Serena Ventures is backing SoLo Funds as the finance platform surpasses 1 million registered users and over 1.3 million downloads, according to TechCrunch. The company hit the market in 2021 with a $10 million Series A funding.
Rodney Williams, co-founder and president of SoLo Funds, says that the new benchmarks make it “the largest and first Black-owned personal finance platform” to reach those marks, adding that “as a business-to-consumer personal finance banking solution, U.S.-based and Black-owned with registered users or downloads above 1 million. Black-owned is defined as Black majority ownership.”
It marks an impressive turnaround for the company, which had to shit down towards the end of 2019 because it ran out of money, but is now soaring following their official relaunch in April 2020 with what Williams says is a better product and new features, including protection for lenders.
“It’s a huge testament to the product we’ve built, that it is actually addressing a real problem,” Williams said of the milestones. “The system is somewhat discriminatory or selective, in that it’s extremely expensive to start a financial services company. That cost is a significant barrier of entry for the average American who are the ones that need these financial services. It’s challenging across the board.”
Williams said the company is on pace to more than triple that transaction volume to over $1 billion by the first quarter of 2024, demonstrating that the company is not slowing down their marked success.
