Opportunity Network and SME Finance Forum announce partnership to accelerate SMEs' growth

The SME Finance Forum will invite its member banks catering to small businesses to join Opportunity Network’s (NO) community of Trusted Partners.

The banks in turn will nominate its most trusted and capable small business clients to join the network and post and respond to B2B deals worth $1 million and above.

ON currently has over 14,000+ CEOs, referred through trusted financial institutions, and hosted over $80 billion in deals. The network’s Trusted Partners include prestigious financial institutions and associations, such as Citizens Bank, London Stock Exchange Group, Caixa Bank, Intesa Sanpaolo, Eurobank, YPO, and Dentons.

“The SME Finance Forum is very excited about this new partnership. ON’s creative approach of using financial institutions as intermediaries to identify those SMEs most ready to take advantage of international market opportunities plays to our strengths in the SME Finance Forum. Hopefully we will be able to help ON accelerate its partnership building with those FIs for whom this platform best fits their SME sector growth strategy,” said Matt Gamser, CEO of the SME Finance Forum.

The SME Finance Forum, created by the G20 countries and managed by the IFC, works to expand access to finance for small and medium businesses. It operates a global membership network that brings together financial institutions, technology companies, and development finance institutions to share knowledge, spur innovation, and promote the growth of SMEs. Its annual flagship event, the Global
SME Finance Forum 2017 will be held November 1-3 in Berlin, Germany.

“We are excited to establish a partnership with SME Finance Forum. With its broad network of financial institutions and industry associations in developing countries we see strong synergies in working together to facilitate trade and investment to support the underserved SME segment. The partnership will also drive digitalisation of SME banking and strengthen our efforts to make the benefits of globalisation truly accessible to entrepreneurs and investors in emerging markets,” said Brian Pallas, CEO and founder of ON.

ON is the community for select CEOs and private investors to grow their businesses worldwide. ON members post or directly connect to actionable business and investment opportunities ranging from early stage funding to M&A, commercial partnerships, and JVs, both domestically and around the world.