Tornado Insider reports about the latest finance round for Webpay:

"2006 got off to a tremendous start for online payment services provider Webpay. The Swiss company was happy to announce its �20 million investment from 3i Group earlier in the week. The 5-year old company intends to use the proceeds to expand further into Europe, the US and Latin America over the next few years. It also plans a stock exchange float in the medium-term.

Webpay offers the online payment system "Click & Buy", which is used by more than 5 million consumers on 4,000 merchant websites. The company joins forces with international partners to provide billing and payment services to content providers and consumers. For example, Click & Pay is operated by Firstgate in Germany (the company's first partner signed up in 2000), British Telecom in the UK and Swisscom in Switzerland. Webpay offers the system directly across the rest of Europe and in the US. Customers include Apple iTunes, Skype, Electronic Arts, Habbo Hotel, Kiplinger, astrology.com and Sandisc as well as European publishers such as the Financial Times and Spiegel."

Click&Buy and its main trademark Firstgate.de to get off the ground - they have been around since 1996 and are just now beginning to emerge as an European counterpart of ebay. They neve had such a strong marketing vehicle that Paypal enjoyed with ebay. But they are moving...