Skalar, a New York-based fintech company, publicly launched Thursday with an undisclosed seed round led by São Paulo-based venture firm Monashees and a debt financing partnership with General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund.
Since its January inception, Skalar has committed to finance more than $125 million in sales and marketing spending across seven technology companies over the next 12 months, according to co-founder and CEO Sebastián Cárdenas.
The company's model targets a familiar startup problem: technology firms routinely spend heavily to acquire customers who may not generate enough revenue to cover those costs for months or even years. Skalar bridges that gap without taking equity or requiring repayments on a fixed schedule.
Skalar provides startups with capital to fund sales and marketing initiatives. Repayment comes directly from the revenue generated by the customers acquired with that capital. If those customers produce less revenue than projected, Skalar absorbs the shortfall rather than demanding full repayment of the original amount. Current deals call for Skalar to collect approximately 1.1 times the amount provided.
In a typical scenario, if a company spends $10 to acquire a customer expected to pay $1 per month for 30 months, Skalar funds the initial $10 and collects the first $11 that customer generates. Once Skalar reaches that ceiling, the company retains all remaining revenue. If the customer cancels after eight months, Skalar collects only $8 and writes off the balance.
Repayment is not tied to a calendar. Companies that recoup acquisition costs in one month repay in one month; those taking 12 months repay over a year. While the obligation remains contractual, Skalar argues the flexible timeline reduces the risk of a cash crunch.
Cárdenas said the structure differs from both venture debt and existing revenue-based financing. Venture debt carries higher interest and risk, and repayment can force startups to curtail spending or hoard cash when growth opportunities arise. Revenue-based financing typically advances money against signed contracts or existing revenue; Skalar finances a potential revenue stream before it exists and accepts that it may never fully materialize.
Underwriting that risk requires close examination of company operations. Skalar analyzes detailed transaction data to determine customer acquisition costs, retention periods, and lifetime revenue. Its system continuously updates assessments as new information arrives, said co-founder and COO Daniel Castrillón. "We have become experts in understanding these types of risks and when they are sufficiently predictable and sufficiently profitable to be underwritable," he said.
The arrangement carries risks for founders as well. Skalar sets minimum revenue targets; falling below them can trigger accelerated repayment. The company can also halt additional capital under certain circumstances, potentially leaving a business short of expected funding. Agreements do not give Skalar the right to seize assets on default and do not require borrowers to maintain specific financial benchmarks or cash balances, Cárdenas said.
"Our structure is fundamentally different because it absorbs most of the downside risk," Cárdenas said. "This incentivizes us to always be mindful of not encumbering the companies we work with with credit risk, as this ultimately increases risk for us."
Skalar targets technology companies spending between $100,000 and $3 million per month on customer acquisition with a consistent record of earning more from those customers than it costs to acquire them. It also assesses whether a company has sufficient cash to remain viable long enough for customer revenue to materialize.
Its first seven customers include four or five Latin American companies as well as U.S. businesses. Skalar initially plans to work with no more than 15 companies annually.
General Catalyst is providing the debt capital for customer financing. The size of that partnership was not disclosed. The connection traces to Cárdenas's time as an entrepreneur-in-residence at Monashees, where he helped introduce several portfolio companies to General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund model. General Catalyst has increasingly focused on larger deals, creating an opening for smaller companies, including those in Latin America, Cárdenas said.
Andrew Ziperski, a partner at the Customer Value Fund, called the model a response to a capital gap. "Most technology companies in Latin America have never had the choice [between equity and duration-matched capital]," he said.
Monashees general partner Caio Bolognesi said the firm does not receive the confidential operating data that startups provide to Skalar. He described Skalar as filling a long-standing shortage of growth financing in Latin America, where capital has flowed in and out of the growth stage, leaving companies with strong customer performance unable to secure funds for expansion.
