PALO ALTO — Tensec, a company transforming cross-border financial services, has secured $12 million in seed funding to provide real-time, seamless payments and financial services for global companies operating in the $190 trillion cross-border payments market. The funding will accelerate Tensec’s mission to provide global trading companies and their clients access to cross-border real-time payments and transaction banking services that have historically been available only through large financial institutions.
Led by Costanoa Ventures, the round also includes investments from Quiet Capital, WillowTree Investments, Cambrian VC, Ignia Partners, Montage Ventures, Renegade Partners, and Endeavor Scale Up Ventures.
“SMBs drive nearly half of global trade but have long been excluded from the financial tools that larger players rely on,” said Helcio Nobre, CEO and co-founder of Tensec. “We’re flipping the model by empowering global trading companies to deliver these services directly to their partners—making global commerce faster, cheaper and more accessible.”
Tensec leverages AI, real-time payments and a global fintech infrastructure to create a no-integration platform that enables global trading companies to offer foreign exchange (FX) services, cross-border payments, treasury and other financial services to their SMB clients. The company is already working with customers who facilitate $10 billion in annual trade volume. Tensec projects this will grow to $30 billion in annual trade volume after its upcoming service expansion into APAC and the EU markets.
“Tensec lets global trade companies seamlessly integrate financial services to better serve their clients,” said Amy Cheetham, Partner at Costanoa Ventures. “It’s a win-win—new revenue for trading companies and modern financial tools for SMBs who’ve been underserved for decades.”
Tensec is targeting the massive cross-border payments infrastructure that still runs on 40-year-old SWIFT technology. With global cross-border payments projected to reach $250 trillion by 2030, there has been significant fintech innovation in consumer and enterprise payments. However, SMB cross-border payments remain largely untouched by innovation, despite representing over 40% of the $25 trillion annual physical goods trade. Tensec is bridging this critical gap.
“Legacy banks built their cross-border infrastructure when fax machines were cutting-edge,” said Helcio. “We’re skipping that entire stack. Our services let the companies already engaged in global trade to offer their own financial services innovations. It fills a real need – and their clients thrive.”
