Fintech Payhawk raises £83 million as it eyes expansion to the US

Payhawk has built software for back-office finance teams that lets them manage invoices, company cards, and expenses
Payhawk’s team: Hristo Borisov CEO left, Boyko Karadzhov CTO center, Konstantin Djengozov CFO right
Payhawk

A financial technology business headquartered in London has raised $112 million (£83 million) as investors continue to pour huge sums into new digital businesses.

Payhawk, originally founded in Bulgaria but now headquartered in the UK, has raised the ‘Series B’ funding from San Francisco-based investor Greenoaks, which has also backed the likes of Gorillas, Robinhood, and Stripe. Payhawk’s existing investors also took part in the funding round.

Fresh capital comes just seven months after Payhawk raised a $20 million ‘Series A’ round. Tech startups are increasingly raising money at a faster clip and larger sums, particularly in the payments space. Checkout.com saw its valuation nearly triple to $15 billion in six months and buy now pay later business Zilch quadrupled its valuation in eight months.

Payhawk, founded in 2018, has built software for back-office finance teams that lets them manage invoices, company cards, and expenses. The company pitches its ‘one stop shop’ product to high growth businesses, including Wagestream, and says transactions over its platform are growing at a monthly rate of 45%.

Hristo Borisov, CEO and founder, said: “Managing company cards, especially reports, bill payments, and invoices is currently a disconnected experience bridged by finance teams through a lot of manual work. We are building enterprise software running on global payments infrastructure that automates all spend processes.”

Payhawk’s corporate cards
Payhawk

Patrick Backhouse, a partner of Greenoaks, said: “Ask any business owner, and they’ll tell you that managing corporate spend is among the most frustrating parts of running a company. It requires significant manual work that consumes employee time and introduces substantial room for error.”

The company operates across Europe and is planning to use the new funding for expansion to the US, Australia, and Singapore next year. Payhawk also wants to launch a company credit card to corporate clients.

Borisov said: “Our strong product background and engineering team allows us to move at break-neck speed. This, in turn, will enable global enterprises and fast-growing technology companies to transform how they manage their company spending, and improve efficiencies while unlocking employee time to be better spent elsewhere.”

Backhouse said: “We’ve been thrilled to see how fast they’ve grown, already serving a truly global customer base that’s attracted by powerful and delightful software. We think that painful expense reports and bill payments should be a thing of the past, and we are excited to partner with Payhawk on the way to getting there.”