Visa partners seven new startups to accelerate payments innovation in Asia Pacific

Amidst a challenging economic environment, startups with the right value proposition are poised for growth as consumers continue embracing the digital habits they adopted during the pandemic.

SINGAPORE, May 16, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Visa, a world leader in digital payments, today announced seven new startups it will partner as part of its Visa Accelerator Program in Asia Pacific. The seven startups selected as part of the 2023 program are from India, Mainland China, Thailand, Singapore and Germany and they will be working on solutions in the areas of Web 3.0, global money movement, embedded finance, merchant and small business enablers, and open banking solutions.

The startups selected for the 2023 cohort are Dowsure (Mainland China), Doxa Holdings (Singapore), Kadmos (Germany), Pi-xcels (Singapore), Playbux (Thailand), Transpure (India) and Twid (India). Over a course of six months, these startups will have the unique opportunity to collaborate with Visa's payment experts, business development teams and customers to co-develop, test and iterate their solutions, while validating them against commercial opportunities with Visa's extensive network of financial institutions, merchants and digital partners.  

"The Visa Accelerator Program offers selected startups a path to rapid commercialisation," said Kunal Chatterjee, Head of Innovation, Asia Pacific, Visa. "Our collaboration with past cohorts of startups has yielded multiple commercial partnerships, joint intellectual property (IP) creation and new product developments with Visa and our clients in Asia Pacific. Success in payments requires strong collaboration and Visa is committed to partnering with and investing in startups that share our vision to build new digital commerce experiences."

The seven startups for the 2023 cohort were selected from a pool of more than 450 applicants. They are:

• Dowsure (Mainland China) provides digital financing experiences for cross-border merchants on global e-Commerce platforms.
• Doxa Holdings (Singapore) offers a collaborative trade platform that enables automated procure-to-pay and financing workflows for companies operating in a cross-industry ecosystem. 
• Kadmos (Germany) offers an end-to-end salary payments platform for migrant workers, bringing fintech, low margins, and transparent FX to traditional industries.
• Pi-xcels (Singapore) digitises paper receipts instantly to provide offline retailers with real-time actionable shopper data, via a single tap. 
• Playbux (Thailand) provides a fully integrated Web 3.0 community platform with commerce activities, blockchain technology, NFTs, and virtual communities.
• Transpure (India) provides technology to minimise friction, build seamless and cost-effective solutions for cross-border payments and remittances.
• Twid (India) is a rewards-based payment network that brings together various issuers' rewards points systems to enable them as a mode of payment across merchants. 

The trend of consumers continuing to embrace the convenience and security that digital commerce, banking, and payments have brought to their lifestyles is set to stay and Visa is collaborating with the selected startups to build new digital commerce experiences together.

Visa is partnering with Plug and Play, one of the world's most successful global innovation platforms for the Visa Accelerator Program 2023. Plug and Play will bring their expertise as a highly successful investor and their experience working with other major corporate accelerator programs, to identify, attract and accelerate startups who want to solve industry challenges and scale new technologies.

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Byron Pei, CEO of Dowsure says, "Through the Visa Accelerator Program, we want to help address the challenge where e-Commerce merchants and small businesses have limited access to financial solutions and aids due to lack of data for underwriting and effective approaches to risk management. Leveraging Visa's expertise in embedded finance, we want to collaborate to co-issue credit cards to provide new payment solutions for cross-border e-Commerce merchants."

Edmund Ng, Co-founder and CEO of Doxa says, "Visa's strong reputation in payments and innovation is a huge draw and we see a lot of synergy with what we are trying to achieve. The mentoring through the Visa Accelerator Program will be invaluable in the areas of digitising B2B invoice and payments as well as growing virtual accounts. We want to use this opportunity to help businesses not just digitalise their manual procurement workflow but embed and automate digital payments as well."  

Sasha Makarovych, Co-founder of Kadmos says, "Joining the Visa Accelerator Program is timely and provides us the right expertise as we are rapidly scaling, hiring, as well as fundraising. Our goal is to focus on creating a holistic salary payments solution for migrant workers, especially those in the Asia Pacific region, and Visa's experience and expertise in enabling and fast-tracking digital payments will help us take our business to the next level."

Daniel Lim, Co-founder and CEO of Pi-xcels says, "The biggest draw of the Visa Accelerator Program is its emphasis on developing a proof of concept that has the potential to succeed in the market. We are thrilled to have the opportunity to collaborate with Visa, and we look forward to exploring ways together to further advance innovation in tap-to-phone technology with the main goal to create an even more secure and seamless payment solution that benefits both businesses and consumers."

Sarun Vichayabhai, Co-founder of Playbux says, "Our prior collaboration with Visa in Thailand has helped us grow tremendously and we are excited to be given this opportunity to extend our partnership through the Visa Accelerator Program. Similar to Visa, we see the potential of simplifying payments using blockchain and on Web3.0 and want to work together on accelerating a payments platform that can link fiat to crypto currency."

Sandeep Chandalia, Co-founder and CEO of Transpure says, "We are delighted to be chosen to be part of the Visa Accelerator Program as we see the synergies and opportunities in bringing innovation to the cross-border payment space. As an entrepreneur, I see great value in Visa's experience and expertise to further our growth and enhance the capabilities of our core products."

Amit Koshal, Founder and CEO of Twid says, "We are excited to be part of the Visa Accelerator Program and that both teams will be co-creating innovative solutions to elevate the customer payments experience by leveraging Visa and TWID's network strength. We are also very excited to work with Visa's network of banks and partners to co-create new rewards experiences for their customers."

Jupe Tan, Managing Partner of Plug and Play Asia Pacific says, "We are excited to partner with Visa for the Visa Accelerator Program 2023. Through this partnership, we will work hand in hand with Visa to identify and nurture the most promising startups in the financial services sector by providing them with the resources, mentorship, and access to our global network necessary to drive meaningful impact." 

About Visa

Visa (NYSE: V) is a world leader in digital payments, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across more than 200 countries and territories. Our mission is to connect the world through the most innovative, convenient, reliable and secure payments network, enabling individuals, businesses and economies to thrive. We believe that economies that include everyone everywhere, uplift everyone everywhere and see access as foundational to the future of money movement. Learn more at Visa.com. 

SOURCE Visa