Madrid-based fintech Fuell is reinventing B2B financial services through a corporate credit card that brings together for the first time the equipment, payment, and accounting means. A card designed for the needs of an efficient company, according to Eduardo Ortiz de Lanzagorta González, CEO of Fuell.
This Madrid fintech has just closed a €1.5M round led by Y Combinator and Fin Capital. US business angels Michael Levinthal and Andy Cohen also participated in the round, and have previously invested in fintech companies Concur, Divvy or Clara. The capital raised will be put toward consolidating Fuell’s Spanish and Portuguese markets and launching in Italy.
Fuell helps companies better manage and organize expenses via corporate cards and employee reimbursements. The company automates expenses management enabling employees, accountants, and CFOs to save money and time. With only two clicks, the Fuell platform synchronizes expenses within companies’ accounting software. Teams can then monitor employee spending in real-time, track and assign card usage controls per employee, as well as instantly send money to employees. Users can also currently earn 3% cashback on all expenses made with Fuell corporate cards.
Additionally, Fuell automatically converts receipts into invoices to support companies recovering VAT in more than 500,000 restaurants, parking lots, and cabs. Due to Tax Agency approval, companies don’t need physical copies of receipts, so if an inspection takes place, companies can submit digital versions of receipts from the Fuell platform.
Story of a corporate card
Eduardo Ortiz de Lanzagorta started his first VC-backed fintech while finishing his engineering degree. Subsequently, he co-founded what became in 2014 the most active seed fund in Spain, backing more than 40 companies. Throughout these years, he suffered the pain of managing and controlling company expenses and decided to build Fuell, the corporate card with integrated expense management software he wanted for himself, that has been backed by investors like TheVentureCity, K Fund, Telefónica (Wayra), Fin Capital and Y Combinator.
Eduardo Ortiz de Lanzagorta González, CEO of Fuell, says “We have grown quietly, without investing in marketing, supported by the recommendations of our customers. Now we are going to step on the accelerator. It took us more than a year to reach 10,000 cumulative transactions, and we are adding that amount every month.”
Fernando Dal Re, Partner at TheVentureCity, the fund that invested in Fuell’s first round in May 2020, says: “We have worked with Eduardo and Fuell’s team from the moment they started, with a special focus on the product and data. Today, we are excited to see how the company has found a sustained growth path on a very solid product with great engagement and an incredible retention rate. The space is hot, the team is strong and Fuell has all the necessary ingredients to be the key player in Southern Europe.”
Fuell helps companies be more business efficient, streamlining operations and administration. Its clients range from startups to publicly-traded companies in various sectors such as tech, hospitality, audiovisual, construction, and commerce. Existing customers include Grupo Solutia, Coverwind Solutions, Docuten, Aloha Poke, and LaMucca.
Fuell is a recent graduate of Y Combinator, the number one accelerator in the world, which has backed the likes of Airbnb, Stripe, and Dropbox. In the latest cohort, the acceptance rate was a competitive 2.4%. Fuell is the eleventh Spanish startup to be accepted by the accelerator since its inception in 2005.
