France-based Lydia, which stylises itself as a “financial services super-app, has joined the growing list of FinTech unicorns, after a $100m investment brings its valuation to over $1bn.
Existing Lydia investors, Accel, Founders Future and Tencent, served as the lead backers to the fresh investment. Also joining the round was Dragoneer and Echo Street.
With the capital, the FinTech company is on its mission to be the main account for ten million Europeans by 2025. To meet this goal, Lydia will hire nearly 800 people over the next three years, with 160 new jobs planned for 2022.
Other growth initiatives include the expansion of its credit and investment offerings, and the deployment of resources to be the key player in at least three European Union countries.
Lydia is a mobile-based financial services app that lets users manage their money through a single platform, without needing to switch banks. Its features include, checking, shared, trading and remunerated accounts, debit cards, mobile cards, mobile payments, instant loans, friend repayments, and money pots.
The company also has a roulette, which lets puts people into a prize draw every time them make a payment with their Lydia card.
Lydia CEO and co-founder Cyril Chiche said, “These new resources will enable us to go further and faster in our mission to change the way banking is done, by making all financial services simpler, more accessible and also more instantaneous.
“The success of Lydia year after year and its adoption by more than a third of all French people aged between 18 and 35 confirms the alignment of our vision with current expectations in terms of banking services.
“This mega fundraising is also a new symbol of the remarkable dynamism of the French tech ecosystem and a strong sign of its capacity to create a significant number of international champions in the years to come.”
Earlier this year, Lydia teamed up with savings platform Cashbee to add savings accounts to its platform.
The FinTech unicorn previously raised $131m in its Series B back in 2020.
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