Spicing up financing for e-commerce, Prague’s Lemonero squeezes in €12 million

Prague-headquartered AI-driven embedded financing platform for e-commerce players Lemonero has raised investment from Komerční banka, member of the Société Générale Group. According to an undisclosed source, the €12 million received in funding, is a combination of equity and debt financing.

The capital injection will enable the startup to expand into Western and Eastern Europe and develop new products. First, the company plans to set its foot in France followed by the Netherlands.

Lemonero aims to disrupt business financing through big data and AI. The Czech startup offers digital lending solution to e-commerce, marketplaces, and payment service providers. It enables merchants to take fast, flexible revenue-based financing to grow business from within the partner ecosystem at no cost or risk.

According to Jan Laštůvka, founder and CEO of Lemonero, the customers can arrange financing in ten minutes, completely online and use the money immediately to inventory purchase or marketing investment. “Lemonero's main goal is to support small and medium-sized online stores with capital that will help them grow and prevent unnecessary bankruptcy. Today, we know that up to 60% of e-commerce players collapse prematurely due to lack or unavailability of external capital,” he said.

Patrik Nový, director of KB SmartSolutions that belongs to the Société Génárale Group added: “We want to support Lemonero's growth and further expansion of e-commerce digital financing in Europe. The investment will be used mainly for entry in France and the Netherlands and eventually in DACH and Eastern European region. Our partnership also helps the transformation of Komerční banka into a digital bank.”