Jan. 21, 2019

UnionPay has extended its network of countries accepting mobile payments from its base of outbound Chinese travelers to 174 countries.

The Shanghai-based fintech, citing a Ctrip.com study, said more than 7 million Chinese tourists are expected to spend the country’s Spring Holiday Festival, or Chinese New Year, overseas, which would be a new record. Regions expected to see more visitors include Latin America, the Balkans, Laos and Myanmar, according to a press release.

Serbia, Montenegro and Jamaica are among the countries that began accepting UnionPay cards during the second half of 2018. Merchants in the U.K., Poland and Georgia have begun to accept mobile payment services from UnionPay.

In Argentina, the UnionPay RedLink ATM network has begun accepting UnionPay, raising the company's ATM coverage there to 60 percent. In Jamaica, the card is accepted at Jamaica Commercial Bank, raising ATM coverage to 70 percent overall, while Cuban ATMs all accept UnionPay and 90 percent in Mexico.

UnionPay services through the mobile app are available in 46 countries globally. The company stated 200,000 merchants accept QR code payments globally. UnionPay said merchants are offering 30 percent discounts in many countries to customers ahead of the festival.

Topics: Mobile Apps, Mobile Payments, Region: Americas, Region: APAC, Region: EMEA

Companies: UnionPay International

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Jan. 21, 2019

Zwipe, a provider of biometric payment card technology, has raised $14 million in an offering of new shares ahead of its planned debut on the Merkur Market Oslo Bors.

The offering was substantially oversubscribed due to strong interest from institutional and professional investors, as well as the general public in Norway and Sweden.

"Our plans following this fundraising are to pursue commercial deployment of our technology in Europe to begin with," Ado Fazlic, vice president, marketing, said in an email.

He said deployment is expected to begin in the second half of 2019. Asked about plans for the U.S. market, Fazlic said the company is "closely following the evolution of contactless payments" in the U.S. and has longstanding partnerships with card manufacturers and payment networks to leverage such an opportunity, but for now it's focused in the Nordic region.

The company had previously announced plans to offer 6 million shares priced at NOK 20 per share, noting that the pre-money valuation of the firm was $22 million.

The company's board of directors, major shareholders including chairman Jorgen Lantto and principal owner Lars Windfeldt, and new institutional investors have subscribed for a about 4.5 million shares, for a total of $10.5 million (NOK 90 million).

The retail tranche of 1.5 million shares representing $3.5 million (NOK 30 million) was oversubscribed by multiple times, according to the company.

Zwipe expects approval for trading on the Mercur Market by Jan. 25, with trading to begin on Jan. 28.

Topics: Financial News, Mobile Apps, Mobile Payments, Region: EMEA, Security

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Jan. 21, 2019

MarketInvoice, a U.K.-based fintech, raised $72 million [56 million British pounds] in equity and debt financing, including a Series B $33.5 million equity round from Barclays and Santander InnoVentures, according to an announcement.

Northzone, a European venture fund and a prior investor in the company, is also a major participant in the equity round.

Viola Credit, which also participated in the equity round, is providing the company’s debt facility of up to $38.6 million, which the company said will help finance its business loan solution.

MarketInvoice said the new round of funding will be used to deepen strategic partnerships in the U.K., grow the number of workers, and boost awareness of its business finance solutions, in the announcement. The company also plans to cross-border fintech-bank partnerships to help more businesses with the company’s lending solutions.

"We’re excited to develop our finance solutions further and become the trusted funding partner for ambitious entrepreneurs," Anil Stocker, co-founder and CEO, said in the announcement. "By collaborating with bank partners, we will be reaching many thousands of companies here in the U.K. and abroad to provide them with their business finance needs."

Stocker added that the new funding will be used to invest in additional risk automation and data models.

Ian Rand, CEO of Barclays Business Bank, said the investment furthers its strategy that it announced last summer to offer hundreds of thousands of its SME clients access to even more types of alternative financing, in the announcement.

MarketInvoice said that since 2011 it has funded more than $2.57 [2 billion pounds] in invoices and business loans.

Topics: Financial News, Mobile Apps, Money Transfer / P2P, Region: EMEA

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