Starling’s maiden tie-up takes it deeper into lending: The challenger’s £50 million ($64.1 million) deal for specialty lender Fleet Mortgages lets Starling put its deposits to work and takes it into a space that’s not crowded with UK neobanks.

Lloyds and Starling top Q4 2020 UK account switching list: The pair took first and second place, respectively, in net account switches—and their different customer acquisition approaches show how to succeed as account switching rebounds from the pandemic.

Its up-and-down year has placed Monzo in the middle of the pack when it’s compared with its rivals in its primary home market, Revolut and Starling. (Note: These neobanks’ annual reports all ended on different months, and Starling used a 16-month period due to a fiscal-year transition.). The increase in Revolut’s YoY loss was much greater than Monzo’s—nearly 93%.

Neobank Starling raised £272 million ($375.8 million), bringing its new valuation to £1.37 billion ($1.89 billion);. Insurtech Zego reached a $1.1 billion valuation after a $150 million raise; and. Insurtech Tractable’s $60 million raise last week brought the UK to the triple-digit milestone. The bigger picture: Fintechs are driving unicorn record-setting across the world.

And to further spook UK neobanks like Monzo, Starling, and Revolut, they’ll all have the JPMorgan Chase brand underpinning them to offer legitimacy, potentially attracting consumers who are curious about trying a digital bank, but want the added reassurance of an established brand.

Recent examples include Starling, which has its MarketPlace as a possible retention product, and NatWest, which recently unveiled SMB offerings including an incubator program and a rewards app from its Tyl unit.

Last Monday, Starling reported that it has 350,000 business customers—an increase of 50,000 from just the past month—and said that it has hit 6% SMB market share in the UK.

Starling continues to broaden its business offering. As of Monday, the neobank counted about 350,000 business clients in the UK—up 50,000 from just a month ago and more than quadruple its 74,000 customers in 2019. Starling has released a steady stream of new offerings as it builds out its business marketplace and expects to hold 18% of the UK’s SMB market in the next five years.

Virgin Money boosts UK SMB lending experience with partnership: The UK bank’s latest fintech team-up demonstrates a focus on pivoting to post-pandemic customer retention.

It is a mainstay for UK neobanks: Revolut, Monzo, and Starling have offered savings pots since 2018. Neobank-Specific Features User Experience Best Practices. Here are the top user experience best practices we identified in the Neobank-Specific Features category:. Aspiration pitches an optional monthly fee as a form of altruism.

Several neobanks in the UK are hungry to gain more share in business banking, including Tide, Starling, Monzo, and Revolut.

Monzo’s premium and business offerings are still young, and they’re not yet as potent as similar accounts are for other challengers: For example, Starling counts more than 300,000 small business clients, despite its much smaller customer base (2 million) relative to Monzo’s (5 million).

The robo-advisor partnered with household names like Yolt, JPMorgan, and Starling to boost user acquisition. In April, it integrated with three money management apps, including Yolt, to allow users to see their Nutmeg investments on these apps and to expose its services to new users via the Yolt marketplace.

Cohort participants may also have attempted to grow in a fiercely competitive market: RBS-owned Bó lasted less than six months, for example, partly because it didn’t offer advanced features, such as fingerprint login, like its much larger peers, including Starling and Monzo.

Mobile check deposit is the most in-demand capability in the Transfers category and the third-most sought-after across the board, with 38% of respondents calling it "extremely valuable"—but of our four surveyed neobanks, only Starling offers it. Best Practice: Starling offers a frictionless user experience for depositing checks in-app.

Swedish buy now, pay later startup Klarna, for example, hit a whopping $31 billion valuation, from $10 billion in September, while UK neobank Starling hit unicorn status last week at £1.37 billion ($1.89 billion). European capital markets aim to attract SPACs.

Historically, incumbents have kept their distance due to sky-high valuations, but lower price tags on smaller neobanks that have lost ground to leading competitors like Starling could make them prime acquisition candidates.

BaaS providers including BBVA, Starling Bank, and Solarisbank are increasingly catching up with B2B players in embedded finance. Dedicated embedded finance providers like Salty, Swan, and Wise are still uncommon, but more of these startups will likely spring up going forward.