Banking and payments API platform Sila has netted $7.7m in its seed funding round to support the development of new products.
The investment was co-led by Madrona Venture Group and Oregon Venture Fund. Additional support came from Mucker Capital, 99 Tartans, Transferwise co-founder Taavet Kinrikus and angel investor Jerry Neumann.
Capital from the round will be used to accelerate growth, release new product features and bolster its financial innovation efforts.
The FinTech launched in 2019, offering companies its infrastructure-as-a-service platform to help them integrate compliant banking and payment services. Its APIs enable companies to implement ACH payment processing, money transfer, digital wallets, bank account linking and digital identity verification.
Sila CEO and co-founder Shamir Karkal said, “The global financial system is broken – despite the global payments industry being $1.9T in revenue, it doesn’t serve consumers, small businesses, or the innovators trying to reach them. It is too expensive, inefficient, tightly regulated, and difficult to integrate into FinTech applications.
“This kills fintech innovation at a time when we need it more than ever. Despite money being effectively digital for decades, the world of finance has still not truly been disrupted by the Internet. The global financial system isn’t controlled by PayPal or Stripe, but by 30,000 global banks that still run on outdated payment systems like ACH. Our mission is to unite all the payment systems in one programmable layer to spur the next phase of financial innovation.”
In line with the investment, Madrona Venture Group managing director Hope Cochran and Oregon Venture Fund lead investor Rick Holt will join the Sila board of directors. Additionally, Oregon Venture Fund general partner Matt Compton will join as a board observer.
Oregon Venture Fund Lead Investor Rick Holt said, “So far we’ve only scratched the surface of the financial ecosystem as a whole, as every company that touches payments or transfers money, in any way, will need fintech integrations. Sila’s mission to provide the infrastructure to break down the regulatory and go-to-market barriers is the right approach to accelerate fintech innovation. Portland has become a hotbed for finance, starting in 2009 with Simple, and we’re excited to continue to develop the ecosystem here alongside Sila.”
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