Zach Perret, CEO and co-founder of Plaid, speaks at the Tech Slopes Tech Summit in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, on January 31, 2020.
George Frey | Bloomberg via Getty Images
Plaid has amassed a new round of capital that is nearly tripling its valuation a few months after a deal to be bought by Visa fell apart.
The fintech company announced on Wednesday a round of financing Series D of 425 million USD, led by Altimeter Capital, with the participation of new investors, Silver Lake and Ribbit Capital. Former investors Andreessen Horowitz, Index Ventures, Kleiner Perkins and New Enterprise Associates also added to the round.
The new funding raises Plaid’s valuation to $ 13.4 billion, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be named because the details were private. The reports first reported that Plaid was raising money.
Earlier last year, Visa agreed to buy Plaid for $ 5.3 billion, which at the time was double the previous valuation of the San Francisco start-up. Later, the Justice Department sued the blocking of the agreement, claiming that it would limit competition in the payments industry. A few months later, Visa canceled its takeover efforts. The companies said the decision to end the merger was reciprocal.
Plaid technology links the bank account to fintech applications such as Venmo, Robinhood and Coinbase – all of which have seen an attractive increase during the pandemic. Plaid also added Google and Microsoft as customers last year and said its customer base grew by 60% in 2020 amid growing digital finances.
CEO Zach Perret said the latest cash injection would help Plaid grow its workforce, which had already risen 40 percent last year, and keep up with demand. He pointed to new digital adopters like his parents, whose 70-year-old colleagues recommend online funding applications to manage spending.
“Our market is facing a big change, with consumers we never thought would embrace digital financing by getting involved in a big way,” Perret told CNBC in a telephone interview.
Plaid drew a star-studded list of Silicon Valley and Wall Street investors, including Visa, Citi, Google and Goldman Sachs. Mary Meeker, the former technology investment banker who spent the last decade in venture capital, was an early investor and is on the starting board.
“A new era of finance is underway, and Plaid is in a strong position to help develop the digital ecosystem that provides the kinds of tools and services consumers want on a large scale,” Meeker told CNBC. in an email.
Regarding plans to make Plaid public, Perret said that “there is nothing on the short-term horizon.” “But in the long run, that’s definitely the direction we want to go,” he said.