Quadrupled Investment Growth On Asia Pacific Fintech Industry
In their recent report “Fintech and the evolving landscape”, Global consulting company Accenture stated that Asia Pacific (APAC) region had a quadrupled growth in 2015 with to USD 4.3 billion. With this figure. APAC contributed almost 20% of total investment in global fintech industry (USD 22 Bio) and become the second biggest invested fintech region after North America. Most of these growths are contributed by China and India while in South East Asia, the hottest fintech hub still being lead by Singapore.
In terms of business model, payment still reigns in a top spot for the most invested fintech business in APAC. However there is a huge surge in Insurance technology. From 2014 to 2015, Insurance Technology grow almost tripled even though the amount is still small compared to payment. The report predicted that Insurance Technology will be the next hot battleground in APAC fintech landscape.
In this report, fintech startups were divided into two different types: Competitive and collaborative. Competitive-type challenges the established financial institutions while collaborative-type add value to the incumbent. Last year investment collaborative-type startup increased by 138 % while competitive-type only increased by 23%.
This is a good sign that going forward banks and other financial are more open to invest and collaborate with fintech startups. Trend which we already see in Indonesia right now with BCA and Mandiri leading the pack.
For more info, read the full Accenture report here.
Paypal launched fintech incubation program in Singapore
Global mammoth on online payment, PayPal has just launched fintech incubation program in Singapore. This program are opened for fintech startups in the region. Selected participant will go through nine month incubation in PayPal’s Technology Centre in Suntec City. The incubation program will include mentorship on finance and technology topics such as risk, compliance, core payment network and channel development. Participant will also given direct access to PayPal executives, external talents and also well-known industry experts.
In order to be eligible, applicants should fulfill these criteria :
1. A fintech or technology startup
2. Have a minimum viable product (MVP) and early trial with customers
3. Armed with seed stage funding
4. Based out of Singapore or willing to relocate to Singapore
Acceptance will be judged based on team capability, business model, technology innovation and traction.
Apart from PayPal, VISA also setup strong footprint in South East Asia by opening their new Innovation Centre which also in Singapore. Align with the Accenture report, massive growth in fintech sector has been jump-starting the interest of global tech giants to setup business in this region.
More information on this here (e27)
Gojek-Bluebird Partnership
In a surprising twist, recently Gojek has striked partnership with the Bluebird, the company they aimed to disrupt. During the press release, Head of Buebird Public Relation Teguh Wijayanto stated that this partnership improve hailing process for Bluebird. Gojek’s CEO Nadiem Makariem also said that the partnership will include technology, payment system and promotion. Currently the detail on this partnership is not yet clear. Both parties has stated that Gojek-Bluebird joint services will be revealed to public at the end of May 2015
Focusing specifically in payment parts, this partnership will likely served as the first Go-Pay payment expansion outside Gojek own ecosystem. Considering this move and their recent GoPay campaign (50% discount for all gojek services), Seems like Nadiem Makariem has a big ambition to dominant players in the universal payment platform going forward.
More information on this here (Kompas).
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