{"id":45584,"date":"2023-10-20T15:44:55","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:44:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/startupsmart.test\/2023\/10\/20\/prospa-eyes-off-half-a-billion-dollars-in-sme-loans-after-25-million-capital-raise-startupsmart\/"},"modified":"2023-10-20T15:44:55","modified_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:44:55","slug":"prospa-eyes-off-half-a-billion-dollars-in-sme-loans-after-25-million-capital-raise-startupsmart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/uncategorized\/prospa-eyes-off-half-a-billion-dollars-in-sme-loans-after-25-million-capital-raise-startupsmart\/","title":{"rendered":"Prospa eyes off half a billion dollars in SME loans after $25 million capital raise – StartupSmart"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"fintech<\/div>\n

Fintech startup Prospa is gearing up to hire an additional 100 employees in its next stage of expansion, after this week securing a $25 million cash injection in what is believed to be the largest fintech venture capital investment in an Australian business.<\/p>\n

The 2016 Smart50 winner says the investment round, led by Australian venture capital firm AirTree Ventures, will shore up the company\u2019s ability to dominate the small business lending landscape on its path to writing more than $500 million in loans.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great story for Australian VCs, and really just cements the general market awareness of how Australia can build great tech companies,\u201d co-chief executive Beau Bertoli tells SmartCompany<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Prospa will be using the funds to further develop the technology side of the business, and with several new projects on the go, Bertoli says the funding injection will also allow the business to keep investing in people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt does require a lot of people\u2014the costs are going to be in hiring, we\u2019re going to be looking to hire about 100 over the next year. We\u2019ve put a lot of thought and planning into it this year\u2014it\u2019s not the first time we\u2019ve tried it,\u201d he says on hiring big cohorts of staff at once once.<\/p>\n

The Prospa platform, which allows small businesses to apply for unsecured loans of up to $250,000, launched in 2011 and previously raised $60 million in debt funding in September 2015<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The lender has written more than $250 million in loans, and recorded revenue of $22 million for the 2016 financial year. The current valuation of the business is $235 million, says Bertoli, and while that\u2019s a \u201csubstantial\u201d number for an Australian fintech operation, he believes there\u2019s still plenty of room to grow.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got a really long way to go,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt all comes back to the customer problems, and they can all use capital at different times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more: Retailers and fintechs dominate the Smart50 class of 2016<\/strong><\/p>\n

Partnerships boost reach as Aussies turn to alternative lending<\/h3>\n

Prospa has developed a number of strategic partnerships with the likes of Westpac and Mortgage Choice, but Bertoli says the company\u2019s connection to smaller operations has also contributed significantly to its growing the loan base.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe work with around 4,000 partners around Australia, from Westpac to small little accounting firms,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat gives us access to well over half of Australia\u2019s small business customers. We\u2019re able to work with lots of [those partners] and get access to their customers.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2016, the Prospa founders told SmartCompany<\/em> that attention to detail will be key to the company\u2019s success in an increasingly crowded Australian fintech market, especially in when it comes to understanding how small businesses start their search for capital in the first place.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur greatest successes have come when we were very precise about expectations,\u201d Bertoli said last September.<\/p>\n

Since launching, the business has also been able to ride the wave of enthusiasm for alternative lenders, with Bertoli saying small businesses are now more keen to entertain the idea of a loan from new providers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve seen a massive shift in the past couple of years for acceptance of lending. When we started there wasn\u2019t a lot of awareness of options outside of the banks, we\u2019ve seen great feedback from customers.\u201d<\/p>\n

The business has been rapidly expanding for a number of years now but Bertoli believes the Prospa team has the momentum and experience to sustain that growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a lot of experience in rapidly expanding. I think we\u2019re in a fortunate position\u2014we\u2019ve five years old and still growing double digits year on year.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article was originally published on SmartCompany.<\/em><\/p>\n

Follow StartupSmart on<\/em> Facebook,<\/em> Twitter, LinkedIn and iTunes.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fintech startup Prospa is gearing up to hire an additional 100 employees in its next stage of expansion, after this week<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":58678,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,14,1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45584"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}