Embedded Finance Review Podcast, episode 33. Published 15 September 2025. Guest: Stefan Scherpenborg, Head of Nivoda Capital. Host: Lars Markull.
Lars Markull: What if your customers could buy inventory worth thousands of dollars with just a few clicks and no upfront cash? Today I'm speaking with Stefan Scherpenborg, Head of Nivoda Capital. Nivoda is a global B2B marketplace enabling jewellery retailers to source diamonds, gemstones and jewellery worldwide. Stefan joined Nivoda with extensive banking and lending experience to build the embedded finance offering from the ground up.
In our conversation you will discover why traditional banks pulled away from jewellery financing, how Nivoda leverages transaction data for superior underwriting, and their unique buy now, grow faster philosophy that prioritises customer growth over lending profits. Stefan also shares practical insights on building fintech products within marketplaces, the hybrid approach they took with compliance and decision engines, and why he believes embedded credit should be invisible at the checkout.
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. At Embedded Finance Review I publish weekly newsletters, a biweekly podcast, and host in-person and virtual industry events. You can find all of them on my website, embeddedfinancereview.com. In addition, I also work with non-financial brands, infrastructure providers, and banks in understanding, designing and launching their embedded finance products. If you are interested in working with me, visit my website and feel free to reach out. And now let's dive in.
Welcome
Lars Markull: Hi Stefan, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today, and in what part of the world are you actually located right now?
Stefan Scherpenborg: Hi Lars. Thank you very much for the invite. I'm very happy to be here on the podcast. I'm in Amsterdam today. It's stormy. Summer has passed.
Lars Markull: It feels like here in Berlin this summer is just starting in September for a few weeks, and that's it, that was the summer.
Stefan Scherpenborg: Maybe I should go there then. In Amsterdam it's all good here in the office today, but the weather outside is a bit more cloudy.
Lars Markull: So even better to sit inside and talk about embedded finance. And first of all, I have to thank you, because this might be a good chance for me in this podcast to learn quite a bit. We're obviously going to talk a lot about embedded finance here in this chat with you, with Stefan, with Nivoda, about embedded lending. But for a very particular industry. And maybe some people who know me a little bit better know that my wife, who's from India, her family is actually very, very deep into the jewellery business. So I'm really hoping to learn something about the industry in this podcast here.
Stefan Scherpenborg: For the next dinner you'll bring some new info to the table.
Lars Markull: Exactly, I'll try to impress my father-in-law, maybe I can do that with some jewellery insights.
Stefan Scherpenborg: The funny thing is that I have a background in financing as well, and I started one and a half years ago, so I was completely new to the industry as well. So hopefully I can share what I've learned in the last year and a half.
What Nivoda does
Lars Markull: Perfect. And maybe to kick things off, we mentioned already jewellery and a few things, B2B marketplace, but maybe you can describe a little bit more for all the listeners out there to understand exactly what Nivoda offers in a bit more detail.
Stefan Scherpenborg: Yeah, of course, happy to do so. Basically Nivoda's mission is to make the global jewellery trade simple and accessible. We really strive and aim to empower every jeweller, online, brick and mortar, to help them grow. We're really their growth partners, so really empowering them with an all in one solution to run and grow their business.
So it's basically multifaceted. We are the principal in the transaction. We are orchestrating the sale and the delivery of the goods, that is diamonds, gemstones, also jewellery. And we help the jewellers to sell more efficiently, effectively, by offering the world's supply at their fingertips, by offering simple returns, by offering stone reservations for if there's a customer in the store but they want to think about it. We offer manufactured jewellery search, and all of that combined with really the backbone of the jewellery store, that they can actively trace their stones, arrange the shipping, and then completely automated invoice tracking.
So it's really the backbone of the operating store, with maybe, even to phrase it a bit differently, the overall objective that the owner of the business can just walk into the store every morning, can focus on the customer, because it starts with the customer, and the rest is arranged by us. So that's really a very innovative business for the industry.