FlipSimply is a €1.8M inventory crowd-financing platform connecting small producers with investors to finance manufacturing. It isn’t equity or lending, it is an investment that returns the amortization and interest in % of the turnover of the financed firm. At the same time, the platform publishes business projects with a verified sales history that seek funding for inventory. The product is pledged as collateral to the investor and when the project author sells it, the investor receives its benefit. That’s why FlipSimply is able to offer greater guarantees and return margins to investors in reduced time frames.
FlipSimply has been founded by Gregorio Lopez and Borja Blanco who structure the company through the following: 80% owned by Taunology, of which 50% is owned by Gregorio Lopez; 7% is owned by Borja Blanco, cofounder with Gregorio Lopez; 5% is owned by Julio Alfaro who comes from the firm IA Newralers; 2,5% is owned by Beatriz Torres, the Chief Technology Officer; and the last would be a 3% owned by Antonio Fernandez, who comes from Nexora, a web and app design and development firm.
According to them all, FlipSimply’s flagship product stands for the Smart Escrow Technology the platform has. The Smart Escrow is utilized for the process of purchase order finance for the suppliers of large FMCG brands. With it, “we can control payments and risk by releasing capital through phases”, said the founders. Therefore, this system allows them to finance production through the release of funds in different stages and ensuring they are used for production. The sale of said products is also controlled so that the investment and the return is safely brought back to investors. It can be thought of as a “pre-factoring”.
FlipSimply that was founded on 2017 and headquartered in Toledo, has received some recognitions such as: being finalist of the La Caixa Emprendedor XXI Awards, so as part of the Bankia Fintech accelerator program, supported by the BBVA Open Space Program, and has being selected by the largest Fintech accelerator in Europe (StartupBootCamp) and also for the Red Link, the largest ATM network in Argentina for product testing in the country.
BUSINESS MODEL
FlipSimply is based on “pre-factoring”, through this way, the purchase order makes sense and the risks, although greater, are compensated with greater control of the process, automatisms and better margins in addition to a pioneering an almost unique market position with respect to rest of traditional banks. At the same time, another platform characteristic that stands up is the “purchase order finance”. Founders explain that “with our Smart Escrow technology, we can control payments and risk by releasing capital through phases (the same system is used with promoters in the real estate market). This allows us to finance production through the release of funds in different stages and making sure they are used for production”.
Moreover, FlipSimply can be very useful in the case of products that take a time to “mature” before they can be sold (beer, whisky, wine, Iberian ham, cheese). With a company that sells Iberian ham, for example, 18 months are needed before the ham can be sold. The company will have large amounts of capital blocked due to immobile stock. It may be that case that they will have capacity problems due to lack of circulating capital. FlipSimply could facilitate the capital they need to increase maturity time and therefore quality. This results in higher benefits for the company even after paying the investor.
Therefore, founder said thet FlipSimply’s business model is “simple and straightforward”. FlipSimply identifies a potential client with the need of financing, for example, a meat supplier of Carrefour. Then, the platform opens up the project to potential investors. Once the total amount of money is raised, it will be securely delivered in phases with the Smart Escrow technology. Once the sale of the supplier’s meat is realised, the money invested by investors will be returned in 6 months, or a year, depending on the terms set plus an 8-12% rate on the amount invested per annum. FlipSimply will keep between 1-5% of the investment the client identified required initially. This business model offers the possibility of opening up an unlimited amount of projects in a simple, safe and automatic manner, leveraging the Smart Escrow technology and thus being able to gain a small commission of each.