Friz co-founders Friz Ash Rhazaly and Nirali Zaveri (R)
Friz, a neobank for freelancers, has announced the completion of its oversubscribed seed funding round of US$1 million from a host of investors, including Indonesia’s Amand Ventures, Iterative Ventures, and Y Combinator.
An Ivy League University Endowment Fund, founders and CEOs of unnamed Indian e-commerce startups, and early Qonto and Funding Societies employees also joined the round.
This deal follows a pre-seed round from investors, including Y Combinator, 500 Durians, 500 TukTuks, and Iterative in April this year.
According to the Online Labour Index, the freelancer economy has almost doubled since 2016, with 70 per cent of the global freelancing talent coming from Asia.
Workers are embracing project-based work increasingly due to trends in remote work and growth in freelancing platforms. However, most non-salaried, contract freelancers face difficulty accessing basic banking products like tailored debit cards, credit cards, or invoicing.
Also Read: Friz raises seed funding from YC, 500 Durians to help freelancers manage their finances better
A considerable part of the problem is that traditional consumer banking is built for salaried employees, and most freelancers cannot open a business bank account without business entities.
Friz wants to solve this issue by providing a neobank in partnership with Matchmove, Mastercard and Funding Societies.
Launched in April 2020, Friz leverages data insights to provide financial products including credit cards, personal loans, insurance, savings and investment products for freelancers. With Friz, freelancers can manage their incomes, expenses, savings and borrowings, all under one roof.
Since its inception, Friz claims to have registered 500 per cent growth month on month.
“70 per cent of our customers are very unhappy with mass-market banking and want a personalised financial tool that solves their problems. Our users are tired of broken financial solutions and being excluded from basic financial services,” Nirali Zaveri, CEO and co-founder of Friz, said.
Since its launch in Singapore, Friz has seen organic traction amongst digital marketers, content creators, programmers, accountants, lawyers and many more knowledge economy freelancers who cannot wait to experience financial freedom.
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Image Credit: Friz
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