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Qonto is a French financial institution that is part of the neobank concept: there are no branches, everything is carried out digitally through applications on mobiles and computers. In the case of Qonto, its services are aimed solely at  companies and freelancers who benefit from advantages such as time savings and greater control over their finances.

 

The startup currently has 220,000 customers across the four markets in which it operates: Spain, France, Germany and Italy. It has set itself the challenge of reaching one million customers by 2025, and Spain will play a prominent role following the creation of a hub in Barcelona, planned for this year, from which it will provide services to all its users.

 

Qonto recently closed a 486 million euro funding round, which brings its value to 4.4 billion euros and gives it the status of a unicorn. Present in Spain since 2019, it opened an office in Barcelona in 2021, where 35 employees work. The figure will rise to one hundred, and one hundred million euros will be invested in Spain to meet its challenges. 

 

      

 

How is Qonto different from traditional banks?

Qonto only focuses on the B2B segment; it does not provide services to private individuals. It seeks to offer entrepreneurs an account tailored to their needs, to help them streamline the financial management of their businesses by relying on technology. We are a neobank born out of entrepreneurship to offer real solutions to entrepreneurs. With a 100% digital culture, we are fully aware of our customers' needs and, based on this, we operate according to a clear, transparent pricing policy where there are no hidden fees, as is usually the case with traditional banks. Over the last year, we have consolidated our position as the leading B2B neobank in Spain, being the only one to offer an all-in-one solution to SMEs and freelancers through business bank accounts with local IBAN numbers.

 

What were the prospects when you arrived in Spain?

Qonto landed in the Spanish market in mid-2019 and ever since then we have worked to align our product with the unique characteristics of a market that had very good prospects. All this while taking into account that SMEs make up 99.8% of companies in Spain, representing just over 62% of gross value added (GVA) and 66% of total business employment. Over time, these prospects have become well-received realities that led to a 240% growth in our revenues last year.

 

How has the company progressed since it arrived in Spain?

Spain is a country in which we had high expectations, and the numbers have proved us right. We want to continue advancing in our strategy of consolidating our position as the leading B2B neobank in Spain. This excellent progress has led to major milestones, such as the opening of our physical headquarters in Barcelona last year, which now has 35 employees, and the decision to open our customer service hub for all countries in the same city. At a European level, we also plan to reinforce our leadership by breaking into new markets during 2023, and by 2025 we expect 75% of our new customers to come from outside France. 

 

     

Will the Barcelona hub be one of the beneficiaries of these amounts?

We are indeed strengthening our commitment to Spain. The boost that the recent round of financing has given us will allow us to create this hub in Barcelona. Its role will be to provide support to all the markets where the company is present and where we are going to launch a business this year, to name just one development. And in line with our commitment to strengthen our team, we also plan to continue bringing in new talent until we reach 100 employees in Spain in 2023.

 

How important is Spain in the company's strategy?

Spain is a key market for Qonto that has enabled us to achieve rapid global growth. There is a growing need among domestic customers for a financial institution that offers real solutions for their finances. We are talking about having a banking service that is able to put finances on autopilot with a value proposition tailored to each small business and freelancer. Companies have realised that they can now access platforms that allow them to not only take the usual bank management actions digitally, but also to organise and track expenses incurred by different teams, and without losing control and visibility over claims, receipts, expense cards and transactions.

 

What are your perspectives based on?

In a recent study carried out by Qonto together with the demoscopic company Gad3, 44% of the SMEs surveyed in Spain stated unequivocally that they had considered changing banks during the past year and approximately half of these were looking for a company that could offer them a service more suited to their needs. This is the reality of the financial sector. As I mentioned before, the core of the business fabric in Spain is made up of SMEs that need real support for their finances in a very competitive environment. This is the reason for our excellent development in the domestic market and what we will continue to focus on.

 

What other projects do you have in the pipeline?

Our most immediate project is to continue consolidating Qonto with innovative solutions leading to  finance process automation, as well as  operational and cost efficiency with technology solutions that dilute the barriers between banks and operators. To do this, we need to continue to scale up our business in the four countries in which we operate and expand our product offering. This means we are not ruling out acquisitions to increase our market share. We still have a long way to go in Spain thanks to a potential customer that is a medium-sized SME with a large number of employees and an increasing number of operations, and which does in turn need to improve operational and cost efficiency in its financial management.

 

^{Photos: Qonto}