On EQT Ventures’ investment in Treecard, building the leading green finance brand
Today, Treecard — the world’s first wooden payment card that reforests as you spend, has raised a $5.12 million seed round led by EQT Ventures. In just a few weeks, it has organically grown its waiting list to over 140,000 people for the card’s launch. Seedcamp, Episode 1 and Angel investors including Matt Robinson (the founder of GoCardless), Paul Forester (founder of Indeed), and Charlie Delingpole (founder of ComplyAdvantage) also participated in the round. The funding will support the US and European expansion.
At EQT Ventures, we believe climate will be to this decade what the cloud was to the last one. The greenification of core industries is happening now. Finance is at the core of how people direct the economy and spending. By challenging this industry, positive and long-lasting impact can be created.
Treecard is well positioned to become the leading green finance brand, the de facto platform for impact financial management with a full suite of products for conscious consumers and business users (e.g. green investing, expense cards, bank to bank payments). This is a position no brand has claimed yet.
In just a few weeks Treecard has attracted over 140k sign-ups for their first product with zero marketing costs, showing the inherent virality: a wood-based card, approved by Mastercard, that reforests as you spend. When you spend with Amex you get rewards, when you spend with Treecard you contribute towards making a better world. No need to change bank account; it’s a decoupled card that links with current bank accounts, making it easy and convenient for users to integrate Treecard into their usual spending habits. The card is completely free to customers and regular purchases contribute to tree planting projects powered by Ecosia. Over the last 10 years, Ecosia has planted more than 100 million trees all over the world. The next big goal is to plant one billion trees over the next five years, financed in part by TreeCard.
The fundamental reason we made this investment was the founding team — as soon as we ended the first Zoom call we knew we wanted to back them. Jamie Cox, James Dugan and Gary Wu have a rare combination of technical, growth and fintech skills coupled with a profound mission to make a difference. After having founded Cashew, a Venmo for the UK, Jamie was hungry for another fintech opportunity, but this time around he wanted to build a financial product with a difference. To quote him directly: “one that was far removed from greenwashing and allowed customers to improve the impact of their spending without drastically changing their habits.”
With this funding round, Treecard will be accelerating hiring talent and launching their first product in both the US and Europe. We’re incredibly excited and honoured to be joining Jamie, James and Gary in their journey towards building the leading green finance brand!
