Clearbanc Raises $300M to Fund Today’s Most Exciting Online Brands and Launches Venture Partner Program

Clearbanc, the company changing the way companies raise money by providing fast, affordable growth capital, announced it has raised $300M USD in new financing. The equity investment was led by Highland Capital and existing investors Inovia and Emergence Capital, and the financing facility was led by Arcadia Funds and Upper90. Funding will fuel Clearbanc’s sales and engineering team expansion and scale the growth capital available to portfolio companies. Dan Nova, General Partner at Highland Capital, is joining the board of directors.

Venture capital isn’t the best solution for every business, especially for online brands who have found product-market fit and just need faster, more affordable access to capital to fuel ad spend. Unlike traditional VC that dilutes founders, or venture debt that saddles cap tables with costly warrants, Clearbanc can invest from $10,000 to $10 million in less than a day using its data-driven, machine learning funding model. 

Clearbanc’s proprietary model democratizes access to capital, making investment decisions without bias by assessing the financial performance of a company — ignoring gender, race, or location of the brand. At a time when only 2.2% of all US venture capital goes to female-founded companies and many states in the US didn’t receive any VC at all, Clearbanc has funded 8X the number of women and more states than any other traditional fund across the entire United States and Canada. 

“It might seem counterintuitive to be raising capital, but it’s quite strategic — we’re raising more capital to build a new asset class,” says Michele Romanow, Co-Founder and President of Clearbanc. “Equity is part of an entrepreneur’s toolkit, but we fundamentally believe it’s the wrong tool to fund the repeatable parts of your business like digital ad spend. We encourage companies to spend equity on technical risk & R&D, and that’s exactly where we’re putting this Series B.”

Leveraging the speed of the 20-Min Term Sheet, Clearbanc has already invested in more than 1,000 companies across 43 states in 2019 who will generate more than $1.5 billion in revenue this year. Customers span small businesses across the United States and Canada to some of the fastest growing consumer brands today, like Le Tote, Leesa Sleep, Buffy and Public Goods. 

“Clearbanc is democratizing access to capital in a way in which we have never seen before,” said Dan Nova, General Partner at Highland Capital Partners. “Investing in Clearbanc is investing in entrepreneurship. We are proud to be backing an experienced, proven team with an industry-leading solution addressing enormous global demand.”
 
Introducing the Venture Partner Program 

One of the benefits of taking on capital from a traditional fund is getting access to expert guidance. With that in mind, Clearbanc is launching a Venture Partner Network to give founders access to mentorship as well as financial and strategic knowledge. 

The Network gathers some of the greatest minds in e-commerce, direct-to-consumer, B2B, and venture capital. The program’s founding partners at launch include Gary Vaynerchuck of VaynerMedia, Jason Finger of Seamless & Upper90, Ryan Hoover of Product Hunt, Jack Abraham of Hims & Atomic, Jesse Horwitz of Hubble Contacts, Morgan Hirsch of Public Goods, Harry Stebbings of 20 Minute VC, Ruma Bose of Humanitarian Ventures, Jason Stoffer of Maveron, Rahul Vohra of Superhuman and Clearbanc’s own co-founder Michele Romanow. Clearbanc will continue to expand throughout the year, adding partners from key industry verticals.

“Most founders don’t have access to the kind of advice and insight that VC firms can give,” says Andrew D’Souza, Co-Founder and CEO of Clearbanc. “We’re launching our Venture Partner Network to offer mentorship and direction from industry veterans and level the playing field for founders all over the world.”

The Network was designed to foster a new community of entrepreneurs and extend the professional networks of Clearbanc’s portfolio companies. The program will support their continued growth while working to ensure products and services are further optimized for entrepreneurs and trends in the broader e-commerce and B2B markets.

“Clearbanc is a game changer for ecomm companies. You don’t need to put up your house, drown in credit cards or give up a piece of your baby to fund ads and inventory,” says Gary Vaynerchuk, investor and CEO of VaynerMedia. “Getting fast, affordable growth capital from Clearbanc was a no brainer for us. Pumped to be advising them as a Venture Partner. Let’s Go!”

About Clearbanc
 
Clearbanc is changing the way companies raise money by providing fast, affordable growth capital to online brands. Clearbanc’s data-driven algorithm has already invested in 1,000+ companies across 43 states so far in 2019 and these brands are expected to generate $1.5+ billion in revenue this year. Clearbanc customers span small businesses across the United States, Canada, and the UK to some of the fastest growing consumer brands today, like Le Tote, Leesa Sleep, Buffy, and Public Goods. 

Founded in 2015 by Michele Romanow, Andrew D’Souza, Ivan Gritsiniak, Charlie Feng, and Tanay Delima, Clearbanc has raised $420 million to date and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada. For more information visit Clearbanc.com and @clearbanc.

Contact Information

Amie Rotherman

Head of Communications

Clearbanc

amie@clearbanc.com