Angel investor Phillip McGriskin is pioneering new FinTech, Vitesse

By Joy Dumasia

Vitesse, an FCA and European (DNB) regulated provider of seamless international payments and innovative treasury management solutions for insurance, receives a boost for launch by investment from Phillip McGriskin, an Aussie born angel investor.

Phillip McGriskin, 47, has over 20 years of experience in FinTech investments. He has built an extensive portfolio of investments across the FinTech world. His ability to spot potential in businesses from as early as ideation has allowed him to be an angel investor for; TransferWise, SuperAwesome, YOTI and Griffin.io, to name a few.

Vitesse, a payments platform that enables its insurance clientele to make reimbursements in a matter of minutes instead of weeks, launched in 2013 and currently boasts customers, including Brit Insurance, Mayfair Group, and CEGA Group. It has secured a £6.6 million Series A investment from Octopus Ventures and seeks Series B funding in 2022.

His career began at the young age of 20, working as an insurance broker in Australia. Over his two decades in the industry, he worked across commercial departments in London. His passion for FinTech stems from the endless possibilities in this sector coupled with the extensive innovation that has been seen over the last years.

This thinking created Vitesse, listed in the Deloitte 50 Fastest-Growing Tech Companies. Vitesse is a dual-regulated provider of near real-time international payments and treasury management solutions for its extensive insurance clientele, supporting in-country payments to over 170 countries in 109 currencies worldwide.

Phillip McGriskin, the CEO of Vitesse, said: “After building a successful financial services business with Paul Townsend which relied on creating international payment relationships for businesses to receive money; we realised that there were still multiple gaps on the other side of the transaction. The outward bound payment. There were some very specific use cases in the areas of insurance, payroll and corporate
payments where service gaps were preventing these businesses from growing to their full potential.”