YouTrip, Singapore’s neobank offering a multi-currency wallet, announced Tuesday that it has raised $30 million in its latest Series A round.
The round, driven by returning investors from major Asian family offices and prominent financial technology investors, will solidify the fintech firm’s position as the leading neobank in Southeast Asia offering business to business (B2B) and business to consumer (B2C) multi-currency payments, YouTrip said in a statement.
With this, the company has now raised over $60 million funding in total since launch.
According to YouTrip, the new capital will supercharge the company’s technological capabilities to bolster its suite of payment products, in particular entering the adjacent B2B payments space, as well as accelerating its entrance into the wider Southeast Asia.
“We have transformed tremendously as a company since our last funding round. From a mobile travel wallet, we have grown to establish a strong foothold in new territories such as overseas online spending to meet the extraordinary shifts in consumer behaviours. We believe there is untapped potential in cross-border payments, and our market-leading position in this space puts us in a good place to serve more of our users’ payment needs – from travellers, to online shoppers, and now, businesses,” said Caecilia Chu, YouTrip’s Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder.
“As a company, this latest round also gives us the resources to strengthen our multiple growth engines to stay resilient and well-primed for expansion into new vistas,” she added.
YouTrip is a Southeast Asian neobank offering the region’s first and leading multi-currency wallet. As a regional financial technology startup, it is dedicated to creating the best mobile financial services by simplifying foreign currency payments and offering the best exchange rates. YouTrip was launched in Singapore in 2018 and subsequently in Thailand in partnership with Kasikornbank in 2019.
According to the statement, YouTrip has maintained its position as the ‘go-to’ card for consumers’ multi-currency spending. To date, it has processed over $800 million card spend globally, with almost 20 million transactions and over 1.5 million app downloads.
YouTrip’s transaction volume has also rebounded to pre-COVID levels, driven by strong traction in cross-border e-commerce transactions and progressive return of travel spending.
With the opening of more Vaccinated Travel Lanes (VTL) in Singapore, transaction volume is forecast to accelerate rapidly especially given upcoming holiday seasons and revenge travel.
To advance its growth, YouTrip has set its sights on the B2B payments ecosystem. The industry, which is expected to be worth $150 trillion by 2022, is ripe with potential, with small and medium enterprises (SMEs) showing a strong willingness to adopt digital banking services, specifically for cross-border payments. Catering to businesses with a global footprint, the company has launched a new corporate credit card, YouBiz.
“We’re very excited about the B2B payments opportunity. It is a segment with a deep market, as companies increasingly operate in a distributed and borderless manner and we expect their cross-border payment needs to go up. By incorporating our company’s core strengths of offering the best exchange rates and an extremely easy to use interface into YouBiz, we help businesses save time and cost, so that they can focus their energy and efforts in finding growth,” said Arthur Mak, YouTrip’s Co-Founder.
According to the statement, registration for interest in the product’s beta launch has received more than 1,000 sign-ups to date.
YouBiz will be rolled out in Singapore in the first quarter of 2022, and with plans to bring it to five other Southeast Asia countries in the next twelve months.
YouTrip is also optimistic about the headroom for growth in consumer’s multi-currency payments, driven by the rapid rebound of leisure travel, and the sustained popularity of e-commerce.
It said its YouTrip Perks – the company’s rewards platform offering cashbacks and deals from top merchants such as Taobao, Amazon and Singapore Airlines – has recorded a 150 percent increase in transactions since its launch in September.
For a more seamless payment experience, it said YouTrip will be refreshing its app with new features such as a virtual card, an interactive exchange rates dashboard, and the ability to hold more popular currencies in their wallet, and this will be launched in early 2022.
On the travel front, it said with more VTLs opening and as Singaporeans steadily take flight, YouTrip has also launched its VTL Holiday Away campaign today to bring more value to their overseas trips.