Last week’s top venture capital rounds echoed the message of the week prior: the future of fintech, and the destination of venture capitalists’ dollars, lies outside the United States. On the list of the five largest fintech fundings this week we find two Chinese companies, one German company, and one Swedish company. Only one company, BitFury, at No. 5, is based in the U.S. — and BitFury is a global company with additional offices in several other countries.
The innovation in the spotlight last week was online shopping. Secoo, at No. 2, and Boozt Fashion, at No. 4, both are growing in this field in their respective regions. The trail blazed by Amazon and Alibaba is being extended to the rest of the world, and venture capitalists want a piece of the action.
- Xiozhu.com is a Chinese website devoted to daily booking and short-term rental of rooms and apartments. Because of population pressure and rapid growth in urban areas, housing in China struggles to keep up with demand. Xiozhu allows its users to find listings that might otherwise escape attention. It raised $60 million in series C of venture capital rounds from Joy Capital LLP. (Lead), CITIC Capital Holdings, Heyu Capital, and Morningside Ventures.
- Secoo, another Chinese company, runs virtual stores collected in an online mall to serve customers directly. This provides for a more personalized experience; the service has more then 20,000 VIP users. Secoo raised $55 million in series E of its venture capital rounds from Ping An, a Chinese insurance group.
- Kreditech is a consumer finance technology group based in Hamburg, Germany with the stated aim of “building a ‘digital bank’ for the unscored worldwide.” Half of the company — Kreditech Holding — develops banking technology and supporting services. Automated online decisioning is gaining popularity an importance in banking. Kreditech uses 20,000 data points to provide fast decisioning, and other digital processes support a strong support culture. Kreditech has received a great endorsement with its $44 million series C venture capital round: Significantly, the money comes from Peter Thiel, the legendary hedge fund manager and venture capitalist who helped found PayPal.
- Boozt Fashion is a virtual web-shop operator similar to Secoo, but serving Northern Europe. Boozt is based in Malmo, Sweden, and is the youngest startup on this week’s list. Its series A venture capital round garnered it $28.8 million from Friheden, Sampension, Sunstone Capital, and Verdane Capital Advisors.
- BitFury Group trailed the pack, but don’t be fooled: it is arguably the most important company on this list. Many readers might know of BitFury already. It is a leading, fully integrated Bitcoin blockchain security and infrastructure provider with the stated mission of “securing the blockchain.” Based in San Francisco, BitFury’s series C venture capital round brought it $20 million from DRW Trading Group, Georgian Co-Investment Fund, and iTech Capital.