Chetwood Financial acquires Yobota to boost BaaS proposition

Digital bank Chetwood Financial has acquired London-based core banking provider Yobota to create a “more collaborative and compelling” Banking-as-a-Service (BaaS) proposition, with Yobota’s CEO and founder Ammar Akhtar set to step down.

Following the acquisition, Yobota, which was founded alongside Chetwood Financial in 2016 as a separate entity, will continue to deliver its cloud-native core banking system (CBS), on which businesses can run fully-compliant financial services, under Chetwood’s banking licence.

Existing Yobota management will continue to run the company, which will operate as a separate brand under the Chetwood umbrella.

In a statement, Chetwood said Yobota’s current partners and customers will remain “unaffected” by the transition.

Meanwhile, Chetwood will continue to run its existing consumer-facing products, including Wave, LiveLend, SmartSave and BetterBorrow.

Andy Mielczarek, CEO and founder of Chetwood, said: “Chetwood and Yobota have common shareholders and shared purpose, and there is pre-established trust from knowing and working together.

“The acquisition is set to bring greater value to investors as well as strengthen our existing BaaS proposition, helping clients create better end-to-end journeys for their customers by handling both the regulatory and technological complexities involved in embedding financial services into existing propositions.”

Mielczarek added that clients of both firms will benefit from their “complementary offerings”.

Akhtar, who is leaving to “pursue new challenges”, said: “These last six years have been an amazing journey. We’ve built a fantastic banking core and there is an extremely talented team in place to take it forward.

“I’m very grateful for all the opportunities and experiences I’ve had during this time and incredibly proud of the work we’ve done together.”