£10m boost for finance group

Leeds-based Reward Finance Group has received £10m investment from an independent infrastructure and private equity investment firm.

Foresight Group LLP has confirmed the additional funding, which Reward said would be used to help fulfil the growing demand by SMEs for its business finance, trade finance and invoice finance products.

The latest investment by Foresight comes 11 months after providing Reward Finance with £40m, which enabled it to double its lending capability.

Having been founded in 2011 Reward Finance now forms 75% of Mettle Investments, a financial services company which is quoted on the South African stock exchange.

Nick Smith of Reward said: “The fact that Foresight has added a further £10m to its initial investment of £40m demonstrates the faith it has in us to continue to maintain our impressive growth by providing SMEs with fast and flexible funding to enable them to grow their businesses.

“An increasing number of companies are turning to asset-backed funders like Reward Finance as traditional banks can be slow to react when, more often than not, funds are needed quickly.  With the extra funding we will be able to quickly meet the growing demand for our finance products across the North of England, through our Leeds and Manchester offices.”

Foresight Investment manager at Foresight, Amy Crofton, said: “Naturally we were already impressed with Reward Finance’s exceptionally strong track record of profitable growth when we made our original investment of  £40m. The company continues to demonstrate huge potential and we have been pleased to  invest this additional £10m to enable the Company to fulfil its reputation in the marketplace for a ‘can do’ approach to SME lending.”