AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands – Creative Group announces €22 million in funding from Prime Ventures. The Dutch fintech company offers customers the opportunity to digitally buy or send prepaid credit to spend with their favourite brands. Leading European venture capitalist Prime Ventures is the sole investor in this round, acquiring a minority stake in the company.
Creative Group makes digital top-up fast, safe and simple for consumers around the world. Their solution combines a highly scalable, proprietary-based tech platform with distribution power via online marketing. This enables brands to easily tap into large new markets and discover new customer segments globally. With their labels Recharge.com and Rapido.com, Creative Group has the ambition to reach a sales volume of €200 million by the end of the year.
Rapido.com
Rapido is the fast-growing online top-up store offering a broad selection of e-vouchers from brands including iTunes, Google, Spotify, Xbox and PlayStation for top-up users. Rapido processes and delivers digital codes, that consumers buy online to use as credit for prepaid services from their favourite brands. The service is now available in 13 countries.
Recharge.com
Based on the same proprietary technology, Creative Group started a remittance business in 2016 that focuses on delivering a service to immigrants for cross-border remittances of call and data credits. Recharge.com is already available in 130 countries, with 600 operators. Recharge.com was named the winner for the 2018 Fintech category of the Deloitte Fast 50 in the Netherlands. In the near future, Recharge plans to be the most convenient way to recharge and pay for all major living cost from anywhere, by anyone and at any time.
Prime Ventures investment to accelerate growth
“We are an official digital distributor for some of the world’s most powerful brands,” explains Günther Vogelpoel, CEO of Creative Group. The fact that these large companies trust Creative Group to sell their products online, was a major factor for Prime Ventures to invest in the fintech scale-up. Vogelpoel: “We are excited to have Prime Ventures on board. With the growth capital they invest, we are able to further accelerate our growth internationally. Their knowledge, vast network, and international contacts will enable us to meet our goal of becoming the global leader in the digital top-up market.”
Pieter Welten, Partner at Prime Ventures, recognizes the appealing value proposition and scalability of Creative Group’s business models: “We believe that Creative Group represents an attractive and largely untapped opportunity. We envision that the market for the personal use of digital vouchers, prepaid solutions and recharge services will continue to grow. We are impressed by the company’s performance to date, despite their limited resources, and we are convinced they will grow significantly in the coming years.”
Prime Ventures is a leading European venture capital and growth equity firm focused on investing in European technology companies. Notable historic investments and exits include Mendix (acquired by Siemens) and Takeaway.com (listed to AEX). Pieter Welten, Partner at Prime Ventures, will join Creative Group’s Supervisory Board.
Expansion all over the world
With the recent funding, Creative Group plans to accelerate its global rollout. “We will push hard and expand fast. By the end of 2020, Rapido.com will be available in 30 countries all over the world and Recharge.com plans to become the alternative for money transfer by offering more household utility credits like energy, wifi and satellite tv,” says Vogelpoel. Additionally, he is looking to invest further into the team. Over the past two years, Creative Group has already grown from 25 to 100 employees. “We will hire more hungry professionals who want to be part of our unique adventure. However, as our platform is very scalable, I don’t expect to grow to 500 people anytime soon. ”
About Creative Group
Creative Group was founded by Robin Weesie and Dirk Ueberbach as the first e-voucher website in The Netherlands. In 2015, Committed Capital became a minority shareholder. Günther Vogelpoel, previously CEO of telecom provider Tele2 and online leisure auction company Emesa, joined the fintech scale up as CEO and shareholder in May 2017.
The broader vision of Creative Group is building global leadership in digital exchange of value services. Today, Rapido.com operates in 13 countries and Recharge.com is available in 130 countries. Creative Group is headquartered in Amsterdam.
More information: https://www.cg.nl/
