British 'challenger bank' Atom gains licence from Bank of England

LONDON (Reuters) - British bank Atom said on Wednesday it had secured its licence by the Bank of England, and planned to launch products and services to customers later this year. Atom, which is headquartered in the Northeast of England, is pursuing a low-cost, digital approach to retail banking and plans to offer its services online rather than in high-street branches. The bank - one of several so-called 'challenger' lenders set up to compete with dominant bluechip banks such as Barclays , HSBC , Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland - has raised 25 million pounds so far from investors including investment industry veteran Neil Woodford. It said Chairman Anthony Thomson, Chief Executive Mark Mullen and Chief Financial Officer Dave McCarthy were currently raising additional balance sheet capital for Atom's launch. "Atom will offer a quality of digital experience without parallel in this sector or in many others," Mullen said in the statement. ($1 = 0.6345 pounds) (Reporting by Carolyn Cohn, editing by Sinead Cruise)