Fenergo Taps ABN Amro, DXC for $80 Million M&A War Chest

Dublin-based Fenergo, a provider of client lifecycle management, client onboarding, and KYC and AML solutions, has sold a 10% stake in the company to Dutch bank ABN Amro’s venture capital fund and IT services provider DXC Technology in return for a combined $80 million investment, to fund further acquisitions.

The investment marks the end of a funding round that began last summer with a €66 million ($72 million) investment from DXC, giving the service provider a stake in the company of around nine percent. ABN Amro gets around a one percent stake in return for the remaining investment. The combined deal values the privately-held, venture-backed company at almost $1 billion.

Fenergo plans to use some of the money to fund acquisitions of other, unnamed regtech providers under the direction of Joe Dunphy, a 10-year Fenergo staffer who was appointed head of strategy and corporate development last year.

It will use the remainder to continue developing its platform, into which the vendor has already invested €40 million (almost $44 million) over the past two years.

ABN Amro is already a client of Fenergo, and uses the vendor’s platform to centralize its KYC operations and systems, decrease complexity, and provide more control around KYC. Bank officials call the system “one of the pillars in our design” for the bank’s KYC processes.

In a statement, Hugo Bongers, director of ABN Amro Ventures, says “This investment will contribute to ABN Amro’s strategic priority to build a future-proof bank and fight financial crime,” which one source familiar with the situation says suggests the bank is likely to increase its spending with Fenergo in these areas.