Funding Societies, Southeast Asia’s small and medium enterprise (SME) digital finance platform, has extended its partnership with global delivery firm Delivery Hero’s subsidiary foodpanda to offer exclusive financing for Bumiputera merchants in Malaysia.
Funding Societies said in a statement that eligible foodpanda merchants can access financing up to MYR 100,000 ($22,207) at a competitive 2 percent annual rate with a flexible financing tenor of up to 24 months.
This limited-time initiative aims to empower local entrepreneurs with the capital to grow and succeed in a challenging market.
According to the statement, Funding Societies and foodpanda have assisted 500 foodpanda merchants and the latest collaboration aims to build on the momentum.
Besides providing essential cash flow and growth capital, by lowering the cost of financing, the collaboration aims to level the playing field and support more underserved micro and small businesses to grow their business within the foodpanda network.
It is noted the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) reported that Malaysia’s services sector achieved a total revenue of MYR 2.3 trillion ($511 billion) in 2023, an 8.4 percent increase from MYR 2.1 trillion ($466 billion) in 2022,
Despite this growth, sub-sectors such as food and beverage (1.4 percent) have yet to recover to their pre-pandemic (2019) revenue levels.
“To support these businesses, particularly MSMEs, access to cash flow is crucial,
“We are hopeful that this partnership between Funding Societies and foodpanda can better assist and scale underserved, creditworthy small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in this industry,” said Chai Kien Poon, Country Head, Funding Societies Malaysia.
Furthermore, he is confident that this affordable financing can help food sellers to better restock supplies and prepare for upcoming seasonal growth amidst a potential surge in staple vegetable costs as a result of the recent floods and ahead of the festive season.
Tan Ming Luk, Managing Director, foodpanda Malaysia, said the firm believes in empowering the merchants with the tools and resources they need to thrive in today’s challenging market.
This initiative not only provides access to much-needed capital at an affordable rate but also reinforces our commitment to supporting local entrepreneurs, especially as they prepare for the upcoming festive season,
“Together, we aim to drive meaningful growth and resilience for our foodpanda merchant community,” he added.
Funding Societies | Modalku is licensed in Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, registered in Malaysia, and operates in Vietnam.
The FinTech company provides $1 billion annually of business financing to SMEs.
In recent years, the firm has made strategic milestones including its acquisition of regional digital payments platform CardUp and co-investment into Bank Index in Indonesia.
Funding Societies 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.
Foodpanda is a on-demand delivery platform in Asia dedicated to bringing consumers a wide range of food, groceries and more, quickly and conveniently.
Powered by technology, foodpanda is spearheading the growth of quick-commerce (q-commerce) across the region with its network of retail partners, as well as pandaMart cloud stores to provide more on-demand options beyond the millions
of food delivery options.
Foodpanda operates in more than 300 cities across 11 markets in Asia Pacific – Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, Pakistan, Taiwan, Philippines, Bangladesh, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar.
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