Mutua Ventures takes a 10% stake in Madrid AI finance platform Alter5

The story so far, in brief; the legwork, and the full article, stay with the original outlet.

Mutua Ventures, the investment vehicle of Grupo Mutua, has bought 10% of Alter5, a Madrid-based platform that uses artificial intelligence to find, structure and place financing for companies and projects. Salvador Carrillo and Miguel Solana founded it in 2021. It works in two areas: corporate financing for small and mid-sized companies, largely for expansion and energy-transition investment, and project finance for renewables and infrastructure. Since launch it has originated and distributed more than €300 million, and it has had the European Investment Fund behind it since 2021. The investment is meant to fund growth, technology and expansion, and to help bring in new strategic partners.

Andrés Sánchez, head of corporate venture capital at Mutua Madrileña, pointed to a model with no balance-sheet risk that is "profitable at EBITDA level, with positive earnings."

Solana's case is that banks, insurers and asset managers want more exposure to real assets and alternative lending but still run it on manual work and scattered distribution networks, and that Alter5 lets them scale up without building a platform of their own. Buying a tenth of someone else's platform is, admittedly, another way to avoid building one.