Starling Bank to buy tax platform Ember ahead of UK digital filing rules

Starling Group has agreed to acquire Ember, a London-based tax and bookkeeping fintech, and plans to build its software directly into Starling Bank's business banking app and online bank. The deal, announced on 19 August 2025, is Starling's first acquisition since it bought Fleet Mortgages in 2021.

Financial terms were not disclosed by either company. Other outlets have put the price at under £10m, a modest sum for a bank that reported group revenue of £887.4m and more than 6.2 million platform accounts in its last financial year.

Why Ember, why now

The timing lines up with a change to UK tax law. From April 2026, HMRC's Making Tax Digital rules will force sole traders and landlords above a certain income threshold to file quarterly tax reports using approved software, on top of their usual Self Assessment return. Starling estimates around 780,000 people will be affected, and many of them are not yet set up to comply.

Ember's software is already recognised by HMRC for this purpose. Starling, which says it holds roughly 9% of the UK's small business banking market, wants to integrate that software into its app by the end of 2025, giving business customers a single place to handle transactions, bookkeeping and tax filing rather than juggling separate apps and spreadsheets.

Ember was built by co-founders Daniel Hogan and Aaron Shaw to simplify accounting for small businesses, with the goal of helping owners make financial decisions faster and with less stress. The pair said the new tax deadline was the trigger for the tie-up with Starling, calling Making Tax Digital "a real call to action for SMEs."

Before the deal, Ember's software was used by customers of several other banks, including HSBC, Revolut, Barclays and Lloyds. Starling plans to make the software exclusive to its own customers from 2026, which means those other banks' customers will eventually lose access. Starling also intends to wind down Ember's standalone accountancy advisory arm, keeping the software but not the advice business that came with it.

A bank buying its way into bookkeeping

Starling frames the deal as part of a broader push to make its business account do more than hold money. It already offers Spaces for setting cash aside for specific purposes, a Bills Manager for paying suppliers on time, and a newer Spending Intelligence tool that uses artificial intelligence to track outgoings. Ember would add tax and accounting to that stack rather than leaving business owners to plug in a third-party app.

Adeel Hyder, Starling Bank's managing director of SME banking, praised Ember's interface and said the lender would keep weighing whether to build, partner or buy to fill gaps in its small business offering.

Declan Ferguson, Starling Group's chief financial officer, described the bank as "a natural fintech consolidator" and said deals like this one would remain central to growing both Starling Bank in the UK and its Engine banking-as-a-service arm abroad. He pointed to Fleet Mortgages as evidence the approach has worked before.

"Making Tax Digital has created a real call to action for SMEs and Ember provides the solution to this." — Daniel Hogan and Aaron Shaw, Ember co-founders

What it signals for the sector

For small accounting and tax-tech startups across Europe, the deal is a reminder that banks with large SME customer bases can become acquirers rather than partners once a regulatory deadline creates urgency. It also shows Starling leaning on acquisitions, rather than only in-house builds, to compete for business banking customers against rivals such as Revolut and the big high street lenders.

The deal still needs to clear customary closing conditions before it completes. Starling has not said what happens to Ember's existing non-Starling customers once the software goes exclusive in 2026, nor has it disclosed what, if anything, Ember's bookkeeping staff will do once the advisory business is discontinued.