Singapore fintech firm Global Digital Payments raises $1m in seed funding

Global Digital Payments (GDP), a fintech startup based out of Singapore looking to serve small to mid-size enterprises, has raised US$1 million in seed funding from angel investors.

The company told Tech in Asia that its main investor in the round was Moneychant, which has a track of funding entrepreneurs who run finance and AI-focused businesses in the region.

Established earlier this year, the company seeks to improve cross-border financial transactions for businesses. It has developed two solutions using technologies such as blockchain, AI, big data analysis, and social innovation.

One of its solutions is PezzaPay, a peer-to-peer cross-border payment service, which users in the Philippines can use to make payments to Japan and China in a more cost-efficient manner. The company claims that the service has achieved US$60,000 in gross merchandise volume in one month of operation, expecting the number to increase to US$8 million by July 2020.

PezzaLoan, on the other hand, is GDP’s P2P financing platform that connects SMEs to investors willing to lend directly to businesses. It is currently in the early testing stages, according to a statement, with SMEs in Taiwan as the beta users.

“As businesses grow and experience more cross-border activity, they face a traditional banking system that often overlooks SMEs. Traditional methods provide inefficient cross-border services with expensive fees, long transaction times, unfavorable exchange rates, and even transparency issues,” said Victor Wu, co-founder and CEO of GDP.

GDP said it aims to grow its user base and transaction cash flow in the upcoming months as it prepares for a series A round early next year. It also said it has already invested heavily in its operations compliance efforts by applying to more than seven licenses in the region, including those in the crypto, money service operations, and e-money industries.

Wu established the company alongside chief operations officer Amos Huang and head of legal Weili Liu.

Prior to GDP, Wu built a big data adtech company called VPon Big Data Group in 2008. Huang, on other hand, previously eatablished AI company Viscovery in 2013 in Taiwan. Liu served as an attorney at LCC Partners Law office.

To date, GDP has offices in Singapore, the Philippines, Taiwan, Japan, and Estonia and is looking to set up shop in Hong Kong and China soon.