• OneID raised $1.3 million (£1 million) in funding.
• The funds come from ACF Investors.
• OneID has a unique approach on digital identity verification. It uses consumers’ existing banking relationship to authenticate their identity.

U.K.-based OneID announced it raised $1.3 million (£1 million) in funding. The Seed round, which marks the company’s second investment round, comes from ACF Investors. OneID also counts 170 angel investors among its backers.

“The investment from ACF Investors is a coming together of similar interests and visions,” said OneID CEO Paula Sussex. “As the world increasingly becomes digital-first, we aim to minimize fraud, enhance online experiences, and make the world a safer place.”

OneID, which will use today’s investment for product development, was founded in 2020 with a unique take on digital verification. The company leverages consumers’ existing bank accounts to authenticate them. After receiving consent from the consumer, OneID contacts the bank to verify their identity.

By leveraging consumers’ existing bank relationship, OneID eliminates the need for consumers to undergo a registration process, take a selfie, provide paper documents, or travel to a physical location. It also means that OneID does not need to store any sensitive data.

Sussex sees the round as a “vote of confidence” in the company’s efforts to make digital identification accessible and available to more U.K. citizens.

“We’re constantly monitoring businesses that have the potential to enhance the lives of the British people and redefine the future of the U.K., said ACF Managing Partner Tim Mills. “OneID, with its simple, trustworthy, and effective solution to a pressing problem, could touch some 50 million U.K. citizens and make bank-verified digital identification the norm in the UK.”

• Ramp landed $300 million in Series D funding today, bringing its total funding to $1.7 billion.
• Today’s funds come from new investor Sands Capital, along with existing investors Thrive Capital, General Catalyst, and Founders Fund.
• At $5.8 billion, the company’s current valuation is 28% lower than its 2022 valuation of $8.1 billion.

Late-stage VC funding has been down in 2023, but business finance automation platform Ramp is bucking that trend today. The New York-based company has announced the closure of a $300 million round of Series D funding.

The investment boosts the company’s total funding to $1.7 billion. With the increase in capital, however, comes a decrease in valuation. The company’s current valuation now sits at $5.8 billion, 28% lower than the company’s $8.1 billion valuation reported last year.

Today’s Series D round comes from new investor Sands Capital, along with existing investors Thrive Capital, General Catalyst, and Founders Fund. Ramp will use the funds to fuel product development and accelerate its expansion into adjacent categories.

“In the last year alone, we’ve expanded Ramp’s offerings to become the only platform in the market that’s designed to save businesses time and money,” said Ramp CEO Eric Glyman. “Our mission is to help our customers build healthier businesses and this funding will help us execute against our goal to continue expanding the Ramp platform to better serve customers. At Ramp, we succeed when our customers can run their business more efficiently.”

Ramp offers its 15,000 clients access to its suite of payment cards, expense management tools, accounts payable offerings, procurement solutions, working capital, and more. Among Ramp’s recent client wins are Anduril, Poshmark, and Virgin Voyages.

Next month, Ramp plans to debut Ramp Plus, a new set of procurement tools to help finance teams with procurement-related tasks. To support this growth, the company also plans to boost its hiring efforts “significantly” and “across all functions.”

Photo by Anna Shvets

• Agora Data has landed $160 million in privately placed term financing.
• The investment marks Agora Data’s fourth privately placed term financing round.
• While there is no word on total funding, today’s financing adds to the $100 million revolving credit line Agora Data received from Credit Suisse in September 2022.

Agora Data, a company that helps buy here pay here (BHPH) car dealers offer in-house financing, secured $160 million in privately placed term financing this month. The round represents the fourth privately placed term financing the company has received since it was founded in 2017.

“Fueling Agora’s mission to enable any car dealer to be a finance company, this $160 million private term financing provides additional funding capacity and reiterates our commitment to our customers’ future growth,” said company CEO Steve Burke.

While there is no data on the amounts of the company’s previous three privately placed term financing rounds, Agora Data said that each of them performed better than projected. Today’s financing adds to the $100 million revolving credit facility the company received from Credit Suisse last September.

Founded in 2017, Agora Data’s Agora Capital helps car dealerships lend to non-prime customers. Lending to unattractive borrowers ultimately helps dealers sell more cars. To provide a competitive interest rate on these sub-prime loans, the company leverages AI to analyze over $350 billion in loan data. Agora Data also offers Agora Trade, a product that allows investors to buy a portfolio of seasoned auto loans at a lower rate of default.

Texas-based Agora Data targets the underbanked community and its strategy will likely fair well as the cost of living crisis, combined with a high interest rate environment, continues. Competitors in the auto financing space include CreditIQ, Creditas, Caribou (formerly known as MotoRefi), and others.

Photo by Jeerayut Rianwed

• Currency risk management company Finofo launched today.
• The Calgary-based startup announced that the first phase of its launch is the release of its cross-border payments tools.
• Finofo raised $1.25 million ($1.6 million CAD) in pre-seed funding in January.

Canadian currency risk management startup Finofo launched publicly today. The company, headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, calls its platform an “all-in-one” solution for businesses’ financial needs and has unveiled tools for cross-border payments as its first offering.

In an extended blog post Finofo co-founder Prateek Sodhi announced the company’s launch and its mission to help businesses manage currency risk. Sodhi underscored the challenge of managing currency risk, calling it a “multifaceted task that requires specialized talent in finance.” He noted that larger companies can often afford to hire the specialized talent required to effectively manage currency risk. However, Sodhi said, “most regular businesses are left grappling with these complexities with a team consisting mainly of trained accountants and corporate finance specialists.”

To this end, Finofo has built a digital platform that leverages advanced algorithms to examine the intricacies of currency fluctuations for individual businesses. If currency fluctuations become an issue, the platform quantifies the value of the risk. This enables the platform to develop tools and strategies, specific to individual businesses and their financial condition, to manage this risk.

The launch of Finofo, according to Sodhi, will take place in three stages. The first stage, announced today, includes the platform’s cross-border payments tools. These tools enable businesses to send or receive money in more than 40 currencies across 180 countries. Businesses will also be able to use Finofo to convert money into different currencies and automate accounts payable.

The second stage of the launch will involve development of the company’s smart hedge engine. This solution will help streamline currency hedging trade execution to reduce the price risk of currencies during the trading process. Future initiatives include financial planning and analysis solutions to help businesses conduct real-time foreign-exchange risk analytics.

“We’re not interested in merely selling financial instruments,” Sodhi wrote this week. “Instead, we leverage our unique technology to help businesses understand if, when, and how much they need them.”

In addition to its launch announcement, Finofo also disclosed that it raised $1.25 million ($1.6 million CAD) in pre-seed funding back in January. The round was led by Motivate Venture Capital. SaaS Venture Capital, Desjardins Financial Holding, and Sweet Spot Capital also participated.

Photo by Juman Salem

• Knot has raised $10 million for its tool that updates consumers’ card-on-file at the company’s network of merchants.
• The round was led by Nava Ventures and brings Knot’s total funding to $13 million.
• Knot also offers a subscription cancelling solution and is currently working on a password updating tool.

With a mission to build an interconnected future online, Knot API has a long road ahead. Nevertheless, the New York-based company received a boost to help it make strides toward that goal with a new $10 million funding round today.

The Series A investment was led by Nava Ventures, with participation from Amex Ventures, Plaid, and more than 20 CEOs and founders. When added to the $3 million Seed round Knot received in 2021, today’s round brings the company’s total funding to $13 million.

Knot was founded in 2019 with an API to enable card issuers to update card-on-file information at Knot’s network of merchants– including Walmart, Netflix, Amazon, Starbucks, and Uber– with just a few lines of code. The company’s technology makes for an easier onboarding experience for consumers while helping the bank retain its customers.

Knot will use the $10 million to scale its services and expand its merchant support. The company’s goal is to “ultimately encompass virtually all online merchants.”

In addition to its card-on-file switching solution, Knot also offers a subscription cancelling tool that helps customers view and cancel their recurring subscriptions. The company is also working on an account creation tool that allows organizations to initiate accounts at third parties on their customers’ behalf, and a password updater that instantly updates customers’ passwords across the web.

“Securing this Series A funding signifies the immense trust our investors have in Knot’s potential to revolutionize the way card issuers manage their customers’ payment methods,” said Knot CEO Rory O’Reilly. “We’re grateful for the chance to further our mission of building a financially interconnected future, and we’re excited about the new opportunities this funding opens up for our team and our customers.”

Photo by analogicus

• SuperFi received $1 million in pre-seed funding for its debt management and repayment platform.
• The round saw contributions from Ascension, Fair By Design, Force Over Mass, and includes a grant from the Greater London Authority.
• SuperFi’s debt management app will be publicly available in late 2023.

Personalized debt support platform SuperFi has landed $1 million in pre-seed funding for its platform that helps users understand, manage, and pay off their debt. The round brings the company’s total funding to $1.2 million.

The investment was led by Ascension and its impact fund, Fair By Design, and saw contributions from Force Over Mass and others. Also included in the investment amount is a grant from the Greater London Authority. SuperFi received the grant funds as part of the Mayor of London’s Challenge LDN scheme to combat poverty.

U.K.-based SuperFi was founded in 2021 with a goal to support the 18 million British adults struggling to pay their monthly bills during the cost of living crisis. To accomplish this, the company shows users an overview of their debts, analyzes their financial and personal circumstances, and offers them access to debt prevention tools and services.

“We believe that debt management should be proactive, not reactive. Our goal is to help millions of people struggling to pay their bills and credit commitments better manage their debt before it becomes a crisis,” said SuperFi Cofounder Tom Barltrop. “In doing so, we believe we can help British people during the cost of living crisis – saving businesses and society billions associated with problem debt.”

Today’s funding will help SuperFi test its platform with Councils and Housing Associations across London before the company rolls the product out to a wider U.K. audience. The investment will also be used to form partnerships with London boroughs.

SuperFi plans to make its app publicly available in late 2023.

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya