Sentenial

Open Banking Payment Infrastructuresentenial.com

Sentenial, operating as Nuapay, was an Irish open banking fintech providing Account-to-Account payment APIs to enterprise and mid-market businesses across utilities, eCommerce, gaming, and hospitality. Acquired by GoCardless in September 2024 for €32.8 million.

Company typePrivate
Founded2003
HeadquartersKildare, Ireland
Headcount51–100
GTM typeB2B
OfferingSoftware

What Sentenial does

Sentenial Ltd is an Irish fintech company, founded in 2003 and headquartered in Kildare, Ireland, that operated in the open banking payments space under the Nuapay brand. Its core technology comprised open banking APIs enabling Account-to-Account (A2A) payments, connecting to real-time payment infrastructure including SEPA Instant, FedNow, India's UPI, and Brazil's Pix. The platform achieved over 95% conversion success rates on A2A transactions while eliminating card processing fees, positioning it as a cost-efficient alternative to card-based payment rails.

The company served enterprise and mid-market businesses across utilities, eCommerce, gaming, and hospitality sectors, targeting organizations seeking to reduce payment processing costs and enable real-time settlement. Its go-to-market was API-first, with integrations into Sage, Salesforce, Zuora, Xero, QuickBooks, Chargebee, and Recurly. The revenue model was transaction-fee based, monetizing payment volume processed through its open banking rails. The business held ISO 27001 certification (since 2016), GDPR compliance, UK FCA authorization (registration 597190), and FinCEN registration as a US money services business.

Sentenial was a subsidiary of EML Payments before being acquired by GoCardless Ltd in September 2024 for €32.8 million, at which point it ceased operating as an independent entity. Its Nuapay capabilities were absorbed into GoCardless's open banking product portfolio, which now includes Variable Recurring Payments, Instant Bank Pay (UK/Germany), and PayTo (Australia). At the time of acquisition, Sentenial had 51-100 employees.

Sentenial firmographics

Firmographics

Name: Sentenial
Legal name: Sentenial Ltd
Website: https://sentenial.com
Company type: Private
Founded year: 2003
Operating status: Acquired
Headcount range: 51–100 employees
Short description: Sentenial, operating as Nuapay, was an Irish open banking fintech providing Account-to-Account payment APIs to enterprise and mid-market businesses across utilities, eCommerce, gaming, and hospitality. Acquired by GoCardless in September 2024 for €32.8 million.
Ownership category
akta.pro rank

Sentenial industry classification

Industry

Product category: Open Banking Payment Infrastructure
NAICS: Financial Transactions Processing, Reserve, and Clearinghouse Activities (52232)
akta.pro primary industry: A2A Payment Initiation Service Providers (PISPs) (FSAMAFAB)
akta.pro secondary industries: A2A Checkout & Merchant Acceptance Solutions (FSAMAFAF), Bank-to-Bank Transfers & Pay-by-Bank (Consumer & Merchant) (FSAMAFAC)

Keywords

Open banking payments
Account-to-account payments
A2A payment processing
SEPA instant payments
Direct debit processing

Where Sentenial is headquartered

Location

Headquarters

HQ city: Kildare
HQ country: Ireland
HQ region: Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

Sentenial business model

Business model

GTM type: B2B
Offering type: Software
Cost components: Technology or R&D, Personnel, Operations, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

Open Banking Payment Processing: Transaction-based revenue from processing A2A payments via open banking APIs for enterprise and mid-market clients

Go-to-market motion1 record

Sentenial product offering

Product offering

Core offering

Sentenial provided an open banking API platform (Nuapay) enabling Account-to-Account (A2A) payments for businesses of all sizes and banks. The platform connects to real-time payment infrastructure including SEPA Instant, FedNow, India's UPI, and Brazil's Pix, facilitating direct bank-to-bank payment transactions with conversion success rates exceeding 95% and no card processing fees.

Product overview

Sentenial operates as part of GoCardless, offering a unified payment platform enabling businesses to collect Direct Debit and instant bank payments. The product portfolio includes core payment collection capabilities (one-off payments, subscriptions, instalments), intelligence add-ons (Success+ for payment recovery, Protect+ for fraud protection), open banking solutions (Variable Recurring Payments, Instant Bank Pay, PayTo), and international payment support across 30+ countries. The platform supports 8 bank payment schemes (BACS, SEPA, ACH, and others) across 36 countries. The acquisition of Sentenial (Nuapay) in September 2024 expanded GoCardless's open banking and Account-to-Account (A2A) payment capabilities, with A2A payments achieving over 95% conversion success rates.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

Nuapay Open Banking Platform Open banking API platform enabling Account-to-Account (A2A) payments for businesses and banks, supporting real-time payment transactions across schemes including SEPA Instant, FedNow, India's UPI, and Brazil's Pix, with conversion rates exceeding 95% and elimination of card processing fees.

Quantifiable outcome

A2A payments achieve over 95% conversion success rates while eliminating card processing fees

Companies that use Sentenial

Customer profile

Segments1 record

Ideal customer profiles1 record

Sentenial technology and API

Technology

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API: Yes
API docs
API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration12 records

AI capability1 record

Feature1 record

Sentenial partnerships and signals

Strategic signal

Partnerships

Two partnerships are on record, tiered core.

GoCardless LtdcoreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 1 September 2024Sentenial Ltd (Irish fintech subsidiary) was acquired by GoCardless Ltd for €32.8 million in September 2024. This acquisition strengthened GoCardless's open banking capabilities and A2A payment offerings.
EML PaymentscoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerSentenial was originally an Irish fintech subsidiary of EML Payments before being sold to GoCardless in September 2024 for €32.8 million.

Scale indicators3 records

Recent moves4 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Sentenial competitors and assessment

Company assessment

Direct peers

TrueLayer: UK-based open banking platform providing A2A payment initiation and connectivity for merchants and banks. Closely overlaps with Nuapay in PISP functionality and target verticals such as eCommerce and financial services.
Yapily: Open banking API infrastructure provider enabling A2A payments and data connectivity across European banks. Directly comparable to Nuapay as an enterprise-grade open banking PISP targeting merchants and banks.
Token.io: Open banking pay-by-bank network offering A2A payment initiation across UK and Europe. Direct competitor to Nuapay in merchant pay-by-bank use cases and bank partnerships.
Trustly: European pay-by-bank network owned by Klarna, providing A2A online banking payments to merchants across multiple verticals. Direct competitor to Nuapay in the European pay-by-bank merchant space.
Banked: Pay-by-bank and account-to-account payment provider offering consumer-to-business and business-to-business payments via open banking rails. Direct overlap with Nuapay on A2A checkout and disbursements.

Broad incumbents

Tink: Visa-owned open banking platform covering account aggregation, PISP, and PSD2 connectivity across Europe. Comparable as a broader open banking incumbent whose capabilities encompass Nuapay's A2A scope.
Plaid: US-led financial data connectivity and payment-initiation platform with global expansion. Overlaps with Nuapay on A2A payments and bank connectivity, though with a much broader consumer-data footprint.
Worldline: Large European payment processor and acquirer with growing open banking and A2A capabilities. Comparable as a broad incumbent moving into pay-by-bank and instant-payment orchestration.
Mastercard Open Banking: Mastercard's open banking connectivity unit offering A2A payment initiation and financial data services. Comparable to Nuapay as a large-network incumbent expanding into pay-by-bank and open banking.

Emerging players

Volt: Open banking payments platform providing real-time A2A payment initiation across European banks. Comparable to Nuapay as a next-generation PISP targeting instant payment use cases.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

Sentenial compliance and trust

Trust signal

Compliance4 records

Sentenial financial estimates

Financial estimate

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Sentenial leadership team

Management profile

Number of profiles

Profiles2 records

Sentenial funding detail

Funding detail

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Sentenial M&A and investment

M&A and investment

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Sentenial

What does Sentenial do?

Is Sentenial a public or private company?

Sentenial is a private company. It is classified as corporate owned and is currently acquired.

When was Sentenial founded?

Sentenial was founded in 2003. It employs 51 to 100 people.

Where is Sentenial based?

Sentenial is headquartered in Kildare, Ireland, in the Europe region.

How does Sentenial make money?

One revenue line is on record: open Banking Payment Processing.

Who are Sentenial's main competitors?

Direct peers on record are TrueLayer, Yapily, Token.io, Trustly and Banked. Broad incumbents are Tink, Plaid, Worldline and Mastercard Open Banking. Volt is listed as an emerging player.

Does Sentenial have an API?

Yes. GoCardless Payments and Bank account data APIs. The API enables developers to integrate payment processing capabilities including Direct Debit collection via BACS, SEPA, ACH and other bank schemes. The API supports webhooks for event notifications, includes a sandbox environment for testing, and offers partner integration capabilities. Developer documentation is at developer.gocardless.com.

What industry is Sentenial in?

Sentenial's product category is Open Banking Payment Infrastructure. Its primary akta.pro industry code is FSAMAFAB, A2A Payment Initiation Service Providers (PISPs), with a secondary code of FSAMAFAF, A2A Checkout & Merchant Acceptance Solutions. Its NAICS code is 52232.