Profile

Centana Growth Partners is a specialized growth equity firm with deep, relevant sector expertise in financial services, fintech, and related enterprise software. Each Partner brings decades of experience across these industries, enabling them to bring valuable insights and an informed approach to their investments.

With investments ranging from $10 million to $50 million or more, every partnership is tailored to meet the unique goals of each company. By maintaining a focused size of investment, Centana is positioned to provide each portfolio company with the dedicated attention, strategic guidance, and hands-on support needed to thrive.

Awards

2025 Top Software Investors, Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors, Top Growth Equity Firms

2024 Top Growth Equity Firms, Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors, Top Software Investors

2023 Top Growth Equity Firms, Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors, Top Software Investors

2022 Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors

2020 Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors, Top Software Investors

2019 Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors

Features

Leading FinTech Growth Investor: Centana’s Eric Byunn

GrowthCap’s RJ Lumba spoke with Eric Byunn on December 18, 2024. Eric is Co-Founder and Partner at Centana Growth Partners, a growth equity firm focused on financial services, fintech, and related enterprise software. He co-founded the firm in 2015 and previously spent 13 years at FTV Capital as a Partner, where he led investments in enterprise technology. In the earlier part of his career, Eric held positions at Netscape, mCFO and McKinsey.

Key People

Matthew Alfieri, Partner

Matthew Alfieri joined Centana in 2017 and is a Partner on the investment team. He currently serves on the Board of Eventus Systems, Gradient AI, Vividly, and serves as a Board Observer at Beacon, Plooto, Sayari Labs, SpyCloud and Zesty.ai. Matthew was recognized three years in a row as one of GrowthCap’s Top 40 Under 40 Growth Investors (2022, 2023, and 2024) and was named one of Business Insider’s Rising Stars of Wall Street (2019).

Prior to Centana, Matthew spent nine years at Goldman Sachs, most recently as a Vice President with the Principal Strategic Investments (PSI) team working in London and New York. During his time with PSI, Matthew gained experience investing in financial technology and enterprise software companies. He led eight investments and served on the Boards of six of the companies; his investments included Barefoot Networks (acquired by Intel), Vapor IO, Unbound Tech (acquired by Coinbase), Aquilon Energy Services and The New York Shipping Exchange. 

Eric Byunn, Partner

Eric Byunn co-founded Centana in 2015 and is one of its Partners. Before founding Centana, Eric spent over 20 years in growth equity and technology. Eric currently serves on the Boards of Athennian, Beacon, Cayosoft, Jumio, Operto, SheerID, SpyCloud, Teikametrics, The Helper Bees, Vena, and WarrCloud. He previously led investments in companies including Cloudmark (acquired by Proofpoint), Coremetrics (acquired by IBM), Covario (acquired by Dentsu Aegis Network), Ease (acquired by Employee Navigator), GMI (acquired by WPP), KVS (acquired by Veritas), MarketShare Partners (acquired by Neustar), One, Inc. (Acquired by Great Hill Partners), PSS Systems (acquired by IBM), Sentieo (acquired by Alphasense), Sourcecode/K2 (acquired by Francisco Partners), Varicent (acquired by IBM) and Vindicia (acquired by Amdocs). Eric spent 13 years at FTV Capital, a $3.8 billion growth equity fund, where he was a partner, served on the management committee and led investments in enterprise technology.

Ben Cukier, Partner

Ben co-founded Centana in 2015 and is one of its Partners. He currently sits on the boards of Adroit, Jumio, Plooto, Sayari Labs, Striveworks, Zesty.ai, and formerly at Alaia Capital (acquired by Axio Group LLC) and Quantitative Brokers (acquired by Deutsche Borse). Previously, Ben spent almost 16 years at FTV Capital, a $3.8 billion growth equity fund, where he was a partner, served on the management committee and led the financial services practice. At FTV Capital, Ben led or co-led 11 investments in, and sat on the boards of companies such as Aspire, Cloudmark, ETF Securities, IndexIQ, PowerShares and Velocity Shares.

Sarah Kim, Partner 

Sarah Kim joined Centana in 2023 as a Partner on the investment team. Sarah has over two decades of experience investing and operating in the technology and financial services industries. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of Corsair (Nasdaq: CRSR), First Connect, and RepeatMD. Sarah previously served on the Board of Directors for ABR Re, a Bermuda-based insurance carrier. Sarah served as the Chief Financial & Business Officer of Archipelago Analytics, an insurtech platform serving the global real estate and insurance industries. Prior to Archipelago, Sarah was the Senior Director of the Investment Strategy Group at ICONIQ Capital where she led ICONIQ’s investing efforts in private equity and venture capital funds and co-investments. Prior to ICONIQ, Sarah was a Director in Private Equity at Stanford Management Company (“SMC”), the group that manages Stanford University’s $25+ billion endowment.

Steven Swain, Partner & COO

Steven Swain co-founded Centana in 2015 and is one of its Partners. Before founding Centana, Steven spent over 26 years building, operating and advising financial services companies, including 11 years of private equity experience. In 2015, Steven was the President of Global X Management, a New York-based sponsor of exchange-traded funds, as well as an Executive Advisor at Aquiline Capital Partners, a New York-based private equity firm investing globally in financial services enterprises. Prior to that, Steven was the Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel of Lyster Watson & Company, an alternative investment management and advisory firm. Before joining Lyster Watson, Steven spent seven years at Lazard Asset Management including as the Head of Global Business Development for alternative investments. He currently sits on the board of True Link Financial and formerly at Quantitative Brokers (acquired by Deutsche Borse). Steven has been a 

board member of several charitable organizations including the Stephen Gaynor School in New York City and Clark University where he was Chair of the Board of Trustees from 2015-2019.

Funds Raised

Centana announced the closing of its oversubscribed Fund III in December 2024 with $600 million in capital commitments from limited partners. This latest fund builds on successes of Centana’s previous $375 million Fund II and its $250 million inaugural fund. This milestone underscores Centana’s focus on partnering with companies that demonstrate strong growth potential, experienced leadership, and meaningful customer traction, with $7 to $75 million in recurring revenue.

Key Investments

Employee Navigator: Initial investment February 2019
Sector: Software – Benefits Administration and HR 

Employee Navigator is a developer of benefits administration and human resource management software for insurance brokers, carriers and human resource departments. 

Jumio: Initial investment May 2016
Sector: Software – ID Verification and Fraud Prevention

Jumio is a provider of AI-powered identity verification, risk assessment and compliance solutions, enabling businesses to verify customer identities, prevent fraud, and meet regulatory requirements like Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML). 

Sayari: Initial investment August 2021
Sector: Software – Data Intelligence 

Sayari is a corporate data and commercial intelligence provider that helps financial institutions, the public sector, and multinationals navigate corporate ownership and relationships to improve transparency, reduce risk, and maintain compliance with regulations related to Know Your Customer (KYC), Anti-Money Laundering (AML), Beneficial Ownership, and Sanctions.

AlphaSense: Initial investment October 2018
Sector: Software – Market Intelligence 

AlphaSense is a market intelligence platform that uses artificial intelligence to help professionals make smarter business decisions by delivering insights from an extensive universe of public and private content—including company filings, event transcripts, news, trade journals, and equity research. The platform is trusted by over 2,000 enterprise customers, including a majority of the S&P 100. 

SheerID: Initial investment January 2018
Sector: Software – Digital Identity 

SheerID is a digital verification platform which provides real-time affinity-related discount eligibility verification for promotional activities and loyalty programs, enabling enterprises to deliver authenticated experiences while minimizing fraud and providing seamless verification services within the brand’s native environment.

Vena: Initial investment July 2016
Sector: Software – Corporate Performance Management 

Vena Solutions provides a multi-tenant, SaaS CPM platform that offers performance management and business intelligence solutions across a number of industries, including financial services, healthcare, consumer goods, energy and resources, professional services, and more. The platform provides flexible and cross-functional capabilities to support a variety of business use cases, ranging from back-office financial management to core revenue and demand planning.