NMI’s Latest Deal Snags A2A Platform Dwolla

Network Merchants Inc. said Tuesday it has acquired Dwolla Inc., a payments-acceptance technology provider with experience in real-time payments, open banking, and account-to-account technology and serving more than 400 clients. The combination creates a company processing nearly $700 billion in transaction volume annually, the parties say, a move that is seen as bringing increased economies of scale to NMI. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

The deal for Dwolla represents the sixth acquisition Schaumburg, Ill.-based NMI has arranged since 2021, when it acquired USAePay, a payments gateway, for an undisclosed price.

NMI cited Dwolla’s expertise in account-to-account processing as a major rationale for the deal as merchants begin to look to the processing option as a means to short-circuit the interchange fees they pay for card transactions, observers say. The move also could improve NMI’s competitive position, they note. “By extending its payments stack to cover A2A rails, real-time interbank payments, and developer-grade APIs, NMI is positioning itself to better compete with the likes of Stripe, Adyen, and Modern Treasury,” notes Eric Grover, principal at Intrepid Ventures, in an email message to Digital Transactions News.

The significance of A2A processing results in part from the emergence and growth of real-time payments processing, observers say. NMI cites a Juniper Research report indicating global A2A volume will reach $125 trillion by 2030, up 37% from 2025. Real-time payments systems have emerged in recent years to meet growing demand. The Federal Reserve launched its FedNow network in 2023, following the emergence of The Clearing House Payments System’s Real Time Payments platform in 2017.

The deal is also seen as sharpening NMI’s tactical positioning as it looks beyond conventional card processing. “NMI is strategically widening their product offering,” says Cliff Gray, principal at Gray Consulting Ventures. “Buying Dwolla instantly gives NMI full-stack capabilities for ACH, FedNow, and other such alternative rails, surely in response to ever-growing merchant demand for alternative rails.”

“The underlying [Dwolla] portfolio certainly has value, but [that’s] likely secondary to NMI’s greater strategy,” adds Gray.

Dwolla, founded in 2008 and based in Des Moines, Iowa, linked to FedNow in the summer of 2025, having already established a connection to TCH’s system. It has long positioned itself as an alternative to card networks, observers say, though that stance can carry some risk for the new combined entity. “There’s obviously some integration risk, along with the challenge of balancing monetizing low-margin A2A rails without diluting NMI’s core economics,” notes Grover.

NMI says it will service Dwolla’s clients while merging the two systems. Dave Glaser, Dwolla’s chief executive, will join NMI as chief operating officer as NMI says it will absorb some 60 Dwolla staffers.