Russia’s digital banking platform, Tinkoff, has reportedly acquired a controlling stake (51%) in Just Look, the business entity behind Jump.Finance, a Fintech firm that automates interactions with freelancers, including making payments.
The transaction was carried out on behalf of Tinkoff Business, the division of the Tinkoff Group that serves SMEs and large companies. As mentioned in the announcement, Jump.Finance will be integrated into the Tinkoff Business ecosystem and retain its professional team. The financial terms of the deal have not been shared publicly.
As noted in the update, Jump.Finance is a provider of payment automation software for taxi fleets, automobile dealers, scrap collectors, delivery firms and other business organizations that work closely with self-employed contractors. The service also assists with streamlining paperwork, accounting and order management.
Jump.Finance will reportedly be adding value to Tinkoff Business’ set of industry services for businesses and entrepreneurs. Jump.Finance clients will receive convenient access to business finance products like credit, identification, virtual card issuance and account management.
At present, the service is used by more than 3,000 firms, making payments to more than 500,000 individuals and self-employed professionals.
As mentioned in the announcement, businesses working with individuals and self-employed professionals are the main clients of Jump.Finance. The firm says it is on track to make around RUB 200 mln in revenue for this year, up a significant 200% YoY.
As confirmed in the update, the project will be retaining its current team, which includes co-founders Mikhail Kirichenko and Anton Kirillov.
Stanislav Bliznyuk, Chairman of the Management Board at Tinkoff Bank, stated:
“Tinkoff Group aims to become a strategic investor in companies that demonstrate sustainable growth, and are able to strengthen our individual business lines, as well as the Tinkoff ecosystem as a whole.”
Bliznyuk added:
“Jump.Finance is one such project that shares our mindset. Tinkoff Business has its own ecosystem of services for businesses, and Jump.Finance, one of the largest providers of payments solutions to individual contractors for companies, will make a great addition to it.”
He further noted:
“By combining Jump.Finance technologies and Tinkoff Business infrastructure, we can create best-in-class solutions for companies across different sectors. We remain open to integrating other solutions into our ecosystem, where we can enable their significant growth by providing access to Tinkoff’s financial technologies.”
Mikhail Kirichenko, co-founder and CTO at Jump.Finance, remarked:
“We were able to build a fast-growing and profitable business from scratch by investing only our time, effort and savings. With this agreement, Jump.Finance will become available to all Tinkoff Business customers straight ‘out of the box’ when they open a new settlement account. We believe that synergies with Tinkoff will enable us to not only boost our growth, but also to achieve the initial goal that we, as founders, have set for this product — to become the main financial tool for all companies working with individuals and self-employed persons, in addition to using traditional settlement accounts for legal entities.”