Stripe alumni elevate €30M Collection A for Duna, backed by Stripe and Adyen execs

Anthropic and OpenAI could also be rivals, however their presidents Daniela Amodei and Gregory Brockman have one factor in widespread: they’re each Stripe alumni. With former workers who went on to create dozens of startups, the fintech firm has turn out to be one of the crucial prolific “founder factories” — and the cash is following. The most recent instance: enterprise identification verification startup Duna, which simply raised a €30 million Collection A to turn out to be the best-funded European member of the so-called “Stripe mafia.” The funding spherical was led by Alphabet’s progress fund CapitalG, which has additionally backed Stripe since co-leading its Series D in 2016.

Primarily based in Germany and the Netherlands, Duna was co-founded by Stripe alumni Duco van Lanschot and David Schreiber. With prospects together with Plaid, the startup helps fintech firms onboard enterprise prospects extra effectively, decreasing the everyday churn related to company ID checks and different fraud prevention measures.

Stripe isn’t a buyer of Duna, van Lanschot mentioned, however its executives had been effectively positioned to grasp the chance that the startup is seizing, which is mirrored in its cap desk. The corporate’s angel traders embody present Stripe COO Michael Coogan and former executives David Singleton (CTO) and Claire Hughes Johnson (COO). Even Stripe rival Adyen obtained concerned, with CRCO Mariëtte Swart and CFO Ethan Tandowsky becoming a member of as angels.

Their endorsements additionally validate van Lanschot’s hunch that these firms received’t compete with Duna, regardless that they might. “It requires such fine-grained controls that change on a company-by-company foundation, that an Adyen or a Stripe isn’t going to spin out their enterprise onboarding as a separate product the place one other enterprise buyer can change the entire configurations,” he instructed TechCrunch.

If it’s nonetheless definitely worth the effort for Duna, it’s as a result of the startup goes after the lengthy tail of enterprise purchasers that don’t have large sources to dedicate to enterprise onboarding. Nevertheless it’s additionally as a result of its imaginative and prescient doesn’t cease there: Duna’s ambition is to construct a community that enables firms to reuse their verified identification info throughout a number of platforms.

“What we need to construct over time is a worldwide belief infrastructure the place we offer a digital passport for each enterprise. So you’ll be able to reuse your file from onboarding on [German spend management platform] Moss to onboard with Plaid, or you’ll be able to reuse it to open up a checking account,” van Lanschot mentioned. 

This aim resonated with Alex Nichols, the final associate who led CapitalG’s funding into the Collection A. “I might say the widespread factor I search for in my investments are some form of community results, or extra formal scale benefit,” he instructed TechCrunch. “I additionally like it when founders have an earned perception about an issue they might not find out about in any other case, and this can be a superb instance of that,” he added.

Duna has opponents within the class generally known as KYB, or Know Your Enterprise. This contains distributors reminiscent of Jumio and Veriff. However for Nichols, what units Duna aside is its choice to generate its personal information, somewhat than attempting to combination present information sources which might be typically missing. “It’s the uncommon alternative to rebuild one thing as foundational as a Visa and create an incredible enterprise within the course of.”

Duna says it has already discovered a powerful enterprise case in serving to prospects onboard company customers sooner and cheaper. This additionally explains why present traders are doubling down: Index Ventures, which led Duna’s €10.7 million seed round in Could 2025, participated within the Collection A, as did Puzzle Ventures and Snowflake chairman Frank Slootman. However the startup’s larger ambition received’t repay till Duna reaches important scale. So the corporate is in search of shortcuts.

How so? Van Lanschot and the Duna crew are figuring out small clusters of firms that already overlap with one another — what they name “patches of networks.” These embody manufacturing firms with shared prospects, funding companies with overlapping LPs, or firms in the identical small nation. In these tight-knit teams, the flexibility to reuse verification turns into priceless instantly, even earlier than Duna achieves full community results.

The nations could also be small, however the alternative is massive, van Lanschot mentioned. “Within the Netherlands alone — a tiny, tiny nation — the 4 greatest banks make use of 14,000 individuals in compliance, and half of them are engaged on companies.” Duna received’t absolutely change these jobs but, however AI automation can save prices and generate income even earlier than the community results kick in.

If Duna ultimately gives the rails for an identification community, there could be a good larger alternative in making the most of this place to allow one-click enterprise onboarding. This could make it akin to Amazon’s one-click checkout — or nearer to B2B, to Stripe Hyperlink. As soon as once more with Duna, the Stripe connection isn’t actually far.