French fintech Aria launches deferred payments platform in the UK

French B2B deferred payments provider Aria is launching in the UK to help fix the late payments crisis.

Founded in 2019 by former freelancers CEO Clément Carrier and COO Vincent Folny, Aria aims to help workers and businesses in the UK with early payments and deferred payment options.

Having seen success in France and Europe, growing by 2000 per cent year on year, the fintech has opened an office in London and hired Tom Lamb, former embedded finance commercial lead at Kriya (formerly MarketFinance) to head up UK operations.

“Post-Covid and in the current economic climate more and more companies are looking online and for contingent workforce solutions but struggle to get the same terms or experience to which they are accustomed,” Lamb said.

“By working with our platform partners we make solving this crucial issue for businesses and freelancers simple, easy and automated.” 

Annually, freelancers in the UK contribute around £20bn through online platforms, but according to the Federation of Small Businesses, around 50,000 small businesses are also forced to close every year due to late payments.

Aria now supports 20,000 freelancers per month, distributing early payment of supplier invoices and deferred payment options through API.

The fintech has seen growth of 25 per cent a month since launching its platform in 2021 and in March raised £50m in debt from M&G Investments to prepare for more growth in the UK and Europe.

“We built Aria to make instant B2B payments the new standard for the platform economy,” Carrier said.

“Our growth has been fueled by solving a real problem for freelancers and businesses in a way that lets platforms keep control of their customer experience. Opening up the UK market is an important step in our journey to change the way businesses pay and get paid.”