SBI Investment, Sony Innovation Fund by IGV and existing investors back Token to unlock new value in open banking digital payments
Leading open banking payments platform, Token, today announces $15m in Series B financing, welcoming investment from SBI Investment Co. Ltd. and Sony Innovation Fund by IGV as well as from existing investors Octopus Ventures, EQT Ventures and the venture arm of BNP Paribas, Opera Tech Ventures.
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The capital enables Token to continue driving the shift from traditional payment methods to account-to-account payments by providing the fastest and simplest path to adoption for large merchants, PSPs and banking-as-a-service platforms.
Founded in 2016, Token quickly established the lead in UK open banking payments. Token was one of the first UK companies to be authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) as a payment initiation and account information service provider. In 2018, the company made history by becoming the first payment initiation service provider to conduct an end-to-end payment through a PSD2-compliant bank API.
Today, Token continues to build out its stack of open payment and data services, which are already powering a range of corporate and consumer use-cases, lowering the cost of digital payments across Europe and delivering unrivalled breadth of API connectivity. Inaugural open payment use-cases include funding an account, paying-off a credit card, paying a utility bill and other one-off payments. Complimentary open data use-cases include accounting package integration, credit risk analysis and cash flow management, plus a host of additional use-cases which leverage value-added functionality, are already starting to emerge.
“The market’s appetite for open payments accelerated dramatically last year as more merchants and payment providers have tuned into the cost and efficiency gains that they offer,” comments Todd Clyde, CEO, Token. “Token’s payment volumes have more than doubled every month since March and our platform is now processing live transactions through PSD2 APIs from over 600 banks in 14 countries across Europe. This Series B investment reconfirms Token’s leadership in the open payments space and will ensure our platform development continues at pace.”
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Yoshitaka Kitao, Director & Chairman of SBI Investment, comments: “The combination of Token’s unrivalled bank connectivity and depth in payment services clearly marks the company out as a market leader. We believe it has continued to outperform the competition throughout the year and has a clear roadmap for development in 2021. We’re very excited to be part of Token’s mission to equip the key players in the payments market with open payments capabilities.”
Gen Tsuchikawa, CEO and Chief Investment Manager for Sony Innovation Fund (SIF) and Chief Investment Officer for Innovation Growth Ventures (IGV), said: “Through our Innovation Growth Fund we invest in companies that develop innovative and scalable technologies for the world’s new and emerging ecosystems. Token offers a credible alternative to card and wallet payments while helping merchants, PSPs and banks offer streamlined UX’s that deliver better payment experiences for customers. This investment adds to our growing FinTech portfolio that we’ve been steadily building, and we look forward to working with the Token team in 2021 and beyond.”
Token’s customers include BNP Paribas, and HSBC which recently launched its fast and secure alternative to online payments, HSBC Open Payments. Other recent announcements include the European PSP Contis, the Banking-as-a-Service provider OpenPayd, the popular Italian messaging app UpCo, and personal finance management tool Money Dashboard.
