SINGAPORE, Nov. 23, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Sleek, a fintech startup that is disrupting the traditional corporate services industry, has raised US $4M in a new funding round. Led by SEEDS Capital, the investment arm of Enterprise Singapore, the funding was also joined by MI8 Limited, a Hong-Kong multi-family office, and investor Pierre Lorinet.
Founded in Singapore by Julien Labruyere and Adrien Barthel, Sleek strives to become every entrepreneur's operating system with its wide range of services from company incorporation and on-going compliance management, to digital accounting and tax filing in Singapore and Hong Kong.
The Sleek in-house platform
The cloud-based solution, with an AI-driven customer platform and automations, makes Sleek five times more efficient compared to traditional service providers in the industry. To Sleek, the vision is to develop highly efficient digital products to improve user experience, while allowing the internal team to focus on advising customers, and helping their companies to thrive in any business environment. Sleek currently manages a fast-growing portfolio of more than 3,000 companies with almost $10M in cash Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), reaching operating financial breakeven a few months ago.
The latest $4M fundraising round was led by existing investors MI8 and Pierre Lorinet, joined by SEEDS Capital - the investment arm of Enterprise Singapore (ESG), a Singapore government agency under the Ministry of Trade & Industry. Prominent angel investors also joined the round – namely, Varun Mittal, cofounder of the Singapore Fintech Association, as part of the Sequoia Capital Scout program. The funding will be used to expand to new markets in Asia and develop digital tools to bring the best-in-class corporate and financial services to entrepreneurs, investors, and SMEs.
"Sleek's innovative digitally-enabled solutions are well positioned to disrupt traditional corporate secretarial services, allowing entrepreneurs to spend more time creating value for their companies and customers, and less on administrative back-office tasks", said Geoffrey Yeo, General Manager of SEEDS Capital. "We see new opportunities created by the accelerated pace of digitisation of business and processes amidst the pandemic, and are excited to support Sleek in their journey to introduce next-generation corporate and financial services to small and growing enterprises."
Despite stiff competition, Sleek's innovative and customer-centric approach has earned itself as a leading competitive player in the rather traditional industry. Sleek developed in-house its entire technology stack and Machine Learning models for legal document classification to ensure a smoother customer experience, with innovative side projects such as SleekSign - the first free, unlimited, and legally binding electronic signature in Asia. The company has also recently launched a corporate insurance desk to provide assistance to companies in need.
Looking onward to 2021, Sleek aims to double down on product development and growth. "It has been extremely humbling to experience the growth we've seen at Sleek over the last 3 years, even more so amidst the global pandemic which has been a growth catalyst for fully digital players like us," Labruyere said. "With the new funding, we will launch more platform functionalities and new business verticals in the near future to enhance the overall customer experience. Ultimately, we envision Sleek to be the go-to digital platform for all entrepreneurs setting up in Singapore, Hong Kong, and beyond!"
See Annex for full details on Sleek.
For more information on Sleek and its service offerings, please visit: https://sleek.com
About Sleek
Sleek makes the lives of entrepreneurs and investors easier.
We incorporate companies in Hong Kong and Singapore, and help them manage their governance, accounting and tax matters using technology. We launched our services in Singapore in 2017, and expanded into Hong Kong in 2019, because we were frustrated at how slow and paper-based the incorporation and company registration process was. Since our launch, we have incorporated thousands of happy companies, offering 100% digital incorporation, company secretary, and accounting services.
