Amid the Pandemic, "Neo-bank" Lucy Secures USD370k in an all Women Funding Round, Bringing Total Raised to over USD750k

    SINGAPORE, November 11, 2020 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Lucy secured S$500,000.00 (USD370k) from an all-women pre-seed round in September 2020. This brings total funding to date to just over S$1,000,000.00 (USD750k). Initial founder funding came from Debbie Watkins (ex MD of Fern Software APMEA), Hal Bosher (ex CEO of Yoma Bank, and Chairman of Wave Money), Luke Janssen (ex CEO and Chairman of Tigerspike), and the Savearth fund.

The list of 19 women investors comes from almost every continent, from countries including the UK, the United States, Singapore, Somalia, Mexico, India, Indonesia, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam and Germany. (See https://welucy.com/team-lucy/)

"Relevant and affordable financial services are needed now more than ever, to prevent the gender gap from widening even further," Debbie Watkins, CEO of Lucy says. "I have seen first hand the huge and immediate positive impact that successful female-led small businesses can have on the lives of families and communities, and during these challenging times we should do everything we can to support them. I am very pleased and humbled by the support from this amazing group of women investors. Their support is critical to achieving Lucy's mission to empower female entrepreneurs," she explained. "With the help of the wonderfully diverse team of women founding members, Lucy will be able to support the economy, which in so many countries is heavily reliant on micro and small businesses, in bouncing back as fast as possible."

"I am no expert in FinTech; but I am deeply passionate about enabling women from all walks of life to be self-sufficient; empowered; and to create something amazing," says Sarah Boyd, Managing Director South East Asia of Sephora. "Lucy for me represents the opportunity to help women financially as well as with advice and support from an equally passionate community, guiding them on their road to fulfilment."

Luke Janssen, Chairman of Lucy says: "The main goal for the pre seed round was to bring on a diverse group of successful women as founder members to inspire and help our future Lucy customers as they found and built their companies. We achieved this earlier than we expected and raised more money than we needed at this stage. Over 90% of Lucy's investors are women and we are now looking toward specific gender lens VCs for our coming seed round."

According to the International Trade Center, COVID-19 strongly "affected 64% of women-led firms, compared with 52% of men-led companies." Similarly the World Bank has reported how women-owned SMEs are 6% more likely to close their businesses than male-owned. These numbers are a reminder of how it's critical to focus on rebuilding with a gender lens.

For more information, visit: https://welucy.com/ or contact Vriti Wadhwa at [email protected] to organise an interview with Debbie, Hal or Luke.

Link to our video: https://youtu.be/xP2wcOBjEfc

Lucy is a mobile app designed from the ground up to provide entrepreneurial women everywhere with the tools needed to take control of financial future.

Built to help women entrepreneurs who are overlooked, underestimated, and underbanked become unstoppable.

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