CreditEase Invests in Qupital, Hong Kong's Largest SME Financing Platform

BEIJING, March 29, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- CreditEase, a Beijing-based leading FinTech conglomerate in China, announced today that its direct investment arm, CreditEase FinTech Investment Fund (CEFIF), led the investment of Qupital's Series A capital raise of USD 15 million, with additional capital injections from the Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund and MindWorks Ventures following their initial investments in the seed round. Qupital plans to use the funds to expand their presence in mainland China, enlarge their technology development and risk management teams, and strengthen its fast-growing, cross-border e-commerce expansion.

As a pioneer and leader specializing in inclusive finance and wealth management (or "As China's first marketplace lending company"), CreditEase will provide marketplace lending access and networks, to facilitate the geographical expansion of Qupital, as well as bringing on-the ground operational expertise. The wealth management team of CreditEase also is considering providing new capital to fund SMEs' trades.

Qupital is Hong Kong's largest online, small and medium enterprise (SME) trade financing platform, operating on a user-driven, safe and secure online platform, Qupital enables SME businesses to raise quick quality capital in a matter of few clicks by connecting them with professional investors in equitable win-win opportunities.

Qupital serves a wide range of businesses in general trading, service sectors, and in addition e-commerce merchants, facilitated by innovative credit control technology. Meanwhile, investors can gain access to a new attractive asset class previously only accessible by commercial banks - short-term, low-correlation, self-liquidating credit products such as the trade receivables.

Qupital has already provided trade finance solutions to hundreds of businesses across the Greater China area. Based on its core competiveness with technology innovation and affordable access for SMEs, as of Q4 2018, Qupital has handled over HKD $1,630,000,000 in transaction volume.

"Qupital has accomplished remarkable results since 2016. Since the completion of the seed round financing, we successfully handled over 8,000 transactions, totaling HKD 2 billion. Over the past two years, we are grateful to all our investment partners for supporting Qupital. In particular, we are honored to receive the capital injection from our strategic investor, CEFIF in this round of funding, whose Vision, Mission and Values (VMV) matches with Qupital, " said Winston Wong, Founder of Qupital.

Dennis Cong, PhD, Managing Director of CEFIF, said: "The growing volume of SME and cross-border trading drives a huge demand for alternative financing for SMEs which are underserved in the market and opportunities for investors to earn a decent risk adjusted return. We look forward to working with Qupital to broaden its source of capital base and create an unparalleled investment opportunities for CreditEase. We will be working with Qupital to further utilize the technologies to enhance risk management, user experience and operational efficiency."

About CreditEase

CreditEase is a Beijing-based leading FinTech conglomerate in China, specializing in inclusive finance and wealth management, in addition to payment technology, marketplace lending, crowdfunding, robo-advisory, insurance technology and blockchain products and services. CreditEase actively engages with global FinTech innovators through business incubation, commercial co-operation, and investment. Better tech, better finance, better world.

About CreditEase FinTech Investment Fund

Founded in February 2016, CreditEase FinTech Investment Fund ("CEFIF") is a venture fund investing in FinTech companies globally. CEFIF has an equivalent of USD 1 billion in the total committed capital. The Fund was recently ranked the 2nd "Most Active Fintech VC Fund" globally by CB Insights and also nominated for "Top Fintech Equity Investor" Award at LendIt USA Annual Conference.

About Qupital

Qupital is Hong Kong's leading supply chain finance platform. Operating on a safe and secure online platform, Qupital enables SME businesses to raise capital in a few clicks by connecting them with professional investors, whilst at the same time providing a brand-new asset class to investors that was previously unavailable. In 2018, Qupital launched its strategic partnership with Alibaba.com, the leading B2B business platform, aiming to help more HK B2B businesses in their transformation to e-commerce.

Qupital has raised a total of USD 17 million in funding. Qupital's shareholders include CreditEase, Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund, Gobi Partners and Mindworks Ventures.

For more information, please visit http://www.qupital.com/ 

SOURCE CreditEase