In April 2022, we wrote about our Series A investment in Slope, a B2B Buy-Now-Pay-Later (BNPL) platform creating an automated, zero-question, instantaneous underwriting platform for B2B installment loans and bringing a buttery experience to B2B payments that has previously been reserved for consumer experiences.
At the time, Slope was seeing fast acceleration with online marketplaces that felt the pain of antiquated payment infrastructure. In the last 18 months, that slope (pun intended) has supercharged. The platform has not only grown more than 20x but has also increased efficiency while remaining laser focused on underlying quality. The default rate has fallen to industry leading rates and the team has stayed lean and focused.
Most importantly, the scope and potential of Slope has significantly expanded. While the mission remains anchored on transitioning the world’s B2B economy online, Slope’s customers have pulled the product set forward. Slope now offers full order-to-cash workflow automation using leading AI tools that power checkout, customer and vendor risk assessment, payment reconciliation, and cash management. With this growth, the customer set now includes enterprise wholesalers, accounts payable automation, and payment processors as well as B2B marketplaces.
Cofounders Lawrence and Alice have taken a product-first approach to financial services, building for developers with easy to use, low lift to integrate software in an industry long bogged down by process. The team’s speed and agility has allowed them to launch features like SlopeGPT, the first LLM-powered risk engine, now integrated into Slope’s underwriting and creating both faster and higher quality results.
The $125T B2B payments market remains overwhelmingly analog but Slope’s suite of solutions are quickly transforming the experience and opportunity in it. As a result, we are excited to deepen our relationship with Lawrence, Alice and their team and lead their recent round alongside Sam Altman, Y Combinator, Monashees, Across Capital, and fantastic founders of businesses including Mathilde Collin from Front, Alex Bouaziz from Deel, and Jack Altman from Lattice. If you’re a potential customer or a product-focused builder, please reach out.