Svea Bank acquires Arex’s FinTech operations in Finland

By Gloria Methri

AREX Markets, the Spanish FinTech company that drives down financing costs for SMEs, has sold its Finland operations to Swedish payment and financing institution Svea Bank. The deal will strengthen Svea’s position as a corporate financier in Finland, where AREX’s 1200 customers and partners will be transferred to the bank’s portfolio.

The Finnish operation of AREX has financed over €500 million worth of invoices. Customers in Finland have been informed of their transition, and their contracts and service details will port across to Svea.

Svea is taking on the operations of AREX in the region to strengthen its own business and offer AREX’s partners and customers a wider range of services.

“Over the years, Svea has grown a lot also through business transactions, therefore acquiring AREX’s business operations in Finland was a good and natural solution for us. In addition, the deal is pleasant for us at Svea because the focus of our activities is to help partners and customers succeed – offering AREX’s partners and customers a wider range of services is exactly that,” said Pasi Väre, country manager of Svea in Finland.

The deal also enables AREX to focus on the UK and Europe regions as it prepares for the rollout of embeddable financing products, which can be white-labelled by neo banks, ERPs, and accounting software alike. The business is seeking to bridge the liquidity gap faced by small businesses. UK SMEs can continue to access AREX’s core invoice financing product through the Xero marketplace.

“For us at AREX, this is a great step. We are developing a stronger presence in the field of embedded finance, which is underpinned by our sophisticated marketplace software, our strongest point,” said Airto Vienola, CEO of AREX.

“For the AREX team, it was extremely important that we find the best possible corporate financier to take care of the business’ customers and partnerships in Finland. Svea convinced us with their customer and partner-centric approach”, added AREX co-founder Perttu Jalkanen.