Augmentum Fintech invests £7.5m in Iwoca

ZOPA backer Augmentum Fintech has announced a £7.5m investment in Iwoca, to support the small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) lender’s growth.

The London-listed fintech investment fund said on Thursday that Iwoca has a “competitive advantage” over other lenders due to its advanced credit product.

Iwoca has funded more than 25,000 SMEs across the UK, Germany and Poland. This new equity investment will enable it to fund balance sheet expansion and accelerate growth, Augmentum Fintech said.

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“Whilst there are many companies attempting to address SME lending, few have a credit product as advanced as Iwoca,” said Augmentum Fintech chief executive Tim Levene.

“We believe their industry-leading analytics and technology set them apart from other lenders and give them a competitive advantage others will find hard to replicate. We are confident that Iwoca will emerge as one of the winners in the SME space.”

This is the second investment announced by the fintech fund this week. On Monday it revealed that it had led a £7.5m fundraising round for online will-writing platform Farewill.

Augmentum Fintech was launched by Augmentum Capital, a venture capital firm backed by Lord Rothschild’s RIT Capital Partners, in March 2018.

The firm already had a 7.4 per cent holding in peer-to-peer lender Zopa worth £18.5m that was transferred into the investment company’s portfolio.