Billhop secures €4 mn in Series A funding led by Element Ventures

By Megha Bhattacharya

Swedish FinTech Billhop has secured €4 million in a Series A investment round led by FinTech VC Element Ventures. The new funding will be utilised for boosting product development, enhancing sales, marketing and customer support functions for meeting the demand for working capital financing solutions.

Sebastian Andreescu, CEO & co-founder of Billhop commented, “We are very pleased to have the backing of Element Ventures and look forward to working with Michael, whose experience and knowledge within the financial sector will be a valuable resource for Billhop. The new capital will enable our accelerated growth plan which entails expanding the team, increasing our market footprint, and further developing and improving our solution for European businesses of all sizes.”

According to Billhop, it manages the entire payment process without onboarding the end recipient of the invoice payment. The service is particularly relevant in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, with companies often experiencing shrinking liquidity margins.

Ingemar Sjögren, CFO & co-founder of Billhop commented, “The pandemic has led to massive reductions in Travel & Entertainment (T&E) spend traditionally comprising the bulk of corporate card spend. It has forced commercial card issuers to find new avenues to stimulate card volumes. In supplier payments, the issue has always been the low card acceptance – this is something that Billhop instantly addresses. Whilst card issuers always had a willingness to promote Billhop to increase transaction volumes, we see that this appetite is intensifying in the absence of T&E spend.”

Recently, Billhop announced a partnership with Visa Finland and Oma Säästöpankki Oyj (OmaSp) with an aim to help Finnish businesses to enhance their cash flow and close their liquidity gap. Under the partnership, OmaSp has launched a new Visa business credit card product, thus giving its customers access to benefits and Billhop’s service at a preferential rate.

Michael McFadgen, Partner at Element Ventures who led the investment in Billhop, commented, “We set up Element Ventures to find companies just like Billhop. Those fintech firms with a strong focus on B2B and whose technology has the potential to revolutionise the way businesses operate. Billhop has already made fantastic progress helping their customers efficiently access financing and liquidity, having grown organically since launch, and it will prove even more crucial as businesses of all sizes navigate the turbulent market conditions ahead. We’re thrilled the team chose to partner with us and we’re excited for what’s to come.”