GoCardless has secured a Series G funding round of around £231 million, making it the latest European and UK tech unicorn at a valuation of $2.1 billion.
The direct bank payment solutions provider processes more than $25bn in transactions per year and serves over 70,000 businesses around the world, including DocuSign, Klarna, TripAdvisor and Epson.
The new investment is led by Permira, which brings significant experience in backing payments and financial software businesses including Klarna, Clearwater Analytics and Carta. New investor BlackRock Private Equity Partners also joined the round.
The funding will be used to accelerate the firm’s growing footprint in the open banking space through both product and geographical expansion as it targets becoming the world’s leading network for direct bank payments.
The company is broadening its focus to enable both recurring and one-time payments. It will also open its ‘bank pay’ network to other payment service providers who want to tap into its technology and platform.
Klarna recently selected GoCardless to offer bank debit payments to its over 21m customers in the US, while a strategic agreement with PayPal will see GoCardless become a direct debit partner for the payments firm.
“The rise of open banking presents a once-in-a-generation shift, one that will change the way payments happen all over the world,” said Hiroki Takeuchi, co-founder and CEO of GoCardless.
“I am delighted to have partners like Permira and BlackRock Private Equity Partners on board, with their global footprint and strong expertise in tech, to support us in building a direct bank payment network that lets payments flow freely, without cards, expiration dates or extra costs.
“I look forward to working with them and our new board members to accelerate the future development of GoCardless.”
The round sees GoCardless add further technology and payments expertise to its board of directors through Michael Rouse, former chief commercial officer at Klarna, and Koen Köppen, chief technology officer at Klarna and board member of Mollie.
Since its last funding round in December 2020, GoCardless’s valuation has more than doubled, while headcount has grown by 85%.
Alberto Riva, Principal at Permira, added: “We believe GoCardless is uniquely positioned to become a global champion in account-to-account payments through leveraging open banking.
“We are thrilled to back Hiroki and his excellent team to continue innovating and offering best-in-class solutions that are cheaper, faster and a more secure way of collecting payments globally.”