Gresham House Ventures has led a £20 million Series B investment in Ryft, to support the Manchester-based payments platform’s expansion across Europe and the US and accelerate its move upmarket into high-growth and enterprise accounts.
The investment reflects Gresham House Ventures’ continued commitment to backing category-defining UK fintech with genuine international potential.
Founded in 2021, Ryft helps marketplaces, platforms and multi-location businesses manage seller onboarding and complex transaction flows – recurring billing, automated split payments and cross-border payouts – through a single integration.
Since its launch, the business has partnered with leading payment companies including Global Payments, Visa, Mastercard and American Express. In the last 12 months it has tripled in size, with more than 6,500 businesses now using its payment system.
Alongside the new investment from Gresham House Ventures, the round also included funding from Pembroke VCT, Ingenii Capital, and the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund II.
The Gresham House Ventures deal team consisted of Rohit Mathur and Hamza Rafiq. The deal continues a busy period of activity for Gresham House Ventures, having made investments into Digital savings and mortgage platform Tembo, workplace trust platform Veremark and specialist healthcare platform 01Health. Gresham House Ventures invests through the Gresham House VCTs and Baronsmead VCTs.
Rohit Mathur, Partner at Gresham House Ventures, said: “Modern commerce runs on platforms – marketplaces, franchises, creators, and increasingly AI agents – but the payments infrastructure underneath was built for a two-party world that no longer exists. Ryft is the rare UK-built, FCA-regulated fintech designed for multi-party payments from the ground up, and its best customers are compounding volumes over 100% a year on the platform.
“As commerce shifts to instant, multi-party platforms and agent-initiated payments, ownership of the infrastructure rails becomes a question of national economic sovereignty, not just merchant cost. We’re backing Ryft because the UK needs domestic champions with payment architecture built for the next era of commerce. Sadra, Alex, Richard and the wider team are executing at an impressive pace, and we’re proud to lead this round for a genuinely category-defining Manchester fintech.”
Ryft’s CEO and co-founder, Sadra Hosseini, commented: “This round of investment means we can take what we’ve built in the UK into new European markets and compete on the global stage. Payments have been dominated by a small number of incumbents for a long time. We want to provide a powerful and efficient alternative to businesses, not just in Europe, but globally.”
The deal was welcomed by Economic Secretary to the Treasury Lucy Rigby, who said Ryft’s success was “a vote of confidence in Manchester’s thriving fintech sector,” and by Sue Barnard, Senior Investment Manager at the British Business Bank, who highlighted the round’s alignment with the Government’s Modern Industrial Strategy.
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