Goldman Sachs-backed payments startup Marqeta prepares for IPO
Nickie Louise
Posted On July 10, 2020
We covered Marqeta back in May. At the time the Goldman Sachs-backed payments startup secured $150 million in funding at $4.3 billion valuation. A year earlier, the startup raised $260 million equity financing led by Coatue and included participation from Vitruvian Partners and several others. In 2019, Marqeta’s revenue doubled to around $300 million, according to a report from Reuters, citing sources close to the company.
After 10 years in operations, Marqeta thinks it’s time to go public. Marqeta is reportedly seeking to hire investment banks to advise on a potential initial public offering (IPO), according to a report from Reuters, citing people familiar with the matter. The startup is planning to interview investment banks that are seeking roles in its IPO, the sources said. The IPO could come later this year or in 2021, the sources said.
Founded in 2010 by Jason Gardner, Marqeta provides infrastructure and tools to help companies build and manage payment programs. Marqeta enables companies to issue credit and debit cards to their staff. It has seen a surge in online shopping and food delivery payments processed through its platform, as U.S. consumers make purchases from home during the coronavirus outbreak.
The company’s platform, built from the ground up with no legacy infrastructure, provides a fully-documented, open API issuer processor platform. In addition to Goldman Sachs, Marqeta is also backed by Visa, 83North, Granite Ventures, and ICONIQ Capital. Marqeta is used by major tech fintech companies including Square, Uber, Affirm, Instacart, and DoorDash.
Marqeta currently has over 350 employees and operates globally including the US, UK, EU, and Canada. The company has extensive partnerships with multiple banks and card networks including Visa, Mastercard & Discover. Its solutions are used by innovators in digital banking, lending, e-commerce, on-demand services and more.
“Marqeta continues to move forward from strength to strength in 2020 as our global modern card issuing platform provides essential infrastructure and support to our customers across industries and oceans,” said Jason Gardner, founder and CEO of Marqeta. “We’re building a single global platform to define and power the future of money for the world’s leading innovators. This new capital helps us accelerate our mission to empower builders to bring the most innovative products to market, wherever they are in the world.”
The global modern card issuing market is a multi-trillion dollar industry and is growing steadily. New commerce disruptors, tech giants, and digital banks are now relying on physical, virtual, and tokenized card products for a range of use cases. With market-leading innovations like Just-in-Time Funding and Instant Issuance, Marqeta’s platform has helped to re-architect what is possible for enterprises issuing cards at scale.
