After growing 10x in 2021, Atlan plans to leverage this financing to accelerate product development and invest in go-to-market.

Atlan announced that it has closed its $50M Series B round led by Insight Partners, Salesforce Ventures, and Sequoia Capital India. Several founders in the data space participated in the round including Fivetran founder Taylor Brown and ThoughtSpot founder Ajeet Singh.

Atlan creates a unified discovery and collaboration experience, bringing context and trust to the entire modern data stack. “Today, data assets are not just tables, but code, models, BI dashboards, and pipelines,” said Prukalpa Sankar, Co-Founder of Atlan. “Metadata is the glue that can bind the modern data stack together, the layer that will allow increasingly diverse, siloed tools and people to collaborate effectively.”

“Data and analytics are mission-critical to navigating rapidly-changing circumstances — informing decisions, seeing opportunities and navigating change,” said Alex Kayyal, Managing Partner of Salesforce Ventures. “As businesses embrace a digital first environment, their need for informed, data-driven collaboration will only intensify. We believe Atlan’s deep integration ecosystem and unified product make them the leader in bringing the future of collaboration to data teams.” Salesforce Ventures has also invested in leading companies shaping the modern data and analytics platform including Airbyte, dbt labs, Monte Carlo, Snowflake, and Starburst Data. 

The latest investment comes just eight months after a $16M Series A led by Insight Partners and high profile angels like Bob Muglia, former CEO of Snowflake. It gives Atlan a post-money valuation of $450 million.

Atlan started out as an internal project at datafor good firm SocialCops and was incubated across over 200 data projects, including India’s National Data Platform used by the Prime Minister. Since emerging from stealth, it has reported impressive growth numbers, with both its customers and ARR growing 10x in 2021.

“Traditionally, tooling in the space has focused on collecting metadata but has failed in helping customers actually drive value from metadata,” said Varun Banka, Co-Founder of Atlan. “We are pioneering a new generation of metadata: going from passive, siloed data catalogs to active metadata platforms that can improve every tool in the data stack.”

Atlan is currently used by data teams at high growth companies and major enterprises like Plaid, WeWork, Postman, Delhivery, Unilever, and Scripps Health. “Atlan isn’t just a data catalog. It really is a home for our data people to collaborate, to discuss things, to work together,” said Larisa Gorokhova, Senior Director of Business Intelligence at CSE Insurance Group.

“Sequoia Capital India has been a part of Atlan’s journey since its early days, since it was part of Surge’s third cohort, and the team couldn’t be happier with the progress,” said Tejeshwi Sharma, Managing Director of Sequoia India. “Atlan has emerged as a global leader in its category. The strength of the product and execution is validated by strong customer traction in a short span of time. Every Atlan customer we spoke to attested to the pace of product development and relentless focus on customer delight.”

“In every interaction with the Atlan team, their commitment to excellence shines through and it is clear to us that they are building a world class company. We couldn’t be more excited to double down,” said Teddie Wardi, Managing Director at Insight Partners.

Today, Atlan is a distributed, global team of over 100 people spread across 12 countries, including the US, India, UK, Canada, Nigeria, Singapore, and the Philippines. It plans to use this funding to expand its current team across all functions and accelerate its go-to market strategy. It also plans to facilitate an

ESOP buyback of up to $1.5 million.

Bank North, the UK's first truly regional business bank of the modern era, has appointed a Head of Valuations, Head of Financial Reporting and Financial Control, interim Head of Underwriting, and acting Treasurer, along with three other key hires. 

Chris Weights joins as Head of Valuations, Adam McNichol as Head of Financial Reporting and Financial Control, Andrew Gornall as interim Head of Underwriting, and James McCulloch as acting Treasurer. Also joining are Raja Abdullah, Data & Business Intelligence Manager and Tom Shillito, Lending Associate.

Chris Weights joins as Head of Valuations and will be a crucial player in ensuring fair loans to SMEs while managing Bank North's risk portfolio. Before joining Bank North, Chris served as Commercial Property Risk Manager at Aldermore Bank PLC and has experience at real estate multi-national CBRE, and leading UK commercial property consultants Matthews & Goodman. After training as a surveyor, Chris now has 20 years of experience in the valuation industry and has worked on some of the largest landmark property deals in the Midlands and North West, further strengthening Bank North’s unrivalled regional knowledge as well as bringing vast valuation experience.

Andrew Gornall joins as Bank North’s interim Head of Underwriting after a successful 38-year career at banking giant Barclays, most recently serving as Head of ESHLA leading a national portfolio of Education, Social Housing, and Local Authority clients. After joining in 1983, Andrew rose through the ranks, holding a variety of managerial roles, including Head of Business Relationships and Head of SME, in which Andrew led a team responsible for supporting around 6,000 SMEs. Andrew brings unrivalled senior banking experience and has a track record of building and developing new teams and talent while delivering high client satisfaction. Andrew will play a key role in developing Bank North’s underwriting teams as the Bank continues to grow.

Adam McNichol joins as Head of Financial Reporting and Financial Control and will play an integral role in ensuring that Bank North meets its regulatory commitments and delivers effective service to customers. Adam joins from the Skipton Building Society, where he was a Structured Finance Specialist, in his time at the company he also held the role of Head of Financial Control and Treasury Settlements as maternity cover. Adam began his career at auditor PWC, and before joining the Skipton worked at Cairn Capital and as an Assistant VP at Barclays Capital.

James McCulloch has been appointed acting Treasurer and will provide the leadership team with overall financial oversight. James previously served as Deputy Head of Treasury for the Cumberland Building Society, after spending more than a decade working in various planning roles in the Armed Forces and Ministry of Defence.

Raja Abdullah has joined as Data & Business Intelligence Manager and will support the team by producing regulatory and insight reports, as well as streamlining Bank North’s reporting structure. Before joining Bank North, Raja was a Senior Management Information Analyst (Capital & Planning) at The Co-operative Bank, with previous experience at fashion brand Misguided and Habib Bank – as well as inspiring the talent of the future as a visiting lecturer at The University Salford. Tom Shillito joins as a Lending Associate and will work with the Manchester Pod team to ensure swift and fair delivery of loans to SMEs. In his previous role, Tom worked as a Junior Broker at professional services giant, Aon. Tom holds a master’s degree in Banking and Finance from Newcastle University. 

The new hires come as Bank North continues to deliver tailored loan facilities up to ten times faster than the banking establishment to SMEs. Bank North is on course to set up similar lending pods in major UK cities, housing lending specialists and decision-makers. Bank North’s goal is to service SMEs looking to borrow between £500k - £5m. Combining technology with face-to-face expertise, the bank aims to bring empathy back to the lending market, whilst powering UK business by executing transactions locally, at pace and delivering finance which is tailored to the individual borrower’s requirements. The Bank North team are also working hard to deliver a leading savings offer to UK consumers with the launch of their first savings products in the summer of 2022.

Jonathan Thompson, Co-Founder and CEO of B-North said: “Chris, Adam, Andrew, James, Raja and Tom join Bank North at such an exciting time in our journey – and this bumper round of appointment announcements is testimony for the momentum in the business. Our new colleagues bring a huge range of experience from right across the banking ecosystem and I look forward to working with them as we look to open new lending pods and begin to welcome savers to Bank North. The success of Bank North depends on continuing to attract top talent to the business, and the range of experience on the CVs of our team shows the brightest and the best are keen to join our mission to deliver loans and savings accounts, closer, faster, fairer.”

Profile Software, the international financial solutions provider, announced the enrichment of Finuevo Digital, the pioneering mobile-first platform for digital banking in-a-box with new advanced inbuilt onboarding functionality to alleviate the customer journey as well as more secure and easy-to-use transaction processes.

In particular, the user is guided through a wizard to provide the necessary information in a methodical way, during onboarding, which eliminates drop-outs and automates the processes to the extent needed. The customer journey is designed to support easy and fast customisation.

Digital Onboarding can be initiated either from an external source, such as an advertisement on social media or ad-hoc from the app/website. For the former, the system is designed to show a browser-based landing page where the user can easily find his/her way around. Once ready to proceed, the user is prompted to enter basic information thus avoiding overflow of questions and info requests. Digital marketing best practices have been deployed to make the journey pleasant for the user so that he/she best enjoys the browsing experience and completes the needed data with ease.

Similar practices are applied when the user onboards from an app or website. A list of the available banking services and products is displayed to select the desired ones and then the same process as above is followed. Information is stored so that the user can complete the process at a later stage from any digital channel (Internet or Mobile Banking). The system asks for biometrics or a PIN for secure connection. Depending on the product selected, a customisable questionnaire is presented to complete in line to international regulations and internal processes.

Finuevo Digital is a truly pioneering digital banking platform with numerous capabilities that are constantly being enhanced to deliver the ultimate user journey and unique experience.

Read more about Finuevo Digital here.

Likvidi’s carbon credit distributed ledger platform will provide a new mechanism for companies to offset their carbon footprint

Likvidi, a sustainable finance company, announces the launch of its carbon trading platform and carbon credits. The ‘Liquid Carbon Credit’ (LCO2) is a tokenized carbon credit designed to be traded at high liquidity on Likvidi’s own platform and on other blockchain-based exchanges and platforms. LCO2 is a real-world digital asset, with each credit equivalent to one tonne of carbon removed from the atmosphere. This gives the holder the ability to buy, trade, and offset carbon credits to achieve net-zero status.      

The COP26 environmental summit in 2021 and the Paris Climate Accords have raised awareness of climate issues and increased pressure on companies to reduce their carbon footprint, including use of voluntary carbon credits. The market is currently fragmented and cumbersome, while the carbon credits are illiquid and variable in quality. The LCO2 features include transparent origin, audit trail and instant trading, via the Likvidi platform.

Likvidi’s blockchain-based solution uses Verra-registered carbon credits from regenerative projects, including agriculture and forestry, opening up a new income stream for farmers and forest administrators. LCO2 can be used to offset a company’s carbon footprint by retiring the tokens. The Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM) was worth $1 billion in 2021 and is predicted to be valued at $100bn by 2050 -  a growth of 100 fold. [1]

Likvidi is partnering with DAO Maker for its launch, due to their strong track record of supporting blockchain-based startups and a shared vision for accelerated carbon markets. Likvidi has selected Avalanche’s decentralised, sustainable, blockchain that has an energy footprint of just 0.0028% that of the Ethereum network.

The Likvidi leadership team has a strong track record in the blockchain space. CEO Ransu Salovaara co-founded the blockchain advisory TokenMarket and launched Europe’s first exchange traded instrument, BitcoinETI. His Likvidi co-founder Tuomas Siltala was previously Director at Scandinavian investment bank Pareto Securities and co-founded an FSA regulated investment bank – Privanet Securities Oy.

Likvidi CEO and Co-Founder Ransu Salovaara commented: “The world is now waking up to the challenge of reducing carbon emissions. Governments alone won’t achieve this, so private companies must follow the examples of Microsoft and Google in going carbon neutral. Likvidi will enable companies to securely and transparently trade carbon credits, to offset carbon emissions and to incentivise them to sponsor the protection of our vital ecosystems.”

• Mette Hindborg Gade joins Pleo as Chief People Officer, following 10+ years as a Partner at McKinsey Digital.

• The new role is part of an ongoing strategy to drive a new company-wide operating model, rapid hiring targets, and ramp up career development for 500+ employees.

• Mette’s instatement follows the addition of Pleo’s first Chief Marketing and Financial Officers, joining back in February.

• Team growth comes after a record-breaking year for Pleo, with a total $350 million raised in Series C funding, at a post-funds evaluation of $4.7 billion. 

• Pleo currently offers its smart company cards and spend management service to SMBs across 8 European markets, with plans to enter another 13 by the end of 2022.

Fintech scale-up Pleo, which offers simplified spend management and smart company cards, boosts its executive team with the induction of Mette Hindborg Gade, functioning as the company’s Chief People Officer. 

As a former Partner in McKinsey & Company with an educational background in Engineering, Mette is an experienced leader and problem-solver, with a specialism in driving people-first organisational transformations and rapid growth companies within the financial sector. Her position as Head of People for the consultancy firm’s Copenhagen outfit saw Mette nurturing a diverse range of high-performing talent. 

Mette has been working with Pleo in an advising capacity to help build, introduce, and roll-out the company’s new operating model. This will enable Pleo to enter 15 markets by the end of 2022, hire 500+ new team members globally in the same period, and enhance individual career growth, inclusion, and impact for it's 500+ current employees.

“It makes me really happy to be joining Pleo. Every moment I have spent with Pleo has made me more excited and more attached to the product, the problem Pleo solves and most importantly the mission that the team is driving,” says Mette.

“Pleo is a truly special company – advocating not just for a new way of handling business spend but embodying a common, aspirational vision: to make everyone feel valued at work. I cannot wait to help unlock that potential in our own growing workforce, and make Pleo the most valued B2B employer brand in the world – just as I know it can be.”

Mette’s arrival to Pleo is preceded by two other new C-level executives from February: James Keating (formerly Microsoft, Cognizant, Dropbox) as Chief Marketing Officer, and Anita Szarek (PayU, Cargill) as Chief Financial Officer.  

“While the spend management vertical is flush with healthy competition at present, Pleo has the product, brand, team and agility to continue its streak as the leading spending solution in Europe,” says James Keating. 

“We have ambitious, bold initiatives planned throughout this year that will accelerate our growth and allow us to offer Pleo to even more forward-thinking companies everywhere.” 

Hiring 50+ people globally every month, Pleo’s ambitious growth plans follow its record-breaking year of investment, raising $350 million in 2021 at a $4.7 billion post-funds evaluation. 

The Series C round – led by Coatue Management, Alkeon Capital, Bain Capital Ventures and Thrive Capital, and supported by returning backers Creandum, Kinnevik, Founders, Stripes and Seedcamp – amounted to the biggest ever Series C in Denmark’s history, as well as one of the largest in Europe. 

• ACI Worldwide offers ACI Low Value Real-Time Payments to organizations adopting the FedNow Service

ACI Worldwide, the global leader in mission-critical, real-time payments software, today announced it is featured in the Federal Reserve’s new FedNow Service Provider Showcase, an online resource designed to connect financial institutions looking to adopt and innovate upon the FedNow Service with service providers offering instant payment solutions. 

 “We’re thrilled to be part of the FedNow Service Provider Showcase and look forward to helping banks and financial institutions across the US to implement real-time payments,” said Craig Ramsey, global head of real-time payments, banking, ACI Worldwide. “As the global leader in real-time payments, we know first-hand that real-time payments drive economic growth and promote financial inclusion. With our solutions, businesses and consumers across the US will be able to make faster, cheaper and all-round better payments and access the full benefits of the new FedNow Service when it launches in 2023.” 

ACI currently supports 17 real-time domestic schemes around the world, including Zelle and TCH in the US, and FedNow as it moves toward production.

“We appreciate the commitment of ACI Worldwide to enabling FedNow adoption and participating in the showcase,” said Nick Stanescu, Federal Reserve Bank senior vice president and FedNow business executive. “The time is now for organizations to identify and connect with partners they’ll need to build the end-to-end solutions the market is demanding.” 

ACI Worldwide is providing ACI Low Value Real-Time Payments to banks and financial institutions to support their adoption of the FedNow Service. The highly scalable, end-to-end real-time payments solution is available as a cloud-based SaaS offering or via traditional on-premise deployment; and is already live and in use by Zelle and TCH in the US. It enables banks and processors to connect to all global schemes and deliver value-added services to their customers. The solution combines origination, processing, orchestration, clearing and settlement, fraud detection and connectivity capabilities—all on a single platform. ACI Low Value Real-Time Payments is designed to speed time to market, reduce implementation risks and will lay the foundation for the rapidly growing demand for real-time digital banking.

To learn more, visit www.aciworldwide.com in the FedNow Service Provider Showcase on FedNowExplorer.org.  

Rapid identity verification, using biometric technology, enables a seamless customer journey for users.

Tesco Bank today announces a partnership with Onfido, the global identity verification and authentication provider. Onfido provides a secure application process for new Tesco Clubcard Pay+ customers, following the launch of the new product in January.

Tesco Clubcard Pay+ is an innovative first for the UK market, allowing Clubcard members to pay with their Clubcard and pick up extra Tesco Clubcard points wherever they shop. Shoppers can add money and ringfence their grocery spend from any UK bank account into their Tesco Clubcard Pay+ account, using the free Tesco Bank mobile banking app. Clubcard Pay+ also gives shoppers the power to save while they shop by rounding up their purchases to the nearest pound, saving the difference into a Round Up account. Tesco Bank also plans to introduce additional features to Clubcard Pay+ which will further help families to budget and save whilst being rewarded for their spending.

Tesco Bank’s partnership with Onfido enables a smooth and fast online user journey for customer applications by using digital identity verification to streamline the process. Rather than filling out postal applications, customers can apply directly through the Tesco Bank mobile banking app. Users simply take a photo of their government-issued identity document (ID) and a selfie. Onfido first checks that the ID is genuine and then matches it with the user’s face. This ensures that the person presenting the identity is the rightful owner of the ID and is physically present. This will allow customers to prove their identity anywhere and anytime with a quick and user-friendly process to open an account.

“The world of banking and e-commerce has changed significantly in recent years and customers are increasingly looking for integrated, seamless experiences,” said Sigga Sigurdardottir, Chief Customer Officer at Tesco Bank. “Tesco Clubcard Pay+ uses the Tesco Bank mobile banking app to deliver the latest measures and technology to give customers confidence and the highest levels of protection from fraud. By partnering with Onfido, we’re building on our reputation as a trusted high street bank with the addition of innovative technology that gives customers the best digital experience possible.”

Onfido’s advanced identity verification prioritises security, preventing fraudulent application attempts while meeting all industry regulations designed to keep users and businesses safe.

Onfido’s unique SDKs, now integrated within the user-centric design of the Tesco Bank mobile banking app, includes glare and blur detection, which provides real-time feedback to help users submit high-quality pictures for document verification. Additional features, such as Optical Character Recognition (OCR) Autofill, extracts data from the ID to prefill the application form to streamline the account opening process further. Clubcard Pay+ customers can benefit from this improved experience using a desktop computer, laptop, tablet or smartphone.

"By combining decades of banking experience with advanced biometric and AI technology, Tesco Bank is now able to accelerate the account opening process for new Clubcard Pay+ customers,” said Mike Tuchen, Chief Executive Officer at Onfido. “The innovative technology provided by Onfido underpins a seamless and secure application experience that protects customers and provides them with a streamlined access to Clubcard Pay+."

Register to join the upcoming webinar on Wednesday 9th March 2022, with experts from Tesco Bank, HSBC, 11:FS and Onfido to hear about the evolution of onboarding and how customer demand is changing.

Building upon success at Arbuthnot Specialist Finance Limited (ASFL), broader bank to adopt cloud-native platform

nCino, Inc. (NASDAQ: NCNO), a pioneer in cloud banking and digital transformation solutions for the global financial services industry, today announced that Arbuthnot Latham & Co. Ltd (Arbuthnot Latham) has selected The nCino Bank Operating System^® to modernise the technology experience across its private and commercial banking estate. nCino will provide Arbuthnot Latham with a market-leading cloud platform that complements the bank’s revered client-centric focus to offer even swifter and frictionless access to financial services.

In 2021, Arbuthnot Latham sought a single, scalable platform that could support the entire lending journey for private and commercial clients - from origination to in-life management. Building upon the successful implementation and use of nCino at Arbuthnot Specialist Finance Limited (ASFL), the property finance subsidiary of Arbuthnot Latham, the bank selected nCino’s cloud-native, end-to-end platform to streamline the digital lending journey for multiple lines of business. 

Kevin Barrett, Managing Director, Banking at Arbuthnot Latham said: “We believe strongly in traditional relationship and service-led banking that is powered by modern technology. We continue to invest in the right people and technology so we can provide the best service for our clients today and scale efficiently into the future. The nCino platform is an innovative and flexible solution that will help us support our clients achieve their goals with even greater speed and agility.”

Built by bankers for bankers, nCino understands the cornerstone of niche client experience, which sits at the heart of Arbuthnot Latham’s philosophy. The platform does not digitise inefficient processes but instead optimises customer relationships through the utilisation of multiple channels and open APIs to enhance data collection, credit decisioning and time to disbursement. 

“We’re extremely proud that the successes experienced at ASFL were recognised and led Arbuthnot Latham to use nCino’s technology more broadly across the organisation,” added Jennifer Geary, Managing Director, EMEA at nCino. “Once live, we expect Arbuthnot Latham to experience multiple benefits such as increased transparency across its entire lending estate, a 360-degree customer and portfolio view, more streamlined and efficient processes, and a reduction in credit cycle times with reduced risk – all leading to improved client experiences. We’re excited to be on this journey together."

 Fime has supported QuantumAeon to become the first transit payment terminal vendor to completely design, build, test and certify in India. With Fime’s technical advisory and certification services, the terminal has been approved in line with the EMVCo contactless EMV^® Level 1 requirements. This project is part of Fime’s efforts to champion the national ‘Make in India’ initiative by offering local end-to-end testing and certification services for Indian manufacturers.

Shri Arvind Kumar, Director General STQC, Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology Government of India, comments: “EMVCo approval plays a big role in the modernization of our mobility infrastructure. This is a huge step forward for the ‘Make in India’ initiative, which will strengthen economic growth and foster innovation. We look forward to further success stories from Fime and Indian manufacturers.”

Balaji Brindavan, CEO of QuantumAeon adds: “Achieving EMVCo approval without having to travel overseas is a major benefit for our business. With Fime’s support, we were able to considerably reduce the costs and time taken to launch our terminal. Building on our strong presence in the transit ticketing sector for the past fifteen years, we are pleased to be contributing to the Government of India’s One Nation, One Card movement to bring consumers seamless and secure transport experiences.”

Angaj Bhandari, Managing Director of India and South Asia at Fime comments: “Our team is proud to collaborate with QuantumAeon to achieve this milestone. Appetite for EMV migration and seamless travel experiences continues to grow in India. We are excited to be able to provide local manufacturers with the support to certify their products in a fast, simple and cost-effective way.”

To learn more about Fime's services for the Indian market, contact the India office directly.