Swedish portable payment company iZettle won The 2015 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 award for the software sector and took second place overall.
The Big Four firm’s award recognises the 500 fastest-growing technology companies in regions around the world, and iZettle was ranked as the second fastest growing tech company in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Dutch online auction house Catawiki topped the list.
According to Deloitte, the Scandinavian start-up has grown by 30,114 percent over the last four years.
Stockholm-based iZettle were founded in 2010, and pioneered the first payment card chip-reader to connect directly to mobile phones and tablets. The reader allowed small businesses to sidestep the expense of till-based systems provided by banks
Speaking to AccountingWEB at Accountex 2015, Iskren Kulev, strategic partnerships manager at iZettle compared his company’s offering to a “merchant bank account working directly with accounting software.”
Kulev defined the company in practical terms as “a cash register on an iPad. A card payment reader connects directly to the iPad or you can register a cash payment.
“This payment is immediately registered in the software, with the option to either print or email a receipt. Everything is then synchronised into your reports (card, cash, refunds etc.) and filed automatically with Xero, which is helpful for businesses and accountants.
When quizzed about the difference between iZettle and other payment options such as PayPal, Kulev emphasised that companies have “completely different hardware. We were the first in market to offer chip and pin for free – it’s completely pay as you go for online payments. We offer frictionless ability for small businesses to take card payments.”