Cross-border salary payments platform Kadmos nets €29m Series A

Kadmos, a Berlin-based salary payments platform for international employers, has raised €29 million in a Series A funding round led by Blossom Capital.

Kadmos co-founder Justus Schmueser

The investment round, which follows an €8.3 million seed round in December, also included existing investors Addition and Atlantic Labs.

The traditional financial system presents employers with unnecessary complexity when paying salaries across the globe, Kadmos says, and the shipping industry is a stark example of this, with “expensive, slow, and untransparent payment processes” forcing many shipping companies to bring significant amounts of cash on board to pay their employees.

Kadmos’ secure salary payments platform enables companies to pay their global workforce efficiently. The firm says its tech can cut expenses and administrative work while allowing workers to save on transaction and remittance costs when receiving salaries and forwarding savings to their families.

Co-founder Justus Schmueser says “shocking” financial restrictions placed on migrant workers mean they often need to wait days or weeks to get paid and are forced to pay “exorbitant” transaction fees.

Kadmos provides each employee with access to its mobile app, where salary payments are instantly paid and which allows employees to transfer money home or use a debit card to spend or withdraw cash.

The fintech says the new financing will be used “to significantly grow its 30-person team” and for technology and product development, with the firm claiming it is “uniquely positioned” to capitalise on the growing global cross-border B2C payment volume, which is projected by the UN to reach $1.6 trillion by 2022.

Founded in 2021, Kadmos says it is already working with several high-profile shipping companies and boasts a “robust waitlist” ahead of its plans for full-scale customer onboarding this summer.