Korea's Viva Republica raises $173m
Viva Republica, the operator of Korean money transfer app Toss, has raised $173 million from a group of investors featuring Sequoia Capital China and Kleiner Perkins.
Aspex Management, Altos Ventures, Goodwater Capital, and Greyhound Capital also participated. It brings funds raised to date to around KRW630 billion ($530 million) and values the company at around KRW3.1 trillion, according to a statement.
This is Viva Republica’s largest round to date, following a $64 million investment last year that featured all the current investors, as well as GIC Private and Bessemer Venture Partners. Previous backers also include Hanwha Investment, Ribbit Capital, Qualcomm Ventures, KTB Network, and Partech Ventures. US payments giant PayPal joined a KRW55 billion Series C round in 2017.
Viva Republica has tied much of its recent momentum to COVID-19, which is seen as rapidly modernizing consumer behavior in a jurisdiction that has lagged in digital payments adoption. Although Korea is a global leader in terms of IT infrastructure and smart phone penetration, mobile banking has proved more problematic, with even small money transfers typically requiring five password checks and dozens of clicks.
Toss, a P2P service used by one-third of the local population with more than 48 million downloads, is touted as simplifying money transfers to a three-step process with one password. Toss has now facilitated some KRW108 trillion in transfers, compared to around KRW3.6 trillion at the time of the Paypal investment. The app is said to have recorded its first quarterly profit during the second quarter of this year at KRW1.7 billion.
Earlier this month, Viva Republica increased its exposure to retail transactions by acquiring the payments division of local telecoms company LG UPlus and launching a B2C service known as Toss Payments. The idea is to shorten the payment settlement period for merchants from seven to two business days and leverage growth in e-commerce. There are also plans to expand activities in insurance and stockbroking.
More on North Asia
Latest News
Asian GPs slow implementation of ESG policies - survey
Asia-based private equity firms are assigning more dedicated resources to environment, social, and governance (ESG) programmes, but policy changes have slowed in the past 12 months, in part due to concerns raised internally and by LPs, according to a...
Singapore fintech start-up LXA gets $10m seed round
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a USD 10m seed round for Singapore’s LXA, a financial technology start-up launched by a former Asia senior executive at The Blackstone Group.
India's InCred announces $60m round, claims unicorn status
Indian non-bank lender InCred Financial Services said it has received INR 5bn (USD 60m) at a valuation of at least USD 1bn from unnamed investors including “a global private equity fund.”
Insight leads $50m round for Australia's Roller
Insight Partners has led a USD 50m round for Australia’s Roller, a venue management software provider specializing in family fun parks.