My interest in software engineering and architecture has always led me to explore how IT systems work. This perspective shaped my conversation with Pascal Roche, CEO of Purse. Whether designing complex financial workflows or distributed systems, I have often seen the same principle: technology reflects how a business operates.
Pascal describes himself as an intrapreneur and a web entrepreneur. His 25-year career reflects the evolution of digital commerce. He helped launch Fnac.com in 1999 and later led digital operations at Leroy Merlin. He also worked on a 3D printing marketplace at Dassault Systèmes and copyright management at Sacem.
Our conversation focused on the structural challenges of e-commerce. In my previous Tech Insights article about SteerFox, I explored how algorithms help retailers attract customers. Purse focuses on what happens next: turning visits into purchases and managing the systems behind each transaction.
Conway's law and E-commerce architecture
The cost of working in silos
After more than 25 years, online sales still account for an average of just 15% of business activity among major retailers. Overall conversion rates remain around 3%. One major challenge is clear: 70% of users abandon their purchase between the basket and payment stages.
Pascal Roche believes Conway's Law helps explain this problem. Conway's Law suggests that software systems tend to reflect the communication structures of the organisations that build them.
In traditional retail, IT systems are often divided between departments. Finance manages payments. Compliance teams handle fraud detection. E-commerce teams oversee customer authentication.
The checkout process is often added later, connecting systems that were not originally designed to work together. Digital-first companies such as Amazon took a different approach. They designed their checkout processes from the beginning, without the same legacy barriers between departments.
Using data models to reflect real business processes
Purse's technical approach draws on industrial modelling, an area Pascal developed during his time at Dassault Systèmes. It uses a concept called ontology. In software engineering, ontology means creating a structured model of real-world information and how different elements relate to each other.
This helps digital systems reflect business processes more accurately. Purse originally emerged from an internal need at Decathlon. The retailer wanted to bring several payment methods together. However, simply connecting payment providers offers limited value. Retailers need more than connectivity. They need an intelligent system that can direct payments based on performance and reliability. This is where payment orchestration becomes important.
Managing the entire buying flow
Bringing customer identity and payments together
Traditional payment solutions often operate as closed systems. This can make retailers dependent on individual technology providers, a problem known as vendor lock-in. Purse takes a broader approach. Rather than focusing only on the final payment, it manages the buying journey from customer login to checkout.
In March 2024, Purse acquired ReachFive, a specialist in Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM). CIAM covers customer authentication, access rights and consent management. By combining these capabilities, Purse developed what it calls the Buying Flow.
Instead of offering a fixed SaaS product, the company provides a flexible platform built around two complementary solutions:
- Purse Identity: Manages customer authentication, access and identity.
- Purse Payment: Manages and directs payment transactions.
Together, these solutions help retailers control more of the customer journey.
Using scale to improve security
Purse operates at a significant scale. Its platform supports more than 100 European brands. Purse Identity secures 325 million customer profiles, while Purse Payment manages more than €7 billion in annualised transactions.
This scale also creates opportunities to improve cybersecurity. One example is its data breach detection feature. If a customer account is identified as compromised at one retailer, the platform can alert other brands in its network. Those brands can then require stronger authentication when the customer next signs in. This shared approach helps retailers respond to security threats before they spread across the network.
Agentic AI and digital independence
Preparing for autonomous AI purchases
Agentic AI is changing how online transactions may work. In the near future, autonomous AI agents could make purchases on behalf of consumers. This raises important questions. How much freedom should an AI agent have? Should it be allowed to create its own login credentials? How can retailers verify that an automated order is genuine?
Traditional checkout systems were designed for human customers. They now need to prepare for transactions initiated by software agents. By managing both identity and payments, Purse is adapting its architecture to support these new interactions. The goal is to create a reliable transaction system that can also handle purchases made by AI agents.
Giving retailers more control over their technology
Digital independence is about more than where data is stored. Large North American technology companies are shaping new buying journeys. Their platforms have the scale to attract and register millions of users.
For retailers, relying too heavily on closed payment systems creates a risk. They may gradually lose control over their direct relationships with customers. Purse's modular architecture offers an alternative.
It allows retailers to manage each stage of the payment process separately. They can choose different providers and improve their systems without being locked into a single technology partner. Pascal Roche's goal is not to promote protectionism. It is to support a more balanced European market where retailers have greater freedom to choose the technologies they use.
From an internal tool to a scalable technology platform
One of the most interesting aspects of Purse's story is how it began. What started as a specific operational need at one retailer became a solution to a wider industry problem.
A new chapter: The buying flow company
Consumer behaviour is changing. AI is also creating new ways to shop. In 2026, Purse is responding with a clearer strategic position: The Buying Flow Company. This reflects its ambition to help retailers manage the entire purchasing journey. The official integration of ReachFive is central to this strategy. By combining customer identity and payment expertise, Purse now offers two connected solutions. Together, they cover the journey from a customer's first login to the final payment.
Building technology that can handle growth
Supporting this vision requires strong software infrastructure. As Purse expands, its platform must process more data and manage increasingly complex transactions. The company has therefore started strengthening its software engineering processes. It has recruited a CTO and expanded its data teams.
The aim is to build a data-driven architecture that can process information in real time while keeping transactions reliable. For software companies, this type of transformation requires significant engineering capacity. Many technology and product leaders choose to work with external technology partners to support complex architecture projects and maintain development capacity.
Bringing experienced engineers into existing teams can help businesses build and maintain reliable B2B retail platforms. It also allows internal teams to focus on their core product while keeping development plans on track.
Purse's story shows how an internal technology project can grow into an independent software platform. By solving a practical problem for one major retailer, the company developed an approach that addresses wider challenges across the e-commerce industry. Its journey also highlights an important principle: well-designed software architecture can give businesses greater control over their technology and customer relationships.
Company spotlight
→ Company: Purse
→ Leadership: Pascal Roche, CEO.
→ Industry: Software / Financial Services / Payments / Customer Identity
→ Why Purse stands out: Purse takes a structured approach to the technology behind online shopping. Originally developed to connect payment methods at a major French retailer, its platform now brings together customer identity and payment orchestration. By modelling the entire transaction process, Purse helps retailers move away from closed, all-in-one systems. Its modular approach gives businesses more freedom to choose their providers, manage transactions and retain control over their technology.
Sources
- Ecommerce Mag - Agentic AI: How Decathlon Is Preparing for the Future of Commerce
- Place de l’IT - Agentic Commerce: Purse Wants to Orchestrate the Entire Transaction
- Radio Classique - Comment j'ai réussi, featuring Pascal Roche, CEO of Purse
