Centana launches $375M Second Fund to invest in high-growth fintech startups

Centana Growth Partners, a growth equity firm focused on the future of financial services, has closed $375 million for its second fund, Centana Growth Partners II, L.P. (“Fund II”) to expand its investments in innovative, high-growth companies across the financial services ecosystem. Fund II is a follow-up that’s 50% larger than its inaugural 2015 fund.

The Fund II is the successor to the firm’s debut fund, a 2015 vintage fund with $250 million in commitments. Centana will build on the team’s investment track record and its thematic investment approach to identify and partner with financial services, fintech, and related enterprise technology companies that are solving sophisticated problems for and generating real value in the financial services industry.

Founded in 2015 by Ben Cukier and Eric Byunn, the New York- and Palo Alto, California-based Centana Growth Partners provides growth equity and venture capital to companies in the financial services sector. Centana invests in rapidly growing companies across the financial services industry, from banking to insurance and payments, putting $5 million to $30 million into each startup.

“We are very grateful for the commitment and continued support of our existing and new investors who value our unique approach to investing,” said Eric Byunn, Partner at Centana Growth Partners. “There continues to be an extraordinary amount of excitement within financial services and fintech. Our team has a tried-and-true formula for finding the real change-makers among the noise, drawing on our deep sector expertise, theme-based sourcing, and our advisory network.”

Centana will continue to invest in its core sectors and verticals—including asset management, insurance, banking, digital identity, wealth management, payments, capital markets, and enterprise technologies that sell into these verticals—and will seek out portfolio companies that have a proven business model, a maturing revenue and customer base, and a talented management team who values a collaborative approach to drive their business forward. The fund is expected to invest between $5 million to $30 million in each category-leading growth company.

“We founded Centana because we recognized how rapidly the financial services industry was evolving and adapting to new economic, regulatory, and technological conditions. This change drives continued demand for entrepreneurial companies,” said Ben Cukier, Partner at Centana Growth Partners. “This new fund will allow us to continue to help companies serving these markets accelerate their growth.”

“Innovation remains at the core of every regulatory, market, and technology cycle, and we believe that the financial services ecosystem will continue to demand the solutions that our portfolio companies provide,” said Steven Swain, Partner at Centana Growth Partners. “Our decades of experience investing in this area and our unrivaled industry network will help our companies meet their goals and expand their connections into the financial services industry.”

Centana Growth Partners currently holds investments in nine portfolio companies. Earlier this year, Centana led the $19 million Series B funding round for Ease, a modern SaaS insurance platform for SMBs and participated in a follow-on $115 million funding round for Vena Solutions, one of the fastest-growing providers of cloud-based financial planning and analysis (FP&A) software.