UK-based fintech equipal has secured £16.25 million in combined equity and forward flow funding from Altum Capital Management, in a deal aimed at expanding its presence in the UK business equipment finance market. The raise, structured as a £1.25 million equity injection alongside a £15 million tiered forward flow facility, comes at a time when institutional appetite for platform lending has tightened, with Altum Capital providing both the equity and funding capacity in the same transaction.
Beyond the headline figure, the transaction is structured to accommodate additional senior funding capacity over time, giving equipal the option to scale without requiring a full refinancing.
“I’m thrilled to get this deal over the line. While the market environment has been challenging, our operating resilience and discipline on credit, while keeping the customer front and centre, has helped us get here. The structure of this deal allows for additional scale with senior funding in the years ahead and critically, provides us with operating flexibility. We look forward to scaling up, in partnership with our new shareholders and funders, Altum Capital,” said Eamonn McMahon, Founder of equipal.
Performance Metrics and Market Context
equipal has built its platform by embedding proprietary technology directly at the point of sale across more than 75 equipment vendors, enabling automated financing for hard assets, from CNC machines to coaches, with the goal of reducing the time and complexity associated with traditional lending processes. Operating across manufacturing and transport, equipal offers lease terms of up to five years on equipment valued at up to £250,000, replacing a historically fragmented, email-dependent process with an integrated platform that handles credit assessment, documentation and funding in a single experience.
To date, equipal has recorded a default rate of 1.26% and zero credit losses, while 69% of customers who have used the platform once have returned for additional financing. The proceeds from this raise will fund hiring across business development, marketing, operations, credit and data, with the team expected to reach 12 over the coming year.
The two firms share a longstanding connection at leadership level. McMahon began his financial markets career at Bear Stearns in London at a time when Altum Capital founder Marjorie Hogan was leading the firm’s proprietary trading globally from New York, a professional relationship that predates the current deal by several decades.
Digitisation Reshaping Equipment Finance: A Gap the Market Has Long Recognised
equipal’s strategy targets a friction point that cuts across manufacturing sectors: businesses needing capital equipment have historically faced slow, manual financing processes that delay acquisition and disrupt operations. By embedding automated credit decisioning directly at the vendor’s point of sale, equipal removes the coordination burden that has traditionally sat between buyers, vendors and lenders.
The need for accessible, vendor-embedded equipment finance is not new. 3DP Unlimited, in collaboration with Lease Corporation of America, launched a leasing program to offer financing for periods of between 24 and 60 months, allowing companies to access a $20,000 machine for less than $400 a month. The programme was explicitly designed to bring high-value equipment within reach of manufacturers and service providers that could not absorb the upfront cost.
Similarly, Airwolf 3D’s partnership with TimePayment Corporation and Marlin Equipment Finance sought to reduce the upfront cash payment required for its printers, giving businesses access to multiple units and higher-specification equipment without the capital outlay normally required.
Both cases illustrate a recurring dynamic: equipment vendors recognise that financing friction directly limits their addressable market, and have consistently sought third-party solutions to bridge it. What equipal brings is the infrastructure to solve this at scale and speed, not through bilateral vendor partnerships but through a single embedded platform.
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Featured image shows equipal platform UI. Image via equipal.
