Hokodo, which develops B2B finance solutions and insurance products, has been awarded €2m by Horizon 2020, the European Commission’s funding programme for research and innovation.
Grants are given to “market-creating innovations” which offer high-growth products. The company will use the funds to launch its API-based invoice insurance offering in Europe, protecting SMEs from unpaid invoices.
The company claims that a fifth of insolvencies are caused by late or non-payment of invoices, and yet invoice insurance is not normally sold by brokers. The InsurTech is helping SMEs access these insurance policies by leveraging data science and machine learning to protect single invoices rather than insure their entire turnover.
Hokodo, based in the UK, offers a range of other financial services including accounting, invoicing or sales tools. Its insurance is supplied through its platform which enables a customer to take out cover in real-time, when they are accepting a purchase order or raising an invoice.
In addition to the launch of the invoice insurance solution, the capital from Horizon 2020 will enable the company to release its HokoScore service in France and Germany within the next 12 months. It will also help it to build two new trade credit products for the SME market.
Louis Carbonnier, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Hokodo said, “Receiving the grant from Horizon 2020 is a huge boost for the business. Not only does it enable us to offer invoice insurance across Europe sooner than we would have otherwise, but we estimate we’ll be able to protect over €200 million worth of B2B trade over the next two years. It is also a huge vote of confidence for the importance of what we’re trying to do, and the role we have to play in supporting SME trade and success.”
Last year, the FinTech startup raised €2.1m in a seed round led by Anthemis.
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