Singapore's Volopay gets $29m Series A

It is Mateen’s third investment in the company. Mateen, who also previously served as Tinder’s chief marketing officer, said he has worked closely with the team since its pre-seed stage. Jam Fund, a US-based VC firm founded by Mateen in 2018, also invested.

Additional contributions came from Winklevoss Capital Management, Rapyd Ventures, Access Ventures, Antler Global, and VentureSouq. US impact investor Accial Capital also joined the round, describing the B2B corporate spend vertical as a way to support entrepreneurs and small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with liquidity and close a credit gap.

Volopay combines business accounts, corporate cards, bill payments, expense reimbursements, credit, cashback, multi-currency wallets, and accounting automation into a single platform. The aim is to solve two critical problems for many SMEs and start-ups: high foreign exchange charges incurred for international payments and a lack of a uniform platform to access all spend data.

The company says its technology allows global companies to eliminate the need for integration with multiple third-party service platforms and deliver a consistent customer experience regardless of jurisdiction. It employs about 150 people across Singapore, Australia, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines. Clients include Funding Societies, Zipmex, Moneysmart, and Smartkarma.

“Volopay is an ambitious project. To build an alternative to Volopay, you would have to launch five different start-ups,” Rajith Shaji, the company's CEO, said in a statement. “We are building the control centre for modern companies for all their financial management needs. Our platform is as easy and seamless to use for a five-person company, as it is for a 500-person company.”

The fresh capital will support expansion across Asia Pacific and the Middle East and North Africa, where a proliferation of sizable start-ups is expected to drive demand. There will also be investment in new products and the enhancement of existing offerings, as well as efforts to advance integrations with various enterprise software and project management applications.

Cross-border payments and related B2B financial services is an attractive VC niche in Singapore. Recent activity includes a USD 60m Series B for Thunes and a USD 200m Series D for Nium. Nium said its total addressable market is worth USD 50trn. Thunes estimates Asia, Africa, and Latin America alone see USD 45trn of cross-border transactions a year.

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• Topics
• Southeast Asia
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