Analysis

Southeast Asia’s startup funding landscape saw a remarkable rebound in April 2025. The region recorded $439 million across 9 funding rounds, marking a 334.7 percent surge from March 2025’s $101 million and a 218.1 percent increase from $138 million in April 2024.

The Southeast Asia (SEA) Monthly Funding Tracker for May 2025 indicates a sharp decline in funding activity. Total funding stood at $128.8 million across 16 rounds, which represents a 70.70 percent drop from April 2025 and a 26.42 percent decline from May 2024.

Maybank Investment Bank said Wednesday that it sees stable-to-improving competition in the mobility segment in Indonesia and Singapore.

Maybank Investment Bank said Wednesday that Indonesia's new logistics rules to benefit third-party logistic providers.

The overhang on the data center theme in Malaysia has eased for now, after the United States scrapped its artificial AI diffusion rules that were proposed during the wane of the Biden Administration, RHB Investment Bank said Monday.

By 2030, IDTechEx forecasts that the deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) data centers, commercialization of AI, and the increasing performance requirements from large AI models will perpetuate the already soaring market size of AI chips to over $400 billion.

The Southeast Asia (SEA) Monthly Funding Tracker for March 2025 reflects a slight upward move in funding during the month. Total funding amounted to $99.5 million across 22 rounds, marking a rise of 10.31 percent compared with February 2025 and an 82.1 percent decline from March 2024.

While ASEAN's regional payment connectivity (RPC) is making good progress, ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office (AMRO) sees some challenges, including fragmented systems, regulatory alignment, and cybersecurity remain.

United States President Donald Trump administration’s reciprocal tariffs (RT) driven macro factors are expected to weigh on Malaysia's semiconductor sector, Maybank Investment Bank said Friday.

While there have been numerous media reports in the past weeks of a potential merger between Grab and GoTo, Maybank Investment Bank opined that acquisition of Gojek would be the most favorable scenario for Grab, leading to maximum synergies while preserving balance sheet strength.