附近上门

鈥檚 mission is to drive financial inclusion of immigrants moving to the United States. Now armed with $35 million in Series B funding, it will continue developing its ecosystem of financial tools and subscription services.

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The Los Angeles-based company was founded in 2010 by and as a digital platform providing immigrants and their multi-generational families with the ecosystem required to thrive in the U.S.

Both co-founders have a background in education and are part of first-generation immigrant families. They saw the difficulties family members had navigating financial services in the U.S. and wanted to establish a trusted resource for finance, health care and education. Its initial consumer-facing brand, SABEResPODER, meaning “Knowledge is Power,” provides educational resources to the Hispanic community.

鈥淲e are focused on connecting immigrants to resources they need,鈥� Hemmat told 附近上门 News. 鈥淕iven where data and technology are today, we鈥檝e never seen any sort of digital 鈥楨llis Island.鈥� We are building a better operating system that looks at an immigrant鈥檚 journey and connects them to financial services, as well as education.鈥�

, and co-led the Series B, which also included participation from , , and . The new raise gives Welcome Tech a total of $50 million of funding to date, according to Hemmat. This includes an round in March 2020, led by Crosscut.

More than 44.9 million immigrants lived in the United States in 2019, with 50 percent entering after 2000, . The average Welcome Tech user finds the company after they have been in the U.S. for five years or more, but the goal is to be relevant to folks when they initially arrive or within the first three years, Hemmat said.

鈥淢ost people spend the first three or five years in a new country to go to school or start a job, with the intent on returning to their home country,鈥� Hemmat said. 鈥淭hey then realize there are other opportunities. They meet a spouse, have kids and decide to plant roots, and want to navigate where they need to go.鈥�

, co-founder and managing director of Crosscut Ventures, sits on Welcome Tech鈥檚 board and said his relationship with Hemmat goes back 10 years. When Hemmat told him about Welcome Tech鈥檚 vision for rewriting immigration, it resonated with him and Crosscut, he said.

鈥淎mir and his team have created a vision that combines a mission-oriented company with deep technical talent,鈥� Garrett said. 鈥淭here are 10 neobanks that have raised between $100 million and $500 million, targeting millennials with low-cost banking solutions. Welcome Tech is instead appealing to a very underserved market, so there is a low cost of acquisition, and they are monetizing it. Its platform is very penetrated with smartphones and app interfaces so that it is not only engageable, but customized and personalized for this demographic.鈥�

Meanwhile, Welcome Tech is approaching 3 million active users, and the new funding will be used to scale and grow the company, as well as introduce new products, such as a fee-free bank account.

鈥淚mmigrants have gravitated toward digital experiences, but what we see in certain key services, such as financial services, is unfortunately highly inefficient and predatory,鈥� Hemmat said. 鈥淐ompanies typically extract value from this type of consumer, but we are creating value for them.鈥�

Feature photo of Amir Hemmat courtesy of Welcome Tech.
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