ICYMI funding round-up: Snoop, Easy, Wildfire Systems, Ritmo & more
At FinTech Futures, we know that it can be easy to let funding announcements slip you by in this fast-paced industry. That’s why we put together our weekly ‘In Case You Missed It’ (ICYMI) funding round-up for you to get the latest funding news.
Jayne-Ann Gadhia, Snoop founder and executive chair
Open banking platform Snoop has secured £15 million in Series A funding from US investment management firm Paulson & Co.
The new raise gives Snoop a post-money valuation of £47 million. It follows a £10 million round in December 2020.
Snoop was launched in April 2020 by Dame Jayne-Anne Gadhia, the former CEO of Virgin Money.
The money management app helps people spend, save and live smarter through personalised money-saving insights, and aims to save the average user £1,500 per year.
The investment from Paulson will be used to continue its growth, fund product and distribution development and international expansion.
Mortgage finance start-up Easy has announced a $15 million Series A funding round led by private equity firm Xponentia Capital Partners.
The round also saw participation from Harbourfront Capital, Finsight VC, RaSa Future Fund and Navida Capital.
Founded in 2018, Easy claims to have developed an in-house technology stack which can deliver “seamless customer experience within minutes” during the mortgage process.
Rewards and loyalty programme start-up Wildfire Systems has raised $15 million in Series A funding from a round led by TTV Capital and QED Investors.
New investors include B Capital, the George Kaiser Family Foundation and Daher Capital, which are joined by existing investors including Mucker Capital, Bonfire Ventures, Moonshots Capital and BAM Ventures.
Wildfire says it will use its new funding to expand the launch of its new white-label monetisation platform.
Wildfire founder and CEO Jordan Glazier is a former eBay executive who led the e-commerce giant’s three largest marketplaces.
Spanish fintech Ritmo has raised €13.8 million in a seed funding round led by JME.
Ritmo provides revenue-based financing, analytics and growth recommendations for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
It plans to use its new funds to expand into South America.
FintechOS founders Teo Blidarus and Sergiu Negut
London-based low-code firm FintechOS has raised $10 million from IFC, part of the former’s ongoing Series B funding round, valued at $60 million in total.
It says the investment will help it boost financial inclusion globally by giving small institutions access to financial services and making their products more affordable.
“Today financial technology is too often an inhibitor rather than an enabler of inclusion,” says Teodar Bildarus, co-founder and CEO at FintechOS.
“Our unique approach to financial technology is designed to overcome many of the barriers institutions face in serving those financially excluded.”
Cloud core banking firm Nymbus has raised $3 million in financing from OFG Ventures, a subsidiary of OFG Bancorp.
The investment is intended to further support “significant demand” for Nymbus and its financial services systems.
“Our mission has remained steadfast to help financial institutions of any size succeed with impactful, intentional innovation,” says Jeffery Kendall, chairman and CEO of Nymbus.
“OFG Ventures’ investment is an added vote-of-confidence to the value our strategy brings to an industry widely in need of immediate and sustainable business growth opportunities.”
Open banking firm Armalytix has raised £1.25 million from investors including former London Stock Exchange executive Brian Schweiger and former Barclays global equities head Job Beebe.
The firm says its latest investment will fuel its mission to create a “form free future” for businesses.
Armalytix’s core goal is to replace forms and paperwork in professional and financial services for fast, safe and accurate data sharing.
“This funding will increase our presence in the world of financial technology and allow us to extend our tools across other multi-industry settings,” says CEO Richard McCall.
Blockchain-based payments firm CoreChain has raised $1.25 million in pre-seed funding from investors including Ulu Ventures, Connecticut Innovations, Bloccelerate VC and New Form Capital.
The firm says its new capital will be used to accelerate enterprise customer adoption and “aggressively expand” its payments and financing network.
“B2B payments in North America are notoriously difficult, inefficient and prone to fraud risk, with the majority of all payments still settled via paper check,” says Chris Aguas, founder and CEO of CoreChain.
“Our blockchain technology allows companies to establish an automated payment process that’s faster and more secure than what is used in today’s linear environments.”
Estonian cross-border payments fintech PayQin has announced a €300,000 seed investment round that takes the company’s funding up to $1 million.
Founded in 2017 by Fabrice Amalaman and Pierre-Antoine Sesque, PayQin aims to drive financial inclusion in Africa’s “vast underbanked markets”.
PayQin is the first company in the West-African francophone countries to offer crypto for cross-border payments.
Cloud-based investment firm Finbourne Technology has raised an undisclosed sum of money from Fidelity International Strategic Ventures, part of a Series A which also sees the latter adopt its technology.
Fidelity says Finbourne’s LUSID platform is set to “revolutionise the way we manage data” across the ecosystem.
LUSID is a cloud-native, API-centric architecture, specialising in “simplifying complex data hierarchies for enhanced control, performance and insight”.
