Credibur is on a mission to modernize asset-backed lending, tackling the industry’s biggest pain points with a fully automated platform for both lenders and originators.
Drawing on years of experience in European fintech and banking, founder Nicolas Kipp set out to eliminate manual work, fragmented data, and compliance headaches – and give customers the tools to operate faster, automate their workflows, and cut down reporting time by 90%. This way, the platform enables both lenders and borrowers to access, monitor, and manage credit facilities in one place.
During their pre-seed round, Credibur used Roundtable to pool more than 15 business angels from across Europe into a single SPV, simplifying their fundraising process significantly. With Roundtable, founder Nicolas Kipp could bring on both experienced fintech “super angels” and first-time investors, regardless of ticket size, and without complicating the cap table or dealing with endless admin. The streamlined KYC/KYB processes, trusted Luxembourg structure, and hands-on support from the Roundtable team made it easy to onboard international investors, and freed up valuable time and mental energy to focus on growing the business.
Key takeaways:
- Credibur is building a new operating system for asset-backed lending and aims to fully automate debt facility management for both lenders and originators. The platform addresses the sector’s biggest pain points – manual onboarding, fragmented data, fraud risk, and compliance challenges – and provides real-time reporting, portfolio analytics, and digital workflows for drawdowns, eligibility checks, and backup servicing.
- Credibur used Roundtable to pool 15+ business angels across Europe into a single SPV, streamlining the fundraising process and simplifying their cap table. The platform’s low barrier to entry allowed Credibur to include both experienced “super angels” and first-time angel investors with small tickets, increasing strategic value and expertise.
- Roundtable’s streamlined KYC/KYB process and trusted Luxembourg structure made it easy to onboard international investors from Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, and the UK. The team’s efficient communication and hands-on help with compliance reduced the operational and mental burden on Credibur’s solo founder.
- Roundtable’s intuitive onboarding, and hands-on assistance from the team made it easy for investors to join the round, regardless of ticket size, location, or experience with angel investing, providing Credibur with strategic value and key connections.
- By handling the legal setup, compliance, and communication with BAs in one place, Roundtable enabled Credibur to close the round faster, simplify its cap table, and keep the founder focused on product and growth.
Roundtable: Could you present Credibur to our readers in a few sentences?
Nicolas Kipp: Sure. We’re in the financial services and fintech space, building software for lending and credit. To put it simply, we connect companies that do lending without a banking license – like those offering leasing, factoring, or subscription models – with banks, funds, and credit investors on the backend.
At that intersection, we automate data exchange, reporting, compliance checks, and accounting. You probably know companies that do invoice factoring, subscriptions, or car lending; Klarna would be the most familiar name. On the backend, you have big banks like J.P. Morgan, Citibank, as well as smaller family offices or credit funds. We’re the connector between those two sides.
Roundtable: How did you decide to launch Credibur? What inspired you to start the company?
Nicolas Kipp: Throughout my entire career, I’ve worked in lending; first, I worked in traditional banks, then for a large BNPL company,, then I founded an SME lending company, and later I helped a number of other lending companies and banks across Europe.
After manually solving the same issues many times over, using Excel spreadsheets and different workarounds, I started to build the software for this. It’s a very niche space, but a huge one; about a two-trillion-dollar market. And most of the work is still done manually.
If you look at adjacent areas like loan approvals, compliance checks, or accounting, everything has been automated over the past decade - but not in this one.. There’s always a breaking point, and behind the scenes, you still find teams of financial analysts manually crunching numbers in Excel. That’s exactly where we step in: to take that work off their plates and automate it. What’s striking is that the same thing happens on the banks’ side too. Even at large funds, there are entire teams working out of spreadsheets – and it’s just as frustrating there.
Roundtable: That makes a lot of sense. So after identifying this gap and building Credibur, the next step was fundraising. How did Roundtable enter into that story? Did someone recommend the platform, or were you actively searching for this kind of solution?
Nicolas Kipp: I was building the company and eventually started thinking about raising a funding round. I knew I wanted to pool angel investors; in the past, I’d done it without pooling, which worked fine, but I’d also seen other founders run into serious problems when they didn’t. If angels aren’t pooled, a single unresponsive investor can cause real issues or even block an exit. So I started looking for a better solution.
I had worked with other providers before, which was fine but nothing special. Then I was introduced to Roundtable through someone in my network.
At first, I was skeptical. I'm risk-averse and very focused on compliance, so I asked a lot of questions about the company, the transactions you’ve made, etc. I received great references from your team and they were overall extremely helpful. That gave me confidence that Roundtable was the right solution.
One thing I particularly liked about Roundtable is the genuine passion for angel investors and building a platform that enables founders to pool them easily. Other providers are fine, but their main focus is on large VC investors; angels are usually more of an afterthought. With Roundtable, it’s clear that the team is really committed and passionate about supporting angels. When I brought up the platform to the angels I wanted to pool, they were also excited, since they saw it as a way to find new deals – or maybe join a syndicate. Their reactions were overall very positive.
Roundtable: Did some of your investors already know about the platform?
Nicolas Kipp: Only one of them had used it before, the rest were new to it. At first, it was a bit tough to convince them about the idea of pooling, but once they agreed, Roundtable was an easy sell. The KYC process was very straightforward for them, and I think they liked the fact that it’s a European platform – which they trusted more than a US provider. Most of them are in Europe: the Netherlands, the UK, Denmark, and Germany.
Roundtable: Did Roundtable make it easier to pool international investors?
Nicolas Kipp: Yes, definitely, exactly because of the simplicity of the KYC/KYB process and the fact that it’s a European solution. Luxembourg’s SPVs are well-recognized on the European investment scene and trusted by everyone.
The alternative would have been to set up a separate entity in Germany, but I think the international angels wouldn’t have agreed to that: going to a notary and dealing with extra costs makes the whole process more complex. Roundtable made it very easy for them.
Roundtable: Can you tell me a bit more about your business angels: their typical profile, industries they work in, and the strategic value they brought to Credibur?
Nicolas Kipp: I’d say there are three different groups of angels.
We had three types of angels.
First, the “super angels” — experienced fintech investors who move fast and bring strong networks. One is a partner at Paper Ventures; another has 50–100 investments. They’re not deep experts in our niche but have broad fintech know-how and lots of angel experience.
Second, potential customers. They understand our product deeply, are excited about it, and some are already becoming customers.
Third, a smaller group of first-time angels. One is a banking expert who now gives us great product input; others were simply enthusiastic to support us, even with small tickets like €1,000. Normally I wouldn’t offer such small allocations because of the admin burden, but with Roundtable, it made no difference — one pooled entry, same fee, regardless of how many angels.
So beyond the capital, their expertise and engagement added real value.
Roundtable: How many business angels do you have around the cap table – and what are the ticket sizes?
Nicolas Kipp: It’s 14 now, but one of them is an entity that pools three more investors behind it. So on Roundtable, it looks like 14, but in reality, it’s 16. Ticket sizes are varied, from €1,000 to €50,000.
Roundtable: How was your own experience using the platform?
Nicolas Kipp: Tech-wise, it’s very easy and straightforward. However, I think the real value (and complexity) isn’t in the software, but in all the legal and financial processes behind it, and my experience with that was great. I was amazed by how personalized the service was: the team answered all my questions very quickly, even via WhatsApp. This was excellent – and I really appreciated it.
Fundraising as a solo founder is stressful; I was working around the clock. I didn’t have the bandwidth to chase angels for KYC and paperwork, so I could just message the team: “Can you please make sure everyone completes their KYB?” I know it’s usually my job, but the team just called each investor individually, which was incredible.
A few of the angels we onboarded now want to use Roundtable for their own projects. Two of them have already asked me to introduce them to the team, because they want to use the platform for their own startups. So that was a great sign.
Roundtable: Is there anything else you’d add about the value of using Roundtable?
Nicolas Kipp: At the end of the day, the alternative would have been to set up an SPV myself, which is possible, but a real operational hassle: you need to find a lawyer, open a bank account, and so on.
Using Roundtable was so much more efficient – it definitely saved a lot of time, and probably some money, too. But most of all, it saved mental load. Not having to figure out all the solutions by myself was a huge relief.
Roundtable: What would your advice be for other founders at a similar stage, who are looking to raise funds or set up an SPV?
Nicolas Kipp: I think there are two approaches to this.
One is to work with just a few angels, i.e. only high-ticket BAs you know very well. If you go that route, it’s fine to have them directly on your cap table.
The second one, which I’m personally a fan of, is to onboard lots of angels who bring strategic value, and accept some smaller tickets. If you want to do that, you absolutely need to pool and use an external pooling provider, because it makes it so much easier. And if you’re in Europe, go for Roundtable.
Roundtable: What will this funding allow you to focus on now? What are your next steps for Credibur?
Nicolas Kipp: Right now, the focus is on building out our product and onboarding more customers, beyond our initial private customers that we had before this round.
Roundtable: Would you consider using Roundtable again, in another funding round?
Nicolas Kipp: Absolutely, unless it becomes super expensive (laughs).
I also do angel investing myself, and I’m now telling founders that they can go to Roundtable for a better experience than with any of the competitors.
{{clients_banner}}
