Fintech funding in Asia-Pacific surged to US$5.56 billion, more than double the same period last year. The figure puts the year 2021 well on track to surpass pre-COVID-19 levels during which fintechs in APAC raised a total of US$9.3 billion in 2019. Increased digital adoption catalyzed by the pandemic has resulted in APAC’s fintech startups raising mega-rounds to accelerate growth and prompted the more mature ones to go on acquisition sprees. Indian payment gateway Razorpay announced a US$160 million in Series E funding round in April after raising US$100 million in a Series D in late-2020. With fresh funds in hand, the firm acquired in July TERA Finlabs, a digital lending software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider, in a bid to scale up its lending business. Razorpay has also announced its intent to broaden its reach to Southeast Asia.
Better World Technology closed the third largest round of the quarter, announcing a US$250 million Series C funding round in May that propelled it to unicorn status. Zeta, which provides the backbone technology for credit and credit-card processing, core banking, loans, mobile banking and personal financial management, plans to expand in the US and Europe. Viva Republica is the Seoul-based fintech company behind super app Toss and South Korea’s most valued private company worth US$7.4 billion. Voyager Innovations is the Manila-based owner of PayMaya, one of the Philippines’ most popular super-apps, providing a range of financial services including digital payments, remittances, bill payments, bank transfers and prepaid cards. The proceeds will go in part towards entering the digital banking space. Amber Group is a cryptocurrency trading and technology firm from Hong Kong, and MatchMove Pay is a Singaporean company that provides a proprietary banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform.