London-based Legaltech startup Thirdfort, specialising in identity and source of funds checks for conveyancers raised US$ 1.3M on 26 Aug 2020 in its seed-plus investment round.
The participants in the round included a number of high-profile investors including James Meekings and Andy Mullinger – co-founders of Funding Circle, David Rutter – founder of R3, law firm Mishcon de Reya and a range of other private investors.
ThirdFort is planning to utilize the funds to capitalise on increasing demand. It wants to increase the number of law firms it works with from 100 to 450 in next few months.
The startup’s web and mobile app combines document scanning, facial recognition and Open Banking in order to streamline identity and source of funds checks done by lawyers. It is a user-friendly app that verifies identity for money laundering checks. There is also a questionnaire in the app for the user to complete.
ThirdFort reported a five-fold rise in inbound leads during March and April since law firms are working remotely and in-person ID checks are not feasible. The team of ThirdFort has also grown from 15 to 25. The lockdown has benefited the company in a “transformational” way.
The startup was founded in 2017 by Olly Thornton-Berry and Jack Bidgood who are school friends. Both of them come from private equity and banking backgrounds. ThirdFort is headquartered in Victoria, London. It has previously secured seed funding from Mishcon, Alex Chesterman – founder of Zoopla and Chris Marks who are some of the high-profile angel investors.
Olly Thornton-Berry said, “The need for the legal market to rapidly adapt in light of the Covid-19 pandemic has been a major catalyst for change and we believe there is an enormous opportunity to help lawyers cut out fraud risk while improving the client experience during life’s big moments, through a slick and simple mobile app.”
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