Industry: Banking and Financial Services

Banking and Financial Services

Insurtech: Uncovering the opportunity in Southeast Asia  

The insurtech sector in Southeast Asia is undergoing a transformative phase, driven by emerging models and categories. Recent regulatory changes have paved the way for innovative business models that enhance customer and agent interactions while reducing servicing costs. In this week’s newsletter, we will explore how insurtech companies are shifting their focus from revenue generation […]

Decoding MENA BNPL Market

1. Credit card adoption has been limited in MENA due to Shariah non-compliance, despite high banking penetration. Despite having a well-established banking sector, KSA faces hurdles when it comes to credit card adoption, with adoption ~20%. This is significantly lower than that of its global counterparts. The primary reason for this low adoption rate is […]

Unlocking Growth: India’s Digital SME Credit Gap and Economic Potential

The “India Digital SME Credit Report 2023,” a collaborative effort between GetVantage and Redseer Strategy Consultants, sheds light on a substantial credit deficit amounting to approximately $220 billion, casting a shadow on the progress of digitized businesses within the country. Despite an injection of $53 billion in the fiscal year 2022 and an estimated $165 […]

Uncovering the Digital Economy in Malaysia

Indonesia, Singapore, and Vietnam tend to dominate digital economy discussions in Southeast Asia. As a neighbor of such countries, Malaysia’s potential is often overlooked. In today’s newsletter, we highlight some emerging sectors in the country. Malaysia’s digital economy sectors are expected to experience meaningful growth, led by factors such as a high urbanization rate, increasing […]

The future of online payments: BNPL, UPI, Embedded Finance & more    

Recent trends in the online payments ecosystem have brought much change to how consumers carry out their day-to-day transactions. From UPI and digital wallets to BNPL, online payments have come a long way to make life easier for both, consumers and businesses. In response to increasing users, fintech companies are also gearing up to meet […]

The Future of India’s Digital Payment

According to a report released by Redseer Strategy Consultants in collaboration with Plural by Pine Labs, it is projected that 85% of businesses in India will be digitally enabled by FY26. This means that a large majority of businesses in India will have embraced digital technologies and processes for their operations. This digital transformation is […]

Open finance – doorway to digitalization

The Indonesian government has put forward a plan to digitalize and democratize the finance systems in the country by 2025. Open finance platforms directly address several of the key challenges and pain points of MSMEs and are positioned to benefit the most. In this article, we look at a sub-segment of fintech – open finance […]

Middle East – A silver lining amid global slowdowns

The MENA region has been a beacon of hope amidst the challenging global investment climate. Despite the economic downturn, MENA has seen a surge of positive investor interest, growing north of 20% in terms of funding. This growth is fueled by the emergence of sectors like FinTech and SaaS, as well as the innovative startups […]

Tapping into the $430Bn TAM of Southeast Asia: Opportunities for Indian Startups

Indian startups looking to expand overseas should consider Southeast Asia, an attractive geography with tremendous growth potential. According to the Redseer SEA report, the region’s economy has been on a stellar growth trajectory, reaching an impressive USD3.2tn in 2021. What’s more, the population of over 650 million and 70 million SMEs in Southeast Asia are […]

Slowing Consumer Demand: A Double Whammy to Startups in a Funding Winter

The market disruption by the COVID-19 pandemic created phases of growth and slowdowns for startups. As a result, most businesses experienced a net growth that spanned two pandemic waves. However, in CY-2022, global inflationary pressures severely impacted consumer demand. The revenue increase was driven by higher prices, as volumes remained low across the urban and […]

Tech to Drive MENA IPO Boom

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has seen a surge in IPO activity in recent years, with several high-profile companies going public and raising significant capital. To sustain this momentum, the region will need to continue embracing new technologies and innovative solutions to drive further growth. Here we deep dive into the thriving […]

Navigating the Challenging $10-100 Mn Revenue Journey

During the first week of January 2023, the media outlets were abuzz with our finding about startup scaling almost 4x faster currently compared to a couple of decades ago. That is, while startups incorporated in the year 2000 took 18 years to reach US$ 100 million revenue, the ones founded in 2017 took 4-5 years. […]

InsurTech: Uncovering the Opportunity in Indonesia – Part 2

Indonesia’s InsurTech sector will grow at ~40% CAGR during 2021-26E due to low base (insurance penetration), already high (and rising) digital penetration, and the emergence of newer models. The capital raises by multiple players in the region suggests the continued support from investors. More could follow as players gain scale and display clearer path to […]

CBT Taxation – Supporting a sustainable local retail ecosystem

Recently, the customs duty ceiling for international cross-border trade was reduced. The policy change is expected to support creating a sustainable local retail ecosystem and further accelerate the trend of partnerships between local and international retail players in the UAE. Here’s an insight into the impact of the policy update on local retail players and […]

BNPL Wave is Now a $1.5 Bn Reality

The Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) market is expected to grow in the Middle East region as this payment mode has a fast approval method. This is the most convenient payment method, spread over a period of time with smaller amounts of EMI. As the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the economic conditions in the Middle East […]

MENA Insurtech: Ripe for the Taking

Insurtech has all the makings of the long-awaited fulcrum that pioneers MENA’s insurance market level with that of developed economies, starting with the GCC. In this article, we deep-dive into MENA’s booming Fintech landscape and highlight a rapidly evolving segment within it – Insurtech. 1. Insurance penetration in GCC economies is still nascent– leaving significant […]

Driven by Digitalization: Philippines Fintech

Philippines has a vast “underserved” banking population of ~57 million demonstrating the untapped potential in the country. Philippines lacks national ID system and hence the prevalence of financial frauds is also quite high. The new age fintech players with their latest technology and credit tools can tackle this issue well and thereby gain customer confidence […]

Vietnam’s FinTech Landscape

Vietnam is at the forefront of a fintech revolution. The structural opportunity in digital banking and insurtech sectors in particular is likely to unfold over the next few years. Accordingly, we expect investors’ interests to sustain in the foreseeable future. 1. Macroeconomic indicators present a conducive landscape for the fintech ecosystem to develop and grow […]

InsurTech: Uncovering the opportunity in Indonesia

As per our report, InsurTech in Indonesia is estimated to grow fourfold during 2021-26 and reach a multi-billion-dollar gross premium size. This will be driven by rising awareness of the need for insurance, rising digital penetration, wider product offerings and other factors. The note also provides some colour on consumers’ preferences for InsurTech offerings.  Here’s a […]

SEA Fintech Report

Robust economic growth and digitally engaged consumer creates massive opportunity to drive innovation in Fintech adoption

Of digital book-keeping apps, foodtech subscriptions and festive sales

1. Digital book-keeping apps have managed to gain strong adoption and regular usage amongst SMEs Published on: Oct 2019 New age book keeping apps are seeing daily usage amongst large chunk of their user base- indicating increasing comfort A significant chunk of app users are having more than 50% of all their transactions recorded on […]

Indonesia Fintech: Looking back into The Future

1. Fast-growing Indonesian eWallets and digital payments space seeing massive supply-side activity Published on: Aug 2019 Summary takeaways  Continued rapid growth (70-80% CAGR) in Indonesia e-wallets space is attracting the attention of major global players even as local players expand into new segments Given the expected intense competition, the market may be heading for consolidation […]

The Upcoming Fintech Boom In India (And Indonesia)

1. InsurTech marketplaces are growing 100% y-o-y driven by strong growth of both incumbents and new entrants Published on: Aug 2019 Key growth driver of sector incumbents is wide coverage viz strong presence in most insurance categories, across insurance providers An additional growth lever is a strong focus on customer service enabled by a large […]

Fintech Insights | Middle-East

1. Fintech: Funding in MENA fintech is led by lending and payment focused start-ups Published on: Oct 2018 Fintech based start-ups in the MENA region are seeing a lot of traction recently with a funding of ~USD115mn till date, of which ~75mn is received within last two years. UAE is the most popular geography among […]