Margin Labs

Margin Labs is an independent embedded payments advisory for PE-backed vertical SaaS platforms. Most software companies run real payment volume through their product and capture almost none of the economics. We help them close that gap.

We are vendor neutral and work for the platform, not the processor. That independence is the point. The best payments advice does not come from processors, ISOs or gateways, because they all have a stack to sell. We model the opportunity across every monetization option and recommend the one that actually fits your stage, volume and risk tolerance.

Our work spans the full model continuum: ISV referral, revenue share, PayFac-as-a-service and full payment facilitator registration. We help platforms see their true processor cost, buy on interchange-plus so the spread is visible, and price to their merchants as a deliberate choice rather than an inherited default. We also advise on embedded finance expansion beyond payments, including embedded lending, embedded banking and card issuing, and the sequencing between them.

Typical engagements:

• The Margin Multiplier, a free calculator that models what payments could be worth to your platform across all four models.

• A Quick Start Call, a focused working session with a written action plan in 48 hours and warm introductions to vetted processing partners.

• Ongoing advisory for platforms building or scaling payments, hands-on and limited to a few clients at a time.

Margin Labs is led by a payments product leader with more than 15 years across point of sale, consumer and commercial banking, banking-as-a-service and vertical SaaS, including owning the payments P&L for acquired software platforms inside a PE-backed rollup.