Krungsri Finnovate as well as Thai multimedia companies Plan B Media and Master Ad chipped in to invest US$41 million into Singpapore-based digital assets platform Zipmex.
Zipmex said this marked the first time in Southeast Asia that a top-tier bank and listed multinational media companies have invested in a digital assets platform.
Krungsri Finnovate is the corporate venture capital arm of Bank of Ayudhya, in turn a part of the Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group.
Currently operating in Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, and Australia, Zipmex has received interest from various regional and international players seeking to invest in the current oversubscribed funding round.
“This commitment from Krungsri Finnovate represents not only the validation of our business model and approach to innovation, but also of the potential for digital assets to become a core part of our lifestyle,” said Zipmex CEO Marcus Lim.
“A marriage of digital assets and traditional banking can provide new innovative use cases for money, which we have demonstrated through ZipWorld,” said Lim. “Further use cases of Zlaunch, and ZipNFT are just the starting point of where we can evolve to be banking forward, lifestyle focused.”
Sam Tanskul, managing director at Krungsri Finnovate, said they believed strongly that Zipmex will play a crucial role in such developments not just in Thailand, but in the Asia-Pacific region.
“We believe that tech and innovation will be the driver of economical and society-focused solutions to the country’s future” said Tanskul.
Also, participation from listed multinational media companies showed that the digital asset trend has the potential to transform the realm of financial landscape and lifestyle.
Plan B Media specialises in out-of-home media and engagement marketing while Master Ad is a leader for billboards and street furniture with an extensive media footprint across SEA.
The funding round also attracted Hong Kong-based MindWorks Capital, US-based Jump Capital, which led Zipmex’s oversubscribed Series A round earlier this January.
The only digital assets platform licensed in Thailand which operates under regulatory supervision in Indonesia and Australia, and under a current notified regulatory exemption in Singapore, Zipmex provides users access to a variety of financial services such as interest-bearing accounts on their crypto-wallets.
So far, the platform has processed over US$4 billion in gross transaction volume since its launch in late 2019.
In Singapore, Zipmex, through its subsidiary, Zipmex Pte Ltd, is currently in advanced stages of applying for a Major Payment Institution licence application with the Monetary Authority of Singapore for digital payment token services, among others.
Zipmex is also set to launch a new marketing campaign centred around the possibilities of access for all to the power of digital payments. The campaign will feature new global positioning and branding which will be showcased throughout Plan B Media’s and Master Ad’s out-of-home assets.
