ThetaRay, the Leader in Next Generation AI-Powered Secure Global Payments, Raises $57 Million to Continue Unlocking Business Opportunities for Banks and FinTechs
Latest Round was Led by Portage, a Global FinTech and Financial Services Investment Platform, and Supported by Largest Existing Shareholder JVP and Other Shareholders
Funding Follows 10x Customer Growth in 2 Years
The Raise will Expedite International Expansion and Position ThetaRay to Dominate the $9 Billion Financial Crime Fighting Market
NEW YORK, TORONTO, TEL AVIV, LONDON, SEPTEMBER 5th, 2023: ThetaRay, the leader in next-generation AI-powered secure global payments with offices in New York, Madrid, London, Dubai and Tel Aviv, announced today a significant growth round led by Portage, with investments by existing investors JVP, OurCrowd and others. The investment, totaling $57 Million, will enable ThetaRay to accelerate global growth plans and capitalize on significant market demand as Banks and FinTechs urgently look to replace legacy tools with next-generation financial crime detection technology.
From Right to Left: Erel Margalit, Founder and Chairman of JVP and Chairman of ThetaRay; Devon Kirk, Partner and Co-Head of Portage Capital Solutions and Peter Reynolds, CEO of ThetaRay. Photo Credit: Alon Talmor.
ThetaRay recently appointed Peter Reynolds – who had spearheaded the company’s growth as Chief Revenue Officer – as CEO.
“Global payment infrastructure too often fails to accurately differentiate between perfectly legitimate transactions and ones from bad actors dealing with illicit funds,” said Peter Reynolds, CEO of ThetaRay. “We’re proud to be at the forefront of the revolution to make global transactions easier, safer, and cheaper and are keenly aware of the massive vote of confidence this investment is in both our technology and our team.”
ThetaRay’s cloud-based transaction monitoring and screening solution uses market-leading proprietary and patented AI technology to monitor financial transactions quickly and accurately. This allows the simple and safe flow of funds across the world by establishing trusted transactions, enabling Banks and FinTechs to grow their business and enter new markets while making more efficient use of their internal resources and reducing the risk of financial crime. ThetaRay’s customers include some of the world’s most significant financial institutions such as Santander, Travelex, Mashreq Bank, MFS Africa and ClearBank.
Global trade has suffered from payment networks becoming risk averse, seeing global interbank corridors reduce by 40%, causing global payments to become hard to complete, unpredictable and costly. ThetaRay turns this trajectory on its head, and ushers in financial inclusion, unlocking business across regions and industries.
As a result, ThetaRay is seeing dramatic business traction – the number of clients grew more than 10x over the last two years while existing customers expanded at a staggering net dollar retention rate of over 180%, resulting in ARR growing over 5x.
“We are excited to support ThetaRay as they bring their market-leading, AI-powered technology to new customers globally,” said Devon Kirk, Partner and Co-Head of Portage Capital Solutions. “We know that Banks and FinTechs are looking for ways to grow their businesses while managing risk and compliance costs and that in many areas, including AML, legacy systems are simply not working. ThetaRay is bringing much-needed innovation to enable transactions and fight financial crime.”
“Portage’s deep expertise in the FinTech and Financial Services space makes them the ideal partner as ThetaRay embarks on a new chapter of growth and geographic expansion,” said Erel Margalit, Founder and Chairman of JVP and Chairman of ThetaRay. “Guided by the adept leadership of Peter Reynolds, the resolute ThetaRay team stands ready to expand its financial technology footprint across continents – spanning North America, South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia – and venture into uncharted realms of innovation.”
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About ThetaRay
ThetaRay’s AI-powered SONAR transaction monitoring solution, based on “artificial intelligence intuition,” allows Banks and Fintechs to expand their business opportunities through safe and reliable cross-border payments. The groundbreaking solution also improves customer satisfaction, reduces compliance costs, and increases risk coverage. Financial organizations that rely on highly heterogeneous and complex ecosystems benefit greatly from ThetaRay’s unmatchable low false positive and high detection rates.
About Portage
Portage is a global investment platform focused on FinTech and Financial Services with over US $2.5 Billion under management.
Our team partners with ambitious companies across all stages, through Portage Ventures and Portage Capital Solutions. We provide flexible capital and deliver a global network of investors, commercial partners, advisors, and value creation experts. With deep industry knowledge and entrepreneurial experience, Portage is committed to supporting the leaders who are reshaping financial services. Portage operates in the United States, Canada and Europe. Portage is a platform within Sagard, a multi-strategy alternative asset management firm with over $14B under management. For more information, visit www.portageinvest.com.
About JVP
Founded in 1993 by Dr. Erel Margalit, JVP is an internationally renowned VC fund. It is among the pioneering firms of the Israeli VC industry and has raised over $1.75 Billion. Over the years, JVP has built over 160 companies and has been listed by Preqin, as one of the top six consistently performing VC firms worldwide. JVP has been instrumental in building some of the world’s largest companies to emerge, orchestrated dozens of industry acquisitions to leading international companies and facilitated 12 IPOs on NASDAQ, including CyberArk Software (NASDAQ: CYBR, $4.7 Billion mkt. cap.), QLIK Technologies (NASDAQ: QLIK, then $4 Billion mkt. cap.) as well as many large industry sales.
Over the past decade, JVP has spearheaded the creation of international Centers of Excellence, including the AI and Media Center in Jerusalem, the Cyber Center in Beer Sheva, the FoodTech Center in the Galilee, the Digital Health Center in Haifa, the Fintech Center in Tel Aviv and the International Cyber and Climate Tech Center in NYC. Visit the JVP Website https://www.jvpvc.co.