Private equity firm Dunedin has announced that it has invested in the £44 million funding of Global Processing Services (GPS), the issuer processor behind many of the UK’s fintech startups and challenger banks.
According to GPS co-founder Tony Kerr, the investment will be used to grow the company, strengthen its offering, and expand internationally.
“The partnership with Dunedin is another important milestone for GPS and we look forward to working with them to take the next step on our exciting growth path,” said Kerr.
GPS, which already operates programmes for 100+ clients in 60 countries and has offices in the UK, India and the Isle of Man, is certified by Mastercard and Visa to process and manage any credit, debit or pre-paid card transaction globally. Clients include names such as Starling Bank, Revolut, Pockit, Volt Bank, Loot, Stocard, Glint, Osper, Curve and more.
The company has had its rough patches over the past year or so, with particular attention being drawn by multiple glitches it experienced in 2017 which caused hours-long outages at its clients twice in four months. While no serious damage appeared to have been done by any of the incidents, they did lose GPS one of its better-known clients, Monzo, which announced after the second outage in four months that it would be moving its card processing in-house as a result. After another incident in November, Revolut also announced that it was working on its own payment processor, which was expected to be ready in early 2018.
However, GPS seems to have bounced back – the £44 million raise is one of the UK’s third largest fintech deals of the year. As part of the investment, Dunedin will take a significant stake in the business.
“GPS is positively disrupting a multi-billion-pound industry and is well placed to continue leading the way following the rise of other highly successful fin-tech companies,” said Oliver Bevan, Partner at Dunedin. “We are really excited to be investing in GPS which represents a significant opportunity for Dunedin to utilise its experience in taking UK companies with a technological edge and enabling them to shine on the international stage.”
“GPS has experienced exceptional growth over the last few years and we have always prided ourselves on the diverse fin-tech customer base that we service,” added Suresh Vaghjiani, Managing Director at GPS. “This partnership with Dunedin will see GPS accelerate even further as innovative fin-tech companies increasingly require global issuing platforms as well as traditional financial institutions looking to compete with new entrants.”
