Signicat Acquires UK-based Anti-Fraud and Identity Technology Company Sphonic

The combination with Sphonic will make the pan-European digital identity specialist better able to protect banks and other customers against fraud, financial crime, and money laundering. The acquisition creates one of the strongest identity ecosystems globally. 

Nordic Capital-backed Signicat, one of Europe’s leading providers of digital identity and electronic signature solutions, is acquiring all shares in the UK-headquartered anti-fraud company Sphonic for an undisclosed sum. Existing management shareholders will reinvest a substantial part of the consideration into Signicat.

Signicat has been growing rapidly in the last years, both organically and through acquisitions. The digital identity pioneer aims to be a single provider for the entire digital identity and anti-financial crime lifecycle across Europe. This includes identity solutions to support customer on-boarding, authentication, e-signing, fraud management and risk management. Since 2019 Signicat has acquired five companies, including in the last year mobile authentication company Encap, electronic signing provider Dokobit, and identity proofing innovator Electronic IDentification.

Sphonic was founded in London in 2012 and is a pioneer in automating compliance decision processes. The company has a unique track record of helping financial services, fintechs, gaming operators and the payments ecosystem manage their client on-boardings and risk assessments including activities such as credit checks, affordability checks, and other compliance checks. With this acquisition, Signicat will be able to extend its leading existing identity platform with Sphonic’s know your customer (KYC), know your business (KYB) and anti-money laundering (AML) solutions.

“With digital fraud continuing to rise globally, it has become critical to know that your customers are who they claim to be. With Sphonic’s leading team of professionals and their data orchestration and decisioning platform, we will be able to offer a more extensive range of on-boarding services with highly flexible risk and compliance solutions - all of which can keep international customers safe from fraud,” says Asger Hattel, CEO of Signicat.

Sphonic’s primary product, Workflow Manager, enables clients to customise, automate and manage compliance workflows seamlessly. Sphonic leverages around 100 of the world's leading data and technology providers allowing banks and other institutions to access the best-in-breed technologies via a single API. The solution improves the quality of data and increases end-user insights that the customers can use to make an on-boarding decision. It also reduces a client’s customer on-boarding time from days to seconds and prevents customer drop-off rates. It prevents fraud and provides an experience fit for the digital age.

Sphonic has recently expanded its solution offering with a highly scalable real-time fraud & AML transaction monitoring solution in addition to a case management system that also offers tools for visualising identity, fraud and AML data.

“We are excited to become part of the Signicat family” says Andy Lee, the founder and general manager of Sphonic. “For the past 10 years we have built industry-leading solutions that solve some of the most complex on-boarding and compliance challenges in heavily regulated industries for global digital payments, crypto, gaming and lending brands requiring rapid on-boarding for their high-volume client base. With Signicat there was a great complementary fit. Now we are ready to accelerate our ambitions in new markets and verticals and creating a compelling joint global solution.”

Sphonic will continue as a separate business entity, named “Sphonic, a Signicat company”, for the short term, and then be fully integrated into Signicat. The Sphonic management team will form part of Signicat’s wider senior management team and Andy Lee will also take on the role as as Signicat’s UK Country Manager.

About Sphonic

Sphonic is the trading name of Symphonic Solutions Limited, a London-Based RegTech business established in 2012 to develop and launch its initial product Workflow Manager. With the growth in digital commerce, alongside increasing concerns around financial regulation and consumer security, Sphonic has created a suite of products to ensure its clients achieve the right balance in protection and customer experience. Workflow Manager enables access to innovations from around 100 leading vendors in areas such as Global Identity & Business Verification, PEPs & Sanctions Data, Device Fingerprinting, Mobile Profiling, Email Verification, Geo-Location, Behavioural Biometrics and many others through its agnostic platform. More recently Sphonic developed a real-time Transaction Monitoring system to identify Fraud, AML & Affordability (for Gaming & BNPL), which offers an end-to-end digital risk platform to its client base. Sphonic has 24 employees based in the UK and Portugal. For further information about Sphonic, please visit www.sphonic.com.

About Signicat 

Signicat is a pioneering, pan-European digital identity company with an unrivalled track record in the world’s most advanced digital identity markets. Its Digital Identity Platform incorporates the most extensive suite of identity proofing and authentication systems in the world, all accessible through a single integration point. The platform supports the full identity journey, from recognition and on-boarding, through login and consent, to making business agreements which stand the test of time. Signicat was founded in 2006 and acquired by leading European private equity investor Nordic Capital in 2019. It is headquartered in Trondheim, Norway.

For further information about Signicat, please visit www.signicat.com.