Relief, the personal finance startup committed to helping everyday people achieve financial freedom by eliminating credit card debt, announced today it has raised $15 million in Series A funding, bringing its total funding to date to $17 million. The round was led by Nava Ventures and includes a range of strategic investors, including Ken Chenault, former CEO and Chairman of American Express; Vikram Pandit, former CEO of Citigroup and The Kraft Group. Other leading venture capital groups include Interplay, Animal Capital, Necessary Ventures, and Brand Foundry Ventures, among others.
Relief is a startup working to lift people out of crippling credit card debt by negotiating with credit card companies on their behalf. The company uses a personalized approach with advanced machine learning technology. Relief’s app seamlessly negotiates with debt providers after analyzing a user’s personal finances and can cut credit card debt in half or more on behalf of the user – for free.
“We are thrilled to partner with Relief in their mission to help consumers with unsustainable debt. The company’s deep founder-market-fit is a hallmark of Nava’s investment thesis, and Relief’s consumer-first approach is a much-needed innovation in the debt settlement industry. We see Relief as a long-term partner for consumers looking to improve their financial well-being,” said Freddie Martignetti, Partner at Nava Ventures.
This latest round of funding will go towards providing Relief with resources to strengthen its platform and scale to support a rapidly growing waitlist. The company expects to release the app to the public later in 2022.
Relief is founded by Jason Saltzman, Bryan Okeke, and Ram Berrouet – three seasoned entrepreneurs with deep market knowledge in advanced technology, finance, and executive leadership.
“Relief stands poised to be the go-to platform that people turn to in order to tackle their debt and return to building their financial future. We believe that access to new technology and services addressing financial challenges should be accessible to all – especially the communities most affected by toxic debt. That is our mission; that’s why our app is free, and that’s why we won’t rest until we can finally take on the credit card debt crisis,” said Jason Saltzman, CEO and Co-Founder.
Scheduled to launch later this year, Relief has already struck a chord with consumers; over 100,000 people have signed up for the waitlist, representing a cumulative $750 million in credit card debt – a reflection of the continued uncertainty for so many throughout the COVID-19 era.
“Each day, we hear from our own communities that people need help managing their debt. With both myself and Ram being Black founders, we are proud to help solve such a huge problem at scale, while also growing the trend of investing into minority-owned companies,” said Bryan Okeke, Co-Founder and CTO of Relief.
The company is ramping up quickly. Consumers can sign up for the Relief waitlist at relief.app and earn $40 toward paying off their credit card debt for each friend they invite.
