French marketplace lending platform Lendix will be fully operational in five countries by the end of the year.
The platform has today announced its entry into Germany and the Netherlands. Headquartered in France, Lendix had already branched out into Spain and Italy. Its strategy is always to establish a physical presence in any new market that it enters, primarily to be close to its customers – especially the borrowers.
In preparation for these moves, Lendix made three senior hires in January, including a new chief risk officer and chief financial officer. The month of January also saw the business lending platform clinch another €200m in lending capital from the European Investment Bank, via the European Investment Fund. That money will be evenly distributed across the various markets that Lendix is active in.
“This funding was raised to be deployed in all the European countries we are opening,” explained Olivier Goy (pictured). “Operating a marketplace is a classic chicken and egg situation, it’s a great advantage for Lendix and its clients to have in part solved this issue.”
Small businesses in Europe can borrow anything from €30k to €5m via the Lendix platform, with terms ranging from 3 months to 7 years. These loans are funded by a mixture of retail and institutional investors. Lendix has lent a touch shy of €150m to date, according to AltFi Data.
