VerticalStack acquires vertical SaaS businesses and brings their financial services onto a single regulated platform. Embedded payments are the first layer; lending, banking, and insurance build on the same rails and the same merchant base.
Vertical software sits at the centre of how thousands of small businesses operate, yet the financial services running through that software, starting with payments, are usually owned by someone else. VerticalStack brings the two together.
We acquire founder-led and small private-equity-owned vertical SaaS businesses in SME-dense, healthcare-adjacent markets such as veterinary, dental, optical, and allied health.
Each business connects to a single regulated platform. Merchant payments move onto VerticalStack rails at software renewal, with no disruption to the service the business relies on, establishing the foundation layer.
Once payments are in place, the same platform and merchant base support further layers: lending and working capital, banking and accounts, and insurance, each one new retained revenue rather than a re-cut of existing economics.
The first layer, embedded payments, launches on established rails and migrates to VerticalStack's own regulated infrastructure, without re-onboarding a single merchant. That regulated core is what later layers are built on.
The platform operates as a Managed Payment Facilitator on established processor infrastructure, so merchants can be onboarded and processed from day one while the regulated core is built.
On FCA authorisation, VerticalStack moves to its own Sponsored Payment Facilitator model and retains the full payment economics, an incremental transition rather than a rebuild.
Figures describe VerticalStack's strategy and build-out plan and are not a forecast of financial returns. The business is pre-authorisation and pre-scale; projections are available to qualified investors under the relevant materials.
Vertical SaaS is operationally essential and rarely switched, which is what makes an embedded payments relationship durable.
In most targets the payment margin sits with a third party today, and lending, banking, and insurance are not offered at all. Each layer is new, retained revenue rather than a re-cut of existing economics.
A single regulated platform serves every acquired business, so each new acquisition adds volume and each new financial layer adds margin, without adding infrastructure.
Vertical SaaS combined with embedded financial services is an established model internationally; VerticalStack brings the full-stack approach to UK SME verticals.
Own the software the business depends on, start with payments, and build the rest of its financial stack on top.
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