“Can a small Belgian open banking gateway win European pay-by-bank adoption by riding on other institutions' PSD2 licenses instead of getting its own?”
Exthand is a Brussels-based open banking infrastructure company founded in 2022. It operates as an agent of licensed Belgian payment institutions (DIGITEAL and PAYBONSAI) to provide account information services (AIS) and payment initiation services (PIS) — the 'Exthand:Gateway' — enabling retailers to accept pay-by-bank, variable recurring payments, and instant SEPA transfers across Europe without payment intermediaries.
Exthand discloses DIGITEAL SA and PAYBONSAI SA as its sponsor banks, according to the Embedded Finance Index 2026.
Exthand does not disclose a bank charter of its own; its banking services are provided through DIGITEAL SA and PAYBONSAI SA.
Exthand processes payments through Exthand Gateway (self-operated).
Exthand connects to bank accounts through Exthand Gateway (self-operated).
The Embedded Finance Index 2026 maps 3 layers in Exthand's stack: Payments / PSP (Exthand Gateway (self-operated)); Open banking (Exthand Gateway (self-operated)); Sponsor bank (DIGITEAL SA and PAYBONSAI SA).
Exthand is founded in 2022 and headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.
Exthand has raised $660K in total (latest round: Pre-Seed, 2022).
Get a read on where your own stack stands against Exthand and the rest of its category — what they built versus bought, which providers they use, and where the gaps in your own strategy and competitive set actually are.