Online equity investment platform SyndicateRoom today announced the successful capital raise of £459,871 for Squirrel, which overfunded to 115% of its original £400,019 target. The fintech company has developed a personal financial management and savings app designed to help people regain control of their money.
“We’re thrilled to welcome Squirrel as the latest UK company to join the varied SyndicateRoom success story portfolio,” opined SyndicateRoom CEO and Co-founder Gonçalo de Vasconcelos. “At our core, we are committed to working with great companies, and remain very proud of the positive contribution our members are making to society through their investment decisions. Squirrel is a great example of opportunities offering both a disruptive and scalable business centred on creating meaningful, positive social outcomes.”
Founded in 2014 and incubated at TechStars, Squirrel is an FCA-authorized firm which issues users with a basic bank account and also provides a budget application which allocates the users’ income into their commitments, saving and spending money before they receiving access to it, ensuring the money needed to pay for essentials, like rent and bills, is set aside. This novel approach to budgeting ensures users have access to money only when necessary, making it harder to impulse-spend and easier to save.
“My main motivation for founding Squirrel was to make a real social difference. With a growing community of 8,000 people and rising, it is truly rewarding to hear the personal feedback from customers on how Squirrel has changed their habits with a positive impact on their personal financial management,” indicated Squirrel CEO and Co-founder Mutaz Qubbaj. “With the funds raised via SyndicateRoom, we aim to expand our customer base even further and diversify our product offering.”
Squirrel works with both businesses and individuals, already partnering with health services, debt management companies and counselling providers across the UK. Squirrel is also offered as an employee benefit and aims to help those on lower incomes. The company plans to use the funds raised to expand its technical functionality to meet the needs of a broader customer demographic.