Neobank Kroo closes £26m Series B

UK neobank Kroo has raised £26m in a Series B funding round less than one year after it landed its UK banking license.

The cash, 60 per cent of which was raised from existing investors will be used to gear the bank up for growth including recruitment.

“The money raised will go a long way in supporting the launch to market of our current account, the development of our lending proposition and the scaling up of the company. We are very excited to offer to the UK customers a new digital bank that will have a positive impact on their lives,” said Andrea De Gottardo, CEO of Kroo.

Kroo says it is on “a mission to create a bank that truly connects people financially, enables them to be financially better off and plays its part in making a positive impact on the world.” 

This has included a customer tree-planting referral scheme in June 2021 whereby when a customer successfully refers a friend Kroo plants 20 trees with the aim of creating a forest of 1 million trees.

To date, Kroo has grown to 23,000 prepaid cardholders, with over 120,000 monthly transactions on the platform.  

Launched in February 2019, Kroo last raised cash in August 2021 with an £18m round, bringing its total haul to £56m of funding since the launch. One week after the Auguat 2021 Series A it announced it had won its banking license. 

At the time de Gottardo, told AltFi that he doesn’t agree with some of the common consensus that the UK neo banking space is a crowded market. 

“There is a feeling that the digital banking market is really crowded but when you actually analyse the market dynamics, Monzo and Starling are the only two fully authorised digital banks that are offering a personal current account,” he said.

“There are a number of others that do not offer a personal current account but we really feel our competitors will be Monzo and Starling," he adds.