Australian fintech startup Limepay bags $15.4m in pre-IPO round

Limepay, an enterprise payment fintech startup based in Australia, announced it has raised A$21 million (US$15.4 million) in the first phase of its pre-IPO funding from current institutional investors.

The latest investment brings the company’s total funding to nearly A$30 million (US$22.1 million). This comes after it raised US$6 million in a seed round last December. The company is expecting to raise additional institutional funding in early 2021.

(From left) Limepay CEO Tim Dwyer and chief revenue officer Dan Peters / Photo credit: Limepay

Founded in 2016, Limepay provides a “merchant-branded platform” that integrates online payments and the “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) functionality. It claims to be different from third-party BNPL services, as it enables merchants to retain ownership of their customer relationships and data, coupled with a checkout experience.

The new funds will be used to scale up the startup’s sales, marketing, and partnerships operations, as well as enhance and expand its products, management team, and balance sheet funding of working capital, it said in a statement.

“The cash injection will provide Limepay with the balance sheet liquidity and operational flexibility required to meet its business objectives as we work toward an IPO in 2021,” said co-founder and CEO Tim Dwyer.

Due to the recent Singles’ Day shopping festival and subsequent Black Friday sales, the company claims it has achieved quarter-on-quarter growth in excess of 250%.

The company has also recently made high-profile appointments. Claire Alexander, the former global head of talent acquisition and organizational design at payments firm Zip, will join Limepay in December as head of people and culture.

Alexander will be joined by Mark Ledsham who is currently based in London as the CEO of XE.com (part of the Euronet Worldwide Digital Group) and will work as the company’s chief financial officer starting January 2021.

Limepay’s board has also welcomed Willie Pang, CEO at MediaCom Australia, who has taken up an independent non-executive director role.

Currency converted from Australian dollar to US dollar: US$1 = A$1.36.