Mos Raises $40M to Grow its FinTech Startup for Students

FinTech startup Mos raised $40 million at a $400 million valuation, led by Tiger Global with participation from existing investors Sequoia, Khaled Helioui, Expa, Emerson Collective and Lux Capital.

“Our mission is to tear down all financial barriers to opportunity. Since the beginning, Mos has been focused on making a better and brighter future accessible to all. That focus is what brought us to tackle the first biggest financial challenge in the lives of countless young adults across America and the world — paying for an education,” founder and CEO Amira Yahyaoui said in a blog post.

Headquartered in Silicon Valley and founded in 2017, more than 400,000 students received access to a combined pot of financial aid topping $160 billion since the company’s inception. Last year, over $1.5 billion was awarded in scholarship funding.

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The company has since moved beyond its roots in financial aid to bring students banking services, which rolled out in September. It introduced a debit card and has no charges for overdrafts, no late fees and no balance minimums.

Mos has since seen its number of users grow 14x through December and was the third most downloaded app in the App Store and the first in finance apps. It’s the first FinTech app to be in the top three overall most downloaded apps, per the blog post.

“We added millions of dollars in scholarships to our platform, launched new financial education content for millions of students on TikTok, and built extensive internal tools and knowledge to best serve our Mosters,” Yahyaoui said.

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The new infusion of fresh capital will be used hire more talent while it continues on its mission to bring financial services to a new generation. The company is also aiming to develop improved products that are faster and meet their customers’ needs.

“We are focused on enabling a brighter financial future for every student by bringing Mos’ services to all those just starting off in financial adulthood,” Yahyaoui said.