Asia

Hong Kong’s virtual bank ZA Bank and United Kingdom-based financial technology firm Wise has jointly announced a partnership on Wednesday to offer low-cost and quick international money transfers to Hongkongers. This partnership marks two firsts: ZA Bank becoming the first bank in Hong Kong to provide international money transfers with no exchange rate…

Accelerating Asia, a Singapore-based venture capital accelerator focused on pre-Series A startups has invested in ten new companies from across Asia Pacific as part of its 7th cohort. The new investments take the venture capital accelerator’s portfolio to 60 startups who have raised a total of over $50 million, with Cohort 7 having raised $5.2 million prior…

Building on the continuing success of its artificial intelligence (AI) solution in delivering diversity and inclusion in hiring, Australian AI-powered recruitment firm Sapia.ai on Tuesday announced a $17 million Series A raise led by Macquarie Capital and Woolworths Group's W23 venture capital arm.

Toss Lab Inc, a South Korean software as a service (SaaS) firm, has secured $1.2 million strategic investment from Kdan Mobile Software, Ltd, a global SaaS company headquartered in Taiwan. The two leading productivity software companies from Asia plan to integrate their solutions to expand the international business to business (B2B) market.

Gusto Collective, a Hong Kong-based brandtech firm, announced Tuesday the establishment of its operations in Japan, headquartered in Tokyo. The expansion is spurred on by accelerating market demand in the region for next-gen customer experiences and innovative technologies in the burgeoning Web3 space.

Bell Society, CarbonEthics, and Surplus are the three selected start-ups to join JICA NINJA accelerator program 2022.

VinES Energy Solutions Joint Stock Company, a member of Vingroup, and Gotion Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Gotion High-Tech, have started construction of lithium iron phosphate (LFP) battery cell factory in Vietnam. The project has a total investment of more than VND 6,329 billion ($275 million), a scale of 14 hectares (34.5 acres) with a design…

Singapore-based private market exchange ADDX has confirmed that it sold its stake in CYBAVO to US-based Circle Internet Financial Limited, a global financial technology firm and parent company of the issuer of USD Coin (USDC), as part of Circle’s acquisition of CYBAVO earlier this year.

The Layer 1 take-off will force established platforms to re-architect their infrastructure to accommodate new players. Where South Korea has begun to realize this potential for a strengthened user-owned economy, we’re certain that the Layer 1 take-off won’t stay a regional phenomenon for long.

Digital Entertainment Asset (DEA), a Singapore-based global Web3 entertainment company that operates the PlayMining non-fungible token (NFT) gaming platform, announced Thursday that it has signed a memorandum of understanding with Rakuten Group for a collaborative partnership in the Web3 domain.