Lendable has raised$ 6.5m (KES671 million)in a Series A round of investment to scale operations, drive market expansion, and roll out new products.
With the round, Lendable aims to scale up its operations in Nairobi and New York and launch its services in Tanzania, Rwanda, and at least one other market while expanding its line of products.
The round was led by KawiSafi Ventures, Omidyar Network, Fenway Summer Ventures and a number of prominent US FinTech angel investors.
According to Daniel Goldfarb, CEO and Co-Founder of Lendable, “Over the last year we have shown we can raise commercial capital for alternative lenders, deliver commercial returns to US investors, and help our alternative lending partners grow exponentially. We are excited to use this money to dramatically increase the scale of capital we are moving and continue to prove out this asset class.”
The Lendable platform enables these companies to raise scalable forms of off balance sheet financing in weeks. Lendable has so far completed five transactions, raising USD$2.83 million (KES292 million) for East African alternative lenders.
Typically, Lendable transactions are a purchase of consumer or SME borrowing contracts secured by productive assets – payroll, SME, livestock, and a range of equipment including farm machinery, vehicles and home appliances. A portion of the alternative lenders’ loan book is purchased, which frees up capital for lenders to make more loans and grow exponentially.
So far, the largest portion of borrowing contracts have been secured by solar home systems and recently launched Maestro, which assesses alternative lender financials, customer collections, and customer payment histories. It uses payment patterns and secondary data to predict future payments and to automatically price and monitor the financing facility.
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