U.K. FinTech startup Curve has widened its range of wearables by partnering with Garmin, Fitbit and Sony’s Wena pay, Curve said in a press release on Thursday (Dec. 12).
The banking platform enables its customers to roll all of their payment and banking cards into a single smart card and app. With this announcement, people using wearables can now pay with any card using Curve.
“Wearables are fast becoming one of the most convenient ways to pay for things on the go,” said Diego Rivas, head of product OS for Curve. “Bringing Curve’s unique, all-your-cards-in-one benefits to three of the biggest players in the wearables space, and enabling their customers to pay with any bank using the Curve platform, truly cements Curve as the ultimate way to manage all your finances in one place.”
Curve users can upload any card to their wearable devices and pay with any bank, including those that used to be incompatible. By partnering with wearables, more Curve customers can leave their cash, wallet and cards at home.
The startup was founded in 2015 by Shachar Bialick and closed a $10 million Series A funding round in July 2017, with new investors including Santander InnoVentures, Investec, Oxford Capital and Breega Capital. Other Curve investors include Speedinvest, Seedcamp, Connect Ventures, Taavet Hinrikus (TransferWise’s CEO and co-founder) and Ed Wray (Betfair’s co-founder).
Curve started integrating with digital wallets last month, starting with Google Pay and Samsung Pay, enabling users to pay with their mobile phones.
Customers using wearables can take advantage of all features offered by Curve, including no fees for global spending and 1 percent instant Curve Cash. Users will also be able to transfer funds between accounts two weeks after a purchase is made on Curve cards across all 31 of the European Economic Area countries.
As of mid-2019, Curve claimed it had 500,000 users, and expects to have one million by the end of the year. Its $55 million funding round in July was led by Gauss Ventures, with participation from CreditEase, IDC Ventures and previous backer Outward VC (formerly Investec’s INVC fund). That infusion of funds brought Curve’s total valuation to $250 million. Curve is not currently online in the U.S., but the firm does have plans for a stateside launch in 2020.