The European Investment Bank (EIB) will provide €15 million of growth funding to the German identity verification platform IDnow. IDnow is an expert in secure, remote auto and video identification and electronic signature services. This enables companies to acquire customers and manage transactions faster and easier, while complying with know your customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) regulations. The investment will primarily support IDnow’s research and development (R&D) activities as well as its international growth.
This operation is part of the European Growth Finance Facility (EGFF), a product under the guarantee scheme of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI). The EGFF is designed to address quasi-equity gaps linked to structural market failures across the European Union in the provision of adequate risk capital to late-stage, venture-backed companies. Such European small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and mid-caps often suffer from systemic shortages of large, non-dilutive financing options for growth investments, both tangible and intangible. The benefit of EFSI in this specific case is the clear enhancement of the risk capacity of the Bank.
EFSI is the central pillar of the Investment Plan for Europe under which the EIB and the European Commission are working together as strategic partners and the EIB’s financing operations are boosting the competitiveness of the European economy. It is accompanied by the advisory service, the European Investment Advisory Hub, which enables public and private project operators to structure their investment projects more professionally.
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EIB Vice-President Ambroise Fayolle, who is responsible for EFSI and the bank´s operations in Germany, said: “IDnow, a first-time borrower for the Bank, depends on significant R&D and marketing investments related to commercialisation. The transaction is an excellent example of how the EU bank, with the support of the Investment Plan for Europe, can facilitate the development of innovaton, in particular in sensitive policy areas such as anti-money laundering, counter terrorist financing and cybersecurity, which are of utmost importance for the European Union and its economy.”
European Commissioner for the Economy, Paolo Gentiloni, said: “As ever more of our interactions move online, it’s more important than ever that we strengthen data security and fraud prevention. And it’s right that the Investment Plan for Europe contributes to those efforts. This support for German platform IDnow will enable it to expand its services for digital identity verification of customers and business partners alike. We are investing in a safer online business environment, an objective of our digital finance strategy.”
CFO of IDnow Joe Lichtenberger said: “IDnow has experienced overwhelming demand for its verification-as-a-service across multiple industries and countries, with COVID-19 significantly increasing the need for digital services. The flexible financing structure from the EIB will allow us to accelerate our investment in developing the platform to capitalise on these opportunities. The EIB is an ideal partner to support us in becoming Europe’s leading provider in identity verification.”
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