Finance Awards 2018

Wealth & Finance International - 2018 Finance Awards 11 Established in 2013 by Xavier Corman (CEO), David Van der Looven (CCMO) and Jon McLennan (CTO), Edebex has flourished since inception thanks to its innovative solution. This was created by the firm’s Founders and acts as an innovative B2B finance and investment solution where companies in need for working capital can sell their non-due receivables to other companies that have an excess of cash available: all within less than 72 hours. All invoices are covered by the world leader in credit insurance, Euler Hermes. Edebex already financed more than 260 million euros of invoices and has recently grown from start-up to scale-up. The platform is today available for sellers in different countries in the Eurozone (France, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Portugal) and accepts invoices from debtors located in France, Benelux, Portugal, UK, Germany, Switzerland and Italy. Today, the company has two different types of direct clients: companies that sell invoices and companies that buy invoices. The Edebex platform offers sellers a simple, fast and flexible financing solution that allows them to strengthen their cash flow position. They can choose when, what and how much financing they need for their company and they don’t need to give any personal guarantee. The costs of using the platform are completely transparent. A disruptive feature is that the accessibility to financing is solely based on the quality of the debtor of the invoice and not on the financial situation of the company in need for working capital as is the standard in financial markets. For investors, the platform represents a unique investment opportunity combining high security, high liquidity and attractive return. Investors are companies, regardless of their size, that have liquidities they would like to invest in the short term, are willing to take the risk of buying an invoice and wish to achieve a better return on their investment than what is available on today’s financial markets. Since the beginning, Edebex chose to apply a strategy of continuous expansion with the adagio that the firm should always be able to achieve break-even within 6-8 months. Putting this adagio into test, break-even was reached in barely four months beginning of 2018. The ingredients for this strong financial performance are growth (scale), a hand on critical mind and objectives. Together, these techniques have helped the firm to achieve its goals. Seeking to build upon this incredible achievement, the firm looks forward to a bright and exciting future. As an innovative and constantly evolving company, Edebex always challenges its established ways of working. The company is currently upgrading its Offering a truly unique solution, Edebex supports a range of clients with their B2B finance platform. We profile the firm to gain an insight into how it came to achieve the incredible success it enjoys today. Best B2B Financing Marketplace 2018 Edebex Edebex Oct18588 internal platform based on an in-depth analysis of the existing user experience. The new version will be launched at the beginning of 2019 and will offer many new features that will enhance the usability. The main goal is to facilitate processes even more for both sellers and buyers. Besides, efforts are being made to increase retention of existing clients by implementing an individualised follow-up. The focus is on strengthening the company’s dominant market position in the existing countries France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Portugal. However, should an opportunity arise at a good moment to enter a new country, the management team is open to seize it. In terms of staffing, Edebex will continue to hire new employees to handle the continuous growth. Additionally, as the interest of the traditional key players towards the Edebex model is growing, the team is looking into the opening of a white label offer in the near future. Ultimately, all of these plans will help Edebex to achieve its mission: facilitating access to working capital for SMEs to support their growth and survival. This business model of Edebex was born as a reaction to the aftermath of the 2008/2009 financial and economic world crisis. The result was that cash poor SMEs faced a hard time getting access to finance solutions with the traditional finance actors to sustain or grow their business. Cash rich companies on the other side could not find any secured investment with banks that also offered an attractive return. By creating an online meeting place for those parties with complementary needs, Edebex found an innovative solution outside the traditional finance sector to help both parties on their needs, and enhancing and improving this will remain central to the company’s ongoing approach. Company: Edebex Name: David Van der Looven Email: [email protected] Address: Rue Jules Cockx 10 box 2, 1160 Brussels, Belgium Telephone Number: +32 2 245 45 45 Web Address: edebex.com