CIBC Innovation Banking recently announced £40 million of growth financing for London-based Smart, a retirement tech provider.
Smart will use the capital “to expand its market growth, accelerate the launch of strategic products, and undertake acquisitions.”
Smart launched in 2015 with the goal of “making pension auto-enrolment and administration simple for businesses and their employees.” The company has since “expanded to work with financial institutions and governments across the world, including through its core technology platform Keystone.”
Eoin Corcoran, Chief Financial Officer of Smart, said:
“We’re delighted to have CIBC Innovation Banking support Smart, helping us accelerate our near-term growth ambitions, increase our presence in core markets, and roll out product initiatives to transform retirement across the world. Our technology is already helping more than a million people save and plan for retirement. We operate across four continents, and our growth plans will soon take us beyond ten million users. Our company is uniquely positioned to capitalise on the $62 trillion global retirement savings market, and this facility will strengthen our ability to do exactly that.”
Sean Duffy, Managing Director in CIBC Innovation Banking’s London, UK office, remarked:
“We’re thrilled to be supporting Smart as they continue to scale their offering for retirement technology to savers across the globe in partnership with financial services organizations, governments, and state legislatures. Smart and its team have provided solutions to more than 100,000 companies and we look forward to being part of their growth journey through the development of new strategic products.”
Smart is also “backed by Legal & General, J.P. Morgan, Link Group, Natixis, Barclays, Chrysalis Investments, DWS Group, and Fidelity International Strategic Ventures.”
As noted in the update, CIBC Innovation Banking “delivers strategic advice, cash management and funding to innovation companies across North America, the UK, and select European countries at each stage of their business cycle, from start up to IPO and beyond.”
With offices in Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Chicago, Denver, London, Menlo Park, Montreal, New York, Reston, Seattle, Toronto and Vancouver, the team “has extensive experience and a strong, collaborative approach that extends across CIBC’s commercial banking and capital markets businesses.”
As mentioned in the announcement, Smart is “a global savings and investments technology platform provider.”
Its mission is “to transform retirement, savings and financial well-being around the world.”
Smart partners “with governments and financial institutions (including insurers, asset managers, banks, financial advisers) to deliver retirement savings and income solutions that are digital, bespoke and cost efficient.”
In addition to the UK, Smart “operates in the USA, Europe, Australia and the Middle East with more than a million savers entrusting over £4 billion in assets to the platform.”
Smart supports its clients “with a 750 strong global team.”