ArK Kapital Raises $153M to Invest in European Tech

Stockholm-based startup ArK Kapital has secured an additional 150 million euros (about $153 million) in funding to invest in European technology founders, Tech Funding News reported Friday (July 8).

The company now has a capital pool of 300 million euros (about $305 million), according to the report.

ArK Kapital is a data-driven precision finance company that aims to provide loans up to 10 million euros (about $10.2 million) to startups in a range of sectors, the report stated. It has developed a proprietary artificial intelligence (AI) platform — the ArK Intelligence Machine (AIM) — which combines company data with external market data to generate business intelligence and strategies.

Potential insights that AIM can create include when a business will become profitable, when it will require new capital injection, and how quickly it can reasonably repay a loan, according to the report.

“AIM and our AI-driven, always-connected approach to underwriting seems to be exactly what the financial markets have been waiting for, which makes it possible for us to onboard more and more financial partners to the AIM-platform, unlocking more growth-money for the European founder community,” said ArK Kapital Co-Founder and CEO Oliver Hildebrandt in the report.

An ArK Growth Loan lasts up to seven years, with repayments not starting for two to three years, which gives founders time to build their companies, the report stated.

Another Swedish company, buy now, pay later (BNPL) giant Klarna, is said to be in talks to raise more capital that would value the firm at roughly $6.5 billion, a significant drop from its $45.6 billion just last year.

Read more: Klarna Goes Shopping for Capital at $6B Valuation

The recent economic downturn saw Klarna lose 2.57 billion Swedish krona — or $250 million — earlier this year, leading the company to announce plans to lay off 10% of its staff.

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