Founded by family law specialist Becki Sant-Cassia, Transparently enables clients to engage with lawyers through alternative service delivery models, allowing them to manage aspects of their cases themselves and access professional support when needed. This approach aims to make legal advice more accessible to underrepresented groups, including BAME communities, individuals with disabilities, and women facing financial hardship after separation or divorce.

The investment from Mint Ventures comes ahead of a planned funding round for the firm in 2025, as it looks to scale its services and increase its customer base.

Co-founded and led by managing director Gillian Fleming, Mint Ventures’ passion lies in making angel investing more accessible to women and acts as a much-needed solution to providing a new source of capital for diverse-led companies to grow. Current portfolio clients include energy-efficient app, Heero Technologies, Freja Bone Broth, and conversational AI platform Inicio.

The Mint team was introduced to Transparently at the annual Playfair Capital Female Founders Office Hours online event in 2024. Founded in 2019, the Female Founder Office Hours (FFOH) is the largest diversity and inclusion initiative in venture and runs twice a year to connect women founders, mentors, and potential investors.

Ms Fleming said: “As a women-led investment group, our focus is on educating and encouraging more women to consider becoming investors and to invest in women-led and diverse start-up businesses who demonstrate a clear social, ethical, or environmental purpose.

“Transparently have an aligned vision with accessibility and clear ambition on growing their reach to help as many people as possible to gain legal support. This means that those who might not otherwise be able to afford full representation by lawyers can take on some of the case management themselves, so they fit perfectly with our portfolio.

“We’re excited to be able to share our expertise with Becki and the team, and to enable their shareholder base to continue to reflect their customer base.”

Becki Santa-Cassia

Becki Santa-Cassia, founder of Transparently, said: “There should be no barriers to seeking legal advice but unfortunately that is the harsh reality of BAME communities, those with disabilities and women who are more likely to experience a greater drop in living standards following a separation or divorce.

“Most legal platforms have been developed with lawyers in mind, which is why we’ve developed an alternative that has clients front of mind who can take on some of the case management themselves and dial-up professional support when their resources allow. 

“The funding from Mint Ventures provides an exciting milestone for us as we begin to raise awareness of our platform. It is also testament to the scope our model has. We’re excited to have a strong team of women-led experts supporting us as we take these next steps.”