TRUSTDOCK Raises 1.3 Billion Yen in Funding｜Providing one-stop eKYC/identity verification services

eKYC market growing along with real-life procedures and transactions going online

KYC (Know Your Customer) regulations have been tightened worldwide from the perspective of preventing money laundering and terrorist financing, and financial institutions and other businesses have been dealing with this issue at great cost through the exchange of physical documents and visual inspection by human operators. In recent years, with the diversification and spread of online services, eKYC (electronic KYC), a method that can be completed online, has been lifted and is rapidly becoming popular. In addition to the enhancement of identification methods and operational efficiency in industries required by law, there has been an increase in the number of businesses voluntarily introducing eKYC in other industries as well, from the perspective of reputational and service quality improvement, as there has been no end to the number of incidents occurring due to lack of proper identification.
In addition to Fintech as a new financial service, its adoption is accelerating in e-commerce and human resource matching, and demand for eKYC will only increase in the education and medical fields in the future.

TRUSTDOCK, a one-stop KYC platform that provides eKYC/identity verification compliant with various business laws

TRUSTDOCK is a KYC platform that provides "machine + human" processing of various KYC operations such as identity verification through various eKYC, My number acquisition, AML risk confirmation, and corporate eKYC, regardless of the business law. Businesses can build the necessary KYC business processes simply by incorporating the provided business APIs into their online services, and users can complete the identity verification required for such procedures by simply following the guidance on the business's service website. Regardless of the size of the company, it is possible to provide an optimized KYC process for online services that operate 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

Background and Purpose of Fundraising

Since the lifting of the ban on eKYC, many businesses have supported our service because it is easy to build KYC business processes that comply with all business laws and regulations, and because it is a one-stop service that covers everything from necessary tools to actual operations, and our service implementation results have been steadily increasing.
In addition, our role as an infrastructure that supports the growth of the digital society is becoming more important, as the expansion of online services of the businesses where we are installed has led to a significant increase in the number of cases processed by us.
In the prolonged Corona Disaster, non-personal procedures and transactions are increasing in all industries, and the expansion of eKYC to accelerate the digital transformation (DX) of society is becoming an increasingly urgent area for society.
With this fundraising, we will make further efforts to improve the infrastructure of eKYC to become a sustainable social infrastructure, including strengthening and expanding the organizational structure including compliance governance, investing in development to realize high-volume KYC processing, and investing in security based on the zero-trust premise.

Innovation Growth Fund I L.P., which is managed by Innovation Growth Ventures, a joint venture established by Sony Group Inc. and Yowa Capital Holdings Co.

Comments from underwriters (in no particular order)

Globis Capital Partners / Mr. Ryohei Minami

Under the leadership of a management with agility and execution capability, "TRUSTDOCK" has led the market since the dawn of eKYC and has already grown to be a service supported by many customers. We are pleased to be able to share in the company's medium- to long-term vision, and are looking forward to working with the company as it takes on this challenge. We hope that the company will accelerate its growth through this procurement and become an indispensable infrastructure for the ever-increasing digitization of society in the future.

STRIVE / Mr. Tatsuo Tsutsumi

TRUSTDOCK continues to provide innovative services that are truly in tune with the times: eKYC/Digital Identity. We have invested in TRUSTDOCK since the last round, and over the past two years, the company has continued to grow without complaint both as a business and as an organization, so naturally we made an additional investment in this round.
The worldview that TRUSTDOCK is aiming for is far from being realized, but with the addition of new and wonderful investors, we can't help but look forward to further growth in the years to come.

Sony Innovation Fund by IGV / Mr. Hajime Tsuchikawa

The e-KYC area is an area of high social need and is also an extremely important area for corporate management.
We believe that the company's ability to provide high value-added services based on superior technology will make it a partner for more and more companies.
We will continue to support the growth of our business.

Mitsubishi UFJ Capital / Mr. Hiroki Yamamoto

With the shift to non-personal services and the spread of the fintech and sharing economy, the challenge of identity verification is becoming more and more profound. As TRUSTDOCK expands into the social infrastructure, people will be able to receive services smoothly, free from complicated procedures. We look forward to the realization of such a future.

Mizuho Capital / Mr. Jun Arai

The eKYC/identity verification service developed by TRUSTDOCK is recognized as a service with extremely high market potential, not only for compliance with the Criminal Code, but also for other regulations, as well as for the specific needs of businesses unrelated to other regulations. We are pleased to participate in this year's financing as we did the last time.
We have high expectations for eKYC's further growth as a global company, including expansion into the ASEAN and other markets.

SMBC Venture Capital / Mr. Ryo Morita

As a KYC provider, TRUSTDOCK, which has been earnestly working on the social implementation of digital identities, is expected to play a major role in supporting the development of the digital society. We hope that TRUSTDOCK, as a KYC provider, will play a major role in supporting the development of the digital society.

About TRUSTDOCK Corporation