spektr, a fintech company set to change ongoing due diligence processes in the financial sector, has €5 million from Northzone (an early investor in Klarna, TrueLayer, Personio among others), Danish PreSeed Ventures’ tech fund PSV Tech01 (Vivino and Trustpilot), and pan-European Seedcamp. Both PreSeed Ventures and Seedcamp were also investors of HelloFlow.
With a platform designed to transform the historically cost-heavy compliance operations into a more efficient and risk-aware process, spektr is poised to make a significant impact on the industry.
Behind spektr is a team of experienced serial entrepreneurs, including CEO Mikkel Skarnager, Ciprian Florescu, Jérémy Joly, and Jan-Erik Wagner. Skarnager and Florescu successfully sold their previous startup HelloFlow to Canadian company Trulioo in 2022.
spektr’s platform offers financial companies an automated solution for risk assessments, customizable to adhere to rules and laws across different markets. Recognizing the exponential growth of the compliance field globally, with an estimated cost of $10k per employee in larger financial companies, spektr aims to simplify risk-based monitoring with a user-friendly platform that does not require specialized IT skills for the user.
“With the spektr-platform, we can make ongoing due diligence an efficient function with commercial value for companies rather than being a costly expense. When looking at the explosion in the number of employees and expenses, I am convinced that there is great potential in making compliance a better business,” said CEO Mikkel Skarnager. “We’re off to an incredible start, thanks to both the platform and the generous support from our investors. This journey brings back memories of our success with HelloFlow, but this time, we’re aiming for something even bigger and long-lasting,” he added.
The foundation of spektr lies in an experienced team with knowledge of building a company, seeing a potential gap in the due diligence market, and delivering an innovative platform. Due to this, venture funds Northzone, PreSeed Ventures, and Seedcamp have invested substantial funds to support the early growth of spektr.
Principal at Northzone, Maxine Rior, commented: “We are incredibly excited to partner with spektr. They are an exceptional team with a very clear product vision, and we believe they will be able to leverage their experience from HelloFlow to build spektr into a category-defining company within the compliance space.”
General Partner in PSV Tech01, Alexander Viterbo-Horten, added: “As one of the earliest investors in Mikkel and Ciprian’s first startup HelloFlow, I’ve been fortunate enough to get to know them very well. Their execution power and strategic understanding of the financial compliance market are profoundly impressive This makes spektr one of the best bets on a future unicorn out of Denmark. It’s a true testament to that, that we’re several investors from the first journey who decided to invest again.”
Partner at Seedcamp, Tom Wilson, said: “We’re delighted to have the opportunity to back Mikkel and Ciprian as they go again with spektr. The HelloFlow journey gave us a taste of the market-leading products they can build and we’re excited to see where they can take spektr, building on that experience.”
