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Amplified Payment System (Amplify)
Founded in 2015 by payments-industry veteran James Foster, Amplify was built specifically to fill the gap between traditional bank factoring and venture...
Amplified Payment System (Amplify)
Founded in 2015 by payments-industry veteran James Foster, Amplify was built specifically to fill the gap between traditional bank factoring and venture debt. Foster's background in merchant acquiring and ISV integrated payments shaped the firm's central thesis — that a software company's recurring contract base is an underappreciated, bankable asset class. From a single desk in Los Angeles, the firm quietly began bridging the working-capital needs of venture-backed startups whose revenue predictability outstripped the willingness of early-stage equity investors to fund operating burn. Amplify's strategy concentrates on providing revenue-based capital to vertical SaaS and enterprise-software companies with annual recurring revenue typically between $3 million and $30 million. The firm writes term advances secured by future subscription receivables, monitored through integrations with the borrower's billing and accounting systems. Unlike traditional venture lenders, Amplify does not require warrants or board seats. The firm's financing structure allows companies to toggle between equity and non-dilutive capital on a tranche-by-tranche basis. Sectors in the portfolio include logistics software, restaurant-management platforms, and field-services tools — verticals where recurring contracts are sticky and churn is low. Amplify operates from a single Los Angeles office with a lean team that blends credit-underwriting expertise with payments-technology infrastructure. The firm has not disclosed total AUM or aggregate deployment figures. Adjacent vehicles or philanthropic structures are not known to exist. There is no documented presence in club-deal networks or co-investment syndicates. Amplify's posture remains narrowly transactional — writing capital facilities, monitoring repayment via payment-processing integrations, and recycling capital as it returns. Amplify's structural differentiator is its reliance on direct payment-rail integration rather than static financial statements for underwriting and servicing. By linking to the borrower's payment gateway, the firm captures daily settlement data to monitor coverage ratios in near-real time. This operating-model advantage reduces monitoring frictions and, critically, allows Amplify to advance capital early in a SaaS company's contract cycle — precisely when cash is tightest — without demanding the warrants or governance rights that venture-debt providers routinely require.
General information
Firm type
Asset Manager
Year founded
2015
AUM
Undisclosed
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
Los Angeles
Corporate office
Los Angeles, CA, United States
Principals
James Foster
Founder, Managing Partner
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
How does Amplify's financing differ from traditional venture debt?
Amplify does not require warrants, board seats, or governance rights, which are standard in venture-debt term sheets from bank-affiliated lenders like Silicon Valley Bank. The firm underwrites directly against recurring subscription receipts by integrating into the borrower's billing and payment systems, rather than relying on quarterly financials and the equity-sponsor relationship which anchor traditional venture lending. Repayment is structured as a fixed percentage of daily or monthly revenue, not as a fixed amortization schedule tied to an interest rate.
What types of companies does Amplify typically finance?
Amplify targets vertical SaaS and enterprise-software companies with annual recurring revenue roughly between $3 million and $30 million. The firm prefers businesses with sticky, recurring contract bases — common in logistics software, restaurant-management platforms, and field-services tools — where churn is predictably low. Early-stage, pre-revenue, or highly seasonal businesses are not a fit for this model.
How does Amplify source deals?
Deal flow has historically come through direct relationships with venture-backed founders, referrals from venture capital firms whose portfolio companies face working-capital gaps, and partnerships with payment processors and independent software vendors. Because Amplify integrates with the borrower's billing stack to underwrite, its sourcing tends to follow where integrated payments are already embedded.
Does Amplify take equity positions in the companies it finances?
No. Amplify's product is explicitly non-dilutive. The firm does not request warrants, equity kickers, or board observation rights as part of its standard revenue-advance facilities. This distinguishes it from most venture-debt providers that layer an equity component into the overall cost of capital.
What is the relationship between Amplify and the broader payments industry?
Founder James Foster came out of the merchant-acquiring and integrated-payments world. That operational DNA shows up in Amplify's underwriting — the firm connects directly to payment gateways and billing platforms to monitor daily settlement activity and coverage ratios, a technique borrowed more from the cash-advance underwriting playbook than from traditional credit analysis.
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