Laybuy secures £80m to accelerate UK expansion

The company has partnered with a number of brands in the UK such as The Hut Group

A ‘buy now pay later’ firm has secured £80m debt funding to accelerate its UK expansion.

Laybuy, which launched in New Zealand in 2017, has partnered with more than 4,500 retail merchants across that country and is also available in Australia.

Its co-founder and CEO Gary Rohloff told BusinessCloud last year that he wanted the firm to be “as big as Visa and Mastercard” as he led an expansion into the UK market. 

After securing its first big-name client Footasylum, it has partnered with several other leading brands in the UK including The Hut Group, ALEXACHUNG and TONI&GUY.

The £80m debt facility is from Victory Park Capital, a leading global alternative investment firm.

Laybuy has also launched a bookbuild ahead of an imminent launch on the Australian Stock Exchange after delaying a planned IPO earlier this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  

Laybuy has grown exponentially since we launched three years ago and we would not be able to continue to scale without our investors’ support and confidence in our vision, said Rohloff. In addition to increasing our customer base in our established geographies and sectors, our expansion in the UK is a critical component of our growth strategy and VPC’s backing will enable us to strengthen our position in the market.

Fast-growing Laybuy enables shoppers to pay for in-store and online purchases over six weekly payments, interest-free. 

Buy now pay later services have seen incredible rates of adoption globally. With the accelerated adoption of digital commerce, Laybuy is well-positioned to capture future growth opportunities, said Jason Brown, partner at VPC.

We look forward to partnering with the strong management team and seeing the platform become a regular part of the shopping experience, he said.

For the 12-month period ending June 30, 2020, Laybuy had more than 5,600 active merchants and over 470,000 active customers on its platform.