Amsterdam-based investment fintech Change is to sell a majority stake to Swiss-based private equity firm Andromeda Capital Partners founded by Ingmar Mattus. The deal will set the mobile-first multi-asset brokerage platform, which includes cryptocurrencies, stocks, derivatives, and yielding assets, on a course to become a global player.
Under the terms of the transaction, Andromeda Capital Partners Suisse AG will increase its stake in Change from 10% to 51%. Mattus’ Swiss private equity fund will acquire the shares held by Change founder Kristjan Kangro. The transaction is subject to approval by the Dutch regulator, which is expected to take place during October.
Kangro, who started building the trading platform at the age of 24, said that Mattus is the right majority shareholder for Change. “He has the experience and ambition to take Change to the next level,” Kangro said. Change was co-founded by Kangro and Gustav Liblik, with the help of early team members Alice Tärk and Marek Pajussaar, who are still part of the company today. “We started operating in 2016, focusing only on cryptocurrency. Since then, Change has raised over €22 million in funding from investors and today we offer almost all possible asset classes on our platform. We’ve grown our customer base to 130,000 users and cover all 27 European Union countries. We’ve achieved all this by offering the most convenient and lowest-cost investment services to help you grow your money,” he added.
Notably, Change is the second tech company Kangro has founded that’s been acquired. His first company was an automated scheduling platform in the Netherlands, which was acquired in 2016.
Mattus is a seasoned investment professional with a proven track record of success. He is the Co-Founder and Director of Tickmill, a 300-employee investment platform headquartered in London with six licensed firms around the world and 100,000 clients with nearly 10 million trading transactions per month. Mattus said that he plans to take Change global and into profit. “Change has great potential to expand and provide the best possible services while being profitable,” he said.
To ensure that Change is well-capitalized, Mattus will lead the new €1 million investment round with Kangro and board member and former DHL CEO Roger Alan Crook. The fundraising will allow Change to offer its clients an even wider range of investment instruments. “As a result of the transaction and the fundraising, we will be able to offer our clients even more convenient ways to invest,” Mattus said.
The acquisition of Change by Andromeda Capital Partners Suisse AG is a significant development in the European fintech space. It is a sign that the industry is maturing and that there is a growing demand for mobile-first, multi-asset platforms that offer convenient and low-cost ways to invest. Change is well-positioned to capitalize on this trend and become a leading global player in the investment space.
