iLex, a market infrastructure provider for syndicated loan and private debt markets, announced it has raised US$4.5 million in new capital.
The investment round was “led by QBN Capital, with participation from existing and new investors.”
This brings iLex’s total equity fundraising to US$8.5 million.
The funding will be “used to accelerate iLex’s product roadmap and client acquisition across Asia Pacific and EMEA, as well as to expand the team to drive user adoption.”
Bertrand Billon, CEO and Founder of iLex, said:
“The ongoing volatile market conditions and banks’ pressure on margins call for greater liquidity and efficiency in loan capital markets. This year, our objective is to bring iLex’s secondary trading platform to maturity and expand our primary syndication solutions to deliver our vision of the all-in-one next-gen distribution platform for primary, secondary and private credit markets that is connected, collaborative and secured.”
Billon added:
“We have built solutions addressing market participants’ need for a modern and intuitive platform, supported by a large network of market participants. As we lead the industry’s transition from outdated market practices to digital solutions, our top priority this year is growing user adoption and delivering excellence in client services.”
iLex is “driving liquidity, efficiency, transparency and security in the US$5tn syndicated loan markets with its all-in-one loan distribution platform, which helps banks, asset managers and debt advisors eliminate operational inefficiencies in the manually-intensive primary syndication and secondary trading processes.”
Market participants can “increase their efficiency in sourcing and distributing loans end-to end using iLex’s comprehensive suite of solutions.”
These reportedly “include open and private marketplaces, interactive investor engagement, automated deal workflows, embedded market and investor intelligence, and connectivity to post-trade solutions.”
Andy Tung, Managing Partner of QBN Capital, said:
“QBN Capital focuses on innovative fintech start-ups in capital markets bringing tangible changes to the industry and with a global ambition. iLex demonstrates potential through their disruptive and scalable solutions, team of industry veterans and partners, and fast-growing network of market participants. We are excited to support iLex in delivering much-needed modern market structure to this multi trillion asset class.”
Andy Tung will reportedy “join iLex’s Board of Directors together with Darren Thomasfrom S&P Global, John Olesky, seasoned loan technology veteran, and Didier Valet, former deputy CEO of Société Générale Group.”
Commenting on the funding, Billon said:
“We are pleased to welcome QBN Capital and other seasoned fintech investors to our capital table to accelerate iLex’s growth and deliver our ambition. QBN Capital brings a wealth of experience in global financing markets and emerging technologies with potential synergies with their portfolio companies.”
This investment “follows a year of significant momentum for iLex.”
This includes “onboarding one-third of the top 50 APAC/EMEA loan bookrunners, tripling the number of market participants and the volume of assets listed on its platform to more than 250 and US$10 billion respectively, and expanding its footprint to EMEA.”
In the coming year, iLex aims “to build the largest and most active network of market participants in EMEA and APAC by onboarding several hundred more market participants and a majority of the top 50 leading book runners from the region.”
The company will also “continue to significantly increase secondary loan market volumes on its platform and collaborate with ClearPar to roll out innovative solutions to the primary market.”