Conta Simplesan expense management and corporate card company in Brazil, raised a series of $41.5 million or more than R$200 million.
Base10 Partners led the round and was joined by Conta’s Series A investors including Valor Capital, Jam Fund, Y Combinator, Big Bets, Broadhaven and DOMO. As part of the investment, Base10 CEO TJ Nahigian joined Conta’s board of directors.
The new funding comes as company executives Rodrigo Tognini, CEO, and Taeli Klaumann, CFO, tell TechCrunch that 2023 was the “best year” for Conta Simples. It ended the year breaking even and received a license from the Central Bank of Brazil to operate as a Direct Credit Company. This means the financial services company can do more with credit, digital accounts and payments.
To date, Conta Simples has 30,000 active users and has issued 500,000 physical and digital corporate credit cards for a total payment volume of R$18 billion, or about $3 trillion, Tognini said.
“Over the past year, we’ve grown revenue-wise, almost 3x year-on-year,” added Tognini. “We also went from negative margin to breakeven, and I think that was one of the main reasons our current investors were interested in doing this Series B round.”
Meanwhile, its cost control technology provides a streamlined process and customized tracking. In 2022, the company acquired Online advertising startup Hackr Ads after R$121 million Series A ($24.8 million in today’s dollars). This enabled Hackr Ads customers to use Conta and Conta to provide its customers with a way to manage ad campaigns.
The company expects to use the new funding in a few ways. The first is to grow his team. Tognini expects to open and fill about 100 new roles in 2024. Another is moving up to handle larger clients. Many of Conta’s initial customers are small businesses. That won’t change. However, the company is now able to scale and develop more features and products and sell to medium and small businesses, Klaumann said.
“Some large companies, not just in Brazil, but in all countries, are not well served by cost management, so there’s a huge potential there,” Klaumann said. “The idea is to use this money over the next three, four or five years. We understand that Brazil’s central bank is trying to create these disruptive ideas. Our plan is to stay close to them and create not only buy now, pay later but also other products to ensure we support businesses of all sizes.”
