Plenty of capital to accelerate growth and target acquisitions, hiring and offering new products. Neon Payments has just finished raising 1.6 billion reais (about $ 300 million) in a Series C round led by General Atlantic.
The round featured new strong investors such as BlackRock, the largest manager in the world, and PayPal Ventures, PayPal's venture capital arm. Vulcan Capital and Endeavor Catalyst also entered the capital of the Brazilian fintech.
Among investors from previous rounds, the Brazilian Monashees and Flourish Ventures entered. And BBVA entered through Propel Venture Partners.
Fintech specializing in digital accounts and financial services for individual microentrepreneurs (MEIs) and individuals has not released the new valuation with the contributions, but experts in the venture capital industry (VC) say it is unlikely that it has not become a unicorn - that is, a startup valued at $ 1 billion.
The reason is that startups that raise funds in Series C rarely give up such a high share of the company at this stage of development, that it would be the only way that the capital contributed would not automatically raise its value to that brand.
The funds will be received in two stages of 800 million reais, expanding the ambition of the plans. Neon is going to attack on different fronts: acquisitions, product launches, increased credit supply and hiring talent.
The executives who lead the new phase of Neon Payments talked to EXAME on the same conference call, revealing the plans and the size of the ambition at a time when fintech was already accelerating growth amid the pandemic.
In August, different indicators showed growth of around 100% in comparison with February, the month before the pandemic, such as the total volume of payments with debit and credit cards. The individual customer base jumped from 3 million to 9 million, while the MEIs served reached 1 million accounts.
“Acquisitions are an important part of our strategy. It is a way to accelerate the business plan, expanding the product offer ”, said Rafael Matos, head of Business Development, citing recent acquisitions such as MEI Fácil, a startup focused on microentrepreneurs, a year ago; and Magliano, the oldest broker in the country, in July.
“We want to offer the complete journey to MEI. We will expand our service offering to assist you in all areas of your business, ”said Daniel Mazini, chief product executive at Neon. Mazini was hired this year from Amazon, where he stayed for ten years, led the retail products area and structured the Prime service in the country.
Carol Oskman, Head of Talent Acquisition, says the round will allow the startup to invest not only in attraction but also in talent retention and that the goal is to become a reference.
Neon is currently led by Jean Sigrist, an experienced financial market executive who joined fintech in 2017 as chief financial officer, after having been a founding partner at Guide Investimentos and working for more than a decade at Itaú, in the country and abroad - he was vice president of Itaú Corretora.
Pedro Conrade, founder of Neon in 2016, serves as chairman of the board.
The raising of 300 million dollars in the C Series differs from the pattern of Brazilian startups that have become unicorns. Nubank, now valued at more than $ 10 billion and a fast-growing case, raised $ 80 million in its C Series at the end of 2016.
Last November, Neon had already raised R $ 400 million (about US $ 100 million at the time) in Series B with General Atlantic and BV.
Plenty of capital to accelerate growth and target acquisitions, hiring and offering new products. Neon Payments has just finished raising 1.6 billion reais (about $ 300 million) in a Series C round led by General Atlantic.
The round featured new strong investors such as BlackRock, the largest manager in the world, and PayPal Ventures, PayPal's venture capital arm. Vulcan Capital and Endeavor Catalyst also entered the capital of the Brazilian fintech.
Among investors from previous rounds, the Brazilian Monashees and Flourish Ventures entered. And BBVA entered through Propel Venture Partners.
Fintech specializing in digital accounts and financial services for individual microentrepreneurs (MEIs) and individuals has not released the new valuation with the contributions, but experts in the venture capital industry (VC) say it is unlikely that it has not become a unicorn - that is, a startup valued at $ 1 billion.
The reason is that startups that raise funds in Series C rarely give up such a high share of the company at this stage of development, that it would be the only way that the capital contributed would not automatically raise its value to that brand.
The funds will be received in two stages of 800 million reais, expanding the ambition of the plans. Neon is going to attack on different fronts: acquisitions, product launches, increased credit supply and hiring talent.
The executives who lead the new phase of Neon Payments talked to EXAME on the same conference call, revealing the plans and the size of the ambition at a time when fintech was already accelerating growth amid the pandemic.
In August, different indicators showed growth of around 100% in comparison with February, the month before the pandemic, such as the total volume of payments with debit and credit cards. The individual customer base jumped from 3 million to 9 million, while the MEIs served reached 1 million accounts.
“Acquisitions are an important part of our strategy. It is a way to accelerate the business plan, expanding the product offer ”, said Rafael Matos, head of Business Development, citing recent acquisitions such as MEI Fácil, a startup focused on microentrepreneurs, a year ago; and Magliano, the oldest broker in the country, in July.
“We want to offer the complete journey to MEI. We will expand our service offering to assist you in all areas of your business, ”said Daniel Mazini, chief product executive at Neon. Mazini was hired this year from Amazon, where he stayed for ten years, led the retail products area and structured the Prime service in the country.
Carol Oskman, Head of Talent Acquisition, says the round will allow the startup to invest not only in attraction but also in talent retention and that the goal is to become a reference.
Neon is currently led by Jean Sigrist, an experienced financial market executive who joined fintech in 2017 as chief financial officer, after having been a founding partner at Guide Investimentos and working for more than a decade at Itaú, in the country and abroad - he was vice president of Itaú Corretora.
Pedro Conrade, founder of Neon in 2016, serves as chairman of the board.
The raising of 300 million dollars in the C Series differs from the pattern of Brazilian startups that have become unicorns. Nubank, now valued at more than $ 10 billion and a fast-growing case, raised $ 80 million in its C Series at the end of 2016.
Last November, Neon had already raised R $ 400 million (about US $ 100 million at the time) in Series B with General Atlantic and BV.