TransferWise is now Europe’s most valuable fintech start-up, with a $3.5 billion valuation – CNBC

TransferWise, the money transfer company that is taking on Western Union, is valued at $3.5 billion after a unique investment round, making it Europe’s most useful financial technology originate up-up.

In lowering fees and alongside side a slick online platform to abet patrons transfer money globally and be aware their transfers, the London-based fully company is taking a up to the moment manner to a staid enterprise that is been dominated by giants esteem Western Union and MoneyGram.

The company says it be been pushing for more transparency across the charges banks and foreign money substitute companies charge their prospects for transferring money in a international nation.

“Eight years prior to now we had a dream, and in a technique the full world used to be against us,” talked about TransferWise co-founder and Chairman Taavet Hinrikus in an interview. “And we were able to grade by grade design the enterprise and also alternate the ambiance round us to be great more user pleasant.”

TransferWise is never alongside side unique money to its steadiness sheet with the investment, nevertheless as an various giving staff and early traders the likelihood to sell a few of their stake in a $292 million secondary deal.

European interior most equity team Vitruvian Partners and U.S. investment companies Lone Pine Capital and Lead Edge Capital sold shares from existing traders, while early traders Andreessen Horowitz and Baillie Gifford increased their holdings in the company. Funds managed by BlackRock also contributed to the round.

“Now we have gotten been a winning company for the past two years, we have gotten a valuable quantity of cash sitting on our steadiness sheet,” Hinrikus talked about. “The company does no longer need any money.”

TransferWise booked a safe income of £6.2 million ($7.9 million) for the fiscal year ending March 2018, while annual income nearly doubled to £117 million. The company says it be signing up 10,000 unique enterprise prospects a month, and now has 5 million total prospects, processing £4 billion in month-to-month transactions.

The latest fundraising manner TransferWise is now essentially the most useful fintech originate up-up in Europe, surpassing British digital lender OakNorth, which used to be final valued at $2.8 billion.

Hinrikus talked about the company is never in a bustle to lope public.

“While we state we will be a public company at final, that doesn’t abet us quit what we are trying to total in the next couple of years,” he talked about.

For now, the company is targeted on grunt. TransferWise at the second has more than 1,600 staff worldwide and will hire 750 more over the next 12 months, Hinrikus talked about.

WATCH: How TransferWise has built-in its product into financial institution apps