Almost five years ago, Israel-based Bank Leumi set out to 'bank right' the early-stage technology sector, from start-up to scale-up. Central to CEO Rakefet Russak-Aminoach’s strategic growth plan, the bank launched LeumiTech, a tailor-made structured business for this market segment.
Tech start-ups face many challenges when trying to access financial services, according to Yifat Oron, CEO of LeumiTech. “They are most often serviced by local or domestic banks, which find it difficult to deal with companies that are small yet global,” she explains. “In addition, these start-ups usually have more question marks than exclamation marks in a bank’s evaluation.”