US-based online lending platform Upstart secured $50m in funding from investors including Progressive Investment Company, the corporate venturing subsidiary of insurance firm Progressive, on Monday.
Financial services firm First National Bank of Omaha and pension manager Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan also took part in the round, which increased the company’s overall funding to more than $160m, it said.
Founded in 2012, Upstart operates an artificial intelligence-powered online lending platform that assesses loans applications based on factors such as salary, employment history and academic qualifications rather than credit scores.
Two-thirds of applications on the platform are processed automatically without requiring customers to provide supporting documentation.
The company also provides software called Powered by Upstart, which enables banks, credit unions and other lenders to use Upstart’s AI platform to power their own lending programs. First National Bank of Omaha will begin using the software following the round.
Upstart will use the funding to expand its offering to other types of credit, having recently launched two credit cards developed in partnership with BankMobile, the mobile banking subsidiary of Customers Bank.
The company received $32.5m in an early 2017 series D round co-led by Rakuten Fintech Fund, an investment vehicle for e-commerce company Rakuten, and an unnamed US-based asset manager, which invested alongside Third Point Ventures, Khosla Ventures and First Round.
The 2017 funding followed a $35m series C round two years earlier which was led by Third Point and backed by First Round, Khosla Ventures and Collaborative Fund.
First Round led a $5.9m series A round for Upstart in 2013 that also featured Khosla Ventures, Collaborative Fund, Founders Fund, Eric Schmidt, Marc Benioff and Scott Banister.
GV, a corporate venturing arm of internet and technology conglomerate Alphabet, had joined First Round, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, New Enterprise Associates, Crunchfund and Mark Cuban for the company’s $1.75m seed round in 2012.