CredoLab secures US$7m in Series A funding led by GBG

ALTERNATIVE credit scoring provider CredoLab on Tuesday said it has secured US$7 million in a Series A funding round led by identity management and fraud prevention company GBG.

Access Ventures, as well as existing investor Walden International, also joined the round.

The company said it will use the funds to further enhance its product features and strengthen its alternative credit core scoring algorithm, CredoScore.

The Singapore-based fintech company will also push the adoption of its solutions in other adjacent industries, it said.

Additionally, CredoLab added that it will focus on consolidating its leadership in South-east Asia, while expanding its market reach in key countries across Asia, Latin America, and Africa.

"Despite the obvious slowdown caused by Covid-19, we have already seen a significant shift from physical originations to digital ones and an increased appetite in using alternative sources of data," said Peter Barcak, chief executive and founder of CredoLab.

CredoLab develops bank-grade digital scorecards for banks, lenders, e-commerce, travel, ride hailing, e-wallets, insurance and retail companies. It uses privacy-consented and permissioned data sourced from smartphones and the Web to help its clients to expand the market share and decrease their cost of risk in real time.

Since its inception in 2016, CredoLab has powered almost US$2 billion in loans issued by over 70 clients across 20 countries, it said.

"CredoLab has continued to provide a stable behavioural score that has kept its predictive power even in the presence of payment holidays when lenders can't rely on credit bureau scores," added Mr Barcak.

Chris Clark, chief executive of GBG, said: "GBG's fraud and compliance solution allows financial institutions to onboard and transact with their customers quickly, safely and securely. We have experienced first-hand CredoLab's capabilities from our ongoing commercial partnership. The company's AI-based (artificial intelligenced-based) proprietary technology will complement our existing offering but also provide critical behavioural risk reference data from good customers that are financially excluded."