Aussie fintech Zeller closes $100M Series B, reaches $1billion valuation

Aussie payments scale-up Zeller has closed a $100M Series B funding round, doubling its valuation to over $1 billion.

US-based VC firm Headline led the raise, alongside industry superfund Hostplus. Previous investors including Square Peg, Addition and Spark Capital also participated in the round.

According to King Goh, principal at Headline, “Zeller is well on its way to redefining how financial connectivity is delivered to Australian businesses, following in the footsteps of the tectonic shifts in the global B2B fintech ecosystem.”

Zeller claims that three in five business owners have left traditional banks due to dissatisfaction with the technology and reduced services, with over 80 percent of their customers jumping from incumbent providers.

Goh believes that Zeller’s growth in the past eight months, raising over $181 million since they were founded, onboarding over 10,000 business customers reflects the business’ successful disruption of the traditional banking sector.

“Businesses of all sizes are now expecting their financial services to be provided via a best-in-class, consumerised experience given the rapid evolution in modern data availability and business needs,” he said.

“Ben and the team have built strong core products, and we are looking forward to working with them to grow and expand on this foundation.”

According to Ben Pfisterer, CEO and co-founder at Zeller, the business is moving into its next growth phase, as they work to expand the financial services product range.

“Listening to feedback from over 10,000 businesses who joined Zeller in our first 8 months helps us to continually build new products that meet their evolving needs, as they reestablish themselves following the pandemic,” said Pfisterer.

“In collaboration with our growing Australian customer base, we hear that they want a single financial services solution that brings together every product they need to run and grow their business.”

Ben Pfisterer, CEO and co-founder at Zeller

The new capital is set to be directed towards the development of Zeller’s product range, as the business works to deploy new financial services including online payment acceptance and next-gen banking capabilities, among others.

According to Pfisterer, “With the accelerated displacement of cash, we have seen in-person card payments experience unprecedented growth. Yet over 9 million Australians transacted online last financial year, so it’s critical that businesses can accept payments wherever their customers are.

“Delivering the tools to accept payments and get a complete view of their business, be it instore or online, is our first step into seamless omnichannel commerce. New integrations with industry-leading website and e-commerce platforms will give our customers a single view of their business and reduce the complexity of having to navigate numerous, disparate systems and providers.”