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Qapital raises $12M in bid to reinvent financial services for millennials
Finance application startup Qapital Inc. has raised $12 million in a new early-stage round of funding for its goal of reinventing financial services.
Founded in 2012, Qapital offers a money management application that allows users to organize their finances in a single place by connecting their online accounts. It claims to offer an instant overview of finances that empowers people to save “on small things so that they can spend on things that matter the most.”
The app leverages behavioral economics to bridge the gap between intention and action when it comes to money management through a mix that includes savings-oriented gamification linked to traditional products. The intention is to encourage millennials, in particular, to take saving more seriously, or as founders George Friedman (pictured, right) and Erik Akterin put it, to “help millennials better translate money into happiness.”
“Our young audience has a natural distrust of traditional banks, but they love using Qapital to help them be more intentional with their money,” Friedman said in a statement. “It’s amazing how things change when people are clear on their goals and can visualize achieving their goals.”
Other features of the app include the ability for users to set goals and accumulate savings triggered by everyday behaviors such as grabbing a morning coffee or ordering take-out, and also gives users the opportunity to save money by using their favorite apps. The company claims it now has 500,000 active users and is adding 10,000 new accounts each week.
The investors in the round included Northzone, Anthemis Exponential Ventures, Industrifonden and Rocketship VC. Including this new Series A round, Qapital has raised more than $23 million to date over six rounds, including a initial seed round of $500,000, three rounds described as seed funding to a total of $6.1 million, and a pre-Series A round of 41 million Norwegian Kroner.
The company said in would use the new funding to strengthen their platform and to “lay the groundwork for continued reinvention in the financial services sector” along with the application of the latest in behavioral economic science.
Photo: infomatique/Flickr
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