Originally featured in FinanceDay, this Q&A with Kani Payments Founder and CEO Aaron Holmes dives into the operational pain points that sparked the company’s creation—and why financial data clarity is more urgent than ever.
From messy processor files to spreadsheet sprawl, Aaron shares why fintechs can’t afford to take their data at face value—and how Kani is helping teams automate reconciliation, stay compliant, and scale with confidence.Aaron Holmes shares how years in the operational trenches led to founding Kani—and why too many fintechs are still flying blind when it comes to their financial data.
1. You spent years working within the payments industry before founding Kani. What was the moment that finally pushed you to start your own company?
I founded Kani in 2018 to fix the very problems I’d witnessed firsthand for years. I was deep in the operational trenches, watching the slow, manual, error-prone process of turning raw transactional data into something you could actually trust and report on.
While working in ops and compliance, I spent countless hours manually wrangling processor data, submitting reports, and firefighting errors caused by bad file formats or missing information. I thought, “There’s got to be a better way.” So, I poured those experiences into building Kani.
The goal was simple: automate the painful, manual parts of payments reporting and reconciliation, and give operations and finance teams the clarity they need. Transparency, accuracy, and speed—those were the things I wished I’d had when I was doing the job. That’s what we set out to deliver.
2. Kani’s mission is to bring clarity to financial data. Why is this such a pressing challenge for fintechs, and how does your platform solve it differently?
Clarity in financial data isn’t just a nice-to-have for fintechs; it’s critical. These companies are moving fast, scaling across regions, dealing with multiple payment processors, schemes, and partners. That creates a flood of complex, often inconsistent transaction data. Beneath all the innovation, someone still has to make sure the numbers add up, whether that’s for internal reporting, regulatory submissions or investor confidence.
At Kani, our mission has always been to bring clarity to that chaos. I’ve lived through the pain of manually reconciling data across systems that don’t speak the same language, chasing missing records and preparing reports under pressure. Traditional tools just weren’t built for the pace and complexity of modern fintech.
What sets Kani apart is how purpose-built our platform is for these challenges. We don’t just aggregate data—we transform it into something accurate, auditable and ready to report on. We automate reconciliation, highlight discrepancies and give our clients a single source of truth. It’s about giving fintechs the confidence to scale, report and operate without second-guessing their data.
3. You built a globally recognised SaaS business not from London, but from Newcastle. What were the advantages or challenges of scaling from outside the usual startup hubs?
Building Kani from Newcastle was a deliberate choice. I’d worked in London, but when it came to starting the company, I saw a real opportunity in the North East. Newcastle has strong foundations: three universities producing great tech and finance talent, a lower cost of doing business and a community that’s both collaborative and ambitious. That gave us a strong base to build from.
Of course, scaling outside the usual startup hubs comes with challenges. Access to funding and visibility can be harder when you’re not in London. But we didn’t let that hold us back. We turned the narrative on its head and used it to our advantage. We built a focused and resilient team, and we continually prove ourselves through the quality of our platform and the results we deliver for clients globally.
Today, we’re proud to be part of a growing fintech ecosystem in Newcastle. The city’s gaining more recognition, and we’re committed to showing that you don’t have to be in London to build a globally successful SaaS business.
4. What’s something about the world of financial reconciliation and reporting that you wish more startup founders or CFOs understood?
I wish more startup founders and CFOs understood that financial data isn’t something you can afford to take at face value. Just because a system outputs a report doesn’t mean it’s accurate. We’ve seen too many cases where assumptions about data quality led to serious issues like missed reconciliations, incorrect reporting and even regulatory breaches.
The risk usually isn’t in the headline numbers. It’s in the gaps, the edge cases, the things no one notices until it’s too late. That’s why visibility and accountability are so important. You need to know exactly where your data’s coming from, what’s missing and how it all connects. Often, that means working with partners who’ve seen it before and know what to look for.
The most forward-thinking fintechs aren’t trying to build all of this in-house. They’re focused on their core product, and they’re leaning on trusted specialists to help them stay compliant, move faster and avoid costly surprises. That’s where we come in.
5. You’ve transitioned from being a corporate leader to a startup founder. What mindset shifts or personal habits helped you make that leap successfully?
Moving from a corporate environment to founding a startup requires a real mindset shift. In larger organisations, you’ve got structure, defined roles and layers of support. As a founder (especially in the early days) it’s all on you. Every decision, every setback, every win. That means getting comfortable with uncertainty, making fast decisions with limited information and staying focused even when things get messy.
In a startup, progress beats polish. You’ve got to move quickly, test ideas and adapt. I also had to become far more disciplined with my time, balancing strategic thinking with the day-to-day reality of building a team, winning customers and evolving the product.
What helped most was staying close to the problem we set out to solve. I’d lived the operational pain around payments data for years, so I knew exactly why we were building Kani. That clarity helped me stay grounded, even when things got tough.
6. What’s next for Kani Payments? Are there new verticals, technologies, or geographies you’re excited about?
We’re focused on scaling what we do best: bringing transparency and control to financial data. The regulatory landscape is only getting more complex, and fintechs are under pressure to reconcile accurately, report on time and stay audit-ready.
We’re expanding into new markets, especially across Europe, the Middle East, and North America, where demand for robust reporting and reconciliation tools is growing fast. We’re also investing in deeper integrations and using automation and AI to help our clients surface insights faster and fix issues before they become problems.
Vertical-wise, we’re seeing strong interest from digital banks, embedded finance players and B2B payments platforms, in short, anyone dealing with high-volume, complex transaction flows. Our aim is to stay close to these operators and keep building tools that make back-office life easier.
7. What advice would you give to a first-time founder building in a saturated or highly competitive market?
Don’t be put off by the fact that others are in the space. A competitive market means there’s real demand. It’s your job to find the gaps others aren’t addressing and focus there.
The key is to stay close to the problem and the people feeling it. In our case, I wasn’t trying to disrupt the entire payments ecosystem. I just wanted to fix a painful, overlooked part of it. That focus helped us build something meaningful from day one.
Lastly, don’t try to do everything yourself. Build a strong team, work with partners who know their craft and listen to your customers constantly. You don’t need to be first; you just need to solve a real challenge and keep solving it even as things change.
