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About
Clearco (founded as Clearbanc in 2015) built revenue-based financing for online businesses from Toronto. Instead of pitching for equity, e-commerce merchants connect the data that runs their business — payment processors, ad accounts, banking — and get a funding offer in about a day, repaid as a share of revenue plus a flat fee, with no personal guarantees and no dilution. The idea started small: advancing Uber drivers $10–20 of their earnings, then funding Airbnb hosts, before the company went all in on e-commerce and grew to fund merchants across 11 countries. By mid-2021 Clearco had raised a US$215M round led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 at a valuation near US$2B. The 2022 e-commerce and rate shock hit hard: layoffs, market exits, and two CEO handoffs — co-founder Andrew D'Souza to co-founder Michele Romanow in 2022, then to capital-markets veteran Andrew Curtis in January 2023 — followed by an October 2023 recapitalization (US$60M Series D led by Inovia Capital and Founders Circle Capital, plus an asset-backed facility from Pollen Street Capital). The reset held: capital advances tripled in 2024, and a rebuilt funding platform launched in 2025. Both co-founders have since moved to new ventures — Romanow remains a Dragon on CBC's Dragons' Den, and D'Souza founded Boardy in 2024 — while Curtis runs Clearco day to day. Over its first decade the company has put more than US$3B into 10,000+ businesses.
Backers
SoftBank Vision Fund 2 (led the US$215M Series C, July 2021, at a valuation near US$2B), Inovia Capital and Founders Circle Capital (co-led the US$60M Series D recapitalization, October 2023), Pollen Street Capital (asset-backed facility with up to US$100M capacity, 2023); earlier rounds included Emergence Capital and Highland Capital Partners (assumption).
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Quick answers
What does Clearco actually do?
It funds e-commerce businesses with revenue-based capital: merchants connect their sales, ad, and banking data, get an offer in about a day, and repay from a share of revenue plus a flat fee — no equity, no personal guarantees. Current products include Cash Advance, Rolling and Fixed Funding Capacity, and Invoice Funding.
Are the founders still running Clearco?
No. Andrew Curtis, a capital-markets veteran from Merrill Lynch and Lazard, has been CEO since January 2023. Co-founder Michele Romanow stepped back after serving as CEO through 2022 (she's still a Dragon on CBC's Dragons' Den), and co-founder Andrew D'Souza went on to start Boardy, an AI that makes warm intros, in 2024.
How did a two-billion-dollar fintech start with $20 advances?
Clearbanc's first product fronted Uber drivers $10–20 of their earnings. That data-first underwriting scaled to Airbnb hosts, then to e-commerce merchants in 11 countries. After the 2022 downturn forced layoffs and a 2023 recapitalization, the company returned to growth — capital advances tripled in 2024.