Rich Data Co raises $17.5m in Series B round to expand in North America

By Gloria Mathias

Australia-based Rich Data Co. (RDC), an AI decisioning platform that helps banks make lending decisions efficiently and safely, has raised $28 million (US$17.5 million) in its Series B round.

The funding round was led by Westpac and cloud banking provider nCino and supported by a reinvestment from Australian funds management firm BMYG and new Singapore-based investor Octava Fund. The funds raised will be used to help accelerate RDC’s expansion into North America and grow its position as an AI decisioning platform in the global banking sector.

Founded in 2016, RDC uses explainable AI to provide banks with deeper insight into borrower behaviour, enabling more accurate and efficient lending decisions for businesses. To date, RDC has helped major banks in Australia and New Zealand, notably Westpac’s Australian business lending operations, leverage AI to accelerate the lending coverage of its existing customers.

RDC has been expanding into North America and, in late 2022, established a global resale agreement with nCino, which enables nCino’s business and commercial lending customers to enhance the lending process with AI decisioning and greater intelligence.

Ada Guan, CEO and Co-Founder of RDC said, “With this investment, we are strengthening our relationship with Westpac and deepening our partnership with nCino. Securing such a significant amount of investment within challenging fundraising conditions speaks to the opportunity that Rich Data Co’s AI Decisioning Platform offers the industry, which is pleasingly being recognised by our investors. Now that the B round has closed, we can get on with doing what we love to do, which is to disrupt current lending approaches and grow our industry leadership in the exciting AI Decisioning space. I am incredibly proud of our people and our growing team of industry and AI experts.”

Shane Howell, Managing Director Business Lending, Westpac said, “At Westpac, our ambition is to enable Australian businesses to achieve their goals.  Since January, we have benefited from partnering with global innovator RDC to enable faster decisions for customers by using RDC’s decisioning tool and advanced analytic techniques, meaning cash is in our customer’s hands quicker, particularly important in these economic times.”