A personal and household financial productivity app chaired by the former head of operations and technology at Barclays Investment Bank has launched a campaign to attract £350k from crowdfunding investors.
Brilliant Bills is the brainchild of founder and CEO Simon Woodiwiss (pictured below), who came up with the idea after missing the end of a mortgage discount period and suffering a spike in the interest rate.
The app, which counts the likes of Onedox among its competitors, helps users better organise their finances and stay on top of “dull and otherwise time-consuming” admin.
“There are companies out there now that are doing great things but are nowhere near as comprehensive or as righteous, for want of a better word, as Brilliant Bills is going to be,” Woodiwiss told BusinessCloud.
Having rebranded from ‘Getonatop’ last summer, the start-up is now looking to raise at least £350,000 through crowdfunding platform Seedrs to support the development of ‘version 2’ of its app.
The money will also help pay for “a robust” digital marketing campaign.
Woodiwiss added: “I know it’s a bit of a cliché but it’s all about disrupting and the market that we want to disrupt is the price comparison website market and we’re going to do this better than the other companies out there.”
Woodiwiss says he was ‘on his own’ until he started building a team last summer.
London-based Brilliant Bills is now made up of chairman Philip Freeborn; CTO and co-founder Johanna Wilson; business and strategy advisor Ross Emerson; and head of marketing Simon Doggett.
Freeborn (pictured above) spent more than 10 years at Barclays in a variety of senior roles, starting with chief information officer in January 2006 and latterly as head of operations and technology at Barclays Investment Bank.
The tech and finance veteran, who is currently global head of banking at consultancy Tori Global, has also invested in Brilliant Bills’ crowdfunding round.
“Philip is the perfect guy to have as chairman,” said Woodiwiss.
At the time of publishing, Brilliant Bills had exceeded more than 20 per cent of its crowdfunding target, attracting the backing of more than 70 investors on Seedrs.
The start-up has more than 40 days remaining to meet its target until the end of the campaign.
“Once we’ve got the funding we’ll have version 2 finished within three months and then hopefully be making money by the middle of our first operating year,” Woodiwiss said.
“When people think about looking after their personal and financial household admin – all the boring stuff – we want to be the go-to choice.”