Fundbox: A Rising Star in Small-business Lending
Plano, Texas-based Fundbox, a leading embedded small-business lender, has been enjoying significant growth in the year 2025. This growth has been fueled by strategic partnerships and a warehouse lending facility from Cross River Bank and Waterfall Asset Management. Fundbox’s unique business model and reliance on data-driven digital underwriting have allowed it to serve a market segment that traditional banks often struggle to reach.
Fundbox’s Strategic Partnerships
Fundbox has announced four major partnerships in 2025, the latest of which is with Wave, a business software and service provider. Wave offers insurance, banking, and payments solutions but lacks a lending service. By integrating Fundbox’s lending solutions into Wave’s platform, the partnership provides Fundbox with access to more than 350,000 potential borrowers.
Earlier in the year, Fundbox also partnered with Cantaloupe, Autobooks, and EverCommerce. In all these arrangements, Fundbox has provided a capital solution for fast-growing fintech platforms that offer business services but do not lend to their clients.
Fundbox’s Chief Business Officer, Anchit Singh, stated in a press release, “Wave has built a powerful ecosystem for small business owners. Our integration extends that value by embedding flexible financing directly into their platform experience.”
Fundbox’s Business Model and Growth
Initiated in 2013, Fundbox has transitioned from seeking clients on its own to pursuing a partnership model since 2022. In the 12 years of its operation, Fundbox has made more than 150,000 loans totaling $6 billion, with approximately $1 billion of that volume coming in the last 14 months.
Using a data-driven digital underwriting approach, Fundbox has been able to reach small businesses that traditional banks sometimes overlook due to their conventional credit-evaluation methodologies. Singh said, “If we get the right data, we can underwrite a small business in [about] 20 seconds.”
Deeper Connection with Banks
Although Fundbox has primarily been financed by venture capital investors, its ties to banks have been strengthening. In September 2024, Fundbox secured a warehouse credit facility from $8.1 billion-asset Cross River Bank and Waterfall Asset Management. This significantly boosted its annual origination capacity to $2 billion.
Through its collaboration with the payments provider Autobooks, Fundbox has also gained broader exposure to community banks. Several banks have sought Fundbox’s assistance with Small Business Administration lending, marking the early stages of another promising initiative.
Cross River Bank
Noah Cooper, chief investment officer at Fort Lee, New Jersey-based Cross River, has stated that the Fundbox warehouse facility fits into the bank’s broader strategy of backing leading embedded small-business lenders.
While 2025 has been a year of significant growth for Fundbox, Singh remains reticent to call it a breakthrough year. However, he promises that the company will be more vocal about its achievements in the future. “That is something that is changing,” Singh said. “Whatever we celebrate internally we are also celebrating externally a little more.”
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