Page 16 - bne_Tech_10_2018

Fintech
October 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 16
Russia’s SimpleFinance secures $15 million from Japanese fund SBI
SimpleFinance, a Russian online micro-lending platform targeting small and medium-sized busi- nesses, has agreed a $15 million equity invest- ment deal with the Japanese fund SBI FinTech Business Innovation Fund LPS.
The fund’s total capital commitment to SimpleFinance now stands at nearly $50 million, taking into account a first round of funding just one year ago.
Launched in 2015, SimpleFinance offers several financing tools including factoring, asset-backed loans, unsecured loans (up to 3 million rubles, ap- proximately $50,000), and tender loans. It claims that its portfolio growth reached some 500% per year from 2016 to 2018.
SimpleFinance’s platform supports fully electron- ic document processing and online-only customer interactions. In addition, the company has built its own P2P-platform, called SimplyFi, for small and medium-sized businesses to raise funds directly from private investors.
The company competes with a number of banks or micro-finance organizations, but claims that none of these competitors has an identical product mix.
Established in 1999, the SBI Group has asserted itself as a pioneer in the fintech industry. Its portfolio includes a variety of startups from the fintech, IT, mobile, bio-life science, artificial intelligence and Blockchain sectors.
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