Founders of Southeast Asian Fintech Announce Completion of USD16MM Series A Funding Round
MANILA, THE PHILIPPINES – Media OutReach – October 24, 2022 – A group of former Tinkoff executives led by Pavel Fedorov, George Chesakov and Raffy Montemayor announce the completion of the USD16MM Series A funding round for the fintech startup with a focus on Southeast Asia. The financing will be directed towards the operational development of the venture, the acquisition of a bank in the Philippines (subject to Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas approval) and the launch of services.
Co-founders (left to right): George Chesakov, Pavel Fedorov and Raffy Montemayor
After exiting Tinkoff in Q2 2022, the trio decided to join forces and establish a new business to pursue the lending-first fintech opportunity in the region with an addressable market of 500MM+ people. The Philippines will be the first market for the upcoming launch.
Despite the challenging fundraising environment, the company received enthusiastic support from the venture capital community. One of the major investors in the round is DisruptAD, ADQ’s venture platform. Other Series A investors include a European venture investor and a group of Filipino investors.
Raffy Montemayor, co-founder and head of business in the Philippines, commented: “It’s an exciting and real watershed. Just a few months ago, our business could fit on a coffee shop napkin, and today we have more than 30 people in our core team, growing every today. We bring cutting-edge, global fintech expertise to the Philippines, and we are inspired by our vision to improve the lives of millions of Filipinos and make financial services simple, convenient and truly accessible. Today’s announcement is a vote of confidence from a list of shareholders in world class to our vision and our team.”
Furthermore, Raffy Montemayor added, “Our future growth will have a special focus on developing local Filipino tech talent. As a sign of our commitment to developing the local tech ecosystem, we plan to invest PHP10MM out of the proceeds of the round towards developing, onboard and nurture Filipino technology talent in partnership with our leading universities.”
Notes to the editors:
Pavel Fedorov was Co-Chief Executive Officer at Tinkoff in 2021-22. Prior to that in 1997-2010 he spent 13 years at Morgan Stanley, mostly in the Telecoms, Media and Technology Group. In 2011-2020, Pavel worked in leading roles with strategic and operational transformation of several London Stock Exchange-listed companies. Pavel holds an MBA from the University of Washington and a Bachelor of Science Degree in Economics from Novosibirsk State University.
George Chesakov was a member of Tinkoff’s founding team, having served as chairman of the Tinkoff bank’s board 2009-11. George has co-founded and launched many successful businesses, including consumer lending at OTP Bank (2003-06) and in-store lending fintech Mokka; relaunched Tinkoff’s POS business in 2016-17, leading it to achieve the #1 market position; and built an innovative Tinkoff’s virtual mobile operator from zero to 1.3m MAU. George holds a master’s degree in computer science from Princeton University and a master’s degree (with honors) in mathematics from Moscow State University.
Raffy Montemayor is originally from the Philippines and has more than 20 years of experience in the Philippine banking and technology sector. Prior to joining the business, Raffy held leadership roles at HSBC and served as General Manager for Agoda (Booking Holdings), OLX (Prosus) and Carousell in the Philippines. Raffy holds an MBA from INSEAD and a Bachelor of Science Degree in Management Engineering from Ateneo de Manila University.
About DisruptAD
DisruptAD, ADQ’s venture platform, was launched to accelerate innovation targeting the world’s greatest challenges through incubation, investment and commercial scaling opportunities. DisruptAD also seeks to unlock the potential of the UAE’s innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem by bringing together highly skilled founders, fund managers, incubators and accelerators to build, support and scale disruptive technologies from Abu Dhabi.
Fintech Holdings Ltd website: www.fhl.world
Hashtag: #FintechHoldings
The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this announcement.
