Israeli digital payments company Rapyd is in talks to raise $300 million at a company valuation of $3.5 billion, "Bloomberg" reports, according to people familiar with the matter. This is a 60% cut on the valuation of $9 billion it received at the peak of the tech boom in the summer of 2021.
Rapyd became a dizzying success oduring the high-tech bubble in 2020-2022, holding huge extravagant parties for staff with budgets of millions of dollars, rented extensive office space in Tel Aviv's Azrieli Towers while CEO Arik Shtilman, regularly released optimistic statements about the company's growth.
The Israeli company became an international payments giant at the beginning of the decade, challenging rivals like Stripe and PayPal, in part by offering small, medium and large businesses outside the US the ability to accept payments through a larger number of channels including banks, credit companies, digital wallets and payment companies, some of which are niche regions like Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
In addition to large offices in Tel Aviv and London, Rapyd opened a big office in Dubai in 2022, when it hired over 100 employees. In Tel Aviv, Rapyd leased 27,500 square meters of office space from Azrieli Group for five years in the Triangle Tower and the Spiral Tower, which is under construction, for a total of NIS 250 million.
Since the tech crisis began in 2022 following the hike in interest rates, Rapyd has held several rounds of layoffs, shedding several dozen employees in November 2022, due to streamlining following acquisition of Icelandic payments company Valitor. In August 2023, the company fired 20% of its workforce worldwide, including in Israel and in June 2024 an additional 30 employees were laid off out of 800 employees. Currently, according to LinkedIn, Rapyd has roughly 630 employees.
During the three years of the tech crisis, the value of many unicorns has shrunk, particularly of fintech companies, which have suffered the largest decline in value of the tech sectors. Other fintech companies have been forced to absorb large declines in value every time they seek to raise a new financial round. Stripe was compelled to reduce its valuation from $74 billion during the boom years to about $50 billion last year. Swedish "buy now, pay later" company Klarna unexpectedly cut its valuation from $45 billion to $6.7 billion in 2022. Since these are private companies, their valuation remains constant as long as they do not raise new capital, but now – according to reports – Rapyd is interested in acquiring a new company and is forced to undergo a valuation update for the first time in three and a half years.
RELATED ARTICLES
Founded nine years ago, Rapyd's investors include Target Global, a European investment fund managed by Israelis, which led the fintech company's most recent finance round at a $9 billion valuation. Other investors, according to PitchBook, include General Catalyst, Coatue, SoftBank, Tal Ventures, and Durable Capital Partners.
Rapyd declined to comment when contacted by "Globes."
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on February 9, 2025.
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2025.
