Requr, an Amsterdam-based growth funding platform, has raised €5M in growth capital from a group of experienced investors. The company didn’t disclose the name of the investors.
Focusing on SaaS companies, the Dutch startup aims to eliminate cash flow problems and provides upfront capital without dilution.
According to Tom van Wees, co-founder and CEO of Requr, investment costs outweighing benefits is the big challenge for fast-growing technology companies.
“As an entrepreneur, you have to invest a lot — in key talents, in the sales and marketing engine, and also in your product — before full turnover is realised. To have cash available sooner, some SaaS companies offer up to a 30 per cent discount to customers who pay their subscription fees in advance. Requr’s financing model largely solves this cash flow problem, which is a critical growth barrier for SaaS companies,” he says.
How was Requr born?
Founders Tom van Wees, Lennard Kooy, and Martijn Niessen experienced a dilemma with their SaaS companies – Ginger and Storyteq.
As experienced entrepreneurs, they witnessed the impact the current way of raising growth capital had on business operations and equity ratio.
Hence, they decided to build a better way of funding growth – to help companies grow without dilution.
With the money raised via Requr, companies can achieve growth, expand internationally, or make acquisitions – all without the negative impact of non-strategic dilution.
Offers better funding experience
Requr has developed a proprietary algorithm that maps risk profiles of SaaS companies and contracts.
The platform matches SaaS companies looking for a non-dilutive and relatively cheap way of funding their business with professional investors looking for attractive returns.
The entrepreneur receives the capital upfront to grow, and the investor gets a return for providing this upfront cash. The return for investors varies from 2 to 10 per cent, based on the risk analysis.
Unlike venture capital, Requr offers founders the opportunity to raise crucial growth capital without giving up control of their business.
Requr is initially targeting SaaS companies in continental Europe that realize more than €20,000 in monthly recurring revenue. The company is also planning to expand into the Scandinavian market.
Tom van Wees adds: “You see a global trend of online and offline companies moving towards a subscription model. In time, those (non-SaaS) companies will also gain access to Requr’s platform. I am therefore convinced that this method of non-dilutive growth financing will be the standard method of financing in ten years’ time.”