The UK fintechs to watch

The UK is home to some of the world’s most dynamic fintech startups. The Finance Talks looks at some of the fintechs likely to make it even bigger.

There are at least 1,400 active ‘high growth’ fintechs operating in the UK, with 20 fintech unicorns and more venture capital investment than any other industry.

Consultancy Beauhurst also rates UK fintech companies as one of the most dynamic sectors of the economy, having raised nearly £22bn in equity funding; in fact last year fintechs raised £7bn alone.

So which fintechs stand the best chance of toppling the the top five, as listed by Beauhurst as Checkout.com, Revolut, Monzo, Starling Bank, and OakNorth Bank - off their perch?

We take a look at the ones to watch.

Freemarket

London-based payments and foreign exchange fintech Freemarket was founded in 2016. It has just scooped 12th place in the inaugural The Sunday Times 100 Britain’s fastest-growing private companies and been appointed by Alternative Airlines, a fast-growth flight search and booking site, to provide multi-currency payment and foreign exchange services.

Freemarket works with financial institutions including neo and digital banks and allows them to receive and pay funds in over 40 different currencies across 100 countries. Freemarket said it currently processes over £350m in transactions monthly.

Vyne

Established in 2019, Vyne is a specialist account-to-account payments platform powered by open banking. It was founded in 2019 by payments practitioners, Damien Cahill, Adam Rowland and Nick Daniel, who between them have an impressive 200 years combined industry experience to ensure direct, secure, faster payments.

In 2021 it secured the largest seed funding round in UK open banking history of $15.5m (£12.7m) from leading fintech investors including Hearst Ventures, Entrée Capital & Triplepoint. Vyne has also partnered with payment platform, Gr4vy, and payment orchestration provider Cellpoint Digital.

Zodia Markets

Crypto exchange and brokerage fintech Zodia Markets is one of the newer entrants on our list. It was established in June 2021 as a partnership between SC Ventures, the innovation, fintech investment and ventures arm of Standard Chartered, and BC Technology Group, a digital asset company and parent of Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC)-licensed digital-asset platform, OSL.

Zodia has also received crypto asset registration from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This is the first time a crypto trading business backed by a leading international bank has been listed by the FCA on the UK’s Financial Services Register.

Moss

At just under three years old Moss claims to be the UK’s newest fintechs and specialises in transforming the finance management of small and midsize businesses. Moss has been working on its all-in-one spend management solution since the end of 2019 with a team of over 400 finance and software experts. The company was founded by Ante Spittler, Anton Rummel, Ferdinand Meyer and Stephan Haslebacher, and operates across the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, with its HQ located in Berlin.

Moss has received over £110m in venture capital and is backed by world's most renowned investors, including Tiger Global, A-Star, Valar Ventures, Cherry Ventures and GFC, of which some have also invested in a number of successful companies including Revolut, Stripe, and PayPal. It is now valued at over €500m (£419m) and was recognised by LinkedIn as a Top 10 Startup in 2021.

Clear Junction

Clear Junction was recently named the fastest growing founder-led firm by the FEBE, a new organisation recognising entrepreneurial success.

Clear Junction, set up in 2016, beat other huge brands including Gousto and Huel. It connects financial businesses to a regulated payments infrastructure that helps them overcome the barriers and challenges related to banking.

TotallyMoney

The most consumer -oriented of our ones to watch list. TotallyMoney aims to make everyone smarter with their cash. It claims to have 4.5 million customers whom it provides a free, live credit report and score, and personalised notifications so they can understand what finances look like.

The fintech is one of the UK’s best companies to work for, ranked 34th in the UK and fifth best in Finance. TotallyMoney is backed by Scottish Equity Partners (SEP) and Elliott Advisors U and in a recent round of funding - November 2021- raised £9m.

WhisperClaims

WhisperClaims is a research and development (R&D) tax fintech company based in Edinburgh. Founded in 2018, it offers R & D tax credit software and support that enables the accounting industry to deliver a comprehensive, tax relief service to their clients.

The fintech said it has enabled over 160 firms across the UK to process over 2, 200 claims worth over £310m in eligible R&D spend. Its subscriber base includes all sizes of accounting and consulting businesses, from one-man-bands to several UK Top100 firms.