Funding deals, Founders and Investors, & Movers and Shakers #35
FUNDING
Funding and FinTechs go hand in hand—particularly with the rise of mega-rounds—and, according to Tech Nation, FinTech funding soared last quarter. New data from Tech Nation shows that, in the last quarter, VC investment in UK FinTechs hit $4.9bn—more than the total raised by UK FinTechs throughout the whole of 2020 ($4.57bn). Link here.
🇺🇸 Atomic, the market-leading provider for payroll connectivity, announced that it has secured $22 million in Series A financing to expand its payroll integration platform and grow its team. Link here.
🇬🇧 Global Processing Services, the leading global payment technology platform, announced it has raised over US$300 million from 🇺🇸 Advent International and Viking Global Investors, who will co-control the company. Link here.
🇳🇬 Mono, a Nigerian Open Banking startup, has raised a $15M Series A funding round, led by Tiger Global Management — with participation from Target Global, General Catalyst, and SBI Investments. Link here.
🇩🇪 Getsafe, the digital insurer targeting millennial buyers in Germany and the UK, has expanded its Series B funding round to $93M. Link here.
French startup 🇫🇷 Swile has raised a $200 million Series D funding round led by SoftBank Group International. Link here.
A new European fund-of-fund has entered the scene with the goal of backing emerging early-stage VC managers. The fund-of-funds is called Presight Partners, which is launching with $200m in assets attempting to tap into the explosion in the number of high-performing smaller funds. Link here.
Productfy Inc., a banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform that aims to build “DeFi for traditional finance,” has raised $16 million in a Series A round of funding led by CM Ventures. Link here.
A Melbourne startup called 🇦🇺 FrankieOne has built an automated platform to help combat that is announcing a Series A on the back of strong customer demand. Link here.
🇳🇬 Klasha, a Lagos and San Francisco-based startup, sees a niche in cross-border commerce and provides multiple integrations and APIs to facilitate transactions in that space. Today, it has raised $2.4 million in seed to scale. Link here.
Lahore-based fintech and logistics startup 🇵🇰 PostEx has raised $1.5 million in a seed round led by MSA Capital, it announced in a statement. Link here.
Berlin-based fintech startup 🇩🇪 FinMarie has just received early-stage funding of €1.4 million. This first round of external funding has been led by High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF) and the Berlin-based wallstreet:online AG. Link here.
Ten months on from closing the first round of its Series B, digital German insurance provider 🇩🇪 Getsafe has more than tripled its latest funding. Link here.
Australia's 🇦🇺 Till Payments has raised US$80 million to fuel international expansion, beginning with North America. Link here.
🇺🇸 Otto, a fintech startup that aims to allow people to tap into their vehicle’s equity for access to credit, has raised $4.5 million in a seed round of funding. Link here.
Money Management app 🇬🇧 Chip opened its crowdfunding round to the general public Thursday and managed to crash Crowdcube's servers as the cash rolled in, hitting £7 million from an initial target of £1 million. Link here.
After initially raising just shy of $10m from Augmentum Fintech last month, Swedish credit refinancer 🇸🇪 Anyfin has closed its Series B round extension at a total of $52m. Link here.
FOUNDERS & INVESTORS
The last 18 months have taught us that for digital-first companies, business can be done from anywhere. But the data shows that this is far from a new phenomenon. Unicorns - startups that reach a billion-dollar valuation - have become an important currency in measuring tech ecosystems globally. Link here.
🇺🇸 Bakkt, a trusted digital asset marketplace that enables consumers to buy, sell, send and spend digital assets, today announced a partnership with Google to extend the reach and usability of digital assets to meet rapidly evolving consumer demand and preferences. Link here.
🇸🇬 GrabPay announced that it has recently strengthened its safety and security features designed to protect its users from fraud and security risks. Link here.
OPPORTUNITIES:
Stockholm reinforces its position as Europe’s 3rd biggest fintech hub, with green fintechs as one of the emerging verticals on the Stockholm fintech scene, new report shows. This year’s edition of the Stockholm Fintech Guide delves into the growth categories in the Swedish FinTech world and looks at the latest investments, where Stockholm ranks third after London and Berlin in Europe. Stockholm-based companies account for nearly 90% of all FinTech investment deals in Sweden and 85% in the Nordics respectively. Link here.
If you are a fintech startup and have over 100 questions send me an email, maybe I can answer a few.