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Pedro Franceschi (left) and Henrique Dubugras, Brex CEOBrex
Brex, a provider of a credit card for startups, raised $ 125 million in venture capital funds, propelling the company to a status of unicorn with a valuation of $ 1.1 billion.
Earlier Friday, the San Francisco-based startup announced the closing of a $ 125 million Series C round, with Greenoaks Capital and DST Global taking the lead in the round. This comes after the $ 50 million raise in June.
Since changing course a little over a year and a half ago, Brex has raised more than $ 1 billion in value. Henrique Dubugras, co-founder and CEO, credits this success to the desired market, his start-up clientele and his mastery of technology, he said, which can not compete with traditional credit card companies.
"We are targeting a very large market and have a unique product," Dubugras said, noting that traditional credit card companies can not keep up with their technical prowess. It's not bad that 50% of start-ups from the Y Combinator, the San Francisco incubator that invests twice a year in promising companies, are Brex customers. And as these companies grow, Brex should make more money. "It's similar to Stripe," Dubugras said. "In the beginning, all these startups grew up and are now bigger companies." Brex was born out of the frustration Dubugras and co-founder Pedro Franceschi faced when trying to get a business credit card for their startups . Brex gives a credit to startups based on the amount of money in their bank accounts. Early-stage start-ups have a long history of difficulty obtaining credit cards because they have no income. Traditional credit card issuers often reject their applications, forcing executives and founders to use their personal credit cards to finance their operations.
The 22-year-old CEO said investors were also interested in Brex because his net developer score was well above the industry average. Dubugras refused to provide the specific score. A net promoter score is an index between -100 and 100 that shows the willingness of customers to recommend a product or service.
Brex's latest fundraising comes at a time when venture capital investments in digital payment companies are on the rise. According to KPMG, investments in the fintech based in the United States businesses accounted for $ 14.2 billion in the first half of this year. Fintech's investments in the United States reached a new high of more than $ 8 billion in the second quarter alone, according to KPMG. There were 427 transactions in the first six months of this year.
According to Dubugras, Brex plans to use the proceeds of the fundraiser to expand the product to companies outside the technology sector. It's something they're not ready to do today, but it's the long-term goal. The CEO noted that Brex had not used the $ 50 million it raised in June from the B series that brought together PayPal co-founders Peter Thiel and Max Levchin. He said that he considered fundraising as an opportunity to work with the right partners rather than as a way to make more money. "It is not because we need money," Dubugras said. "We always arouse a lot of interest, but we try to build relationships with people longer before taking the money."
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Pedro Franceschi (left) and Henrique Dubugras, Brex CEOBrex
Brex, a provider of a credit card for startups, raised $ 125 million in venture capital funds, propelling the company to a status of unicorn with a valuation of $ 1.1 billion.
Earlier Friday, the San Francisco-based startup announced the closing of a $ 125 million Series C round, with Greenoaks Capital and DST Global taking the lead in the round. This comes after the $ 50 million raise in June.
Since changing course a little over a year and a half ago, Brex has raised more than $ 1 billion in value. Henrique Dubugras, co-founder and CEO, credits this success to the desired market, his start-up clientele and his mastery of technology, he said, which can not compete with traditional credit card companies.
"We are targeting a very large market and have a unique product," Dubugras said, noting that traditional credit card companies can not keep up with their technical prowess. It's not bad that 50% of start-ups from the Y Combinator, the San Francisco incubator that invests twice a year in promising companies, are Brex customers. And as these companies grow, Brex should make more money. "It's similar to Stripe," Dubugras said. "In the beginning, all these startups grew up and are now bigger companies." Brex was born out of the frustration Dubugras and co-founder Pedro Franceschi faced when trying to get a business credit card for their startups . Brex gives a credit to startups based on the amount of money in their bank accounts. Early-stage start-ups have a long history of difficulty obtaining credit cards because they have no income. Traditional credit card issuers often reject their applications, forcing executives and founders to use their personal credit cards to finance their operations.
The 22-year-old CEO said investors were also interested in Brex because his net developer score was well above the industry average. Dubugras refused to provide the specific score. A net promoter score is an index between -100 and 100 that shows the willingness of customers to recommend a product or service.
Brex's latest fundraising comes at a time when venture capital investments in digital payment companies are on the rise. According to KPMG, investments in the fintech based in the United States businesses accounted for $ 14.2 billion in the first half of this year. Fintech's investments in the United States reached a new high of more than $ 8 billion in the second quarter alone, according to KPMG. There were 427 transactions in the first six months of this year.
According to Dubugras, Brex plans to use the proceeds of the fundraiser to expand the product to companies outside the technology sector. It's something they're not ready to do today, but it's the long-term goal. The CEO noted that Brex had not used the $ 50 million it raised in June from the B series that brought together PayPal co-founders Peter Thiel and Max Levchin. He said that he considered fundraising as an opportunity to work with the right partners rather than as a way to make more money. "It is not because we need money," Dubugras said. "We always arouse a lot of interest, but we try to build relationships with people longer before taking the money.
