Warburg Pincus, Goodwater lead Series D for Vietnam's MoMo

Kora Management and Macquarie Capital came in alongside Goodwater as new investors, while several existing backers re-upped. The company did not disclose financial details of the transaction; the $100 million-plus figure came from a source close to the situation.

MoMo received a $100 million Series C led by Warburg Pincus – still its largest shareholder – in early 2019. This followed a $28 million Series B in 2016, which included a $25 million contribution from Standard Chartered Private Equity – now Affirma Capital – and $3 million from Goldman Sachs. Goldman previously committed $5.75 million in Series A funding in 2013.

Headquartered in Ho Chi Minh City, MoMo claims to be Vietnam’s leading e-wallet operator. In 2020, the company nearly doubled its user base to 23 million, while transaction volume grew 3.5x to hit $14 billion. The e-wallet is accepted by 30,000 companies with 120,000 points of sale and has direct connections to 28 domestic and international banks.

On closing its Series B round, MoMo had one million customers using its e-wallet services and worked with approximately 100 merchants. The other part of the business, under parent company M_Service, was an over-the-counter remittance service serving 1.5 million unbanked individuals through a network of 4,000 independent agents.

The Series D proceeds will go towards turning MoMo into a super app platform that incorporates a variety of different services. The company will also launch MoMo Innovation Ventures, which will invest in Vietnamese start-ups with the potential to be integrated into the MoMo’s ecosystem.

Established Southeast Asian super apps Grab and Gojek – which expanded from ride-hailing into multiple areas, including financial services – have similar ecosystem-building initiatives. In 2019, Grab pledged to invest $500 million in Vietnam to spur the development of the local digital economy.

“MoMo has solidified itself as the clear market leader in digital payments in Vietnam and we believe this is only just the beginning for the platform,” Jeffrey Perlman, a managing director and head of Southeast Asia at Warburg Pincus, said in a statement. "It is one of the rare companies in [Southeast Asia] that presents a unique combination of best-in-class management team, hyper-growth, and strong profitability.”

He added that Warburg Pincus is looking for more fintech opportunities in Southeast Asia, consistent with its thesis that top digital payments providers in historically underbanked markets will see upside from increasingly connected and digitally savvy middle-class populations. Perlman believes MoMo can replicate the growth of other leading e-wallets in Asia.

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• Topics
• Southeast Asia
• Technology
• Financials
• Expansion
• Vietnam
• Fintech
• Warburg Pincus Asia
• Goodwater Capital
• Affirma Capital
• Macquarie Group