Novo, the powerfully simple small business banking platform, today announced that the company has raised $90 million in Series B funding at a $700 million valuation. Stripes led the round, with continued participation from existing investors Valar Ventures, Crosslink Capital, Rainfall Ventures, and BoxGroup. This latest round brings Novo’s total funding to more than $135 million.
“After speaking with thousands of our more than 150,000 customers over the last few years, one theme keeps coming up: the more you can help a small business remove all red tape and friction around cash flow, the better off that business is,” said Michael Rangel, CEO and Co-founder of Novo. “With this additional funding, Novo will take a huge leap forward in improving cash flow for small businesses. In the coming months and years, our small business customers will be able to access their funds faster than they ever thought possible.”
With the additional $90 million in funding, Novo will build out modern lending capabilities, integrations, and proprietary products that allow small businesses to send and receive money more quickly with new advanced features which entail a series of enhancements followed by Novo’s announcement in 2022. This will help to reduce the cash flow friction and implement technologies in banking and engineering back-end operations to foster advancement in the system.
“For small business owners, the technology that powers their digital banking platform should fade into the background,” said Tyler McIntyre, CTO and Co-founder of Novo.
Ajar Upadhyay, Director of Operations – India, Novo, said, “At Novo, we have support operations in India across Gurgaon, Ahmedabad, and Bengaluru. After successfully securing Series A and B funding from our investment partners, we are focussing on the next expansion step, that is, to hire 200+ talented workforce from middle and top-level management in banking and engineering roles in India for the next six months and build an organization that’s motivated and growing and accomplish new milestones in India,”
Novo’s latest funding round comes at a time of significant growth for the company. Novo has surpassed $5 billion in lifetime transactions – processing more than $4 billion in transactions in 2021 alone, and entering 2022 with a run-rate transaction volume of more than $7 billion. Novo also opened its new headquarters in Miami, and received multiple awards, including CNBC’s “Best Business Checking Accounts”, Money Magazine’s “Best Business Checking Accounts of 2021”, and The Banker’s “Most Innovative Bank in North America”.
“Despite being the heart of the U.S. economy, the more than 30 million small businesses in the U.S. have always struggled to access even basic financial services as they are constantly overlooked by the big banks,” said Saagar Kulkarni, Partner at Stripes who will be joining Novo’s Board of Directors. “What sets Novo apart is a fundamentally different approach to helping small businesses succeed. Instead of opting for incremental change, Novo built its banking platform from the ground up so that it could not just deliver a great digital banking experience, but actually deliver Novo financial products to a customer base that is yearning for them. At Stripes, we only invest in companies building amazing products, and Novo’s rave reviews, strong retention, and incredible growth make it clear it has built something that small businesses love.”