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Zennon Kapron
Asia Fintech, Payments, Digital Banking, CBDCs | LinkedIn Top Voice Finance in Asia
Zennon Kapron is a fintech expert and educator with over 20 years of experience in the financial technology industry.1 He is an Academy Instructor teaching "FinTech: The Future of Money, Markets and Banking" at Singapore Management University.4
Kapron was the founder and director of Kapronasia, a leading provider of financial industry market research in Asia.3 He recently moved on from the company after founding it in 2007.2 Prior to Kapronasia, he worked as the Global Banking Industry Manager for Intel in Shanghai and as the CIO for Citigroup Portugal.1
Zennon Kapron has significant expertise in various aspects of fintech and blockchain technology.1 He has testified before the U.S. Congress on China fintech issues and authored the book "Chomping at the Bitcoin: The History and Future of Bitcoin in China," published by Penguin.13
In addition to his academic role, Kapron is a regular speaker at financial conferences and a recognized thought leader on fintech in Asia.3 He is also involved with the Singapore FinTech Festival as an ambassador and speaker.5
Kapron holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Syracuse University and an MBA from INSEAD.1
Highlights
Sea Group, Southeast Asia's most valuable listed company, has never branded itself as a super app, but its business model has sought to tap the synergies among its gaming, e-commerce and fintech arms. Recently, however, the fintech business has begun to grow rapidly – and not necessarily because of integration with Shopee.
Sea’s fintech business had a solid first quarter. Revenue rose 21% to US$499.4 million, while adjusted EBITDA was US$148.7 million, up 50.3% year-on-year. Sea’s digital financial services revenue and operating income are primarily attributed to its consumer and SME credit business.
While Sea’s first digital bank was in Singapore, and it also has one in Malaysia, we like the prospects for its online banks in the Philippines and Indonesia. These markets have ample low-hanging fruit, and Sea can bring onboard customers who are entering the formal banking system for the first time, not just those who are opening a secondary account just to benefit from a promotion.
SeaBank Philippines posted a profit of P110.7 million in the January-March period, the company’s first profitable quarter since launching its app in June 2022. SeaBank attributed the profitability to the doubling of its loan portfolio to P13 billion over the previous year and a 75% growth in deposits to P20.2 billion.
What is interesting about Sea’s bank in the Philippines is how it has carved out a niche as a so-called “rural bank” – for which licensing requirements are less stringent than the six official digital banks in the country.
We suspect SeaBank Philippines’ loan portfolio is benefiting from the tie-up inked last with WeFund Lending, owner of the JuanHand app. Under the agreement, SeaBank announced last November that it planned to provide roughly 300 million pesos in loans to eligible borrowers through the JuanHand app.
Meanwhile, Sea is also considering increasing its fintech presence in Indonesia. While it already has SeaBank Indonesia, which was originally Bank BKE before Sea bought it, the Singaporean company is expected to acquire a 10-15% stake in HiBank, a subsidiary of PT Bank Negara Indonesia Tbk (BNI), according to Royke Tumilaar, BNI’s president director.
The deal could close as early as the end of June, and would give Sea a new channel from which to tap digital financial services opportunities in Southeast Asia’s largest economy.
#seagroup #superapp #fintech #digitalbanking #philippines #indonesia #southeastasia
While the buy now, pay later (BNPL) concept has proven immensely popular with consumers worldwide, developing a sustainable business model as a BNPL focused fintech is a challenging endeavor. For that reason, it always noteworthy when a BNPL firm reaches the profitability milestone. The Philippines’ Billease, founded in 2017, appears to have done so in 2023.
In an April 3 news release, Billease said that in 2023 its revenue doubled, reaching US$57 million, while net income totaled US$7 million. The company attributed its brisk growth in part to strong demand for loan disbursements, while emphasizing that it achieved a return of equity (ROE) of 47% compared to a typical ROE of 5% to 15% at incumbent Philippine banks. Further, BillEase said that its return on assets was 14%.
When it comes to Billease’s business strategy, the company has made some shrewd decisions with regards to its strategic partners. For instance, it is the first credit-focused fintech in the Philippines to integrate with Alipay+, enabling customers to use BillEase with global merchants like Agoda. The Philippine company also counts some big payment gateways and aggregators in Asia Pacific as its partners, such as Xendit, 2C2P, PayMongo, Paynamics, and iPay88. These partnerships allowed BillEase to more than treble its merchant network to 10,000 in 2023 from roughly 3,000 a year earlier.
Looking ahead, BillEase will look to raise additional funds for its expansion. Previously, it raised US$11 million in a Series B funding round led by BurdaPrincipal Investments in 2022. Other investors in that round included Centauri (backed by Telkom Indonesia and KB Investment), 33 Capital, and Raisin DS CEO Tamaz Georgadze. Overall, Billease has raised US$15 million to date.
Auguring well for Billease is the genuine need for credit in the Philippines, which has a huge underbanked population. Regulators in markets with significant financial inclusion needs are often more tolerant of different types of credit products than in advanced economies where BNPL is known for allowing consumers to pay for expensive vacations, appliances or luxury goods in interest-free installment payments.
Meanwhile, research firm Research and Markets estimates that BNPL payments in the Philippines are expected to grow by 16.4% on an annual basis to reach US$2.29 billion in 2024 and 11% on a compound annual basis through 2029.
#philippines #payments #fintech #financialservices #financialinclusion #alipay
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Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
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Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Mesh is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Mesh as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Mesh offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
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Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
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Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Mesh's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Mesh has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Mesh a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.