The Fintech Times Bi-Weekly News Roundup sees funding success stories for Chip and Futora. While tomato pay QR-code based invoicing app goes live.
Funding and investment updates
Elliptic, the cryptoasset risk management firm, has raised $60million in Series C funding. The financing round was led by Evolution Equity Partners, alongside new investment from SoftBank Vision Fund 2. Existing investors AlbionVC, Digital Currency Group, Wells Fargo Strategic Capital, SignalFire and Paladin Capital Group also participated. Additionally, Richard Seewald, founder and managing partner at Evolution Equity Partners will join the Elliptic board.
Infrastructure firm M2P Fintech has secured $35million in a Series C financing. Tiger Global Management led the round alongside existing investors BEENEXT, Flourish Ventures, Omidyar Network India, 8i Ventures, Better Capital and the DMI Group. It intends to use the funds to enhance its API infrastructure capabilities and expand beyond Asia.
Zone has closed $1.6million in an oversubscribed seed round to launch the first gamefi ecosystem on Algorand. The round was led by Borderless Capital as well as Karma Innovations and Sheesha Finance. Zone has built a gamefi ecosystem for decentralised real money gaming and on-chain fantasy sports.
Chip, the digital savings account, is enjoying success in the crowd component of its growth round. The Crowdcube campaign initially launched privately to select shareholders, reaching £1million in under 10 minutes, and is now open to the crowd. The funding will fuel growth as the company aims to build the ‘best savings account in the world’.
Further funding updates
Meanwhile blockchain gaming platform PlayDough Technologies has secured $2million funding round led by Westridge Markets. PlayDough Technologies is an NFT gaming startup focused on building a global platform for play-to-earn games.
AI tech startup YData has achieved $2.7million in funding in order to fast-track international expansion.The funding round was led by Flying Fish Partners, and also included the participation of existing investors Faber, EDP Ventures and Real Ventures. Financing will accelerate expansion strategy in North America and Europe.
There’s also funding success for fintech startup Futora – raising $6million for developing personally customised investment products. The round included TAU Ventures, North First Ventures, as well as J-Ventures. The company is now traded at a value of more than $16billion.
Research and insight
Qatar FinTech Hub, a Qatar Development Bank incubator, has releasesd its first global report on the state of fintech in Qatar and the Middle East. The white paper reviews the evolving sector and spotlights challenges, opportunities and benefits for the international fintech community. The strategy aims to facilitate the set up and growth of local fintechs, while creating a favorable business ecosystem to attract international ones.
Appointments
Monese, the pan-European fintech, has appointed Atul Choudrie to MD of its BaaS business. While Steve Tryner is named CFO and Stephen Chang as VP Operations. Monese said the appointments build on the progress it has made and will help push it forward during its next phase of growth.
RedCloud, the global commerce platform for all, has unveiled Stan Mlatac as its new CFO. Mlatac leads the finance team and supports the growth of the company with the executive team. Mlatac was previously group finance director at fintech WorldRemit.
Partnerships and collaborations
Mbanq, a banking-as-a-service provider, has signed a strategic agreement with Temenos to launch a credit-union-as-a service offering, as well as to accelerate BaaS adoption across the US. The two companies are already engaged in customer acquisition and proof of concepts in the US with credit unions. Mbanq will also offer a fast-track solution based on Temenos’ technology to fintechs and e-commerce firms wishing to embed banking services.
There’s also a partnership for payment processor PPS and mortgage overpayment app Sprive. PPS provides Sprive with its payments technology platform, payments licensing and processing services. Sprive’s app links to a customer’s bank account to analyse spending information and gain automatic access to mortgage information.
Meanwhile fintech accelerator Supernovae Labs has joined forces with open banking firm Salt Edge to provide Italian financial institutions with a secure way of aggregating bank data and initiating payments powered by PSD2. Salt Edge’s Open Banking Gateway provides connections to over 5,000 banks worldwide for account aggregation.
JPIN VCATS
Matrix, a virtual assets trading platform, has teamed up with BitGo, a digital asset financial services firm. Through the partnership, BitGo will provide Matrix with a wide array of custodial services, including hot- and cold-storage capabilities to protect traders on its platform.
Basler Kantonalbank and Bank Cler have expanded their long-standing partnerships with Avaloq. The banks have both moved their web and mobile banking solutions to Avaloq’s Engage platform. Both banks have used Avaloq’s core banking solution since 2007.
Launches and producy updates
Divi launches mobile wallet in the UK in the first phase of its European expansion. It will begin with four cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and DIVI. Divi is on a mission to improve people’s lives by making crypto easy and accelerating its mainstream adoption.
Finastra has unveiled new instant onboarding capabilities for its Fusion Payments To Go solution. The move enables banks to access the benefits of Finastra’s SaaS solution at speed and with reduced costs. Payments To Go being in the cloud also ensures flexible infrastructure that adapts with payments peak.
Global small business platform Xero will roll out a series of significant technology and design updates to new reports over the next six months. The new features enable accountants and small businesses to customise reports easily, get answers fast and streamline financial analysis. Xero also recently launched Analytics Plus, bringing powerful predictions and accurate forecasting to customers.
The tomato pay QR-code based invoicing app for SMEs and sole traders is now available to download from app stores. According to tomato pay’s research, 84 per cent of small businesses suffer from late payments. tomato pay is also currently bidding for Pool F of the Banking Competition Remedies Capability and Innovation Fund – set up to distribute grants to improve the financial products and services available to UK small businesses.
