American payments firm to set up Cork base after virus subsides

US payments company Remitly plans to open an office in Cork after the coronavirus restrictions subside. Remitly builds software for digital and mobile remittance payments across borders and is mostly used by workers to transfer money internationally.

The Seattle-headquartered fintech firm is valued at around $1bn after its last funding round of $220m in July 2019. Some of its investors include Barclays and Bezos Expeditions, the venture capital fund of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

Amid uncertainty over the Covid-19 pandemic and when offices will be fully operational again, the US company has begun hiring for roles in Cork. The company will be hiring a general manager to oversee a team responsible for anti-money laundering and fraud prevention reviews and ensuring user activity complies with regulations.

It is currently in the process of securing an office and expects to have 10-12 people employed before the end of the year, with plans to expand the team in 2021, but that timeline will hinge on how workplaces return to normality after lockdown.

“Cork has an established and long history of providing multinational tech companies with first-class customer success teams. The opportunity to build our team here as part of that ecosystem and access to such customer-focused talent made the decision an easy one for us,” said Rene Yoakum, chief customer and people officer at Remitly.

The company has been pushing further into the European market over the last three years and has offices in London and Poland.

It kick-started its European launch in the UK where it held the necessary financial licences to operate in the EU. It obtained a payments licence from the Central Bank of Ireland in 2019 that would allow it to continue operating and expanding in Europe. Remitly registered an Irish entity in 2018 and invested €400,000 into that company in 2019, according to filings with the Companies Registration Office.