BlackRock doubles down on Scalable Capital as fintech raises €50m

Oscar Williams-Grut
·Senior City Correspondent, Yahoo Finance UK
·2 min read
A logo sign outside of a facility occupied by BlackRock, Inc., in Wilmington, Delaware on June 28, 2015. Photo by Kristoffer Tripplaar *** Please Use Credit from Credit Field ***
BlackRock, the world’s biggest money manager, first backed Scalable Capital in 2017 and has re-invested several times since. Photo: Kristoffer Tripplaar/PA

Anglo-German wealth management start-up Scalable Capital has raised €50m ($57.9m, £45.6m) from backers including BlackRock.

Scalable Capital said on Wednesday it had raised new funds from its existing investors BlackRock (BLK), Holtzbrinck Ventures, and Tengelmann Ventures. The funding takes the total raised by Scalable Capital to €116m since its founding in 2014. Terms of the latest funding round were not disclosed.

"In times of COVID-19, our funding round is a powerful signal,” said Erik Podzuweit, co-founder and co-CEO of Scalable Capital. “It shows that our focused, digital business model is convincing investors.”

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Scalable Capital is a digital wealth management startup that uses AI to help people manage their money. The company offers its own investment app but has also done deals with Barclays, ING, Santander, and Siemens to power their wealth management and automated advice offerings behind the scenes.

Scalable Capital currently has €2bn of assets under management across Europe and 85,000 customers.

BlackRock, the world’s biggest money manager, first backed the company in 2017 and has re-invested several times since.

Scalable Capital's founding team. Photo: Scalable Capital
Scalable Capital's founding team. Photo: Scalable Capital

“With this funding round, we want to expand our team of currently 130 employees in order to drive our expansion and the further development of our platform,” Scalable’s co-founder and co-CEO Florian Prucker said.

The company has offices in Munich and London. UK chief executive and co-founder Simon Miller told Yahoo Finance UK earlier this week that the company had been relatively unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

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“We’re a new company and we’re tech focused,” he said. “I don’t want to say we’re fine... but the main transition for us was getting everyone to go remote.

“I would actually see the UK’s fintech position as more insulated and protected by a lot of other industries. I don’t think it will be negatively impacted in the same way as other areas of the economy. “