Fintech Spotlight

Category: AI

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  • Hedepy acquires Poland’s HearMe to expand corporate mental health services in CEE

    Hedepy acquires Poland’s HearMe to expand corporate mental health services in CEE

    The Prague-based platform adds HearMe’s team and clients to strengthen its position as a leading online psychotherapy provider in Central and Eastern Europe.

    Prague-based Hedepy has acquired HearMe, a Polish workplace mental health platform, in a move to consolidate its presence across Central and Eastern Europe. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

    Founded in 2020, Hedepy connects users with certified therapists for individual, couples, and teen therapy, and also provides online psychiatric care. Operating in nine countries, it works with nearly 1,000 therapists and delivers hundreds of thousands of sessions annually. The platform also collaborates with insurers to support reimbursement and offers corporate programs under Hedepy for Business.

    HearMe, also founded in 2020, supports employers with employee therapy, webinars, and well-being programs. Its services will now be integrated into Hedepy for Business, with HearMe contributing locally tailored content and improved app functionality.

    “Poland was crucial for us as it’s the largest market in our region with a highly developed mental health sector. We also greatly value having Katarzyna and Adam join our team. Adam brings extensive experience in consolidating the CEE market, and Katarzyna has deep expertise in providing corporate mental health care” ~ Hedepy cofounder and CEO Lukáš Krčil.

    The deal brings over 120 professionals and more than 80 corporate clients into Hedepy’s network. HearMe’s founders, Adam Radzki and Katarzyna Gryzło, will join the leadership team—Radzki as Head of Sales in Poland and Gryzło leading B2B marketing.

    “Merging with Hedepy is a logical step that opens doors to new markets while preserving the personal approach, high expertise, and quick accessibility that our Polish clients value most. We considered several options but chose Hedepy because we share a similar company culture and a strong commitment to business with purpose” ~ Katarzyna Gryzło.

    Hedepy expects to break even by the end of 2025 with a projected gross transaction value of €13 million. The company is preparing for a new investment round as it continues to expand. Existing investor Purple Ventures welcomed the deal, with partner Jan Davídek saying it “created a solid foundation for developing corporate services and paves the way for further acquisitions.”

    Looking ahead, Hedepy plans to combine online and in-person care while integrating AI tools responsibly into its mental health services.

  • DataCrunch raises €55M to scale AI-focused cloud infrastructure in Europe

    DataCrunch raises €55M to scale AI-focused cloud infrastructure in Europe

    The Helsinki startup plans to expand its GPU-powered data centres and pitch itself as a European alternative to U.S. cloud giants.

    Helsinki-based startup DataCrunch has raised €55 million in a mix of equity and debt to expand its AI-focused cloud infrastructure. The funding comes less than a year after its €12 million seed round in October 2023.

    The equity financing was led by byFounders, with participation from Skaala, the family office of Wise cofounder Taavet Hinrikus, Finnish pension fund provider Varma, and sovereign wealth fund Tesi. Debt financing was provided by Nordea, Armada Credit Partners, Danske Bank, Norion Bank, and Lahitapiola (Local Tapiola).

    Founded in 2020 by Ruben Bryon, DataCrunch offers GPU-based cloud services optimized for AI training and inference. The company operates four data centres in Finland and Iceland, with customers including Sony and Freepik. Its main Helsinki facility also recycles waste heat to warm parts of the city.

    Bryon said the company was created to serve early-stage startups priced out of hyperscaler platforms like AWS and Google Cloud. “For me, someone who was hacking away in the basement, I couldn’t find a service that aligned with what I wanted to achieve, the pricing was just completely out of whack” he said.

    Startups often struggle with quota restrictions from larger providers, Bryon added. “If you’re facing annoyances like quotas with the hyperscalers, that is often something that we can help our customers with to be much faster in making sure that the customer is not running out of compute on our platform.”

    The company pitches itself as a European hyperscaler alternative, particularly for security-sensitive clients unable to work with U.S. providers. “We have a growing number of customers which are much more security sensitive and which, by default, cannot really work with the US providers” Bryon noted.

    With the new capital, DataCrunch plans to expand its infrastructure footprint and deploy Nvidia’s latest B300 and GB30 GPU systems.

  • Stripe and Paradigm launch Tempo, a stablecoin-focused Layer 1 blockchain for payments

    Stripe and Paradigm launch Tempo, a stablecoin-focused Layer 1 blockchain for payments

    The $91.5B fintech and the crypto venture firm are building a new blockchain to power stablecoin payments, remittances, and AI-driven transactions.

    Stripe and Paradigm have teamed up to launch Tempo, a Layer 1 blockchain designed specifically for stablecoin payments. The project, long rumored in Silicon Valley, was announced Thursday and marks Stripe’s most direct foray into crypto infrastructure.

    Bonded by Paradigm’s co-founder and managing partner Matt Huang, who also sits on Stripe’s board, the venture already has 15 employees and has secured partnerships with Anthropic, OpenAI, Deutsche Bank, Shopify, and Revolut. Additional partners include Visa, Nubank, Coupang, DoorDash, Mercury, Standard Chartered, and Lead Bank.

    Stripe, valued at $91.5 billion, brings a massive payments customer base to the project. In 2024, it processed over $1 trillion in transactions, positioning Tempo to gain traction with enterprises that until now have hesitated to engage with crypto. “We think of Tempo as the payments-oriented L1, optimized for high-scale, real-world financial services applications” Stripe co-founder Patrick Collison wrote on X.

    Unlike most blockchains that issue native tokens, Tempo will not launch with its own cryptocurrency. Instead, it will rely on stablecoins such as USDC and Tether as “gas” for transaction fees, aligning with its payments-first focus.

    Paradigm said Tempo will target use cases including global payouts, remittances, microtransactions, tokenized deposits, and agentic payments—transactions executed by AI agents. Crypto advocates argue these are areas where blockchain technology can prove essential.

    Stripe incubated the project, but both firms emphasized that Tempo is designed to remain independent and “neutral.” Still, with Stripe and Paradigm as its first investors and customers including half the Fortune 500, Tempo is set to test whether a purpose-built payments blockchain can succeed where earlier networks have struggled.

  • Baseten raises $150M Series D at $2.15B valuation to scale AI inference platform

    Baseten raises $150M Series D at $2.15B valuation to scale AI inference platform

    The company reports 10x revenue growth in 12 months as it expands its infrastructure powering AI applications.

    Baseten, a San Francisco–based AI inference platform, has raised $150 million in Series D funding led by Bond, valuing the company at $2.15 billion. The raise comes just six months after Baseten’s $75 million Series C, nearly tripling its valuation.

    The company provides infrastructure that enables trained AI models to generate predictions and decisions—a process known as inference. Its platform helps enterprises deploy, manage, and scale applications powered by large language models, video generation models, and voice-to-text systems.

    CEO and co-founder Tuhin Srivastava said Baseten is “laying the train tracks so the models can run” supporting customers such as Abridge, OpenEvidence, Clay, Patreon, and Writer. He added that revenue grew more than 10x over the last year.

    New investors CapitalG, Premji, and Scribble joined the round, alongside existing backers Conviction, 01a, IVP, Spark, and Greylock. “Inference will be one of the biggest markets in AI” said Sarah Guo, Conviction founder. “Baseten has the leading product and the happiest customers in the category.”

    Jay Simons, general partner at Bond, described the company’s biggest challenge and opportunity as rapid growth. “Baseten carries an incredible amount of responsibility for its customers. It’s a critical service that needs to be absolutely bullet-proof” he said.

    Founded by Srivastava with Amir Haghighat, Philip Howes, and Pankaj Gupta, Baseten sees inference as the foundation of the AI economy. “We think AI applications are the last great market” Srivastava said. “If the market as a whole wins, we win.”

  • Flowbox acquires Dreaminfluence to expand UGC and influencer platform across Europe

    Flowbox acquires Dreaminfluence to expand UGC and influencer platform across Europe

    The Swedish SaaS firm now serves 1,000+ customers and reports nearly €9M in ARR following the deal.

    Flowbox, a Stockholm-based SaaS company focused on user-generated content (UGC), has acquired Danish influencer marketing platform Dreaminfluence. With the deal, Flowbox surpasses 1,000 customers across Europe and reports close to €9 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR).

    Founded in 2018 by Mikkel Malesa and Rasmus Tobiasen, Dreaminfluence’s platform has been used by more than 200 brands, including Estée Lauder, Mondelēz, and DK Company. The acquisition strengthens Flowbox’s position as Europe’s leading UGC platform, following its earlier merger with Spanish company Photoslurp.

    “This acquisition is a natural step in our mission to transform how brands and creators collaborate to drive e-commerce across Europe” said Flowbox CEO Eulogi Bordas. “By integrating Dreaminfluence’s UGC creator network with our platform, we’re building a unique end-to-end solution that empowers brands to seamlessly create, activate, and scale authentic content.”

    Dreaminfluence CEO Mads Wedderkopp, who will join Flowbox as chief revenue officer, said: “Flowbox quickly stood out as the best match. Creators and influencer marketing are central to Flowbox’s vision and growth strategy, and I couldn’t imagine a better home for our team and product.”

    The deal was financed entirely through Flowbox shares. Dreaminfluence’s largest shareholder was Danish brand incubator Blazar Capital, while Flowbox’s top shareholders include founder Marcus Carloni and Norwegian growth equity firm Viking Growth.

    “The acquisition of Dreaminfluence solidifies Flowbox’s ambition to serve our customers with a broader product portfolio in line with our growth strategy” said Eivind Bergsmyr, Flowbox chairman and partner at Viking Growth.

    Flowbox now employs more than 60 people across Stockholm, Barcelona, Amsterdam, and Copenhagen. Its customer base includes brands such as G-STAR, Desigual, Decathlon, and Intersport.

  • Aiomics raises €2M pre-seed to cut medical documentation time with AI platform

    Aiomics raises €2M pre-seed to cut medical documentation time with AI platform

    The Berlin startup’s system captures speech, handwriting, and documents in one workflow, easing Europe’s healthcare staffing crisis.

    Berlin-based Aiomics has raised €2 million in pre-seed funding at a €10 million valuation to tackle the documentation burden facing Europe’s healthcare sector. The round was led by Vorwerk Ventures with €1 million, joined by Calm/Storm, Norrsken Evolve, Rule30, and several angel investors including Konstantin Othmer, Nicolas Weber, Andrea Kranzer, and Markus Wild.

    The company is addressing a critical workforce challenge: Europe is projected to face a shortfall of 4.1 million health workers by 2030, with over 1.2 million already missing as of 2022. In the UK, clinicians spend an average of 13.5 hours per week on documentation, roughly a third of their working time. This administrative load reduces efficiency and drives burnout, with nearly one in three physicians considering leaving their roles.

    Aiomics’ AI-powered documentation platform integrates speech, handwriting, and existing records into a single validated workflow. It performs completeness and consistency checks through a human-in-the-loop system, producing structured, coded, and audit-secure data that feeds back into hospital IT systems. The result is fewer errors, faster reimbursements, and more time for patient care.

    “I used to choose between time for patients or for compliance” said a head therapist at a partner hospital. “With Aiomics, I regain time and improve compliance.”

    The startup was co-founded by Dr. Sven Jungmann, Dr. Nikita Tarasov, and Kirill Schitomirski, a lawyer with prior experience scaling the hospitality-tech platform Numa Group. While its team of four is currently all male, Aiomics is in late-stage discussions with a female product leader for its first hire, signaling a commitment to inclusive hiring practices.

    “Aiomics goes beyond transcription by reviewing and quality-assuring patient records before generating outputs” the company noted. Its platform uses multimodal capture and FHIR-based handoff to ensure validated, coded, and reconcilable outputs that align with EU regulations. The company is working toward ISO 13485/27001 certification and MDR compliance.

    With the new funding, Aiomics plans to expand across hospitals, rehab centers, and telemedicine providers, aiming to prove measurable reductions in documentation time and faster reimbursement cycles. It also plans to localize its platform for new European markets, starting with Sweden.

    “The clinical software landscape is undergoing a fundamental transformation” said Sascha Günther, partner at Vorwerk Ventures. “Unlike traditional software, AI can adapt more granularly to the realities of hospitals and specialties, enabling solutions like Aiomics to integrate faster and more seamlessly.”

  • Vouched raises $17M Series A to expand AI and human identity verification

    Vouched raises $17M Series A to expand AI and human identity verification

    The Seattle startup’s Know Your Agent platform unifies physical, digital, and AI identity checks into one adaptable system.

    Seattle-based Vouched has raised $17 million in a Series A round led by Spring Rock Ventures, bringing its total funding to $22 million. The company will use the capital to scale its Know Your Agent (KYA) platform, designed to secure identity verification for both humans and AI agents.

    Founded in 2019 by John Baird and John B. Cao, Vouched was created to address gaps in traditional identity systems. Baird’s earlier work at Blue Nile and in self-driving technology revealed inefficiencies that excluded millions from banking and healthcare access.

    “In healthcare, 1 in every 5 medical records is a potential duplicate, each costing $1,950 in administrative overhead” said CEO Peter Horadan. “On average, hospitals lose $17.4 million annually due to patient misidentification, and wrong-patient events expose providers to significant compliance and safety risks.”

    Vouched integrates verification of physical IDs, mobile driver’s licenses, and AI-powered identity assessments into one platform. Supporting more than 200 countries, it was among the first to use government-signed digital licenses that verify biometrics directly on-device.

    “What sets Vouched apart is that we don’t force customers into a one-size-fits-all approach” Horadan said. “Our workflow is fully customisable, so clients can strike the right balance between security and conversion.”

    The company is positioning itself as the trusted identity layer for industries where compliance and speed are essential, including finance, healthcare, and ecommerce. Vouched also addresses the emerging challenge of verifying AI-powered agents, preventing fraud and impersonation in digital transactions.

    Looking ahead, Vouched plans to expand its support for global physical IDs, accelerate adoption of digital credentials, and prepare for an era where AI agents autonomously transact securely. “The identity verification industry has been fragmented and outdated for too long” Horadan said. “With this round, Vouched is doubling down on delivering a single, modern identity layer.”

  • Alpic raises $6M pre-seed to launch MCP-native cloud platform for AI agents

    Alpic raises $6M pre-seed to launch MCP-native cloud platform for AI agents

    The Streamroot founders’ new venture aims to provide the infrastructure for AI agents to act directly on digital services.

    Paris-based Alpic has raised $6 million in pre-seed funding to build what it calls the first Model Context Protocol (MCP)-native cloud platform, designed specifically for AI agents. The round was led by Partech, with participation from K5 Global, Irregular Expression, Yellow, Drysdale, Kima Ventures, and Galion.exe, alongside angel investors from companies including Mistral, Datadog, and Dataiku.

    AI models have become adept at generating text and ideas, but enabling them to act—such as booking travel or updating records—has been hampered by workarounds like scraping websites or custom plugins. MCP, a protocol now adopted by major AI players, offers a secure and structured way for agents to connect to external services.

    “Agents need infrastructure built from the ground up, not retrofitted” said co-founder and CEO Pierre-Louis Theron. “The real potential of agents lies in their ability to interact with the digital world around them.”

    Alpic provides a developer platform for deploying and managing MCP servers in minutes, with built-in security, analytics, and tooling. The company says this reduces operational complexity and speeds up production for agent-accessible services.

    The founding team previously built Streamroot, a video delivery startup that helped media companies adapt to streaming. With Alpic, they see parallels between the rise of streaming and the coming shift to agent-first computing.

    “Agent-first protocols like MCP could be as foundational to AI as HTTP was two decades ago to the internet” said Boris Golden, general partner at Partech. “Alpic has the deep infrastructure experience and timing to shape how they will be adopted.”

    After deploying dozens of MCP servers with early customers this summer, Alpic has opened its platform to public beta. The funding will support further product development and scaling as the company positions itself as infrastructure for agent-first computing.

  • TrustNXT raises €1.6M pre-seed to protect images and videos from AI manipulation

    TrustNXT raises €1.6M pre-seed to protect images and videos from AI manipulation

    The Basler spin-off will expand its deep tech platform for securing visual data in industries from insurance to public safety.

    Hamburg-based TrustNXT, a computer vision and cybersecurity startup spun out of Basler AG, has raised €1.6 million in pre-seed financing. The round was backed by D11Z.Ventures and High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF).

    The company is developing a deep tech software platform that combines cryptography, computer vision, and patented trust technology to guarantee the authenticity of image and video data. Its solution ensures data integrity in security-critical B2B processes, a growing concern as AI tools make it increasingly easy to generate convincing forgeries.

    “In a world where AI can generate deceptively real images in seconds, trust and data integrity are crucial” said co-founder and managing director Ariane Scheer-Danielsson. “Our mission is to secure this integrity for companies.”

    TrustNXT’s first industry focus is insurance, where its software helps detect manipulated photos of damages. The startup says its technology can automate claims and underwriting processes without human review—cutting costs and reducing fraud.

    “We are excited about the cryptography technology used by TrustNXT” said Patrick Krönlein, principal at D11Z.Ventures. “It generates a technically unique fingerprint of the sensor data at the point of origin. This prevents manipulation and proves the origin of digital content beyond doubt.”

    Tizian Hoppen, senior investment manager at HTGF, added: “Trust is the foundation of a functioning economy. Today, important decisions are based on digital media such as photos and videos. TrustNXT has impressed us with its digital trust technology, which is based on years of deep tech research.”

    The company plans to extend its platform to real-time protection for industrial video data, with pilot projects slated for 2026. Founded in 2024, TrustNXT combines expertise in image processing and cybersecurity to secure digital business processes and create trust in complex environments.

  • Zefir raises €15M Series B to expand AI-driven real estate platform

    Zefir raises €15M Series B to expand AI-driven real estate platform

    The French startup has powered €600M in annualised sales and is now launching ZIA, an AI assistant for home buyers.

    Paris-based real estate marketplace Zefir has raised €15 million in a Series B round led by FinTech Collective, bringing its total funding to €50 million. Existing backers Sequoia Capital, Zigg Capital, and Heartcore Capital joined the round, alongside new investors TX Ventures and FJ Labs.

    Founded in 2020, Zefir uses AI to simplify and accelerate residential property transactions. The company says its platform has supported more than €600 million in annualized home sales by nearly halving transaction times and boosting agent revenues.

    Until now, Zefir has focused on helping sellers. With the launch of its AI-powered home-search assistant, ZIA, the company is expanding to the buy side. ZIA functions as a digital buyer’s agent, helping users filter listings, compare options, and secure viewings more efficiently.

    “Now we’re doing the same for buyers” said co-founder and CEO Rémy Fabre. “In a market where they have no agent on their side, our AI assistant gives them clarity, speed, and confidence.”

    The company says homes sell nearly twice as fast on its platform, with agents earning up to €100,000 more annually. By qualifying buyers before they reach an agent, ZIA reduces wasted enquiries and helps professionals close deals more quickly. Over 4,500 agents are already using the platform.

    “Zefir has already transformed the sell-side experience in France” said Toby Triebel, partner at FinTech Collective. “With ZIA, they’re now bringing that same innovation to buyers—delivering a rare trifecta of network effects, transactional velocity, and AI-driven utility.”

    Fabre sees Zefir as a unifying infrastructure for European real estate, where AI can make transactions faster and more transparent. The new funding will support expansion into France’s 15 largest cities, continued product development, and team growth, with headcount set to double by 2026.