Grab’s US listing plan casts spotlight on South-east Asian ecosystem

SINGAPORE - Singapore-headquartered super app Grab's plans to go public in the United States, in what is the largest blank cheque company deal ever, is testament to the growth prospects of South-east Asia and Singapore's start-up ecosystem, analysts and industry players said.

Grab, which started out as MyTeksi to address the safety concerns of taxi commuters in Kuala Lumpur, announced on Tuesday (April 13) its agreement with Altimeter Growth, a special purpose acquisition company (Spac) backed by Altimeter Capital, which will see the combined entity valued at around US$39.6 billion (S$53.2 billion).

TurnKey Lender and Globe Telecom Partnership to Fulfill Thousands of Loan Requests Per Day to Serve More Filipino Customers in Need

TurnKey Lender is pleased to welcome Globe Telecom as a new addition to its rapidly expanding client family. Globe Telecom, one of leading mobile telecommunication companies in the Philippines, joins more than 170 lenders worldwide that rely on TurnKey Lender’s software platform for best-of-breed digital lending services, from origination and underwriting to repayment and reporting.

One-stop platform to track financial data: How Recko makes financial operations a breeze for businesses

Recko provides a centralised platform for businesses to manage their financial data by collecting data from a wide range of sources, including mobile payment platforms and banks.

The Bangalore-based startup seeks to solve this problem by providing a centralised platform for businesses to manage their financial data. It achieves this by collecting data from a wide range of sources, including mobile payment platforms and banks, before consolidating and displaying it on an easy-to-read dashboard for finance teams.

SOCASH partners up with Singtel Dash to improve payments, remittance services

Fintech startup SOCASH has teamed up with Singtel’s mobile wallet Dash to expand payments and remittance services, allowing Dash users to top up at select SOCASH retail touchpoints in Singapore.

The partnership also aims to help the migrant workers to remit money back home in a safer and more convenient way amidst the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, tapping into SOCASH’s large partner network of retail stores.

Overseas, offline foray on the cards for Licious

Six year old Licious has in many ways led the transformation of buying fresh meat and fish online in a sector that is fragmented, with over 90% of the market unorganised and unbranded.

The Bengaluru-based online meat startup has added five new cities (Coimbatore, Cochin, Vijaywada, Vizag, Jaipur) in the last three months and operates in 12 cities now. It plans to reach 20 cities over the next 18 months.

SoftBank, Tencent backs IP analytics platform PatSnap in USD 300M round

Innovation intelligence company PatSnap has raised USD 300M in their latest Series E funding round.

The round was led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Tencent Investment. Other existing investors who participated in this round were CPE Industrial Fund, Sequoia China, Vertex Growth (VGF), Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia & India (VVSEAI) and Shu Wei Capital.