Brex pivots from startups to enterprise

Brex’s 2022 pivot was really a bet that the durable profit pool in corporate spend sits with larger finance teams buying control software, not with startups swiping cards. Exiting smaller customers narrowed the sales focus, while Brex Empower gave it a way to sell budgeting, approvals, reporting, and delegated spend controls into companies with more employees, more entities, and more compliance needs. That moved Brex closer to the Concur and Coupa budget, instead of just the startup card budget.1 2 3 4 5

• Empower was not just another card feature. It was positioned as Brex’s spend management layer, built to compete with SAP Concur, where the buyer cares about policy controls, audit trails, and ERP integrations more than rewards or free software.3 4
• This matched a broader shift in the category. Ramp, Airbase, Divvy, and Teampay all pushed beyond the card into approval and reconciliation workflows, because the card itself is easy to replace, while the system that routes requests and closes the books is much stickier.2 4
• Brex’s twist was to split the market. For startups and mid market firms, all in one finance software works best. For enterprise, Brex increasingly sold card and spend management as a best of breed point solution that plugs into travel and procurement tools like Navan and Coupa.3 5

From here, the logic is straightforward. Brex keeps moving upmarket by using cards as the wedge, then layering software and embedded distribution into the workflows large companies already use. The more enterprise spend moves through procurement, travel, and ERP systems, the more valuable Empower becomes as the control layer sitting in the middle.3 5