Qonto adds financing to its bank-as-a-platform model

The aim of this new offer is to provide Qonto customers in financial difficulty with financing through Qonto's partners, directly integrated within its application. Qonto wants to position itself as a true service platform, with financing as the cornerstone.

FACTS

• Qonto announces the launch of a comprehensive finance offering within its app. It provides customers with direct access to a range of financial offers tailored to the needs of SMEs, through various partners: October, Defacto, Silvr and Karmen.

• Qonto provides the selected partners with a secure authorisation to access the customer's account information so that they can process the financing request directly and quickly: if the request is approved, the funds appear directly on the Qonto account.

• Different financing offers are available, with flexible amounts and repayment terms:

  • Types of financing: loans; short-term financing and revenue-based financing;

  • Amount: from €500 to €20 million;

  • Repayment terms: maximum 2 months;

CHALLENGES

• To position itself as a "Bank-as-a-platorm": the launch of this new offer shows Qonto's will to federate all the technological bricks (APIs) to be a central place for managing all the subjects related to the finances of European SMEs. Financing was missing from this system that Qonto has been helping to build since its birth, through a number of partnerships. The enrichment with these four partners fills this gap.

• Helping businesses in a difficult economic context. The beginning of 2023 has been particularly difficult for SMEs: inflation, wage pressure, rising energy costs. With this launch, the company is responding to the growing demand for financing from its customers to help them manage their cash flow.

• Simplify procedures and save time for businesses by transferring account information to Qonto's partners. Customers save time in the digitalized financing underwriting process.

MARKET PERSPECTIVE

• To position itself as a bank-as-a-platform, Qonto uses open banking to integrate its partners' technologies into its own interface, in order to build a modular offering around the issues and challenges of corporate finance. Qonto is forging partnerships or resorting to external growth, for example with the acquisition of Penta.

• On-board credit for SMEs has developed significantly, particularly in the e-commerce sector. The e-commerce platform Prestashop announced its financing offer in January in partnership with Riverbank, and PayPal launched in France in May 2022 with a revenue-based financing offer. This allows SMEs to complete their processes without leaving their operating environment, promising a faster process and less administrative work.

• A thriving BtoB market after the arrival of a real innovation cluster in the B2C market, technologies and seamless customer experience to the B2B market is therefore, a logical next step.