Zopa
“Can a digital bank turn its consumer lending scale into the dominant embedded finance and merchant checkout platform in the UK?”
Founded2005
HQLondon, England, United Kingdom
Latest roundVenture - Series Unknown
IndustryFintech / Neobank
The story
Founded in 2005 as the world's first peer-to-peer lending marketplace, Zopa pivoted away from P2P entirely in 2021 after securing a UK banking licence in 2020, repositioning as a full-service digital bank offering personal loans, savings accounts, and credit cards. From 2023 onward, Zopa began an aggressive embedded finance push — acquiring DivideBuy to enter point-of-sale and BNPL lending for merchants, then acquiring Rvvup in 2025 to add AI-powered payments infrastructure, transforming from a consumer lender into a merchant-facing embedded finance platform combining lending, payments, and checkout.
Product timeline
2005
Zopa launched as the world's first peer-to-peer lending platform in the UK.· lending
2020
Zopa received its full UK banking licence and launched Zopa Bank, offering savings accounts and credit cards.· banking
2021
Zopa wound down its P2P lending platform to focus entirely on its digital bank.· pivot
2023
Zopa acquired DivideBuy's point-of-sale finance technology and lending platform to enter BNPL/embedded lending.· acquisition
2025
Zopa acquired Rvvup Ltd., a next-generation AI-powered payments platform, to build a unified merchant checkout experience.· acquisition
Regulated entities
National Bank Charter / UK Banking Licence
UK (PRA/FCA) · 2020
Zopa Bank Limited
The stack
Payments / PSP
Banking / BaaS
Card issuing
Lending
Zopa Bank Limited (in-house)Zopa Personal LoanZopa Embedded Lending (white-label/co-branded loans for partners)Zopa Consumer Finance (point-of-sale retail finance)Zopa BNPL 2.0 (DivideBuy-powered POS finance, £250–£30,000)Zopa Credit Card
Accounting
Accounting gap: minor