FERO Secures $3M Seed Funding to Improve Online Payment Experience

Amsterdam-based startup, FERO, has successfully closed a $3 million seed round. The round saw participation from Coatue, Volta Ventures, and Antler. This capital injection will enable the company to expand and enhance its unique online payment solution. The objective is to address the yearly $5 trillion in revenue that merchants lose at the point of checkout.

Checkout Complexity Breeds Opportunity

FERO was co-founded by Craig Savage and Maximilian van Boxel. Both founders previously worked for Ekata, a global payments fraud solution, and later for Mastercard when Ekata was acquired. Their experience at these companies exposed them to the complexity of payments processing at checkout for end-merchants.

Data indicates that a majority of online shoppers that reach the checkout stage fail to complete their purchases. The current ‘one size fits all’ approach to the checkout experience and payment journey is a significant barrier to purchase conversion. This insight led the team to identify an opportunity to create personalised purchase preferences. This would make it easier and more seamless for consumers to complete their payments.

Improving Purchase Conversion Rates

FERO’s solution is designed to analyse each shopper, their behaviour and activity, to predict the likelihood of purchase completion. It employs a sequenced application of segmentation, multi-classification prediction, and reinforcement learning. It learns a shopper’s purchase preferences and delivers the most optimal payment experience. This includes individually customised payment methods and subsequent payment journeys.

As stated by Craig Savage, Co-Founder and CEO, FERO, “We founded FERO to help retailers deliver a more seamless and customised shopping experience to their customers.”

Behaviour-Driven Purchase Solutions

Elena Sakach, Partner, Coatue, supports the initiative taken by FERO. She said, “Few solutions have looked at the behaviour of shoppers to understand why so many items are left un-purchased in the online shopping cart.” She added that it’s exciting to see FERO leverage behaviour analytics to deliver purchase solutions that will improve the shopping experience and drive revenue for retailers.

Expanding Team and Enhancing Product Offerings

With the funds from the seed round, FERO plans to build out its team across Europe and the US. The company also intends to further enhance its product offerings to serve more retailers globally.