GoCardless

GoCardless runs a bank payment network that lets businesses collect recurring and one-off payments by direct debit and open banking instead of cards. It was founded in 2011 by Hiroki Takeuchi, Matt Robinson and Tom Blomfield while they were students at Oxford, went through Y Combinator, and is headquartered in London. Takeuchi led the company as CEO. As of 2025 it was used by about 100,000 businesses and processed about $130 billion of payments a year, and it reported FY2024 revenue of 126.8 million pounds.

In 2012 GoCardless raised 1.5 million pounds from investors including Y Combinator, Google Ventures, Salesforce and Accel. Balderton Capital led a $7 million Series B in January 2014, with Accel and Passion Capital participating, which funded expansion into France, Germany and Spain. A $22.5 million Series D in 2017 brought total funding to $47.2 million. Bain Capital Ventures led a $95 million Series F in December 2020 with Balderton participating, taking total funding to $240 million and making the company a unicorn. In February 2022 Permira led a $312 million round with BlackRock Private Equity Partners, valuing GoCardless at $2.1 billion. The company used that capital to buy the open banking provider Nordigen in 2022 and Sentenial (Nuapay) from EML Payments in 2024.

On December 11, 2025 the Dutch payments company Mollie announced an agreement to acquire GoCardless. Mollie did not disclose the price; Wikipedia, citing press reports, puts it at 1.05 billion euros in a mostly stock deal, below the 2022 valuation. Mollie completed the acquisition on September 1, 2026. GoCardless continues as "GoCardless, a Mollie company" under Takeuchi, inside a group serving more than 350,000 businesses across 30 or more markets.

GoCardless shows the full arc of a European fintech venture investment: a 2012 seed through Y Combinator, a 2014 Series B led by Balderton Capital, growth capital from Bain Capital Ventures and Permira at the 2020 to 2022 peak, and an exit about 15 years after founding. Early backers such as Y Combinator, Accel and Balderton bought in at small valuations. Investors in the 2022 round at $2.1 billion exited at a lower reported price, and the deal was paid mainly in Mollie stock, so their return depends on Mollie's future value.