In a round of undisclosed value, the company founded by Argentine Julian Colombo attracted investors of the caliber of Illuminate Financial, Exor Ventures and LTS Investments (of the trio Lemann, Telles and Sicupira)
In the wake of novelties such as Pix and Open Finance, banks and fintechs increasingly use cutting-edge software to develop products and advance scalability. However, it can be laborious and expensive to manage multiple technologies with different solutions at the same time. That’s where N5 Now comes in.
Founded in 2017 by the Argentine Julian Colombo (former director of Santander), the software company for the financial industry is announcing on Wednesday (13) a new round of funding to deepen its presence in the countries where it is already or inaugurate offices in new centers, with Latin America as a highlight.
“A year ago, we saw that it was a countercyclical moment, everyone was coming out of venture capital. We’ve always been very conservative, down to earth. And this made the company very attractive and allowed us to be super selective when choosing partners,” says the founder and CEO of N5, in an interview with Finsiders.
‘Dream team’
Round values and post-deal valuation were not disclosed. But, according to the CEO, the problem was not money. N5 doubled sales during the first half of the year. However, capital helps address another structural gap: the absence of strong supporters.
“When you go to sell the project to a bank, we always won on the technical side, but the corporate part is where we failed,” he says. “We’re done with the dream capable.”
In the ‘dream team’ of the supporters are Illuminate Financial, a venture capital that has as limited partners (LPs) J.P. Morgan, Citi, Barclays, BNY Mellon, S&P Global and Jefferies; and Exor Ventures, the venture investment vertical of Exor N.V., a manager controlled by the Agnelli family (founder of Fiat) with a portfolio of brands such as Ferrari, Stellantis, CNH Industrial, Philips, The Economist and the Italian football team Juventus.
The funding also attracted Madrone Capital Partners, a private equity firm associated with the Walton family, Walmart’s majority partner; LTS Investments, by the trio Jorge Paulo Lemann, Marcel Telles and Carlos Alberto Sicupira; Arpex Capital, investment holding company of entrepreneurs André Street and Eduardo Pontes; and Overboost, a venture builder and fund management firm.
Software Integration
While he doesn’t open the numbers for the current round, Julian says it’s a “big deal.” Proof of this are the 800 open positions. The idea in the coming months is to strengthen the technology team with hires in three core areas: product, platform design and the implementation of solutions for customers.
Currently, N5 has a platform that makes the native integration of software such as CRMs, BPMs, incentives and multichannel (omnichannel). A financial company takes, on average, about 100 days to get the solutions up and running. In return, it can reduce 14 out of every 100 software used and distribution costs by 16%. On one front, the intention is to implement your solutions even more quickly.
In another, it is to deepen the complexity of services, such as an artificial intelligence module for companies. With 19 modules on the platform (as the solution sets are called), the company wants to bring that to 25. “But more important is the depth,” the CEO warns. “We have AI at home, but let’s do something more parrudo.”
Strategy
Before venturing as an entrepreneur, Julian spent almost 20 years at Santander, between positions held in Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Spain. Although it is 100% home office from the initial day, most of N5’s employees are Argentineans, Brazilians and Chileans. There are also some Venezuelans and Colombians.
This is how N5 reached 57 customers, including banks, insurance companies and means of payment. They are renowned players in the market, such as Mastercard, Santander, Credicorp Bank, Zurich, Sudameris, Banco Atlas, N26, Farmers Insurance and BCP.
In this way, Latin America will have special attention in the use of resources. In the division, Brazil (which should get 25% of the funding), Chile, Mexico, Colombia, Peru and Panama, as well as the United States, emerge. Two other squares that have not yet been defined should also receive investments – Spain is a strong candidate.
“I know a lot about the ecosystem, the problems and the pains of Latin America. We decided to start with what we knew best. Few places in the world are more interesting than Brazil in terms of financial innovation. For us, these are market and talent opportunities,” says the executive.
The destination of capital will be different in each place. On Brazilian soil, the company is building an even larger office, while in places like Peru, where it takes its first steps, the company is expected to open a headquarters next month, for example.
Editorial: Fernando Barbosa for Finsiders
