Ivella raised $3.5M to replace joint accounts with an auto-split couples card

Couples banking: individual accounts plus a shared debit card that splits charges by preset ratios

Couples before marriage will bank through a shared card that intercepts each transaction's authorization and auto-splits it across two individual balances

$3.5M from Anthemis, Financial Venture Studio and Soma Capital; Y Combinator, Joshua Browder and Sahil Lavingia among the investors

CEO Kahlil Lalji, who previously helped creators with digital content, founded the Santa Monica startup out of frustration that couples were expected to use Venmo until marriage. Ivella's first iteration was a P2P transfer app with better UX — and it failed because payment networks only see one account: a $100 charge split between two $50 balances would reject, while an approved charge could leave one partner unable to cover their share.

Ivella rebuilt around the split account: couples keep individual accounts and balances, get one debit card linked to both, and set ratios — prorated by income — so Ivella intercepts each authorization, checks both balances in real time and moves the money before approval. Lalji called the internal ledger tracking money between accounts the biggest technical challenge, something he thinks most fintechs skip. Competitors were circling the same idea: Braid launched Pools for shared group wallets, and Zeta raised $1.5M to make joint accounts more collaborative, with its CEO arguing splitting is a 'temporary' mindset. Ivella planned to expand to joint accounts, credit and joint investment products for couples at any stage.

Joint accounts force couples to merge everything or fall back on manual Venmo requests

Intercepting authorizations with real-time balance logic is the only way to split a card charge at the rail level

The pre-marriage couple niche was unserved by banks and by rivals like Zeta, which targets sharers rather than splitters

When payments networks only see one account, owning the ledger and the authorization decision is the only way to split a charge for real

As of 2022-06-06 Ivella had just raised, was launching the split account, and planned premium subscriptions plus long-term joint, credit and investment products for couples at any relationship stage.