Plaid, a US-based financial data software provider backed by corporate investors Alphabet, American Express (Amex), Citi, Mastercard and Visa, raised $425m in series D funding yesterday.
Growth equity firm Altimeter Capital led the round, investing together with Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z), Index Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Ribbit Capital and Silver Lake. It valued the company at $13.4bn, according to CNBC, citing a source privy to the matter.
Founded in 2013, Plaid has created a software tool that helps users connect their bank accounts with products provided by external financial technology providers such as Coinbase, Robinhood and Venmo.
The company’s chief executive, Zach Perret, told CNBC the money will be used to develop new services and hire staff, after it increased headount by 40% in 2020.
Regarding Plaid’s plans to go public, Perret added: “[There is] nothing on the near-term horizon, but long term, that is certainly the direction we would like to go.”
Payment services group Visa was in talks to acquire Plaid for $5.3bn in January 2020 but the deal was called off a year later due to regulatory difficulties. Visa had joined its peer Mastercard to back a 2019 round of undisclosed size for the company.
Kleiner Perkins had led Plaid’s $250m series C round the year before, participating alongside A16Z, Goldman Sachs, Index Ventures, NEA and Spark Capital, at a $2.65bn post-money valuation.
Payment service provider Amex and financial services group Citi had backed a $44m series B round for the company in 2016 that also featured Goldman Sachs Investment Partners and NEA.
NEA had led a series A round a year earlier that came in the wake of $2.8m in a 2013 seed round backed by internet technology group Alphabet’s GV fund as well as Felicis Ventures, Homebrew, NEA and Spark Capital.
