Sardine has successfully raised $145 million over three funding rounds, with its most recent Series C round led by Activant Capital. The platform specializes in AI-driven risk management, offering comprehensive tools for fraud prevention, credit, and compliance.
Keep reading to explore the intricacies of Sardine's fundraising journey and the investors backing this innovative platform.
What Is Sardine?
Sardine, founded by Zahid Shaikh, is a company that specializes in AI-driven risk management solutions for fintech, crypto, and web3 companies. The company aims to make payments instant, global, and risk-free by providing comprehensive tools for fraud prevention, credit underwriting, and compliance.
With locations in Austin, New York City, and San Francisco, Sardine has grown to employ between 51-200 people. The platform's modular building blocks include fraud prevention, KYC/AML compliance, transaction monitoring, bot detection, and ATO protection.
Sardine's mission is to enable companies to move money confidently, allowing them to focus on growth rather than dealing with fraud. The platform is used by leading banks, online retailers, and fintechs to automate risk decisioning and protect customers from scams.
How Much Funding Has Sardine Raised?
- Series A Round
- Amount Raised: $19.5 million
- Date: February 2022
- Lead Investors: Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), led by Angela Strange
- Motivation Behind the Round: To expand its fraud detection capabilities and grow its client base.
- Series B Round
- Amount Raised: $51.5 million
- Date: September 20, 2022
- Lead Investors: Andreessen Horowitz's (a16z) Growth Fund, led by Alex Immerman
- Motivation Behind the Round: To further expand its client base, enhance its fraud detection technology, and push into core banking processes.
- Series C Round
- Amount Raised: $75 million
- Date: September 2023
- Lead Investors: Activant Capital
- Valuation at Round: $1 billion (~estimated)
- Motivation Behind the Round: To scale operations, enter new markets, and invest in product development.
Sardine has raised a total of $146 million with a current valuation of $1 billion (~estimated).
Key Investors
- Andreessen Horowitz (a16z)
- Details: Andreessen Horowitz is a prominent venture capital firm based in Silicon Valley. It was founded by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz in 2009.
- Investment Focus Areas: Technology, fintech, healthcare.
- Notable Investments: Coinbase, Facebook, Airbnb.
- Activant Capital
- Details: Activant Capital is a growth equity firm that invests in technology companies. It was founded by Steve Sarracino in 2015.
- Investment Focus Areas: Technology, e-commerce, fintech.
- Notable Investments: Better.com, Bolt, Deliverr.
- Nyca Partners
- Details: Nyca Partners is a venture capital firm focused on fintech. It was founded by Hans Morris, a former President of Visa.
- Investment Focus Areas: Fintech, payments, blockchain.
- Notable Investments: Acorns, Affirm, Revolut.
- Sound Ventures
- Details: Sound Ventures is a venture capital firm co-founded by Ashton Kutcher and Guy Oseary. The firm invests in early to growth-stage companies.
- Investment Focus Areas: Technology, media, consumer products.
- Notable Investments: Uber, Airbnb, Spotify.
- Google Ventures (GV)
- Details: Google Ventures is the venture capital arm of Alphabet Inc. It was founded in 2009 and focuses on funding innovative startups.
- Investment Focus Areas: Technology, healthcare, AI.
- Notable Investments: Uber, Slack, Nest.
What's Next for Sardine?
As Sardine looks to the future, the opportunities are vast. The company is poised to expand into core banking processes and form partnerships with large banks in the U.S. and Europe. With its unique instant ACH and card onramp to crypto, Sardine is well-positioned to capture a significant share of the fintech and traditional banking markets.
Given these opportunities, future fundraising rounds seem likely. Existing investors like Andreessen Horowitz and potential new backers such as Visa and Google Ventures may show interest. However, Sardine will face challenges, including competition from other fraud detection startups and the need to maintain the accuracy of its algorithms. Balancing rapid growth with these challenges will be crucial for Sardine's continued success.
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