Leaf
Mobile point-of-sale platform that helps local merchants manage and grow their business.
| Date | Investors | Amount | Round |
|---|---|---|---|
| N/A | €0.0 | round | |
$20.0m | Series A | ||
| Total Funding | 000k | ||
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Leaf was a financial technology company established in January 2011 by co-founders Aron Schwarzkopf and Sebastian Castro. Schwarzkopf, an entrepreneurship graduate from Babson College, conceived the idea to streamline how local businesses operate in a cloud-based world. The company began as a bootstrapped operation, eventually securing angel investment to fuel its growth.
The core of Leaf's business was a purpose-built, Android-based tablet designed to function as a comprehensive point-of-sale (POS) system for small and medium-sized businesses, particularly in the retail and restaurant sectors. This "LeafPresenter" tablet was engineered to replace traditional cash registers, integrating a magnetic stripe reader, EMV, and NFC capabilities to handle a wide array of payment types, including credit cards, gift cards, and mobile wallets like PayPal. A key differentiator was its "processor agnostic" approach, allowing merchants to maintain their existing payment processor relationships, which provided flexibility and cost control. Revenue was generated from the sale of the tablet hardware, priced at $250, and a monthly software subscription of $50.
Beyond payment processing, the platform offered a suite of business management tools accessible via a cloud-based dashboard, LeafBusiness. Merchants could track sales trends, manage inventory, and monitor employee performance and hours. The system also featured an app store, enabling further customization. Security was addressed through end-to-end encryption and tokenization, ensuring that sensitive cardholder data was not stored on the device. A significant milestone occurred in September 2013 when Heartland Payment Systems made a $20 million strategic investment in the company. This partnership provided Leaf with access to Heartland's extensive network of small business customers. Subsequently, in August 2014, Heartland acquired the remaining interest in Leaf, which then began to operate as a separate business unit. The company is now reportedly defunct.
Keywords: Leaf POS, Aron Schwarzkopf, Sebastian Castro, Heartland Payment Systems, mobile POS, tablet POS, point of sale system, small business commerce, payment platform, processor agnostic, LeafPresenter, cloud-based dashboard, restaurant POS, retail POS, payment processing, business management tools, mPOS acquisition, financial technology, Android POS, LeafBusiness