Embedded Finance Review Podcast, episode 38. Published 8 January 2026. Guest: Jas Shah, fintech product consultant. Host: Lars Markull.
Lars Markull: Hope is not a strategy. That's a line from today's episode that stuck with me, because in fintech too many partnerships are actually built on hope. Hope that the customers will come, hope that the product will fit. But the companies that actually succeed, they do the work upfront.
Today I'm joined by Jas Shah, a fintech product consultant who has worked on both sides of embedded finance, from inside big banks to advising fintechs on how to become embedded ready. In this conversation we explore what separates successful embedded finance partnerships from the ones that never take off, why the customer so often gets forgotten in these deals, and how companies can test their embedded strategy before going all in. We also dive into agentic finance, and why Jas believes AI agents will transform SME lending by replacing brokers with a smarter, faster and cheaper alternative.
My name is Lars Markull and this is the Embedded Finance Review Podcast. Every two weeks I interview the builders and shapers of embedded finance. And a quick reminder from my side. At Embedded Finance Review I publish weekly newsletters, biweekly podcasts, and host in-person and virtual industry events. You can find all of this on my website, embeddedfinancereview.com. In addition, I work with non-financial brands, infrastructure providers, and banks to understand, design and launch their embedded finance products. If you are interested in working with me, visit my website and reach out. And now let's dive in.
Welcome
Lars Markull: Hey Jas, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today, and in what part of the world are you actually located right now?
Jas Shah: Hey Lars, great to be here. I am in London, which is sunny even though it's December. Great to be on the pod and great to speak with you.
Lars Markull: Yeah, thanks for joining. At the time of the recording I'm actually in Mumbai, so it's pretty sunny over here as well. Looking at the weather in Berlin, it seems pretty cold over there, but glad to hear that you're having some sunny days in London as well.
Jas Shah: The rare sunny day in London. Yesterday was just all rain, so, nice balance.
What good embedded finance looks like
Lars Markull: Indeed. And now also maybe a good time to talk about embedded finance and dive into that rabbit hole. With your background, you have seen the machine from the inside. As a product consultant you have spent time on both sides of the value chain, working with companies building embedded finance products.
To kick things off, is there something from your personal experience that you've seen that differentiates companies who are doing an amazing job compared to those who are doing a poor or maybe just an average job?
Jas Shah: Yeah. I think the companies who really think about, I've spoken about using Klarna as an example of a torch bearer for what good embedded finance looks like, because Klarna's implementation of embedded finance is a three party win.
It's a win for the embedder, so for merchants, for retailers who want to increase conversion, there's benefit there. For Klarna obviously, they get customers, there is revenue, and obviously they can offer new products and they get the consumer behaviour there and they get consumer data. But then for the consumer, they also get the win of being able to get through checkout and having an option to check out where they might not have the funds and they don't have to find external sources for finance. They get basically point of sale finance to complete their transaction.
So for me, just generally, the folks who do it well look at all three parts: the embedder, the embeddee and the customer. And those are the ones where you see it. And I always use Klarna as the example. It might not be the best example to use at all times, based on some of how they do things, but in terms of the execution of the product, I don't really think there's much to fault there.