all-round financial services, including working capital solutions, and covering other critical bases such as expense management and card issuing to SMEs—a segment that is often overlooked and underserved,” states Serdons. He explains that currently, many banks struggle to create a unique customer experience for SMEs factored in by the legacy technology they have to work with. “To address this, we are looking to replicate how we revolutionised the payment processing segment to offer a stellar experience to our customers as we develop and expand,” concludes Serdons.