US$2b of capital available for FinTech start-ups through Singapore FinTech Festival 2017's Investor Summit

SINGAPORE, Nov. 18, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Over 1,000 attendees, comprising investors and FinTech start-ups, turned up at the Singapore FinTech Festival's Investor Summit or "Deal Day" today, and up to US$2 billion of capital was made available for the start-ups. The Investor Summit was the finale of the four-month long matchmaking programme to provide opportunities for FinTech start-ups to access funding from local and global investors. More than 1,000 FinTech start-ups and 400 investors indicated interest to participate in the process and 525 connections were made among interested parties.

The Investor Summit, powered by Ernst & Young (EY), is organised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and The Association of Banks in Singapore, as part of the 2017 Singapore FinTech Festival. The Investor Summit wraps up the week-long Singapore FinTech Festival which saw more than 30,000 participants from over 100 countries.

Mr Sopnendu Mohanty, Chief FinTech Officer of MAS, said, "The fundraising process for start-ups can be a long and arduous process. On the other side of the table, the challenge for investors is to generate quality prospects aligned to their investment objectives. "Deal Day" aims to provide a platform for FinTech start-ups to connect to investors. We want to enhance access to funding for start-ups and improve the quality and quantity of FinTech investment deals in Singapore. I am delighted that we have managed to facilitate a considerable number of matches, and kickstarted promising conversations. I am hopeful that concrete deals will emerge from these connections."

Annex A -- More information on the Investor Summit

The matchmaking programme provided a perspective on the funding and FinTech landscape in Singapore and ASEAN.

• Most of the investors came from Singapore (59%), followed by China (9%) and Indonesia (6%).
• Most of the FinTech start-ups came from Singapore (36%), followed by India (17%) and US (8%).
• From the pool of participating investors, the key areas of interest were on data analytics (70%), blockchain (65%), lending applications (64%), payment solutions (61%) and regulatory technology (RegTech) (56%). 
• The top solutions offered by participating FinTech start-ups largely aligned with investors' interests as they are similarly in the areas of payments (20%), lending (14%) and regulatory technology (RegTech) (10%), with added product focuses on robo-advisory (14%), and trading and fund management (12%).
• It is also worth noting that each FinTech start-up typically offered more than one solution or product focus, with the majority of them (80%) requiring funding of less than US$5 million.

About the Singapore FinTech Festival

Organised by the Monetary Authority of Singapore in partnership with The Association of Banks in Singapore and in collaboration with SingEx Holdings, the Singapore FinTech Festival will provide a platform for collaborations, connections and co-creations within the FinTech ecosystem in Singapore and beyond. In keeping with this spirit, the Festival is supported by the industry. Festival Grand sponsors include AMTD, Deloitte, and Prudential. A series of back-to-back events that will take place from 13-17 November 2017, the Festival will comprise the Global FinTech Hackcelerator, Innovation Lab Crawl, FinTech Awards, FinTech Conference, and Investor Summit. For more information, please visit www.fintechfestival.sg.

Logo - https://photos.prnasia.com/prnh/20171117/1995967-1LOGO

SOURCE The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS)