MTS Venture Fund Leads the Investment Round of the Fintech Artificial Intelligence Platform TalkBank
The MTS Venture Fund led the round, which was also attended by the founders of the G&K Capital venture fund Pavel Goltsblat and Jan Krustkaln, the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (FRII Invest LLC), Sergey Dashkov’s company JointJourney and other investors. The raised funds are aimed to strengthen the team and infrastructure, expand the company’s market position in Russia and launch a pilot project in Europe.
TalkBank has two key products: a flexible Fintech platform and an online bank in instant messengers, without mobile apps and call centers. Now the startup is developing a bot based on the MTS Bank smart bank API and TalkBank chatbot technologies, called MTS Bank Now. At the beginning, the bot will design virtual cards, carry out p2p-transfers and financial help. The first version of MTS Bank Now will be launched in the upcoming months. By the end of 2021, the bot will learn to issue applications for loans, deposits, insurance and open accounts.
“This is not the first time the MTS Venture Fund has invested in a Fintech startup. We received a minority stake in CoinKeeper, a mobile personal finance accounting service. TalkBank is a fast-growing, promising project, both in the Russian and export markets, which has experience in working with attracted investments. It is also important for us that the startup team offers a product of interest to the MTS ecosystem. In particular, therefore, we have headed the current investment round and are planning further active cooperation with TalkBank,” said Islam Midov, head of the MTS Venture Fund.
“We have offered turnkey banking to medium and large businesses with large audiences. The market has long needed flexible and technological service, but it is still tied to apps, personal accounts and offices. TalkBank is a neo-bank that can serve clients in instant messengers. This applies to both individuals and entire IT platforms, marketplaces and telecom operators. We are working in this direction with MTS; soon, clients will use our joint innovative product. We also see a great potential of the project not only in the Russian market but also in the world. Therefore, soon we plan to present our solution also in Europe,” commented Mikhail Popov, founder and CEO of TalkBank.
TalkBank is the first virtual bank in Russia without branches, call centers and mobile apps. It offers full banking functionality and works in instant messengers. Financial management is carried out using AI—a chatbot that helps to issue and receive cards, go through personal identification and carry out monetary transactions online. The architecture and API of TalkBank allow embedding banking functionality into the business processes of services and clients. TalkBank technologies have received awards from experts: Seedstars, MoEx, SWIFT, Bank of Russia. He is a resident of Skolkovo. Graduate of Accelerator IIDF.
