Straight answers about business funding.

Working capital is the cash a business needs to trade day to day — to buy stock, pay wages, and cover the gap between doing the work and being paid for it. Working capital funding covers that gap. It is not a single product: at Runway it can be invoice finance, a revolving credit facility, or a combination, depending on where your cash is tied up.

It depends on where your cash is tied up. If it is sitting in unpaid invoices, invoice finance releases it. If it is tied up in stock you are building ahead of a busy season, a revolving credit facility secured over the business is usually the better fit. If you are importing goods against orders you have already won, trade finance funds the shipment until your customer pays. Runway starts with where the cash is stuck, then structures the facility around it.

Not usually. Invoice finance funds invoices raised to other businesses, so if you sell direct to consumers there are no trade invoices to fund. Where cash is tied up in stock rather than receivables, a revolving credit facility secured over the business and its assets is the usual answer.

They solve different problems. Invoice finance releases cash already tied up in invoices you have raised. A revolving credit facility is an agreed 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, repaid on a set schedule. The first two fund working capital; the third funds a plan. Runway offers all three, and often combines them.

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.

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; in the other, you keep that contact yourself. The difference that matters to most owners is who talks to their customers. Runway offers invoice finance in both shapes — we can manage collections, or you can keep the relationship — and which one applies is agreed with you when the facility is set up, rather than imposed.

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.

A revolving credit facility is an agreed limit you draw on and repay as you need it, rather than a lump sum you take once. You pay for what you use, and the limit is there when you need it again. Runway secures it over the trading business and its assets, and sizes it against what the business earns and owns.

Yes. Where cash is tied up in stock — building inventory ahead of a season, or holding it through a long supply chain — Runway can fund against it through a revolving credit facility secured over the business and its assets. This is often the right structure for businesses that sell direct to consumers, where there are no trade invoices for invoice finance to work against.

Yes, where there is a confirmed order behind it. Trade finance covers the gap between paying an overseas supplier and being paid by your customer — Runway funds the shipment, and the facility clears when the sale settles. It suits importers who have won the order but need to pay for the goods before they land.

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.

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, 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 an application 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 — professional services, education, 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 something is outside what we can fund, we say so promptly and clearly.

Runway facilities start at $250,000 and typically run to $3 million. Larger facilities are considered where the business and the security support them, and are funded through Runway’s private credit fund. 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 with one person, and they stay with you. Your application is not passed from team to team — the person you speak to about a facility takes it through Runway’s credit process, can tell you where it stands at any point, and gives you the answer either way, with the reasoning behind it.

We tell you, and we tell you promptly. Runway gives clear feedback either way, including when an application is unlikely to proceed. 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 client 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 is based at 1/18 Railway Street, Newmarket, Auckland. The following entities are registered as financial service providers: Lock Finance Limited FSP 554426, Runway Limited FSP 1012529 and Runway Private Credit Fund (No.1) Limited Partnership FSP 1013212.