London-based FinTech Staling Bank has raised £60m in a Series C funding round as well as additional $15m investment from an existing backer.
Merian Global Investors led the round for the digital banking platform, bringing its total invested in Starling to approximately £50m.
The FinTech’s seed investor Harald McPike also invested £10m in the round following on from a recent $15m commitment.
The company has said it will use the new funding to support investment in its retail and SME banking products and accelerate its global expansion.
Starling Bank is a mobile only banking platform which offers users, payment services, transaction management and card control. Through the application a user can access both Android and Apple pay, by connecting the Starling Bank debit card to the payment solutions through the app.
The platform has no monthly fees and can be used to set up direct debit, standing orders or one-off payments. Transaction management allows for a clear track map of where money is being sent, with real-time updates keeping an up-to-date statement of funds in the account.
The banking app, which launched in May 2017 has a customer base of 460,000 personal current accounts and 30,000 SME accounts.
The start-up recently added three new institutional clients for its banking services division, which provides proprietary banking and payments infrastructure.
Starling Bank founder and chief executive Anne Boden said, “Building our platform and launching in the UK to provide genuine choice to retail, SME and Banking-as-a-Service customers was just the first step.
“Our ambition is to use our technology to build a next-generation global, digital banking platform, starting with our launch across Europe this year.
In December last year, Starling added Onedox, an app to help consumers manage their bills and insurance, to its in-app marketplace.
The company launched the in-app marketplace in February 2018, providing its customers with access to various financial services via their mobiles.
The challenger bank has partnered with a number of other FinTechs including pension provider PensionBee, digital investor Wealthsimple, and life insurer Anorak, among others. Starling has a number of other partnerships in its pipeline, it claims.
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