Melbourne-based digital onboarding firm FrankieOne has closed a star-studded $20 million Series A round, attracting multiple celebrity investors including international Djs The Chainsmokers, Robinhood founder and CEO Vlad Tenev, Monzo founder Tom Blomfield, and senior executives at Revolut and Public.com.
The round was led by Australian VC heavyweights AirTree Ventures, and Greycroft, a US-based VC firm whose prior investments include Bumble, HuffPost, and Venmo. Harry Stebbings’ UK-based 20VC, as well as Reinventure, Tidal Ventures, APEX Capital, and Mantis VC also participated.
Originally formulated as a neobank, FrankieOne pivoted to major on the customer onboarding problems facing major banks and fintechs. The company bringing together ID verification, KYC, KYB, AML, fraud and credit tools into a single unified platform that connects to over 350 vendors and data-sources to provide a ‘single point of truth’.
FrankieOne CEO Simon Costello, says: “Regulatory and technical challenges are often a major roadblock in a fintech’s ability to rapidly scale internationally. Our mission is to create a platform that provides fintechs with the convenience of consuming the world’s identity verification and fraud-prevention services via a single unified API. This allows fintechs to “switch on” geographies and services as they need, enabling them to focus on innovation and their core business.”
The company has experienced 20x year-on-year growth, with sales outside of Australia now comprising approximately 50% of revenue, compared with just one per cent only six months ago. In the last 18 months, the platform has attracted over 80 new clients across banking, BNPL, digital exchanges and fintech, including tier 1 companies such as Afterpay, Westpac, and Zipmex.
The funds raised from the Series A round will be put towards further extending its international footprint. In addition, the company says it will begin offering transaction monitoring for both fiat and cryptocurrencies later this year.