Last week, we reported that Klarna is about to open a technology centre in Madrid. Today, three months after its previous funding round, the company has raised another $639 million in the latest seed round at a money valuation of $45.6 billion. The newest round positions Klarna as the largest private fintech in the whole of Europe.
“...best is yet to come as Klarna multiplies their addressable market through global expansion.” Eric Munson, founder and CIO of Adit Ventures.
The new valuation means that Klarna's valuation increase by 47.3% within the space of three months. In March, the Company's valuation stood at $31 billion thanks to the $1 billion it raised in a seed round. In March, the Company's valuation increased by 330% over its $10.6 billion valuation back in September 2020.
The latest seed round, led by SoftBank's Vision Fund 2, featured existing investors like Adit Ventures, Honeycomb Asset Management and WestCap Group. Speaking of investors, Klarna has been backed by Sequoia Capital, SilverLake, Dragoneer and Ant Group in the past.
Klarna is garnering a lot of attention lately, with more than 18 million American consumers now using the Buy-now-Pay-Later platform. That is an 80 per cent increase over its 10 million customers in the third quarter of last year. Overall, Klarna is live in 20 markets, has more than 90 million global active users and more than 2 million transactions a day conducted on its platform.
"...the company’s growth is founded on a deep understanding of how the purchasing behaviors of consumers are changing.” Yanni Pipilis, managing partner for SoftBank Investment Advisers.
Klarna launched in New Zealand and France last week. This is the sixth country this year, and the company plans to expand to other markets before the end of the year. The company has about 4,000 employees with several hundred in the U.S. in markets such as New York and Los Angeles. It also has offices in Stockholm, London, Manchester, Berlin, Madrid and Amsterdam.
Given the company's success in the U.S., the company plans to use the latest funding to continue to grow its operation in the U.S. and globally.
USA in focus
GDP: $21.433 trillion compared to France $2.176 billion in 2019
Population: 328,239,523 compared to France 67,005,854 in 2019
GDP per capita: $65,297 compared to France $40,496 in 2019
