AI Banking Platform Flex Secures $1.2 Billion Valuation

Flex, a 3-year-old startup offering artificial intelligence-powered banking solutions for medium-sized business owners, was valued at $1.2 billion in a funding round, Reuters reported Tuesday (July 14), citing an unnamed source.

The B1 round more than doubled Flex’s valuation from six months ago, according to the report.

Flex did not immediately reply to PYMNTS’ request for comment.

Flex announced Tuesday that it raised $70 million in a B1 round, although it didn’t disclose its valuation, the report said. The company has raised a total of $180 million in equity and $300 million in debt.

Flex will use the new funding to expand globally, increase its marketing and double its headcount to over 200, the report said.

PYMNTS reported in December that Flex raised $60 million in Series B funding. Flex said at the time in a press release that it serves high net-worth middle-market business owners generating $3 million to $100 million in revenue.

According to Flex’s website, the company’s platform provides a single financial home for business owners that manages everything from business revenue to personal spend.

The platform includes four products: Global Banking for local-currency accounts and cross-border payments; stablecoins; a Flex Reward Card for business spend; and Flex Capital for revenue-based financing.

“Together, they form a complete financial operating layer for the internationally operating business owner,” Flex said on its website.

Flex announced the launch of Flex Global Tuesday, describing it as a service that uses stablecoins to enable cross-border money movement between more than 100 countries, according to the Reuters report.

The customers Flex serves include scaling businesses that operate with complex financial needs and operations, multinational operators that want to consolidate their financial operations on a single platform, cross-border payments businesses that have entities in two or more countries, and internet native operators that sell and source globally, the company’s website said.

Flex said last week in a post on LinkedIn that it surpassed $10 billion in annualized total payment volume (TPV) in June, up from $1 billion a year earlier.

“Growth has been phenomenal,” the company said in the post.