Hong Kong-based financial settlement network EMQ has secured $20 million in a Series B round of financing led by cross-border venture capital firm WI Harper Group to accelerate its international expansion.
The Series B round was backed by Abu Dhabi Capital; DG Ventures, an investment arm of Japan-based Digital Garage Group; California-based venture capital firm Hard Yaka; early-stage VC Quest Venture Partners; Indonesia-based Intudo Ventures; and January Capital, an investment firm that backs founders in the Asia Pacific, per a statement on Tuesday.
Hong Kong-based investment firm Vectr Fintech Partners, Taiwan-based startup accelerators AppWorks and SparkLabs Taipei, as well as VS Partners also participated in the new round.
EMQ offers cross-border settlement solutions to businesses around the world while adhering to regulations and compliance standards in different markets. Its network infrastructure can be used for a broad range of services, including e-commerce, merchant settlement, procurement, remittance, and payroll.
“As digital transformation intensifies globally, enterprises today are increasingly international in scale, and they will require a network infrastructure like EMQ with greater speed, more certainty, increased flexibility and transparency, to expand their business in Asia and beyond,” said Edward Liu, a partner at WI Harper Group, in the statement.
Founded in 2014, EMQ is currently licensed in Hong Kong, Singapore, Indonesia and registered as a Money Service Business in Canada. EMQ was also accepted into Taiwan’s Regulatory Sandbox by the Financial Supervisory Commission in Taiwan, according to the statement.
“As we look to the future, we will continue to invest significantly towards constant innovation of our cross-border solutions and compliance capabilities, to deliver additional value to the global payments ecosystem and capitalize on the explosive growth of cross-border B2B payments market – valued to exceed $218 trillion by 2022,” said Max Liu, co-founder and CEO of EMQ.
The startup raised $6.5 million in a Series A round from Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and international venture capital firms in December 2017.
