Deal focus: Tryb sees strength in numbers

When the four founders of Tryb Group decided to go into business together they wanted to raise a Southeast Asia-focused credit fund. The plan was soon abandoned because they couldn’t find enough digitized credit. While the likes of ride-hailing platforms Gojek and Grab have leveraged their user bases to create online payment and lending businesses, the region’s banks are far behind.

“Everything is on paper. If you look at the flow of capital – digital contracts, securitization, syndication, and distribution to global investors – it’s not there. Once you move from paper to the cloud you can securitize,” says Markus Gnirck, co-founder and CEO of Tryb. “VC investors are doing a great job in providing risk capital to fintech start-ups, but we believe Southeast Asia has the ‘tech’ and is missing the ‘fin.’”

Tryb is intended to provide that missing ‘fin’ – a platform that will hold control or minority positions in an ecosystem of fintech companies involved in small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) lending, trade finance, and micro-credit. Loans originated by these businesses will be securitized and sold to institutional investors, with Tryb leveraging its scale to execute larger deals.

The founders have strong fintech credentials: Gnirck helped establish Startupbootcamp FinTech, relocating to Singapore to launch the Asia business; Veiverne Yuen, who serves as CIO, was previously at GIC Private; Magnus Böcker launched OMX, became president of NASDAQ after it bought OMX, and then spent six years as CEO of the Singapore Exchange; and Nels Friets is an alumnus of CLSA and Citigroup.

Tryb’s first two investments – ASEAN payments provider MC Payment and Swedish freight and commodities contract manager Chinsay – were completed using friends and family money. The firm has now raised $30 million from the Makara Innovation Fund, a Singapore government-backed vehicle that focuses on intellectual property-driven businesses, as part of a $50 million round. 

The proceeds will finance investments in 6-8 companies over the next 18 months. The aim is to close a $100 million round in 2019, with a view to going public within a four-year timeframe. Tryb is structured in the traditional start-up mold; investors receive preferred shares in the holding company, the value of which is driven by the performance of businesses on the platform.

Gnirck draws comparisons between Tryb and Lending Club, the US-listed lending business that started with a peer-to-peer model but then securitized its portfolio and brought in institutional investors. Southeast Asia is too fragmented to accommodate a single player of this nature, so agglomerating assets on a platform is the next best approach.

“It is all about bringing capital markets closer to the consumers of capital,” he adds. “We’ve had conversations with global institutions that want to buy ASEAN credit. And they would rather invest through Singapore because they don’t want to go into these countries directly.”   

• Tweet  
• Facebook  
• LinkedIn  
• Google plus  
• Save this article  
• Send to  

• Topics
• Southeast Asia
• Technology
• Financials
• Expansion
• Singapore
• Makara Capital
• Financial Services