Leaf builds a commerce-focused tablet and software platform marketed to retail stores, restaurants, and other local merchants. Its LeafPresenter hardware includes a magnetic stripe reader, NFC, EMV capability, and front- and rear-facing cameras to accept payments via cards, gift cards, PayPal, LevelUp, and mobile wallets. LeafBusiness is a cloud-based business analytics and management portal that provides insight for small business owners. The Leaf Appstore, currently in beta, is designed to enable developers to build applications that run on the LeafPresenter and integrate with LeafBusiness. Led by co-founder and CEO Aron Schwarzkopf, the company plans to use funds to advance manufacturing of the LeafPresenter and expand its developer and employee teams to grow LeafBusiness and the Appstore. Heartland Payment Systems has also joined Leaf’s network of distribution partners. Leaf builds a payments service that sends paperless receipts to customers and stores transaction data in the cloud for merchants. The product can be integrated as an app into a merchant’s existing point-of-sale terminal or used via a special terminal that Leaf leases for $20 per month. Leaf says merchants do not need to change payment providers; all data is encrypted and routed through a Level 1 PCI-compliant payments gateway. The company has begun an alpha with more than a dozen merchants in Boston and plans to launch a consumer iPhone and Android app in two weeks. Leaf was co-founded by recent Babson and MIT graduates Aron Schwarzkopf and Sebastián Castro Galnares and has recruited senior payments and technology executives to its team. With $1M in seed funding, the team prototyped a point-of-sale terminal for under $250,000 and is positioning itself against incumbents like PayPal, Intuit, Square, and iZettle.

Total raised

$21M

Funding rounds

2

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Oct 2013