Latvian fintech startup Nordigen raises $800,000

Latvian startup Nordigen, which allows banks to make loan decisions based on customers' banking data, has raised $800,000 from Inventure and Seedcamp, bringing the total amount raised since its inception to $1 million. Nordigen is planning to use the capital injection to hire more people with a focus on sales and business development, as well as for entering new markets, including Brazil, South Africa, the USA, and the UK.

Founded in 2016 in Riga, Nordigen has the ambition to replace traditional credit bureaus. It claims to be able to “instantly verify a customer's real income and spending habits to make the first assessment of their creditworthiness.” The company's algorithms are supposedly able to identify risk-critical behaviours when looking at the customers' banking data.

“It's hard to love credit bureaus at the moment,” said Rolands Mesters, co-founder of Nordigen. “What they do was necessary, but with the rise of Open Banking, we're now able to build technologies that are much faster, more reliable and more customer-friendly than traditional credit checks. This is a great time to build a global alternative to credit bureaus.”

Currently, Nordigen works with banks and alternative lenders in 12 countries: Baltic states, Spain, Finland, Poland, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, Czech Republic, Australia, and New Zealand. According to the company's estimation, it's analysed close to 1 billion transactions to date.

In the photo, left to right: Nordigen co-founders Roberts Bernans and Rolands Mesters