Participated · Equity · Jul 2022

TomoCredit offers a credit card and lending products aimed at the more than 40 million credit‑invisible immigrants and international students with no U.S. credit history. The company uses a proprietary underwriting algorithm called Tomo Score to identify high‑potential borrowers without a traditional credit score. Its first product is a card that the article describes as requiring no credit check, no deposit, no APR, and no feeds. TomoCredit plans to use new funding to expand its credit product offerings into areas such as auto loans and mortgages. The company is led by founder and CEO Kristy Kim and is based in San Francisco, CA. The fundraising includes both equity and debt capital, strengthening its ability to scale underwriting and product expansion. TomoCredit issues a fee-free Mastercard that helps first-time borrowers build credit by underwriting applicants on cash flow rather than FICO scores, using open-banking data from Finicity. The product charges no fees, no APR and does no credit pull; the company monetizes via merchant fees. TomoCredit is powered by Finicity (acquired by Mastercard) and was founded in January 2019 by Kristy Kim and Dmitry Kashlev. The startup has pre-approved more than 300,000 customers, expects to issue 500,000 cards by year-end, and says it has grown 10x this year. It currently has about 30 employees (up from 10 at its last raise) and is focused on recruiting senior talent to scale. Planned product and feature moves include a premium Tomo Black card for high-performing customers in early 2022, weekly autopay, and higher credit limits to accelerate score improvement. TomoCredit is a San Francisco-based fintech that issues a fee-free credit card designed to help first-time borrowers and immigrants build credit using cash-flow and open-banking data rather than traditional FICO scores. The card is issued by Community Federal Savings Bank, uses a seven-day automatic payment schedule, carries no fees or APR, and has average credit limits around $3,000 (scaling to $10,000). Users can link investment accounts to increase limits. Tomo launched cards in late summer 2020, attracted over 300,000 signups with roughly half pre-approved, and today reports more than 10,000 active users while aggressively issuing cards. The company’s revenue model is based on merchant fees rather than consumer fees. Tomo plans to use new capital to triple its headcount from 15, hire full-stack and data engineers, advance product development, and issue cards to remaining pre-approved applicants by this summer.