US expense management fintech Brex is coming to the EU

US expense management fintech Brex is coming to the EU.

The San Francisco-based fintech has bagged an EU Payment Institution licence, meaning it's now authorised to offer corporate cards, expense and treasury tools to businesses across the bloc. Brex is also looking to expand to the UK, saying it was looking to acquire a separate licence to support UK-based customers in the coming months.

Brex CEO and co-founder Pedro Franceschi posted on X “Big news. Brex is coming to Europe!"

Outlining its motivation behind the EU move, Brex said it already serves 1.500 customers with EU operations and that the licence would pave the way for Brex to serve more companies across the bloc.

Previously, Brex could only offer its spend management services to companies with a US presence.

In a blog post, Franceschi said it is now the only "intelligent finance platform" with US and EU licences.

Franceschi added: "This licence takes us one step further, enabling Brex to directly serve EU-based businesses and their subsidiaries with locally accepted cards, less friction, and best-in-class payment capabilities."

Brex has set up an office in the Netherlands, where it secured its Payment Institution licence, with a 12-strong team running across sales, operations and customer success. The fintech said it would start onboarding select EU customers in the coming months, through a phased rollout, with the expectation that Brex would be fully operational in the EU by early 2026.

Brex, whose clients include Robinhood, Anthropic and other fast-growing startups, was last publicly valued at $12.3bn in 2022.