Klarna

Klarna Receives Investment from Brightfolk

Klarna Receives Investment from Brightfolk
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Funding, Klarna

Online payments company Klarna announced a major new strategic investor this week. Brightfolk has reportedly become a qualified owner of Klarna, meaning it has purchased at least 10% of the company. Brightfolk is held by Anders Holch Povlsen, owner of European fashion company, BESTSELLER. Povlsen will acquire shares from existing shareholders General Atlantic, DST Global and Niklas Adalberth, all of whom will retain a stake in Klarna.

Specific terms of the deal were undisclosed, but based on Klarna’s most recent valuation of $2.25 billion we can extrapolate that Brightfolk contributed $225 million or more in equity funds. TechCrunch reported that today’s deal is an up round, meaning Klarna is now valued at more than $2.25 billion.

Writing in the press release announcing the investment, Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Klarna co-founder and CEO said, “Klarna has successfully been partnering with BESTSELLER for a number of years. This has given him a firsthand insight into the strengths of our offerings and therefore a unique ability to strategically support the future development of the company. I am delighted to welcome such a strong partner into Klarna.”

Klarna helps 70,000 merchants offer payment solutions to 60+ million users in Europe and North America. Founded in 2005 in Stockholm, Klarna is active in 18 countries. The company is now headquartered in Ohio with 1,500 employees working in offices in Columbus, Ohio; San Francisco; New York; Tel Aviv; and throughout Europe.

Klarna demonstrated its online payment-processing service at FinovateSpring 2012. In 2016, the company experienced a 50% increase in transaction volumes YOY. Also in 2016, 12 million users tried Klarna’s services for the first time. Earlier this year, the company acquired online payment provider BillPay from Wonga for $75 million.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Coinbase, DefenseStorm, Ethoca, Fidor Bank, HedgeCoVest, Klarna, Moven, Newchip, StrategyCorps, ThreatMetrix, Zopa

On Finovate.com

  • Fidor Solutions Brings on former ABN Amro Exec as CIO.
  • European Alums Shine in FinTechCity’s FinTech50 2017 Roster.
  • Klarna Receives Investment from Brightfolk
  • Newchip Helps New Investors Own a Piece of the Startup Economy.

Around the web

  • PSCU partners with Ethoca to improve CNP fraud loss recoveries for CUs.
  • Zopa opens development centre in Barcelona, Spain ahead of bank launch.
  • HedgeCoVest launches DEPLOY to handle day-to-day operations of separately managed accounts
  • StrategyCorps BaZing rewards-based mobile app has deployed nearly 400k geofences in conjunction with local deals
  • Western Union reveals pilot Coinbase integration.
  • DefenseStorm experiences 100% customer renewal rate for second consecutive year.
  • Moven fintech partnership wins CANSTAR Award for innovation excellence.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: AutoGravity, Bitbond, Clinc, D3 Banking, Evo Snap*, eWise, Feedzai, Fiserv, Hyperwallet, InComm, Klarna, ProfitStars, Riverbed, Zopa

On Finovate.com

  • Check out this week’s FinDEVr APIntelligence.
  • Alexa, Tell Me About D3 Banking’s New Voice Banking Skill.
  • Finie Gets Funding: AI Innovator Clinc Closes $6 Million Series A.

On FinDEVr.com

Around the web

  • Zopa named Best Personal Loan Provider and Best Alternative Finance Provider at British Bank Awards
  • 7-Eleven names InComm Vendor of the Year.
  • ProfitStars introduces Gladiator Incident Alert for complex risk monitoring and management.
  • D3 Banking unveils Amazon Alexa-based intelligent banking service.
  • FinDEVr veteran Hyperwallet adds former SecureNet Payments EVP, Mark Engels, as Chief Revenue Officer.
  • Fiserv recognized among “world’s most admired companies” for fourth year in a row.
  • Best of Show winner AutoGravity forges new partnership with Westlake Financial Services to expand financing options for car shoppers.
  • Feedzai and Merchant Risk Council (MRC) team up to leverage AI and machine learning to fight fraud.
  • Klarna adds to payment options for omni-channel commerce technology innovator, Radial.
  • The Paypers interviews Nicole Mantow, General Manager of EVO Payments, parent company of FinDEVr veteran, EVO Snap.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Entersekt, EyeVerify, Featurespace, HotDocs, Icon Solutions, Klarna, Wonga

On Finovate.com

  • Practicing Perfection Before FinovateEurope 2017.

Around the web

  • BAI’s Banking Strategies takes a look at Wells Fargo’s deployment of eyeprintID from EyeVerify. Catch EyeVerify at FinovateEurope this week.
  • Entersekt CIO Gerhard Oosthuizen shares advice on passwords and protecting personal data in Moneyweb.
  • HotDocs teams up with Irish enterprise scale applications and infrastructure provider, Codec-dss. See HotDocs at FinovateEurope in London this week.
  • Klarna acquires German online payment provider BillPay from Wonga.
  • Icon Solutions joins forces with Featurespace to bring anti-fraud protection to instant payments. Meet Icon Solutions at FinovateEurope this week in London.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Aqubix, Avoka, Engage Insight, i-exceed, ITSector, Klarna, Kontomatik, modeFinance, Nomis Solutions, Sberbank, Stratumn, Temenos, Truphone, wipro, WorkFusion, WorldPay

On Finovate.com

  • WorkFusion Closes $35 Million in Funding

Around the web

  • Klarna teams up with ASOS Partners to bring “pay after delivery” to Nordics.
  • Luxembourg’s Rakuten Europe Bank goes live with core and digital banking technology from Temenos.
  • Wipro to acquire Brazilian IT banking services provider, InfoSERVER.
  • Let’s Talk Payments interviews Kontomatik CEO Marcin Truszel.
  • Financial transactions optimized using Nomis Solutions technology exceeds $1.5 trillion in 2016.
  • Finextra: Worldpay partners UnionPay for bumper Chinese New Year.
  • Truphone launches Global SMS recording solving the Blackberry migration challenge.
  • Sberbank launches a new corporate online banking platform designed together with IBM iX.
  • WISeKey partners with Stratumn to use Blockchain for real-time accountability and traceability.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Klarna Acqui-hires P2P Payment Company Cookies

Klarna Acqui-hires P2P Payment Company Cookies
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Klarna, Mergers & Acquisitions

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Online payment solutions company Klarna made a move to bolster the brain power of its team today. The company has acquired Germany-based Cookies, a P2P payments startup that filed for bankruptcy earlier this month. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Cookies was founded by former N26 employees Garry Krugljakow and Lamine Cheloufi who launched the startup in an effort to become the Venmo of Europe. For Klarna, the acquisition is about talent and not about Cookies’ money-transfer technology. The entire Cookies team, except for cofounder Krugljakow, will join Klarna and remain in Germany to become Klarna’s new Berlin office.

In August, we covered Cookies’ effort to change its business model into a messaging-based P2P payment service geared toward millennials. The messaging service included paymojis, emojis with special powers (such as a lightning bolt to make the payment send faster) that could be included alongside the payment. Regarding the transition, Cookies co-founder Cheloufi said, “I am thrilled to become part of Klarna together with our strong team and take on new innovative projects out of Berlin. For us, this is a unique chance to join Klarna and benefit from their wealth of expertise, tech and talent.”

Founded in 2005 in Stockholm, Klarna is headquartered in Ohio with offices in San Francisco, New York, Tel Aviv, and across Europe. The company demonstrated its online payment-processing service at FinovateSpring 2012. Recently, Klarna went live with SAP’s Smart Accounting for Financial Instruments—Smart AFI—a solution that offers a centralized sub-ledger that integrates directly into a company’s accounting-documentation chain. In September, the company added American Express as a payment option at checkout.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Compass Plus, IBM, Klarna, Lighter Capital, NYMBUS, PayNearMe, Prosper, Sezzle, Student Loan Genius, Trustly

On Finovate.com

  • “The Best of FinovateAsia 2016 in Photos“
  • “Sezzle Raises Seed Funding Ahead of Shopify Debut”

Around the web

  • PayNearMe to power cash payments at Oklahoma Turnpike Authority.
  • IBM to launch 4 new data centers in the U.K.
  • NYMBUS partners with QTS Realty Trust to enable financial institutions to move legacy core systems to NYMBUS’s private cloud.
  • Compass Plus enabled processing center Quipu to reach 100% service availability in 2015.
  • PYMNTS.com takes a look at the challenges facing Prosper and its incoming CEO David Kimball.
  • Trustly hires new Head of People Operations, Ulrica Falkenberg.
  • HVAC manufacturer Mestek to offer Student Loan Genius benefit via Prudential.
  • Lighter Capital ranked #4 in Puget Sound Business Journal’s list of fastest-growing private companies in Washington state.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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H2 Ventures and KPMG Unveil 2016 Fintech 100

H2 Ventures and KPMG Unveil 2016 Fintech 100
By David Penn Posted on
Categories: Azimo, Coinbase, Credit Karma, Feedzai, Finova Financial, identitii, itBit, Kabbage, Klarna, Kreditech, Lending Club, LendUp, Motif Investing, North Side, Nubank, On Deck Capital, Overbond, Payoneer, Prosper, Rippleshot, SecureKey, SocietyOne, Tink, TipRanks, Wealthfront, Xero, Zooz

h2_kpmg_2016fintech100

H2 Ventures and KPMG have released their Fintech 100 roster for 2016. Divided equally between 50 “industry leaders” and 50 “emerging stars,” the roster features 17 Finovate/FinDEVr alums in the first category, and 10 in the second. Calling its roster a “celebration” of the most compelling innovators in this “bold new space,” the H2 Ventures/KPMG 2016 Fintech 100 covers a variety of different shades of fintech:

  • Lending (32 companies)
  • Payments (18 companies)
  • Insurance (12 companies)
  • RegTech (9 companies)
  • Data & analytics (7 companies)
  • Wealth management (6 companies)
  • Blockchain (5 companies)
  • Digital currency (5 companies)
  • Capital markets (3 companies)
  • Crowdfunding (2 companies)
  • Accounting (1 company)

And here is a look at how Finovate/FinDEVr alums fared. Earning recognition among the companies in the Leading 50 group are:

Also noteworthy in the Leading 50 are Ant Financial, which acquired Best of Show-winning EyeVerify in September 2016, and Avant, which acquired Finovate alum ReadyForZero in the spring of 2015.

Additionally, Finovate/FinDEVr alums earning spots in the Fintech 100’s 50 Emerging Stars roster were:

The H2 Ventures/KPMG report includes a geographic breakdown of the 2016 Fintech 100, as well as a set of key takeaways such as increased geographic diversification, the return of lending, the continued ascent of Insurtech, and the appearance of RegTech. The report also notes that China now has four out of the top five companies in the report’s top 10, and eight companies in the top 50. The report says funding for fintech “continues to rise,” and its authors cite more than $14 billion in capital was raised by the Fintech 100 in the past year.

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Finovate Alumni News

By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: ACI Worldwide, DriveWealth, Klarna, Personetics, Top Image Systems, TransferWise, Trustly, VENTENY, Xignite

On Finovate.com

  • FinDEVr Silicon Valley: When You’re a Dev, You’re a Dev All the Way
  • DriveWealth Brings Robo-advisory to Latin America in New Partnership with Alkanza. See DriveWealth make its FinDEVr debut next week at FinDEVr Silicon Valley 2016.

Around the web

  • Personetics launches Chatbot Bootcamp.
  • Klarna unveils online retailer financing.
  • ACI Worldwide to provide back-end tech for TransferWise’s integration into the Faster Payments Scheme.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Klarna Goes Live with SAP’s Smart AFI

Klarna Goes Live with SAP’s Smart AFI
By Julie Muhn (@julieschicktanz) Posted on
Categories: Klarna

screen-shot-2016-09-26-at-4-28-48-pm

Online payment-solutions company Klarna has made a move that furthers its goal to become “the world’s favorite way to buy.” The Ohio-based company has gone live with SAP’s Smart Accounting for Financial Instruments, (Smart AFI).

The new solution, which is compliant with International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and U.S. GAAP standards, comes as a part of SAPs Bank Analyzer 9.0 release. Using the new offering, Klarna will supply a centralized sub-ledger for banks that integrates directly into a company’s accounting-documentation chain. The facilitated integration will allow for easier geographical expansion, since it can handle multiple GAAP policies and the ability to offer more products.

“Our growth necessitated a centralized accounting system, one that gave us visibility across regional lines of business,” says Klarna VP Max Fischer. “We were concerned that getting that visibility would take a substantial amount of time and resources, but with SAP we were able to do it in only three months and with zero lag time in operations. It’s had a positive impact on our business.”

Klarna serves 45 million customers and works with 65,000 ecommerce merchants. At FinovateSpring 2012, the company demoed its technology that offers after-delivery payment, which ensures buyers receive the goods they ordered before the payment is due. As a perk to retailers, Klarna assumes the credit and fraud risk of a transaction to ensure retailers receive payment. Spotify, Disney, and Samsung are among the company’s clients.

Founded in Stockholm in 2005, and making its U.S. debut just one year ago, the company is headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, and has offices in San Francisco and New York City. Klarna raised $35 million bringing its total funding to $291 million from 12 investors.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: ACI Worldwide, Alloy, FinanceIt, Fiserv, FTPartners, Klarna, Kyckr, Linkable Networks, MX, NCR Corporation, On Deck Capital, RightCapital, Sezzle, Smartwave, Temenos, Zopa

On Finovate.com

  • Financeit Recruits CFO from Capital One Canada
  • Wave Mechanics: FT Partners Report Highlights Trends Driving Rise of Insurtech

Around the web

  • Fiserv inks deal with FCTI to provide transaction processing for 8,000 ATMs in 7-Eleven convenience stores in U.S. Video of Fiserv’s recent live demo from FinovateFall is now available.
  • NCR launches cloud-based developer portal.
  • ACI Worldwide and Vocalink partner to provide real-time payments solution.
  • Let’s Talk Payments interviews Tom Burgess, Linkable Networks founder and CEO.
  • Visions FCU signs with MX for money-management app.
  • Zopa releases its first-ever rating of a batch of securitized Zopa loans.
  • Sezzle Wins $10,000 from Securian in Minnesota Cup Startup Competition.
  • Aurionpro joins Temenos MarketPlace.
  • OnDeck launches marketing campaign featuring Shark Tank judge Barbara Corcoran.
  • RightCapital launches Leads, a tool to help financial advisers turn leads into clients.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

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Finovate Alumni News

By David Penn Posted on
Categories: ACI Worldwide, Daon, EyeVerify, Jack Henry, Klarna, Signifyd

On Finovate.com

  • Signifyd Raises $19 Million in New Funding
  • Read All About It! FinovateFall 2016 in the Press

Around the web

  • BBC America features Daon in a look at how biometric technology is replacing the password. Video of Daon’s FinovateFall 2016 debut will be available soon.
  • Klarna partners with retail giant Arcadia to provide “buy now, pay later” shopping for U.K. consumers.
  • ACI Worldwide earns 2016 Swift accreditation for its money-transfer system.
  • Jack Henry & Associates announces full integration of Banno Mobile.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

 

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