Two German investors are giving British startup iwoca $20 million.
iwoca, an online small business credit provider, has raised a total $31.5 million in its two rounds of funding, reports Business Insider. The German Commerzbank’s venture capital business is one of the latest to back the four-year-old startup.
Former Goldman Sachs investment banker Christoph Rieche and ex-Duestsche Bank investment banker James Dear developed iwoca to offer up to $150,000 credit to small businesses in the U.K., Spain, Poland, and Germany. The company charges interest, but no fees to give customers more flexibility. Issued loans grew by 250% between June 2014 and June 2015. Potential clients know within the day whether they will be approved for a loan.
“We go beyond the traditional credit scoring and gather a wealth of other sources, such as banking data and industry-specific data. If you look at the eBay traders of this world, we gather data from them that would enable us to get a better credit view of our customers,” says CFO Michael Elalouf.
The latest raise could put the company value in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The company is looking to expand its offerings, and is considering France or Ireland for its next move.
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