USA – Upgrade, Inc., a San Francisco, CA-based neobank that offers credit to mainstream consumers, raised $40m as part of its Series D funding round.
The round, which brought total funding since inception to $200m, was led by Santander InnoVentures, the venture capital fund of Santander Group, with participation from existing investors Union Square Ventures, Ribbit, Vy Capital and Silicon Valley Bank and new investors Ventura Capital and Uncorrelated Ventures. In conjunction with the funding, Chris Gottschalk, senior advisor at Santander InnoVentures, will be joining the Upgrade board. The company intends to use the funds to accelerate growth of Upgrade Card, and the upcoming launch of Upgrade Account. Led by co-founder and CEO Renaud Laplanche, Upgrade is a neobank that offers credit to mainstream consumers through cards and personal loans, together with free credit monitoring and education tools that help consumers understand and manage their finances. Upgrade Card provides an innovative credit card that brings the low cost and responsible credit of installment lending to millions of retail locations in the U.S., while Upgrade Account is a mobile banking product offered to mainstream consumers. The company, which has delivered over $3 billion in consumer credit through cards and loans since launch in 2017, is headquartered in San Francisco, California, with an operations center in Phoenix, Arizona, and a technology center in Montreal, Canada. Personal credit lines and personal loans are issued by Cross River Bank, a New Jersey State Chartered Commercial Bank, Member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender and Blue Ridge Bank, National Association. Upgrade Card is issued by Sutton Bank, Member FDIC, pursuant to a license from Visa U.S.A. Inc. 17/06/2020
