Private equity firm CVC Capital Partners targets the payments security industry by investing in Kount.

Kount Inc., a provider of online and mobile fraud-prevention services, plans to add products and expand globally with an $80 million investment from CVC Capital Partners’ CVC Growth Fund.

The investment, announced Wednesday, also will be used to enhance customer service for Kount, which works with retailers and the financial services and gaming industries. The company, monitoring transactions on tens of thousands of websites and reviewing billions of data points, says its detection and prevention services eliminate or reduce manual reviews of potentially fraudulent transactions, which cuts credit card chargebacks, boosts customer satisfaction and reduces fraud—sometimes by more than 90%.

 “This investment is perfectly aligned with CVC Growth Partners’ strategy of partnering with uniquely positioned technology companies in large, growing markets,” said John Clark, managing partner at CVC Growth Partners.

 “Online merchants face greater fraud challenges than ever before,” Kount CEO Brad Wiskirchen said. In its 2015 Mobile Payments & Fraud Survey, Kount reports that 60% of respondents are uncertain if mobile fraud is growing at a faster, slower or equal pace as their overall mobile transaction volume. “CVC’s funding and strategic guidance will provide Kount with significant resources to continue investing in our industry-leading fraud prevention solutions and to deliver the tools our customers need to combat fraud every day.”

Five retailers in the Internet Retailer 2015 Top 1000 use Kount for payment security services: Blissworld LLC (No. 450), CD Listening Bar Inc. (No. 205), Online Stores Inc. (No. 457), ShoppersChoice.com (No. 333) and The Children’s Place (No. 122). Kount also works with Chase Paymentech, PayPal-owned Braintree, New Balance, Spotify and Bodybuilding.com, part of Liberty Interactive Corp.’s Digital Commerce unit Liberty Ventures Group (No. 26).

advertisement
Favorite