Minority-led, all-in-one payments platform Stax reached unicorn status with a valuation of just over $1 billion after raising $245 million from Greater Sum Ventures, HarbourVest Partners and Blue Star Innovation Partners, according to a press release on Tuesday (March 8).
The investors will serve as strategic partners to Stax. Rob Wechsler, founder and CEO of Blue Star, will join Stax’s board of directors.
Founded in 2015 in Orlando, Florida, by brother-and-sister team Suneera Madhani, CEO, and Sal Rehmetullah, president, the new funding and valuation status comes at a time when less than 3% of venture capital goes to minorities and less than 1% goes to businesses helmed by women-of-color CEOs, according to the release.
See also: Stax Buys Automated Surcharge Platform CardX
“As a minority woman and executive in FinTech, I’m no stranger to discrimination and doubt,” said Madhani. “My brother and I built this company from our parents’ home back in 2014. Since then, we’ve grown 500% in the past three years and processed more than $23 billion in payments for 22,000…
