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~ Ronan Bardet ~

COLUMN

FLEXIBLE CAPITAL TO DEMOCRATISE E-COMMERCE
ACCELERATION

he challenges for an online shop don’t stop after the launch
T and stabilisation of sales.

Cash flow can be a challenge itself, and continuing to grow What makes the
among all the great competitors in the market is more difference between
difficult every day. For small and medium companies, this this business model
challenge can easily be overwhelming. and traditional loans is that the monthly fee is completely
flexible. Quotes will be adapted to monthly sales to repay
There is a new trend that, in my opinion, will bring certain the loan at your own pace. This flexibility opens great new
democratisation in the e-commerce world. In 2015, the chances for smaller businesses, new opportunities to be in the
Canadian company Clearco was founded to offer a more race together with the giants of e-commerce.
friendly capital solution for e-commerce, introducing us to a
new business model. It was about time to have a more reasonable way to drive
growth to your e-commerce. Huge funding rounds are great
This business model is changing the way we understand for SaaS that are willing to expand their businesses and need
finantiation, and it’s opening brand new opportunities to engineers to improve their solutions together with bigger
the companies that had difficulties getting loans or were sales teams, customer services and marketing. But there wasn’t
not ready or interested in opening a funding round. Flexible a specific option focused on helping e-commerce other than
capital opened the eyes of the industry, and, in the last year, traditional loans coming from traditional banks. We can’t
new companies following this business model have been born expect to work on digital transformation by using formulas
in the UK, France, Germany and even in Spain. created more than 50 years ago.

Why? Being able to adapt the amount received depending on your
There are many reasons why this model is so successful. At needs, being able to receive part of it while placing the order
this very moment, the money value is not at the highest level, for the new stock and getting the rest of it once production is
so interest rates are low, allowing companies to get the most over is great to pay for what you need at every moment. Why
of their loans. get 50K if you need 10K now and 40 in 3 months. Why start
paying now for what you don’t need at the moment?
In this positive environment for loans, companies such as
Clearco, Wayflyer, or Uncapped are helping e-commerce I am intrigued about the next steps of these companies and
companies to get the money they need to launch new will closely follow their evolution as I really think they will
marketing campaigns, implement new digital commerce be key for the growth of many e-commerce players that were
solutions to keep growing or to help them grow their waiting for their opportunity to show their ideas to the world.
portfolio by buying new stock. In a matter of days, the ••
e-commerce businesses can get between €10K and €2M to
develop their projects. RONAN BARDET
Founder of EGI Group & Club eCommerce; I have been named one of the Top
How? 10 Spanish eCommerce Influencers with more than 17 years of experience in
The first step is to analyse sales, traffic and related metrics the Digital Commerce industry.
from the inside. The company in charge of authorising the
loan gets access to the shopping platform of the e-commerce I am an expert in SaaS Retail Tech & eCommerce Tech Startup acceleration
company so they can see what would be the perfect amount to (sales + marketing + capital). My passion for the industry has led me to
balance needs and opportunities. The loan must be something launch and grow many Digital Commerce tech startups in Spain and create a
helpful without causing financial tensions to e-commerce specific acceleration program for them. As an eCommerce expert, I have also
while returning it. mentored many Spanish DNVBs / D2C Brands.

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