Allica Bank raises £26m and eyes £100m more to meet SME demand

New CEO Richard Davies says the bank is looking for “potential acquisition opportunities”.

Business lender Allica Bank has closed a £26m follow-on funding round from majority shareholder Warwick Capital Partners and is already eyeing more capital.

Newly-appointed CEO Richard Davies announced today that Goodbody and Ashcombe Advisers had been appointed to lead a £100m additional raise in order to meet surging demand from its business customers.

Allica said it has received more than £1bn worth of borrowing demand from SMEs in the wake of Covid-19.

“Established small and medium sized enterprises will be vital to the recovery and health of the UK economy, but it is clear that the supply of finance has been very badly damaged by Covid-19 outside of the government schemes,” said Davies, who joined Allica after stepping down as Revolut’s banking CEO.

“The time is now for Allica to scale up its operations to meet this business funding gap, bringing a blend of human relationships, deep lending expertise, and digital disruption.” 

Davies also said Allica was looking for “potential acquisition opportunities of non-bank lenders impacted by the pandemic” in order to bolster Allica’s position in the SME challenger banking market.

The upcoming closure of the government’s Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) at the end of September is going to be a crucial time for challengers and non-bank lenders to return to a commercial lending market dominated by CBILS and Bounce Back Lending for most of 2020.