UK FinTech B-Social Notches Extra £7.8M Before Rebranding

The London-based FinTech B-Social raised £7.8 million in seed funding as it prepares to rebrand as Kroo and become a full-fledged bank, reports said on Wednesday (Feb. 26).

The only investor revealed was Rudy Karsan from Karlani Capital; the others are undisclosed. This new round of funding brings the startup’s total raised to £13.25 million as the company continues the journey to becoming a fully-licensed bank.

“We recognize that almost all financial transactions are inherently social,” B-Social co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO) and founder Nazim Valimahomed told reporters in 2018. “We want to change the relationship people have with money by helping them overcome the anxiety, awkwardness and wasted time when they engage with their social finances. We are doing that by building a digital bank that truly accommodates the way people live their lives and is dedicated to connecting a person’s finances to their social world.”

Founded in 2016, B-Social is a social payments app “where friends and money meet.” The platform comes with a debit Mastercard and enables users to buy, share and track expenses with friends and family. It aims to make it clear who owes what when people are splitting a bill. B-Social said it is on a mission to improve the relationship people have with money.

The startup indicates it has over 8,500 customers who have spent more than £1 million with their B-Social cards and have shared over 36,000 expenses with friends.

Valimahomed told reporters that the company has “significantly progressed” the pre-application stage for acquiring a U.K. banking license. He expects to submit the full banking application in Q2 2020.

In 2018, the company raised £3.2 million ($4 million) in funding from undisclosed but high net-worth entities.  Valimahomed said the idea was born from his own financial frustrations with friends, and his view that people are banks themselves, lending and borrowing from acquaintances.