Frontier Capital has agreed to make a majority growth investment in RegTech 100 company Agreement Express, a digital onboarding platform provider.
The Charlotte-based growth equity firm is focused exclusively on software and tech-enabled business services companies. Its investment is intended to support Agreement Express as it seeks to accelerate growth through expansion of sales and marketing operations, furthering technology innovation, and extending its talent base.
As part of the funding, both Richard Maclean and Dave Pandullo, Frontier’s managing partner and vice president, respectively, will join the RegTech’s board.
Agreement Express is an end-to-end digital onboarding platform, which claims to have revolutionised financial services client onboarding experiences by taking the complexity out of the first crucial touchpoint of the customer lifecycle. It extends beyond digital forms and signatures, delivering a ‘unified onboarding solution’ that acts as a hub where data, processes, augmented intelligence, risk scoring, compliance, and business analytics connect.
The platform allows financial institutions to design and execute consistent automated onboarding experiences across their product offerings.
“As an early innovator in digital onboarding solutions, we believe our growth in recent years is a direct outcome of our focus on replacing complexity with simplicity at every juncture of client onboarding to deliver lasting business value for technology-first financial services institutions,” said Mike Gardner, Agreement Express CEO.
“We feel the optimal time has come to take Agreement Express to the next level, and are excited to work with the talented and well-respected team at Frontier as our partner in the next phase of our journey as a growth company. We believe their experience helping transition SaaS businesses such as ours into market leaders will help us propel our innovation and enhance value to our customers in their race to digital sustainability, differentiation, and enhanced profitability.”
The deal represents Frontier’s third investment in Canada within the past twelve months and its fifth investment in a SaaS-based company over the past eight months. It was made from the firm’s $700m Frontier Fund V, which closed in 2017.
In an exclusive interview with RegTech Analyst, Gardner said RegTech needs to stop ‘letting everyone down’ and do more to make solutions convenient to the financial services industry. With the financial services industry seemingly reluctant to implement change, Gardner believes lack of convenience is a key factor hindering adoption.
Last year, Agreement Express was hand-picked by a panel of industry experts for the RegTech 100, a list of companies that every financial institution should know about in 2018. The RegTech 100 is part of the Global RegTech review – an essential, in-depth analysis of the global RegTech market.
