European compliance regtech SteelEye raises $21mn in funding

Regtech scale-up SteelEye has sealed US$21mn of Series B funding – reportedly the largest raise from a European regtech firm this year.

The funding round was led by Ten Coves Capital alongside existing investors Fidelity International Strategic Ventures, Illuminate Financial, and Beacon Equity Partners. It takes the total amount raised by the firm to date to US$43mn.

SteelEye, which simplifies compliance for financial firms, plans to use the money raised to accelerate its global expansion with an emphasis on North America. Founded in 2017, the company has already secured some of the largest financial services firms as clients – including Fidelity International and Schroders – and last year recorded revenue growth of 88%. SteelEye says this growth will form a foundation as it targets “rapid yet scalable international expansion”.

Compliance ever-important amid regulatory scrutiny

Matt Smith, CEO of SteelEye, says: “Facing regulatory clampdowns, huge data volumes, and inflation impacts on budgets, financial firms need ways to reduce costs through efficiencies and automation. This is what we deliver through our distinctive, data-centric compliance platform. We are delighted to partner with the team at Ten Coves Capital, who have a long history of enabling technology businesses to scale and deliver real value to the financial services industry.”

A changing operational environment in the wake of COVID-19 and growing data volumes have increased the complexity and cost of compliance for financial firms, making it harder for them to accurately comply with rules designed to protect the integrity of the financial markets. At the same time, regulatory scrutiny is growing, with regulators imposing combined fines of more than US$1bn on global tier-one banks in the last nine months, SteelEye says.

Steve Piaker, Managing Partner at Ten Coves Capital, adds: “SteelEye has a highly differentiated approach and has demonstrated strong momentum and growth in Europe. Financial services firms are drowning in data and SteelEye delivers a modern unified data capture and analytics solution at scale tuned to more accurately and efficiently separate out the noise from actionable investigations. We are excited to partner with the company as it accelerates its expansion in the North American market and beyond.”