Finverity, the digital ecosystem for trade and supply chain finance, has raised $5 million in a heavily oversubscribed equity funding round from new and current investors. New investors include London-based fintech specialist Outward, Amsterdam-based Acrobator Ventures and US-based s16vc founders fund with follow-on investments from MENA-based B&Y Venture Partners as well as a range of UHNWIs.
The funding round comes on the back of 15x revenue growth in 2022 across the Middle East and Africa and the recent expansion to Eastern Europe.
Founded in 2017 by Viacheslav Oganezov and Alex Fenechiu, Finverity was born out of a vision to make the global financial system work for all, one product at a time. Fast forward 5+ years and Finverity has built the world’s first truly digital ecosystem for trade and supply chain finance in pursuit of achieving its mission of bridging the $1.7trn global trade finance gap by channelling capital to where it’s most needed.
Finverity has a dual offering:
- Funding Platform – brings together corporates seeking working capital and funders looking to deploy capital into quality mid-market assets on a single platform. The platform provides a whole suite of services and technology to enable trade and supply chain finance deals to be executed seamlessly and at scale.
- Software as a Service solution – provides an end-to-end technology system for banks and non-banking financial institutions (NBFIs) to completely revolutionise their trade finance and working capital operations, client experience and risk capabilities.
The funding raised in this round will be used to immediately increase the headcount from the current 40 to 60 employees, to meet rapidly increasing demand for Finverity’s solutions and complete office openings in Dubai, Poland and Kenya. Furthermore, Finverity’s technology is expanding to cover almost the entire range of funded trade finance and working capital products.
Alex Fenechiu, COO & co-founder of Finverity, commented “The pace at which our industry is evolving is truly impressive. Five years ago, Supply Chain Finance (SCF) barely ever made the headlines. It wasn’t even a “real” financial product in many countries. Today, it’s deemed a key requirement to fuel economic growth for the years to come. This means we have moved into the mass adoption phase of SCF. What is needed today is very different from what has been used for the last 20 years. We have created a wizard which allows financial institutions to launch new products in the working capital space in 4 weeks instead of 12 months. We have also helped banks and NBFIs alike increase utilisation from existing clients and reduce losses due to fraud and default. Our time is now and with our new partners, I’m confident that Finverity will be a leading driver of SCF & working capital innovation across emerging markets”.
Andi Kazeroonian, Investment Manager at Outward VC, commented “Whilst technology has powered exponential growth of the multi-trillion dollar SCF and trade finance industry in developed economies over the last decade, some of the world’s most important emerging economies have been somewhat left behind. Prohibitively high set-up costs, immediate and complex integration requirements and insufficient AML/KYC capabilities of existing platforms all act as contributors to manual and paper-based processes remaining the market norm. Finverity team’s deep understanding of these acute pain points has enabled the creation of a solution that is truly fit for purpose.
Fast deployment, easily configurable and customisable workflows, clean and intuitive UI, and market-focused origination capabilities are already having a profound impact on their target markets, enabling the launch and growth of SCF for organisations where it was not previously possible. We firmly believe that this dynamic, combined with the growth outlook and increasing digitalisation of emerging economies, all point toward an enormous opportunity for Finverity to emerge as the global leader in this space. As such, we at Outward are proud to be partnering with Slava, Alex and the rest of the team to support this exciting next phase of growth and beyond.”
