UK fintech Revolut continues to prove fertile ground for producing the next generation of founders.
Since its founding in 2015 as a financial travel app, the neobank has made a push into various verticals including business banking, insurance and trading. In the process, Revolut’s raised more than $1.7bn from investors including SoftBank and Tiger Global and turned many of its former employees into entrepreneurs in Europe.
According to a report by VC firm Accel and data platform Dealroom (which covered up until September 2023), Revolut alumni have launched 34 companies — the highest among European fintechs.
Ex-employees say that while Revolut’s “get shit done” culture isn’t for everyone, the level of responsibility and ownership they’re given is a key ingredient for entrepreneurial skills.
“You’re always challenged and it’s high-speed,” one former Revolut employee told Sifted last year. “And the exposure you get as an employee is unmatched — you can take on as much as you can handle.”
There might be more employees-turned-founders waiting in the wings. Friday saw Revolut close a sale of current employee shares that increased its valuation from $33bn to $45bn. Unlocking capital for this cohort of employees could encourage some of them to take the dip into entrepreneurship.
For now, however, we’ve tracked down 15 businesses founded by ex-Revoluters in 2023 and 2024. If we’ve missed any, please reach out.
Peter Nguyen Andersson, cofounder at Bond
Role at Revolut: After joining Revolut in 2019 as one of its first senior risk managers, Nguyen Andersson remained at the company for four years. During his time, he says he played a key role in the development of Revolut’s market risk management framework.
New venture: Nguyen Andersson founded Bond in November 2023, a treasury management platform that helps companies optimise their balance sheets with a range of investment management products. Bond currently has 12 employees, is revenue generating and isn’t currently seeking external funding, Andersson tells Sifted.
Sonya Baranova, cofounder at Inovat
Role at Revolut: Baranova worked in Revolut’s legal and operations department between June 2017 and September 2018.
“I strived to be an entrepreneur before that and Revolut was the best place for me to learn top practices,” she tells Sifted.
New venture: Inovat, an app offering digital VAT refunds for travellers, was founded by Baranova and her cofounders in August 2023. She tells Sifted the startup is revenue-making and seeking funding but didn’t share any further details.
Jeremy Bensoussan, cofounder at Avenir
Role at Revolut: Bensoussan joined Revolut in 2021 where he led product development for the fintech’s savings product Vaults for two years.
New venture: He left Revolut in July last year to found financial reporting startup Avenir, which took part in Techstars’ fintech accelerator programme the following month. Its team of five are based in London and raised a $530k pre-seed round led by SFC Capital in March this year.
Fedor Chmilev, founder at Resolv Labs
Role at Revolut: Chmilev was lead software engineer in the crypto and trading divisions at Revolut between 2019 and 2022. During his tenure at the UK fintech giant, he developed and managed stock, crypto and commodities related products and features.
New venture: In June last year, Chmilev founded Resolv Labs, a crypto startup building yield generation tools using stablecoins, cryptocurrencies pegged to a price of a fiat currency like the US dollar.
Matteo Damiani, cofounder and CEO at BOK
Role at Revolut: Damiani worked in B2B sales and strategy development at Revolut’s Paris office between August 2022 and September 2023, where he led the launch of company accounts and cards in the Italian market.
“Revolut helped me understand how to interact with different markets and how a fintech sales cycle looks, with all its idiosyncrasies and difficulties,” he tells Sifted.
New venture: In April this year, Damiani founded BOK (Bills of Knowledge), a mobile app focused on building generational wealth for Gen Zs through saving and investing. It’s set to launch in October and is currently raising a pre-seed round.
Ruslan Fakhrutdinov, Dmitrii Krasovskikh and Stefano Franz, cofounders at X10
Role at Revolut: Fakhrutdinov was Revolut’s head of crypto operations, Franz led crypto engineering while Krasovskikh was a technical lead at the fintech.
New venture: The three former Revolut employees left the neobank last year to found X10, a new crypto exchange for professional traders. The company emerged from stealth in April this year to raise a $6.5m round led by European crypto VC fund Tioga Capital.
Dimitrios Ilias and George Pastakas, cofounders at Intryc
Role at Revolut: Ilias was a software engineer in the finance department at Revolut between April 2018 and June 2019, where he led the development of Revolut’s treasury and core banking platform. His cofounder Pastakas was a product owner and data scientist in the financial crime team for three years, until June 2021.
New venture: The pair are currently building Intryc, an AI co-pilot to automate quality assurance for customer support. They’ve raised $1.8m from Y Combinator, Episode 1 and 500EE. Intryc is part of Y Combinator’s summer cohort for this year.
Dmitry Larkin and Oleg Velikanov, cofounders at PaySway
Role at Revolut: Larkin was at Revolut for three years where he headed up operations in the bank payments department, while Velikanov was a software engineer at the company between 2022 and 2024.
New venture: Founded in June this year, PaySway develops software tools to help fintechs and banks to ensure the success of transfers and payments. For example, it has developed an API to decrease payment failure rate and predict the delivery time of local and international transfers. Larkin tells Sifted the startup’s not currently fundraising.
Jordan Rolando, founder and CEO at Fintigua
Role at Revolut: Rolando was at Revolut between April 2020 and January 2023, where he served as senior sales executive in the corporate growth department.
New venture: In August last year, Rolando founded Fintigua, a startup offering businesses the ability to integrate fintech services such as IBANs (International bank account numbers), international transfers and foreign exchange services. Currently a team of six, Fintigua is revenue-making and is self-funded, operating without any external funding or investment, he tells Sifted.
Rhim Shah, cofounder and CEO at Arva AI
Role at Revolut: Shah led the financial crime product team in Revolut’s business banking division between July 2022 and November 2023. He credits the Revolut experience as influencing his decision to become an entrepreneur.
“The Revolut culture really pushes you to care about the problems you’re working on,” he says. “That level of ownership no company pushes its employees to have and it’s the exact level of ownership you need as a founder.”
New venture: Arva is building AI agents to handle the verification process for businesses onboarding to a bank or fintech. Shah and his cofounder Oli Wales are in San Francisco to take part in Y Combinator’s summer cohort. The startup is currently raising a seed round.
Other employees turned founders include:
Gaetano de Maio, cofounder at Qomodo
Role at Revolut: Country manager, Italy.
New Venture: Qomodo is a payments company offering BNPL solutions to small and medium businesses in Italy.
Shirin Krall, founder at MARBL
Role at Revolut: Global head of retail (B2C) marketing.
New Venture: Marbl, an AI-powered concierge service for the beauty industry.
Ethan Waldie and Dominic Aits, cofounders at Ferry
Role at Revolut: Waldie was a data scientist at Revolut while Aits was operations manager and product owner.
New Venture: Ferry is a platform for building digital apps for the manufacturing industry.
Bartosz Czerkies, cofounder at Tequipy
Role at Revolut: Marketing manager.
New Venture: Tequipy is a HR platform handling the employee onboarding process.
Anton Shumskih, cofounder and CTO at NeoAgent
Role at Revolut: Senior backend software engineer.
New Venture: NeoAgent is an AI copilot for IT helpdesks.
Read the orginal article: https://sifted.eu/articles/revolut-alumni-founders-latest/
