Startups Venture

Swappie’s European Expansion Boosted By $40.6M Series B

Finland-based Swappie raised a 35.6 million euro ($40.6 million) Series B round of funding to expand its online refurbished smartphone marketplace to new markets in Europe, the company said Tuesday.

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Led by TESI, the round also included existing investors Lifeline Ventures, Reaktor Ventures and Inventure, all of which participated in Swappie’s $5.6 million Series A round in 2019. The new funding gives the 4-year-old company a total fundraising amount of 42.5 million euros, the company said in a written statement.

Sami Marttinen and Jiri Heinonen co-founded the company to help customers upgrade their phones in a more affordable way and with a smaller carbon footprint, the company said.

Since 2016, the company said, it has scaled its employee base to more than 260 employees and quadrupled its revenue in 2019 to more than $35 million. In addition, the company said it continued to grow during the COVID-19 pandemic, bringing in five times its revenue growth in April and May compared with the same period last year.

“As consumers become more aware of the environmental impact that their purchasing decisions have, we expect to see far greater demand for high quality refurbished smartphones,” CEO Marttinen said in a written statement. “Because we refurbish every device ourselves, in our own factory, we control the whole value chain.”

Meanwhile, Tony Nysten, investment manager at TESI, said in a written statement that he sees growth potential for Swappie, due in part to the smartphone market in Europe being worth more than 100 billion euros, and the used or refurbished sector of the market making up just 10 percent.

“Through its rapid growth to date, Swappie has proven its ability to not just grow market share within the refurbished market, but to expand the size of the category overall,” Nysten said.

Photo courtesy of Swappie
Blogroll illustration: Li-Anne Dias

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