The first strategic alliance in Spain between a bank and a crowdlending fintech.
Spanish companies will be able to access participative financing from a bank run by fintech October.
The first collaboration agreement between a bank and a lending platform is reached three years after the approval of the regulation was created: Spanish bank Liberbank (LBK) and October (formerly Lendix) have signed an alliance with the aim of boosting financing for SMEs.
Liberbank goes one step further, within its open banking strategy, starting to sell fintech products that contribute and complement its value proposition. This agreement is part of Liberbank’s digital transformation strategy and seeks to improve the customer’s experience by expanding its offer of financing services, through a totally agile and digital solution. In this way, Liberbank will be able to give its customers access to complementary financing.
This alliance will put into practice the complementarity between banks and fintech in several ways: on the one hand, by agility, thanks to its use of technology, October can give a rating in one minute and financing in one week; on the other hand, with regards to the purpose of the loan as October is specialized in financing projects for any purpose of business growth, whether for tangible or intangible assets and without personal guarantee (internationalizing the business, investing in marketing, acquiring a business, growing the team, digitizing the business, etc.). And, finally, the fintech will be complementary in the volume of the loan, it will be able to complete what has already been offered by Liberbank.
“For Liberbank, this is one more step in its open banking strategy, introducing fintech products in its catalogue in order to be able to give companies another financing alternative, once again demonstrating our commitment to the sector and offering the best solutions for our clients. This alliance reinforces the bank’s digital strategy, which is constantly being renewed to adapt to the current market and the needs of the business sector”,says Joaquín Sevilla, Chief Digital Officer of Liberbank.
“Our mission is to empower businesses to thrive by simplifying and democratizing their funding and the main objective of this agreement is to be able to serve Liberbank’s SME customers even better, finding the solution to their financing needs in a more complete way through its reference bank and October, as a complement. The bank has the infrastructure and the customers, while we have the agility supported by technological innovation. The combination of both offers the service that today’s customer demands. We are proud to start this path together by breaking down the barriers between banks and fintech in Spain”,
adds Grégoire de Lestapis, CEO of October Spain.