Fintech Paypa Plane to double team size after securing $10m in Series A backed by Mastercard

Brisbane-based cloud payments software provider Paypa Plane has raised $10 million in a Series A led by the Queensland Investment Fund (QIC), and also received backing from US payment giant Mastercard, Cuscal and Sprint Ventures.

The new investors join existing backers Commonwealth Bank (ASX: CBA), which over a year ago acquired a 20 per cent stake in the fintech for an undisclosed sum, and Tyro Payments (ASX: TYR).

Founded in 2018 by Simone Joyce and Jonathan Grant, Paypa Plane offers white-label solutions to help banks and businesses evolve their small-to-medium enterprise (SME) products without changing the existing infrastructure of their platforms.  

Off the back of the capital injection, the fintech plans to more than double its team from 40 to 100 over the next five years to further support product development and deployment.

"We are coming into an exciting period for Paypa Plane. We will focus on growth in Australia which will be driven by changes in our payment landscape and competition hotting up in business banking. We will also continue our expansion into the USA where we are seeing the similar drivers for growth,” Paypa Plane co-founder and CEO Joyce said.

"We are fortunate to have such strong shareholders that will support us with these objectives.”

The raise comes six months after the company trialled PayTo – a New Payment Platform (NPP) that allows customers to link their bank account to apps, loan repayments, BNPL services, and more – with CBA business customers.

“Australian financial institutions and their corporate customers continue to navigate a changing payments environment,” QIC private capital associate Nick Capell said.

“That includes balancing the need to support legacy infrastructure and prepare for the pending shift to PayTo, which Paypa Plane is well-positioned to capitalise on.

“The participation of strong domestic and global financial instituations in the round, and prior investments from CBA and Tyro, reflect the solution’s capability and the strategic importance of Paypa Plane’s technology.”

Treasurer and Minister for Trade and Investment Cameron Dick added QIC’s investment in Paypa Plane will support the company as it builds out its Brisbane-based product, engineering and customer support team.  

“Our government has followed a deliberate strategy to grow Queensland’s financial technology sector, creating more highly skilled jobs,” he added.

“The global finance sector is looking for solutions that focus on speed, transparency and optimisation, and those solutions are being developed right here in Brisbane.”