Banking software company Galileo Financial Technologies has scored $77m in an investment round led by venture capital firm Accel.
Qualtrics co-founder and CEO Ryan Smith also put money into Galileo. The company plans to use the cash injection to speed up its ability to scale across the world.
Not only is the Salt Lake City-based enterprise looking to expand across its native US and in Europe, but has also set its eyes on growing into Latin America, joining other FinTech startups like Revolut that have already ventured down south.
Speaking of, Galileo has named Revolut as one of the tech companies trusting Galileo’s API to open and verify financial accounts, issue and process payment cards and to launch new products. Other companies trusting the software includes Robinhood, Monzo, and Transferwise.
The company stated that as of last month, Galileo manages over $26bn in annual payments volume, which represented a 130% increase over September 2018.
Commenting on the new funding round, Clay Wilkes, founder and CEO of Galileo, said, “Over the years, we’ve built the API standard for card issuing programs and FinTech innovation, focusing on a feature-rich product set, profitability and delighting our clients.
“This funding will help us double-down on these themes, while [are] also becoming more aggressive in expanding geographically and providing the building blocks for the world’s most innovative payments programs. We’re thrilled to be working with Accel and Ryan Smith.”
Accel Partner John Locke, who is joining the Galileo board of directors as part of the investment, added, “We’re in a golden era of FinTech innovation and Galileo has quietly built the API infrastructure layer powering the industry’s most innovative products.
“Clay and his team have built a very impressive business with many parallels to companies like Qualtrics and Atlassian: bootstrapping first to build a quiet, profitable powerhouse and now, ready to go big globally. We’re excited to help Clay and team take Galileo to the next level.”
Galileo is by no means the only company that have seen their interest piqued by the opportunities served up by Latin America’s underbanked population.
The FinTech sector in Latin America is booming. There have been more than 464 investment deals into the region’s FinTech scene since 2014. That year, the sector only attracted investment worth $89.8m, according to FinTech Global’s data.
However, that number jumped to $671m in 2018 and skyrocketed in the first six months of 2019 to reach $2.15bn.
Other companies that had bet on the rise of Latin American FinTech is Goldman Sachs, the investment bank. While it reportedly seemed reluctant to invest in the Facebook-backed Libra project, it gave the Mexican FinTech company Konfio a $100m credit faculty in September.
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