Founders of Southeast Asian Fintech Announce Completion of USD16MM Series A Funding Round

MANILA, PHILIPPINES - Media OutReach - 24 October 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 start-up focused on Southeast Asia.

The funding will be directed towards the operational build-up of the venture, the acquisition of a bank in the Philippines (subject to Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas approval) and the launch of services.

Having all left Tinkoff in Q2 2022, the trio decided to join forces and set up 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 its 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 Business Head in the Philippines, commented, "It is an exciting and truly watershed moment. 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, which keeps growing by the day. We're bringing cutting-edge, global fintech expertise to the Philippines, and we're inspired by our vision of improving the lives of millions of Filipinos and making financial services simple, convenient and truly accessible. Today's announcement is a vote of confidence from a roster of world-class shareholders towards our vision and our team."

Continuing, Raffy Montemayor added: "Our future growth will have a particular 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 proceeds of the round towards developing, onboarding and nurturing Filipino tech talent in partnership with our leading universities."

Notes to the Editors:

Pavel Fedorov was a Co-Chief Executive Officer of Tinkoff in 2021-22. Prior to that in 1997- 2010 he spent 13 years at Morgan Stanley, most of it in the Telecoms, Media and Technology Group. In 2011-2020 Pavel worked in executive roles on strategic and operational transformation of several London Stock Exchange-listed companies. Pavel holds an MBA from the University of Washington and Bachelor of Science Degree in Economics from Novosibirsk State University.

George Chesakov was a member of Tinkoff founding team, having served as the Chairman of the Tinkoff bank's Management Board 2009-11. George has co-founded and launched many successful businesses, including consumer lending business at OTP Bank (2003-06) and in-store lending fintech Mokka; relaunched Tinkoff's POS business in 2016-17 which led to its attaining #1 market position; and built an innovative Tinkoff's virtual mobile operator from ground zero to 1.3m MAU. George holds a Master of Arts Degree in Computer Science from Princeton University and a Master's Degree (with Honors) in Mathematics from Moscow State University.

Raffy Montemayor is a native of the Philippines and has more than 20 years of experience in the Philippine banking and tech sectors. Prior to joining the venture, Raffy held leadership roles at HSBC and served as general manager of 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 the Ateneo de Manila University.

About DisruptAD
DisruptAD, ADQ's venture platform, was launched to accelerate innovation targeting the world's biggest challenges through incubation, investment and commercial scaling opportunities. DisruptAD also seeks to unleash 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

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