The London-based company Stenn has chosen Barcelona to boost its international expansion. The Catalan capital will be home to the fintech's first technology and innovation hub outside the United Kingdom, which will involve the creation of 25 jobs. The company, specialized in online financing for international business, e-commerce, and digital services companies, will work from Barcelona on the development of its technological platform.
Specifically, Stenn's Barcelona subsidiary will focus on developing the software and technology that the company uses in its business model. The digital platform promoted by this City company facilitates financing, especially for SMEs, and, since its founding in 2015, it estimates that it has financed clients worth 18 billion euros.
And how does it finance them? Through outstanding invoices. Stenn offers liquidity to companies by financing these invoices in order to cover financing gaps in both national and international supply chains. With this mechanism, the fintech speeds up access to liquidity for these companies, without affecting their credit rating. Stenn, which operates in 74 countries, is one of the best-positioned companies in the United Kingdom to reach a valuation of 1 billion dollars and become a future unicorn: a soonicorn, due to the English pun.
With the opening of this hub, Stenn joins the group of UK companies operating from Catalonia, which total 936To boost the development of its software from Barcelona, the company has hired specialized personnel in engineering, design, and digital security. The company, which has had the support of the Generalitat's ACCIÓ agency to establish itself in the Catalan capital, it plans to exponentially increase this initial workforce of 25 employees over the next few months.
Stenn has chosen to land in the city because "Catalunya is an ideal territory for its ability to attract talent from all over the world, for the high quality of its infrastructure for developing businesses and for the mentality of its inhabitants and administrations," according to Stenn's Head of Product and Technology, Bilal Bajwa.
With the opening of this center, Stenn joins the group of UK companies operating from Catalunya, which total 936. This figure makes British companies the fourth most numerous among international subsidiaries established in Catalan territory. Furthermore, the United Kingdom is the third country with the most presence of technology sector companies in Catalunya, with 13% of the total, most of which operate in the field of electronics and information and communication technologies.