Straight answers about business funding.

Invoice finance turns unpaid invoices into cash you can use now. Rather than waiting weeks or months for customers to pay, Runway advances most of the invoice value as soon as it is raised, and releases the balance when your customer settles. It is working capital drawn from revenue you have already earned.

Not quite. Invoice finance is the category. Factoring is one form of it, in which the lender also takes over collecting from your customers. The difference that matters to most owners is who deals with their customers, and how the facility is shaped around the way the business already runs. Runway funds against your receivables and structures the facility around your customers, your trading history and your growth.

Runway advances around 70–85% of your receivables, with the balance released when your customer pays. Where a business sits in that range depends on its customers, its invoicing and its trading history, which is why we read the whole business before we set it.

Yes. A Runway invoice finance facility scales with your revenue rather than sitting at a fixed limit — as you invoice more, more funding becomes available. That is the point of funding against receivables: the facility moves with the business instead of being renegotiated every time you win work.

They solve different problems. Invoice finance releases cash tied up in invoices you have already raised. A working capital facility is a revolving limit you draw on and repay as you need it — for stock, for seasonality, and for delivering the contracts you have won. A business loan is fixed-term funding for a defined purpose. Runway offers all three, and often combines them.

Runway lends for defined needs with a plan behind them: new equipment, expansion, an acquisition, or a succession or management buyout. The funding is structured around the plan rather than the other way round, so the term and the repayments reflect what the money is actually doing.

Yes, and many do. Runway combines products where the situation calls for it — group structures, periods of high growth, and transitions where one facility on its own would not fit. We start with the need and match the facilities to it, then adjust them as the business changes.

Banks assess businesses against a standard set of criteria, and viable businesses fall outside it every day — often because their value sits in cash flow, customers and contracts rather than in property. Runway is a New Zealand non-bank lender built for those businesses. We read cash flow, customers and trading history, and we back good businesses that do not fit the standard mould.

Runway starts with the business. Funding is secured on the trading company and what it earns, most often its receivables, supported by general security and specific asset security where appropriate. Residential property is not where we start, and most facilities are structured without it. Where a deal calls for more, we say so early and explain why.

Runway assesses every facility on the five Cs of credit — character, capacity, capital, collateral and conditions. In practice that means reading the whole business: how cash moves through it, who its customers are, what it owns, and how it has traded. We are looking for a viable business, not a perfect balance sheet.

Runway lends across most of the New Zealand economy — services, distribution, manufacturing, healthcare, transport and primary sectors among them. What matters more than the industry is how the business trades and whether the funding fits what it is doing. Where a need sits outside our appetite we say so promptly and clearly.

Runway facilities start at $250,000 and run to $4 million, with larger facilities considered where the business and the security support them. The number matters less than the structure — the right combination of invoice finance, working capital and term funding for what the business is actually doing.

You deal directly with the people who make the decision. Runway keeps the line between a business owner and a credit decision short, so the person you speak to about a facility is the person who can answer on it.

We tell you, and we tell you promptly. Runway gives clear feedback either way, including when a need sits outside our appetite. An answer you can act on is worth more than a process that goes quiet.

Yes. Brokers, accountants and advisers introduce a large share of the businesses Runway funds, and we work to give them the same clarity we give a borrower: a considered answer, and a clear explanation of the structure behind it. Introduce a deal at hello@runway.co.nz.

Runway acquired Lock Finance in 2026. Lock Finance is one of New Zealand’s longest-standing specialists in invoice and receivables finance, with a lineage back to 1889 and more than 135 years of lending behind it. Same team, same relationships, same discipline — now with Runway’s capital, governance and leadership behind them.

Yes. Runway Limited is a registered financial service provider, FSP1012529, based at 1/18 Railway Street, Newmarket, Auckland.