Boss of Goldman-backed digital bank Starling to step down next month
Starling Bank CEO Anne Boden.
Starling Bank
The co-founder of Starling, one of the U.K.’s largest digital banks, is set to step down as CEO next month, the company said Thursday.
Starling, which is backed by U.S. investment banking giant Goldman Sachs, is one of the most prominent fintechs in the country with a user base of 3.6 million customers.
Anne Boden is to step down on June 30, according to a press release. She will hand the reins to Starling’s chief operating officer, John Mountain, who has been with the bank since 2015.
“I have spent nearly a decade here as both the founder and CEO, a dual role which is unique in U.K. banking,” Boden said in a statement Thursday. “It’s been all-consuming and I’ve loved every minute of it.”
“Now that we have grown from being an aspiring challenger to an established bank, it is clear the roles and priorities of a CEO and a large shareholder ultimately differ and require distinct approaches. As Starling continues to evolve and grow, separating my two roles is in the bank’s best interests.”
Starling reported annual revenue of £453 million ($600 million) for the year to March 31, 2023, more than doubling from 2022, with pre-tax profits of £195 million, a sixfold increase year over year.
Total lending stood at £4.9 billion, up from £3.3 billion. Customer deposits increased 17% to £10.6 billion.
Boden, who co-founded Starling in 2014, took the startup from a tiny challenger in banking to a major player in the U.K.’s financial scene.
The often outspoken CEO has been a key voice behind the U.K. government’s attempt to make it an established fintech hub.
She is also a staunch critic of social media’s role in online fraud as well as a prominent crypto skeptic.
On a call with reporters Thursday, Boden said the main thing that triggered her decision was concerns that her significant shareholding in the firm could create a conflict of interest.
Boden owns a 4% stake in Starling.
She added that it was herself, not the company’s board, that initiated conversations about her departure.
Starling has raised a total of £946.5 billion to date from investors including Goldman Sachs, Fidelity and the Qatar Investment Authority. The bank was last valued at £2.5 billion.
In response to a CNBC question Thursday, Boden said that, were the firm to raise capital today, its shares would not decrease in value from their last price.
Asked how her plans to step down may impact Starling’s path toward an initial public offering, Boden said the IPO market is currently closed and the firm is in no immediate hurry.
The U.K. has received plenty of criticism from top tech bosses over its tech listings environment — earlier this year, the CEO of Revolut said he would never list in London.
Boden said that Starling has not yet taken a decision on a listing venue for its eventual public offering, however the U.K. was likely to be the place in which it debuts.
“We need to keep our options open. This is not the right time to make a decision on listing venue, however we’re a U.K. bank and a very successful U.K. bank,” Boden said.
“Customers love us and the default situation would be a U.K. listing because of the consumer enthusiasm for a brand that is as powerful as Starling.”
A Waymo rider-only robotaxi is seen during a test ride in San Francisco, California, U.S., December 9, 2022.
Paresh Dave | Reuters
Alphabet’s Waymo unit plans on bringing its robotaxi service to Dallas next year, adding to a growing list of prospective U.S. markets for 2026, including Miami and Washington, D.C.
Rental car company Avis Budget Group will be managing the Waymo fleet in Dallas, via a new partnership the companies announced Monday.
Avis CEO Brian Choi said in a statement that the agreement marks a “milestone” for the company, which is now also working to become “a leading provider of fleet management, infrastructure and operations to the broader mobility ecosystem.”
Waymo robotaxi testing is already underway in downtown Dallas involving the company’s Jaguar I-PACE electric vehicles with the Waymo Driver system. That combines automated driving software, sensors and other hardware that power the vehicles’ “level 4,” driverless operations.
Passengers will be able to hail a driverless ride using the Waymo app in Dallas. In some other markets, Waymo only makes its services available through ride-hailing platform Uber.
Waymo has surged ahead in the robotaxi market while other autonomous vehicle developers, including Tesla, Amazon-owned Zoox, and venture-backed startups such as Nuro, May Mobility and Wayve, are working to make autonomous transportation a commercial reality in the U.S.
Waymo says it conducts more than 250,000 paid weekly trips in the markets where it operates commercially, including Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix and San Francisco.
Waymo’s steepest competition internationally comes from Baidu’s robotaxi venture Apollo Go in China, which is eyeing expansion in Europe.
On Alphabet’s second-quarter earnings call, execs boasted that, “The Waymo Driver has now autonomously driven over 100 million miles on public roads, and the team is testing across more than 10 cities this year, including New York and Philadelphia.”
The business has become significant enough that Alphabet even added a category to its Other Bets revenue description in its latest quarterly filing.
“Revenues from Other Bets are generated primarily from the sale of autonomous transportation services, healthcare-related services and internet services,” the filing said.
The Other Bets segment remains relatively small, however, with revenue coming in at $373 million in the quarter, up from $365 million a year ago. The division still reported a loss of $1.25 billion, widening from $1.13 billion in the second quarter of 2024.
WATCH: Waymo co-CEO on 10 million driverless rides and Tesla’s coming robtaxi challenge
Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses on display in the window of a Ray Ban store in London, UK, on Friday, July 19, 2024.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Revenue from sales of Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses more than tripled year over year, EssilorLuxottica revealed Monday as part of the company’s most recent earnings report.
EssilorLuxottica said the success of the Ray-Ban Meta glasses, built via a partnership with the Facebook parent stemming back to 2019, contributed to its first-half overall sales of 14.02 billion euro (US$16.25 billion), which represents a 7.3% year-over-year jump.
“We are leading the transformation of glasses as the next computing platform, one where AI, sensory tech and a data-rich healthcare infrastructure will converge to empower humans and unlock our full potential,” EssilorLuxottica CEO Francesco Milleri and deputy CEO Paul du Saillant said in a joint-statement. “The success of Ray-Ban Meta, the launch of Oakley Meta Performance AI glasses and the positive response to Nuance Audio are major milestones for us in this new frontier.”
In the earnings report, the company said that its new Oakley Meta smart glasses, unveiled in June, represents the latest product line to come from its partnership with the social media company. CNBC reported in June that Meta and Luxottica plan to debut a Prada-branded version of its smart glasses in the future.
Luxottica owns several well-known brands including Ray-Ban, Oakley, Vogue Eyewear and Persol.
In September, Meta renewed a long-term partnership agreement with Luxottica to “collaborate into the next decade to develop multi-generational smart eyewear products,” according to the announcement.
WATCH: Meta’s ambitious AI plans.
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