British digital bank Zopa is hiring two top executives to boost expansion and prepare for a public offering.
The SoftBank-backed firm, which offers credit cards, personal loans, and savings accounts, tells CNBC that it has appointed Moonpig’s former CTO, Peter Donlon, as its CTO.
As chief operational officer, the business hired Kate Erb, a KPMG certified accountant with over 20 years of financial services expertise.
Leeds Building Society’s last operations director was Erb.
In 2021, Donlon led Moonpig’s £1.2 billion public IPO. Moonpig’s market worth is £518 million, suggesting a tech stock collapse. Its share price is £151.
Zopa hired him to mature and expand users in preparation for an IPO. Last year, Zopa planned to go public, but increasing interest rates hurt high-growth tech businesses and the stock market tanked.
If public market opinion changes, CEO Jaidev Janardana said the bank might float by mid-next year. He said that would need public markets to reopen.
“We haven’t had great IPOs,” he told CNBC at London Tech Week. “I want some successful IPOs.”
Banks and IT businesses have low public market values.
Liquidity was his second point. “A public company needs enough liquidity to be truly public. Shares should be easily traded.”
A Zopa representative told CNBC the firm will soon exceed 1 million customers. It wants 5 million users in the future. It competes with big banks and fintechs like Monzo, Revolut, and Starling.
Janardana advised mergers and acquisitions, small business loans, and open banking, which allows banks and third-party corporations to share data, to develop the company.
This year, investors gave Zopa £75 million ($95.9 million).
“Open,” he said. “We are interested in using open banking, infrastructure, and data to provide holistic customer experiences.”
We also like SME financing.
Zopa became profitable monthly in April 2022. Zopa expects full-year profitability by 2024.
Crypto is Janardana’s least-wanted product. The finance executive, who has led Zopa since 2014, claimed bitcoin “is not great for the retail consumer today.”
“I’m not convinced of crypto yet,” he remarked. “It’s a complicated product people don’t understand, so we never offered it.”