Part of HSBC’s ASEAN Growth Fund, an accumulative commitment of over US$100 million to Funding Societies since its partnership established in 2022

SINGAPORE, Nov. 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Funding Societies | Modalku (Funding Societies), the largest unified digital finance platform for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in Southeast Asia today announced signing the third credit facility* with HSBC under its ASEAN Growth Fund. The overall transaction, an accumulative commitment of over US$100 million, also includes the two annual credit facilities extended to Funding Societies, reaffirms HSBC’s continued support for MSMEs through the platform since 2022.

This transaction, which is amongst HSBC’s largest asset-backed secured facilities extended to digital SME lenders in Southeast Asia, will further deepen and extend Funding Societies’ reach to providing credit access to underserved MSME segments in the region.

While the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region has grown its middle-class and gained tremendous traction in terms of increasing access to formal banking services and digitalising its commercial environment, the region still has a US$2.5 trillion credit access gap, making up over half of the global shortfall in small business financing[1]. To put into perspective, up to 99.9% of enterprises are MSMEs contributing to 35% to 69% of each country’s gross domestic product (GDP)[2].

Co-founder and Group CEO of Funding Societies, Kelvin Teo, said, “The continued support from a global bank such as HSBC is a testament to its commitment to support the development of digital platform businesses such as ours and MSMEs as we ride through a two-decade high interest rates impacting the global economy. This enables us to further explore scalable debt financing for growth and profitability, and bolster financial inclusion for the underbanked and underserved SMEs in the region.”

As part of its ASEAN Growth Fund strategy, this transaction underlines a scalable solution to allow and enable digital lenders like Funding Societies to raise additional equity capital and debt financing through different channels. Furthermore, HSBC will act as the structuring bank, lender, account bank, FX counterparty, facility and security agent in providing a scalable and pan-regional financing solution to support Funding Societies’ business expansion in the region.

Harish Venkatesan, Head of Corporates and Business Banking, HSBC Singapore, said, “As an early-starter and a leading MSME digital financing player in ASEAN, we are pleased to provide our third credit facility for Funding Societies, cumulatively in excess of US$100 million. This will enable us to continue supporting its efforts to provide financing support to micro, small and medium enterprises which will contribute to the building blocks of societies in the ASEAN region. We look forward to continuing support for Funding Societies as they grow their business and for the underlying MSMEs in the region through the HSBC ASEAN Growth Fund.”

The US$1 billion HSBC ASEAN Growth Fund was launched in March 2024 to enable Singapore-based digital platform businesses supporting e-commerce in the region to achieve economies of scale across multiple international markets, grow their asset portfolios, and advance along the corporate lifecycle. Together with the New Economy and Venture Debt Fund, HSBC Singapore offers a comprehensive suite of financing solutions for new economy businesses across different stages of growth[3].

This announcement comes at the heels of Funding Societies’ most recent strategic investments from Maybank in September.

Since its inception in 2015, Funding Societies has disbursed over US$4 billion in business financing, positively impacting more than 100,000 businesses across Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam, as well as processed an annualised US$1.4 billion in payments GTV (gross transaction value) since its entry into payments in late 2022.

About Funding Societies | Modalku

Funding Societies | Modalku is the largest unified SME digital finance platform in Southeast Asia. It is licensed in Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, registered in Malaysia, and operates in Vietnam. The FinTech company provides US$1 billion annually of business financing to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). In recent years, it has made strategic milestones including its acquisition of regional digital payments platform CardUp and co-investment into Bank Index in Indonesia.

Funding Societies | Modalku is backed by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Maybank, Khazanah Nasional Berhad, CGC Digital (the digital arm of the Credit Guarantee Corporation Malaysia Berhad), SBVA (previously SoftBank Ventures Asia), Peak XV Partners (previously Sequoia Capital India), Alpha JWC Ventures, SMBC Bank, BRI Ventures, VNG Corporation, Rapyd Ventures, Endeavor, EBDI, SGInnovative, Qualgro, and Golden Gate Ventures among others.

It has received accolades through the years including: Brands for Good (2019, 2023), Global SME Excellence Award, Global SME Finance Awards by IFC (2021-2023) Global Startup Awards (2020), MAS FinTech Award (2016, 2021), Singapore’s Fastest-Growing Companies 2024 (a list of 100 companies compiled by The Straits Times and Statista), High-Growth Companies in Asia-Pacific 2024 (a list of 500 companies compiled by the Financial Times and Statista) .

For more information, please visit: www.fundingsocieties.com

About The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited

The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited is the founding member of the HSBC Group. HSBC serves customers worldwide from offices in 60 countries and territories. With assets of US$2,975bn as of 30 June 2024, HSBC is one of the world’s largest banking and financial services organisations.

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SOURCE Funding Societies

COIMBATORE, India, Nov. 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — Exterro, Inc., the leading provider of data risk management software, today announced it continues to build its world-class executive team with the appointments of Jim Cox as Chief Revenue Officer and John Vincenzo as Chief Marketing Officer. These strategic hires are critical additions to the management team as it focuses on rapidly scaling the company to capitalize on the fast-growing market.

“I’m incredibly excited to welcome both Jim and John to Exterro as we build an industry-leading go to market team to complement our award-winning product and innovation engine,” said Exterro Founder and CEO Bobby Balachandran. “John and Jim have a history of creating highly efficient and productive teams that exceed expectations. We will continue to invest in a customer-centric approach to both technology and our go-to-market teams. We’re primed to accelerate our growth and fully leverage our internal and partner resources to ensure we capitalize on the great momentum we’ve built.”

A successful, dynamic, sales leader, Jim has more than 20 years of experience driving exceptional growth by building sales teams that focus on execution and cultivating outstanding partnerships. During more than a decade in cybersecurity, Jim built a network of CISOs and executive relationships that, while at Proofpoint, helped the organization scale from $100M to $1.4B in just over six years.

As CRO at Exterro, one key area will be the increased focus and expansion of the company’s partner programs. “The time is now for Exterro to seize this substantial market opportunity,” stated Cox. “We offer the only platform that offers legal teams, cybersecurity professionals, and C-level leaders an integrated solution to e-discovery, digital forensics, cybersecurity compliance, and data privacy, governance, and security challenges. I’m excited about our ability to accelerate growth by expanding platform sales, to not only the market but to the extensive list of customers we have.”

John Vincenzo has led both public and private technology companies’ marketing teams and helped them take their go-to-market efforts to new heights. He has spent the last 25+ years in technology industries, most recently with cybersecurity companies such as the privately held Nozomi Networks; Silver Peak (acquired by HPE/Aruba Networks) in the software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN) space; and global networking leader 3Com (acquired by HP). In each instance, he has helped increase overall awareness and drive revenue growth. 

As CMO, Vincenzo will be responsible for increasing the visibility of the company so it matches the success the company is seeing in the market. He will also help accelerate revenue growth by working closely with the Sales teams as well as the Exterro Partner ecosystem.

“Exterro may be the best kept secret in the industry, and we need to change that,” added Vincenzo. “It’s amazing the growth and level of technology innovation the company has already achieved. I’m excited about the opportunity to tell our story to the world and help customers understand the value and return on their investment they can achieve by leveraging the Exterro data risk management platform. No company helps organizations better protect data, minimize risk and ensure safer digital environments than Exterro, and we will make it our mission to put a spotlight on our role in making the world a safer place.”

Exterro has taken a holistic and integrated approach to data risk since its inception, and is the first and only company to use an AI-powered technology platform to assess and mitigate data risks in a comprehensive and integrated manner. The more we learn about data risks–posed by privacy regulations, litigation, data breaches and cybersecurity incidents, data governance and compliance challenges–the more we recognize they cannot be comprehended in isolation. They are interconnected and interdependent, and must be assessed and addressed holistically with a unified data risk management platform.

About Exterro, Inc.

Exterro empowers organizations and law enforcement agencies to achieve better legal, regulatory, and investigatory outcomes, while saving money and minimizing the impact of data risk. Its data risk management software is the only comprehensive platform that leverages data discovery, automation, and workflow optimization, and one of the first to utilize responsible AI to give users insight into and control over the complex interconnections of privacy, legal operations, digital investigations, cybersecurity response, compliance, and data governance. Thousands of corporations, law firms, managed services providers, and government and law enforcement agencies trust Exterro to manage their risks and drive successful outcomes at a lower cost. For more information, visit www.exterro.com.

Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2547934/Exterro_Expansion.jpg

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9TH Annual CX Summit in Kuala Lumpur – The Next Chapter (13-14 November 2024)

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia, Nov. 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — AI and Digital capabilities are elevating customer experience everywhere. In Malaysia, we look towards inspiration in relevant and practical solutions from these developments to steer transformation in customer experience; and this year’s CX Summit in Kuala Lumpur promises to deliver such.

With a star-cast speaker line-up led by Global CX Gurus, Ron Kaufman and Shep Hyken, and supported by highly reputed CX thought-leaders, the 9th Customer Experience (CX) Summit is expected to ignite strategic thinking and CX innovation for the audience into their Y2025/2026 plans.

In recognizing the importance of CX in the growing digital economy of Malaysia, the Contact Centre Association of Malaysia (CCAM) with the support of Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) is set to launch CX Malaysia at this year’s CX Summit in a special ceremony. CX Malaysia is positioned to be a think-tank to provide strategic leadership for CX innovation in Malaysia and steer the nation to be the centre of excellence in the region. The initial work carried out in CX Malaysia through its Research & Analytics partner, Twimbit, will be previewed with the audience at the CX Summit through a presentation on “State of CX in Malaysia” and the release of the 1st National CX Index (via classification of 100 Malaysia based brands).  This will be groundbreaking and a start of a new chapter in CX Malaysia.

The Summit to be held on 13-14 November at the Sunway Resort Hotel also promises truly insightful presentations, most notably the real transformation case studies from Pos Malaysia, Telekom Malaysia, Lazada, Malaysia Airlines, CIMB and RHB Bank while having more than 20 world-renowned digital solutions providers showcasing their latest in the specially created Digital CX Marketplace. The audience will have access to the latest and greatest in the digital space from partners like Genesys, NTT Data, ITAPPS, AWS, Vonage, Freshworks, NICE, O’Connor’s Engineering, Sprinklr, Zoom, Verint, Nubitel, Knowmax.ai, Soprano Design, Enghouse Interactive, Talkdesk, Atas Cloud, Oracle, Business Next and Orlig. Expect your technical needs to be met from all sides of CX, including omni-channel solutions, CRM systems, Text analytics, knowledge management, customer sentiment analysis, social customer management, quality assurance, data security but with a strong enforcement of AI this time around.

The 9th Annual CX Summit is happening on 13 and 14 November 2024 at the Sunway Resort Hotel, Greater Kuala Lumpur. 

“As we move towards the next chapter, we expand out from Contact Centre focus towards a more holistic view of customer experience.  We are a nation with strong skills in hospitality and customer service.  With the addition of new digital capabilities and through strong governmental initiatives, we can build a platform where Malaysian organizations can truly shine in terms of customer experience,” states CCAM President, Mr. Vigneswaran Sivalingam.

He further states, “The State of CX Research that we are undertaking with Twimbit will allow us to truly assess where organizations stand in their CX journey and where we need to build on the capabilities.  The first part is to evaluate organizations within the country, from here we hope to see how Malaysian organizations stand in a regional and then international standpoint. This is an ambitious, but necessary undertaking if we are to truly progress.”

CCAM, the organizing association of the CX Summit is working closely with the Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) and the Human Resource Development Corporation (HRDC) to make CX Summit the premier engagement of its sort in the region.

CX Summit is around the corner, register your seat today! Tickets are available through https://cxsummit.com.my/. HRDC claimable for local Malaysians under corporate attendance, priced at the best levels in this region at RM2,500.00 (domestic) / USD$600.00 (international).

Contact details of CCAM Secretariat  
Email address: ccam_secretariat@ccam.org.my
                           cxsummit@ccam.org.my 
Phone number: +6(03) 9779 5599

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SOURCE Contact Centre Association of Malaysia (CCAM)