How CRS balanced 50% growth and advanced product development with Gynger

"Gynger gave us the flexibility to create budget for expenses that have strategic value for growing our business." - Sarika Merchant, CFO at CRS 

Credit Reporting Services Inc. (CRS), a fintech company specializing in regulated credit data solutions, faced a critical challenge in late 2023: managing explosive 50% year-over-year growth while operating on limited resources between funding rounds. Chief Financial Officer at CRS, Sarika Merchant, needed to balance ambitious growth investments with financial prudence—a delicate act that required thoughtful capital allocation and financial management strategies.

Through Gynger, CRS transformed how they managed large technology expenses, freeing up working capital for strategic investments that directly fueled their growth trajectory. The result: successful development of their proprietary CRS FinStack, acquisition of critical product infrastructure, financial flexibility for building budget around strategic initiatives, and strengthened vendor relationships.

Balancing Growth and Cash Management

Since it's inception, CRS had experienced a strong market pull for its innovative credit risk products. Despite clear interest from external investors, the CRS founding team spent their first few years focusing on building the business to seven figures in revenue, with the intent of better positioning the company to raise a sizable seed round. When new investor capital finally arrived, it created immediate opportunity for CRS — but a dynamic finance stack required discipline and focus to manage effectively.

CFO Sarika Merchant soon found herself at the helm of a rapidly growing company with expanding budgetary needs. "My duties were managing the spend of the business without stunting the growth of the business, and that balance was always tricky," Merchant explained. As CRS moved up the value chain and began serving larger customers, the demand for strategic product development and associated investments began to grow.

With ambitious growth goals and a robust development roadmap ahead, Merchant knew that CRS would have to make some strategically necessary investments into its product and operations to keep up.

The complexity of this balancing act became even more apparent when examining the specific operational and financial pressures CRS was facing. These challenges were creating bottlenecks that threatened to slow their momentum just as their market opportunities began to accelerate.

Specific Pain Points:

Cash Flow Constraints: Critical technical infrastructure like credit data licenses, were necessary for the growth and sustenance of the business. With large vendor bills reaching into the 6-figures, significant portions of available cash were tied up in accounts payable, limiting tactical flexibility.

Growth Investment Needs: The product and engineering teams needed budget for executing strategic sprints, acquiring essential product components, and leveraging productivity-defining tools to deliver solutions to the market at a competitive pace.

Vendor Relationship Management: Outstanding bills with key vendors were impacting CRS's ability to negotiate better rates and terms.

"We were in a frustrating spot because we were experiencing phenomenal growth but still burning through a lot of cash," Merchant recalled. "We had to figure out fundraising on one side and on the other side figure out how to stretch every dollar without losing momentum."

Discovery and Evaluation

These mounting pressures forced Merchant to begin exploring financing solutions that could address CRS's unique investment needs and ease cash flow demands. Upon evaluation, however, traditional sources of funding seemed to fall short as sustainable solutions for the business.

Traditional Bank Financing: Even with their established relationship at Silicon Valley Bank, processing loan applications remained complex and time-consuming, requiring extensive documentation and waiting periods. 

Asset-Based Lending: Like most tech companies, CRS had limited physical assets to underwrite, and their fast-turning AR didn't provide the aging receivables traditional lenders prefer. As a result, they struggled to secure large enough loans despite their revenue strength, financial track record, and growth potential.

Investment Capital: Following CRS’s successful seed raise with venture capital backers, VCs continued to express interest in investing; however CRS remained patient and chose not to source additional external funding until they hit key growth milestones. As a result, VC capital remained a non-ideal solution for their immediate cash flow needs.

The Gynger Differentiator:

When CRS's co-founder brought Gynger to Merchant's attention, her initial reaction was skepticism. At first glance, Merchant saw a fast and flexible alternative to standard fundraising. “I remember asking, “this seems too good to be true, so what's the catch?” laughed Merchant. 

But after digging in with the team, it became clear the Gynger solution was more than just an enticing sales pitch. "Our initial conversations with the Gynger team gave us confidence to move forward,” Merchant noted. “And building trust in financial relationships was so critical for us.” Unlike the purely cash-in-hand solutions they’d previously considered, Gynger was a cashflow management solution with tactical embedded financing designed to help businesses like theirs gain total control over their tech payables. 

CRS was instantly pre-approved with Gynger and in a matter of hours, Merchant could elect to pay flexibly on any tech bills she wished. Finally equipped with the control she desired, Merchant could now select terms that complemented CRS’s financial strategy, which allowed her to spread out big expenses in order to shore up budgets for key initiatives in the near term.

Speed, Savings, and Strategy unlocked

Soon after implementation, CRS began to immediately feel the impact of using Gynger’s payable management solutions to soften immediate cash flow demands. 

Operational Flexibility

Gynger allowed CRS to transform their approach to cash management. Instead of large lump-sum payments to vendors that tied up working capital, CRS could now spread payments out over time, all the while maintaining positive vendor relationships by ensuring their vendors got paid up front.

"Simply put, Gynger gave me the freedom to run the expenses that made the most sense for our growth. It gave us financial flexibility without the cost or delay of traditional working capital options," exclaimed Merchant.

As a result, Merchant and her team at CRS could keep operations humming and invest in mission-critical tools during rapid periods of growth all without straining cash flow.

Enhanced Vendor Relationships

An unexpected benefit emerged from improved cash flow management: better vendor negotiations. Leveraging Gynger, CRS could pay over time while still ensuring their vendors were paid up front and in full, each billing cycle. "Previously, vendor terms were fairly rigid,” Merchant explained. “With Gynger, we were able to pre-pay and negotiate from a position of strength, which helped us build stronger, more collaborative relationships.”

Strategic Product Investment

The real value of Gynger emerged in CRS's ability to redirect freed-up capital toward growth initiatives:

Product Acquisition: With Gynger, CRS was now able to engineer certain product elements that ultimately accelerated their development timeline and bring products to market at a competitive pace.

Engineering Sprint Funding: Human capital support was also made possible thanks to the working capital Gynger helped to unlock. "Gynger gave me the ability to make budget for engineering to sprint towards certain goals," enabling the development of CRS FinStack, their proprietary technology suite.

Proprietary Technology Development: The company successfully launched "Credit Order Pro," allowing it to better serve a previously unattainable customer segment. This strategic move resulted in minimum 5-figure additional revenue in 2025.

The bigger picture: 

Enabling Sustainable Growth

CRS's success with Gynger illustrates a broader principle for growth-stage companies: the importance of capital efficiency and strategic flexibility. In an environment where every dollar must work harder, tools like Gynger that unlock working capital without dilution become invaluable.

"Gynger helps me as a CFO say yes to things that will directly go towards growing the business, that I otherwise couldn't have," Merchant explained. 

The company's 50% year-over-year growth during this period demonstrates that thoughtful planning combined with the right financial tools can empower businesses to maintain momentum even during capital-constrained periods.

Impacts you can see

Financial Impact:

• Proprietary Technology Development: The flexibility provided by Gynger allowed the product team to invest in long-term innovation, not just short-term customer needs. This freedom led to the launch of several key products, including the industry’s first non-FICO SBSS API, Standard Format, and new data furnishing capabilities
• Growth: sustained 50% year-over-year growth maintained throughout the financing period
• Vendor Discounts: Improved vendor relationships led to better pricing negotiations (specific percentages confidential)

Strategic Achievements:

• Technology Independence: Successful development and launch of proprietary CRS FinStack
• Expanded technology portfolio: Tool acquisition and critical product development sprints that weren't previously possible with traditional cash constraints
• Financial independence: Able to continue investing in the company’s growth without taking on additional dilution.

Operational Improvements:

• Cash Flow Optimization: Large payables spread over time across many smaller payments without sacrificing access to the tools need to scale
• Strategic Agility:  Newly available working capital for immediate growth opportunities
• Vendor relationships: Improved vendor relationships by paying them up front

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Conclusion

After nearly two years using Gynger, CRS experienced benefits far beyond payment flexibility—to Sarika Merchant, Gynger became a strategic tool for cash flow optimization, relationship management, and thoughtful planning that yielded tangible results for her team. By freeing up working capital from expensive payables, she was able to invest in product development and key infrastructure without losing momentum during a critical period of growth. 

For growing companies navigating the complex balance between operational needs, strategic investments, and a competitive timeline, Gynger provides the financial flexibility to say yes to growth opportunities while maintaining operational discipline.

"If I were to recommend Gynger to a friend, I would say go with them absolutely," Merchant concluded. "Gynger is the perfect resource for when you need to stretch that dollar because you need it for another equally important reason elsewhere in your business."