Wikipedia
Ezbob, is a UK-based financial provider that offers financing through a web portal for small and medium enterprisess. The company was founded in 2011 and started lending to small businesses in the UK in September 2012.
The automated online platform analyzes the applicant's personal and business information, including links to business bank accounts, online marketplaces, online accounting providers, payment service providers, and e-commerce platforms with which Ezbob is integrated. Ezbob also analyzes the applicant's current business operating data such as sales, profitability, inventory, customer feedback, business and personal information.
Ezbob compiles this data into a workable client profile in a brief span of time so that it can make a qualified decision, allowing the approved applicant immediate short-term funding. Funding can be paid off at any time because there are no termination fees or early payment penalties. Customers can also re-up their financing in midst of a repayment period if additional funding is needed.
Prior to the alternative lending boom in the UK market, it was very difficult for the SME to attain financing because there were only traditional avenues of financing available. Bank loans were simply not designed to provide financing to the SME sector because many of those SME businesses didn't qualify within the stringent credit validation process. Banks were also less inclined to loan smaller amounts of money because it wasn’t financially worth the trouble and made them little money in return. This would force small and medium businesses to look into invoice financing, merchant cash advances, collateralize personal loans, bridging loans and other costly options in an effort to attain the financing needed. While these avenues provided some businesses with financing opportunity, many weren't applicable for various reasons. For example, merchant cash advances would only be applicable to retail businesses that take credit card payments, where a loan could be taken off of future credit card transactions. The automated online platform analyzes the applicant's personal and business information, including links to business bank accounts, online marketplaces, online accounting providers, payment service providers, and e-commerce platforms with which Ezbob is integrated. Ezbob also analyzes the applicant's real-time business operating data such as sales, profitability, inventory, customer feedback, and business and personal information. Based on this data, which can be accumulated in a brief span of time, a qualified applicant may be provided with immediate short-term funding.
Initially, the company provided business funding specifically for e-commerce retailers who used eBay, Amazon, PayPal, shopify, play.com, Magento, PrestaShop, ekmPowershop, ChannelGrabber and More. In November 2013, Ezbob began offering its services to the entire SME market in the UK. Ezbob currently offers instant business loans of between £3,000-£120,000 for up to 12 months available to approximate 5 million businesses in the UK.
As ezbob continues to grow as a leading choice for unsecured loans, partnership talks have begun to take place with UK high street banks to discuss the opportunity of having ezbob become their SME alternative lending partner. This type of relationship is similar to the recent partnership announced between Santander and another alternative lending business in this sector.
Ezbob has recently partnered with Better Business Finance and will be an alternative lender option for its patrons