PayPal Vets Launch $158M Fund to Advance FinTech

Early-stage venture capital firm Infinity Ventures is launching its inaugural $158 million fund to help fuel FinTech infrastructure, commerce enablement and other startups that align with its model and portfolio.

Infinity Ventures’ model helps take the risk out of execution by applying the operation and investment experience it has culminated over the decades. That experience has helped startups scale, and also supported product development and go-to-market strategies for FinTechs, according to a press release on Monday (May 16).

Founded in 2021 by PayPal veterans Jeremy Jonker, Jay Ganatra and Mario Ruiz, the venture capital fund was started to back the builders of FinTech infrastructure and commerce enablement, per the release.

Together, they made venture investments in Plaid, Divvy, Olo, Extend, Paxos, PPRO, Acorns, TaxBit, Toss, Tink, Happy Returns and Paidy. They also led the transformational M&A transactions of Venmo, Braintree, Honey, Hyperwallet, Xoom, Swift Financial and iZettle.

Read more: Online Sellers Needing Capital Turn to FinTech Lenders Who Know the Terrain

Infinity Ventures has so far funded 11 companies that have developed solutions to address some of the major challenges facing financial infrastructure — access, utility, flexibility, and cost.

Financial services is a $27 trillion market in annual GDP, the company said, citing World Bank figures. FinTechs are picking up capital to build technology to support the ongoing and fast-moving transformation in digital commerce and banking. Almost 170 FinTechs have become unicorns since last year, over three times higher than the previous 15 years combined, per data from CBInsights cited in the Infinity Ventures press release.

“Over the last decade the fintech industry has innovated consumer and business applications at a rapid pace, with intuitive design and sleek functionality that have been truly life-changing in terms of access, transparency and convenience,” said Jonker.

Related: Study Shows Highly Integrated Digital Financial Services Accounts Go Long Way with Consumers

“We see a massive opportunity investing in key infrastructure, making fintech apps and services more scalable and secure. Our team has the experience, and isn’t afraid to get our hands dirty helping founders build this core, underdeveloped layer, from negotiating contracts, formulating the product roadmap, and delivering on partnership and client opportunities,” Jonker added.

Infinity Ventures participates in pre-seed through Series A funding rounds ranging from $500,000 to $8 million. The company’s funding has gone to startups in the U.S., Asia, Latin America, and Europe.