In celebration of this week’s London Fintech Week taking place in Shoreditch, East London, we’ve taken the opportunity to wax lyrical about some of our favourite fintech companies born and bred in the area. Here are 5 of the best:
Yapily, EC2A
Yapily has developed an Open Banking-based API platform making it easier for service providers – such as payment companies and e-commerce companies – to connect to banks.
Last month it announced $5.4M seed funding, which will be used to drive growth and build on the 35 European banks it’s already connected to, aiming to onboard 536 banks by the end of 2019.
The Yapily API can be used to retrieve financial data and initiate payments, which then connect to each supported bank’s open API – a move which is particularly pertinent as more banks bring their open APIs online in compliance with European Union PSD2 legislation.
Zego, EC2A
Founded in 2016 by two former Deliveroo workers, Zego allows gig economy workers to pay for commercial vehicle insurance only when they use their cars and scooters for work, by the minute.
This significantly reduces costs for the likes of Deliveroo couriers and Uber drivers compared to them having to purchase ‘always on’ traditional commercial insurance.
It raised $42m last month to fund its European expansion and support its aim to expand its offering to cover electric scooter rental.
Yielders, E14
Fresh off the back of a £500,000 crowdfunding round on Seedrs, Yielders is a real-estate investment platform and the UK’s first Islamic finance-friendly fintech company regulated by the FCA.
They are here to lower the barriers of entry to what it a traditionally difficult/inaccessible investment option, with investment opportunities available from just £100.
Yielders’ assets are pre-funded which means there are no loans or interest involved in the acquisition process; all of Yielders’ returns are quoted in net values which gives complete transparency over people’s investments. When the asset is sold, they charge a profit share of 15%.
Neyber, EC2M
Founded in 2014, Neyber works with an impressive selection of blue-chip companies and SMEs enabling them to provide loans to employees that are repaid out of their salaries.
These loans come at lower rates than credit cards or payday lenders and are less likely to default due to the security of deducting repayments directly from someone’s salary.
Its Series C investment round of £100M was led by Goldman Sachs in September 2017, taking the total raised to £149.5M.
Its customers include ASDA, Co-Op and Travis Perkins.
Homeppl, EC2A
An award-winning disruptor in collecting and verifying rental data online, backed by the Techstars Barclays London Accelerator in 2017.
They aim to make rentals easy for everyone, with less bureaucracy and more automation.
According to Homeppl, 1.1 billion people move home around the world every year and find traditional credit checks or traditional referencing to be either isolating for those without credit history or simply too time-consuming.
To make the whole process easier for tenants, landlords and agencies alike, Homeppl provides a tech-driven solution guaranteeing more comprehensive, digitally enhanced verifications.
Some of its leading agent partners include Hamptons International and Douglas & Gordon.
If you’re looking to drive impact, tell your business story or simply get your name into the UK media, speak to a member of our award-winning team today.
