Amex, Mastercard invest in alt-credit marketplace Divido

Divido, a London-based retail finance marketplace platform provider, has raised $15 million in a Series A capital round that includes American Express and Mastercard as investors.

The startup is a B2B and B2C marketplace platform that connects lenders to shoppers at point of sale in both digital and in-store channels to provide instant loans. Unlike competitive alternative credit providers such as Klarna and Affirm, Divido is not a lender, but rather a platform that creates a marketplace for multiple lenders to compete for a purchase being made by businesses and consumers.

Divido claims that by connecting multiple lenders to compete for a customer’s purchase it is able to offer higher loan approvals with lower fees. It offers a money-back guarantee on its website for retailers joining its “Uplift Programme” if sales do not increase by at least 20%.

Divido states In a blog post that it is on track to process its first $1 billion worth of credit applications in 2019 and counts clients such as Mercedes-Benz, BNP Paribas and Shopify.

It has also appointed Renier Lemmens as its chairman. Mr. Lemmens is a board member at the digital banking alternative provider Revolut and previously served as CEO of PayPal EMEA and COO of the International Retail & Commercial Banking Division of Barclays.

According to Crunchbase, a website that tracks private equity funding for fintech startups, Divido has raised a total of $19 million over five funding rounds. The lead investors for the Series A round were Dawn Capital and DN Capital.

The retail platform already provides services in nine countries (Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Norway, Spain, Sweden, the U.K. and the U.S.) with expansion planned for seven additional nations including Austria, Belgium, Canada, Ireland and Italy.