Estonian financial services firm LVH is to invest £4.45 million in B-North, the Manchester-based firm building a regional SME lending bank for the UK.
The investment from LHV adds to B-North’s growing list of backers, including Greater Manchester Combined Authority and Channel 4 Ventures, as well as a series of successful crowdfunding rounds.
B-North needs to secure a £20 million commitment from backers in order to secure its UK banking licence.
The firm aims to disrupt the UK’s £150 billion SME lending market by establishing a network of regional ‘lending pods’ combined with a cloud-based banking system, with the aim of delivering loans to business 10x faster than the industry standard.
Jonathan Thompson, co-founder and CEO of B-North says: "This investment from LHV is a significant boost to our capital raise and shows real momentum and investor appetite for our vision for business lending in the UK and is the latest step in our journey from B-North to Bank North.”