Utrecht-based SurePay, a payment verification software company, has secured a new strategic growth investment from Carlyle Europe Technology Partners (CETP), in partnership with Rabo Investments.
Carlyle is investing through its CETP V fund, a €3.2B vehicle focused on growth-stage technology businesses in Europe.
David-Jan Janse, CEO and co-founder of SurePay, says, “We are thrilled to welcome Carlyle as a strategic partner for the next stage of our journey. The team is grateful to Connected Capital and Iris Capital for their partnership since 2021, and the valuable experience they have brought in scaling B2B SaaS businesses and supporting breakout technology ventures like ours.”
“With Carlyle’s deep experience in financial infrastructure and enterprise software, they are the ideal partner to join Rabobank in supporting our ambition to strengthen our leadership across Europe and the UK, and expand into other international markets.”
Janse adds, “This investment is a major milestone for our team and a strong validation of the platform we have built together with top-tier financial institutions and leading corporates around the world.”
IRIS makes a successful exit
As part of the transaction, venture capital and growth tech investor IRIS has announced its exit from SurePay. IRIS joined as an investor in 2021 during SurePay’s first financing round.
Thorben Rothe, Partner at IRIS, says, “When we invested in SurePay in 2021, real-time payment verification was still a niche topic. Today, it is an infrastructure standard across Europe, and it is becoming mandatory in more and more countries. SurePay anticipated this development early on and played a key role in shaping it, becoming a leader wherever they launched their product.”
IRIS has supported SurePay since its Series A financing round in 2021, alongside Connected Capital and Rabo Investments. The goal was to expand across Europe and develop a product model aligned with regulatory and technological needs.
Solution provider for EU Verification of Payee
Founded in 2016 by Marcel Rienties and David-Jan Janse, SurePay provides payment verification technology to financial institutions and companies in Europe and the UK.
Its services include IBAN-name check, Confirmation-of-Payee (CoP), Verification-of-Payee (VoP), and Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI). The company introduced the IBAN-name check solution in the Dutch market in 2017 and has since expanded its offerings across Europe and the UK.
SurePay supports over 200 banks and more than 750 companies with its payment verification technology. The company has processed more than 10 billion payment checks. Its technology helps clients improve payment accuracy, prevent fraud, meet regulatory requirements, and streamline operations.
Once implemented, SurePay claims to reduce impersonation scams by 81 per cent and erroneous payments by 67 per cent on average.
Capital utilisation
SurePay will use the fresh funding to further expand its payment verification and fraud prevention solutions and to broaden its geographic presence across Europe and beyond.
The funding will also support the company’s goal to continue serving its blue-chip customers effectively.
Floris Onvlee, Director at Rabo Investments, says, “Since its founding within Rabobank, SurePay has been developed to meet the highest possible financial services quality standards with best-in-class platform reliability, scalability, and security.”
“We believe that this bank-grade heritage, which underpins the many strengths of SurePay’s current offering, has enabled the team to execute with focus, ambition, and credibility to become a European leader in payment verification. Today, their solutions are used by many of the world’s largest financial institutions and corporations, delivering meaningful impact at enterprise scale.”
“After a fruitful partnership with Connected Capital and Iris Capital, we are proud to continue on this growth journey with the SurePay team alongside Carlyle, supporting Rabobank’s corporate venture strategy to build a stronger and more secure financial ecosystem.”
Brief about Carlyle
Carlyle is an investment firm that manages private capital through three business segments: Global Private Equity, Global Credit, and Carlyle AlpInvest. The firm has $453B in assets under management.
Carlyle operates with the goal of creating value for its investors, portfolio companies, and communities.
Commenting on the development, Constantin Boye, who leads European growth equity efforts within the CETP investment advisory team at Carlyle, says, “SurePay is a mission-critical payment verification solutions provider with a powerful combination of proven technology and deep relationships across the European and UK banking ecosystem.”
“The team has done an exceptional job building a platform that delivers real, measurable impact in reducing fraud and improving payment accuracy for both financial institutions and corporates. We are excited to partner with Rabo Investments in supporting SurePay as they continue to scale internationally and drive innovation in this increasingly important space.”
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