User:Anil116/sandbox
| File:Atoa logo.png | |
| Type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Financial technology |
| Founded | 2022 in London, England |
| Founders | Sid Narayanan, Cian O'Dowd, Arun Rajkumar |
| Headquarters | London , England |
Key people | Sid Narayanan (CEO) |
| Products | Account-to-account ("Pay by Bank") payments; card payments |
| Website | paywithatoa |
Atoa is a trading name of Atoa Payments Ltd, a UK-based financial technology company headquartered in London, England. The company provides open banking ("Pay by Bank") and card payment solutions for businesses in the United Kingdom. Atoa (pronounced ah-TOH-ah; legally Atoa Payments Limited) is a British financial technology company, based in London, that provides payment processing to merchants, including both open banking-based account-to-account payments and card payments. Its account-to-account service, marketed as "pay by bank", allows a customer to approve a payment directly inside their own banking app.[1][2]
History
[edit]Atoa was founded in 2022 and is based in London.[3][4] Its co-founders are Sid Narayanan, Cian O'Dowd and Arun Rajkumar, who had previously co-founded the Singapore-based fintech company KlearCard, which was acquired in 2021.[5][4] Narayanan, a former Standard Chartered banker, had also earlier founded the property technology startup Greyloft.[3] The company launched Atoa, aimed at small and medium-sized retail businesses, positioning account-to-account payments as a lower-cost alternative to card networks operated by Visa and Mastercard.[1][2]
In March 2025, Atoa was approved as an Authorised Payment Institution by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The authorisation allowed it to offer payment initiation services, account information services, and virtual accounts provided in partnership with the embedded banking firm ClearBank.[3][6]
Funding
[edit]In November 2022, Atoa raised $2.2 million in a pre-seed funding round led by Leo Capital and Passion Capital, with participation from Moon Capital Ventures and the angel investor Matt Robinson, a co-founder of GoCardless.[1][7] In June 2023, the company raised $6.5 million (about £5.17 million) in a seed round led by Valar Ventures, the venture firm associated with Peter Thiel, with continued participation from Passion Capital and Leo Capital.[2][4][5] According to UKTN, the rounds brought Atoa's total funding to about $9 million by 2025.[3]
Products and services
[edit]Atoa offers merchants a combined payment service covering both open banking-based account-to-account payments and card payments. For account-to-account payments, a merchant presents a customer with a QR code, payment link via email or SMS; the customer selects their bank and is redirected to their own banking app to approve the payment, without installing a separate app.[2][1] The company says funds from these payments settle close to instantly, compared with the one-to-two-day settlement typical of card payments.[2] Atoa has said its service can lower the cost of accepting payments for merchants by up to 50% compared with card payments, though this figure is the company's own claim rather than an independently verified benchmark.[4][2] Card payment processing was added to the platform after launch, giving merchants a single service for both payment types rather than requiring a separate provider.[3]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- 1 2 3 4 Dillet, Romain (24 November 2022). "Atoa helps UK merchants cut down on card processing fees". TechCrunch. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Open banking payments startup Atoa raises $6.5m". Finextra. June 2023. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 5 Hornstein, Oscar (14 March 2025). "Atoa joins crowded payments market with FCA approval". UKTN. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- 1 2 3 4 "Irish co-founded Atoa raises €6m in seed funding round". The Irish Times. 9 June 2023. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- 1 2 "UK payments fintech Atoa secures $6.5m in seed funding round". Electronic Payments International. 2023. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- ↑ "Atoa Payments Secures FCA Authorisation: a 'Springboard' to Slash Payment Processing Costs". The Fintech Times. 2025. Retrieved 1 July 2026.
- ↑ "Atoa closes pre-seed to give small businesses alternative debit card payments". FinTech Global. 24 November 2022. Retrieved 1 July 2026.