UK car finance FinTech Carmoola has raised £8.5m in its Series A round, alongside a new £95m debt facility.
The round was led by US-based FinTech specialists QED Investors. Participation also came from existing investors VentureFriends and InMotion Ventures, the investment arm of Jaguar Land Rover. NatWest supplied the debt facility.
With the capital, Carmoola plans to grow its team to 20 people to help meet the market demand. Funds will also be used to scale the company and support its rapid customer adoption.
The company’s mission is to revolutionise how people pay for cars. Carmoola launched ten months ago with a “neo car finance” product that removes complexity of car purchases.
Its technology offers a streamlined process that provides buyers with a budget, generates a free history check on the car and allows a payment to be made instantly online and at the showroom within 60 seconds through the Carmoola virtual card.
Carmoola is set to launch green discounts in the coming months which will incentivise consumers to buy greener cars.
Carmoola CEO Aidan Rushby said, “Used-car finance couldn’t be more ready for a fintech revolution. Consumers want the freedom to go shopping anywhere, knowing what they can spend, without sending off reams of forms and payslips.
“Frustrated consumers are being put in a corner with excessive rates, manipulated commission, and poor customer service, but it’s the very process of getting finance that is at the heart of the problem. It’s full of paperwork, lengthy processes, and lack of certainty, but most importantly, car finance is obtained after the consumer has fallen in love with the car they want, which wholly puts them on the back foot. Until now, that is.”
The FinTech company previously raised £27m in its seed funding round in April 2022. The investment was led by Jaguar Land Rover’s investment fund, InMotion Ventures, VentureFriends, BCI, Truesight Ventures and California-based Clocktower Ventures.
In time for Valentine’s Day, Carmoola released a Kama Sutra-inspired Valentine’s Day card game. Titled “Car-ma Sutra”, it offers players different ways to have sex in, or around, their car, with car-related names such as “The Undercover Mechanic”.
For Valentine’s Day FinTech Global highlighted some of the key FinTech partnerships to happen in 2023, so far.
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![Temenos (SIX: TEMN) today announced that National Bank of Iraq (NBI), part of the Capital Bank Group, has successfully gone live with Temenos core banking and payments. NBI, which has 27 branches across Iraq, offers a comprehensive range of services to individuals and businesses in the country. Since 2005, NBI has been majority owned by Capital Bank, one of the top financial institutions operating in the Jordanian and regional markets, with assets of approximately JOD 7.6 billion[1]. With this implementation, NBI moved from its legacy systems onto the same core banking platform as other entities in the Capital Bank Group. This will enable NBI to operate more efficiently and integrate seamlessly with other systems to develop new products faster and deliver an improved customer experience. Capital Bank Group is a long-standing Temenos customer with other entities in the Group including Capital Bank of Jordan, Bank Audi, Société Générale Bank Jordan and NBI Saudi Arabia, already on the Temenos platform. NBI also becomes the first part of the group to adopt Temenos Payments, which enabled the bank to process more than 100,000 transactions of incoming and outgoing domestic and international payments in the first 15 days of operation, with a 99% straight-through processing rate. The migration to the Temenos platform for core banking and payments at NBI was completed in under 12 months thanks to Temenos’ pre-configured banking and payments capabilities and APIs which reduced the need for complex customizations, as well as close collaboration between Temenos, NBI, Capital Bank and delivery partner ITSS. This success was recently recognized in the IBS Intelligence Innovation Awards, with Capital Bank winning ‘Best Implementation of Core Banking Services'. The implementation at NBI follows several other successful transformation projects with Temenos for Capital Bank in the last few years, including the launch of NBI’s branch operations in Saudi Arabia in just 45 days, as well as the integration of Bank Audi and the former Jordanian operations of Société Générale, each of which was achieved in under four months. Collectively, these projects helped Capital Bank to increase operational efficiency by more than 50% within three years, bringing significant cost savings and an improved customer experience. With faster, more accurate processing and immediate service requests, the bank has maintained high customer retention rates and a reputation for service excellence. Izzidin Abusalameh, Chief Operations Officer, Capital Bank Group, commented: “This achievement marks a significant milestone in our digital transformation journey and positions us as a leading player in the banking industry. We have seamlessly transitioned the National Bank of Iraq to a cutting-edge core banking system which will not only enhance operational efficiency but also support providing our customers with a superior digital banking experience. Our continued partnership with Temenos has not only provided us with an advanced technological platform but has also facilitated a culture of flexibility and adaptability, enabling us to execute our ambitious growth plans.” Lee Allcorn, Managing Director, Middle East & Africa, Temenos, said: “Congratulations to National Bank of Iraq and the Capital Bank team on this successful implementation that gives NBI business agility and the same modern technology platform and ability to deploy fast with pre-configured banking capabilities as the rest of the group. With Temenos, Capital Bank Group is future-ready, and we are proud to support them as they continue to innovate and leverage our platform to grow sustainably and enhance the banking experience for customers.”](https://fintech.global/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/rupixen-Q59HmzK38eQ-unsplash-2-218x150.jpg "Flutterwave teams up with Acquired.com to streamline outward remittances in EU and UK")
