61. Divido

Founders: Christer Holloman, Fredrik Borgquist and Anders Hallsten
Founded: October 2014 (launched August 2015)
Website: www.divido.com

In what can be very aptly described as a win-win, fintech start-up Divido offers what it refers to as ‘finance as a service’; enabling customers to pay for any purchase in bitesize installments, while retailers are paid in full instantly.

Based on the belief that banks are typically slow to innovate, Swedish-born founding trio Christer Holloman, Fredrik Borgquist and Anders Hallsten decided that they could developing new, unique  technology themselves, providing useful financial innovations so that banks could focus on lending.

Backed by top-tier financiers, technology entrepreneurs and Europe’s biggest early-stage VC, Divido started with £100,000 and a goal of helping customers spread the cost of big purchases made at small stores which weren’t typically able to offer staggered payment options.

Three years later, Divido is now able to facilitate £25m of credit, financing up to £25,000 at a time to cover users’ transactions.

The start-up has partnered with national and multinational retailers both online and offline and these partnerships mean retailers are able to attract new customers and sell more big ticket items. Divido charges a single set up fee, a monthly fee and the cost of the finance it provides.

Today, Divido serves an average of 5,000 consumers per month – spreading the cost of purchases between 12 months and five years.

Divido’s big plans for the next 12 months include quadrupling turnover, securing more relationships with retailers and reaching more consumers. We’ll be watching on from the sidelines as it “builds the future of payments”.