SPRING. Singapore’s enterprise growth statutory board, has formed a partnership with the city of Austin, Texas, to function as a bridge for startup ventures seeking expansion. Additionally, QT Vascular is discussing the sale of assets and Validus Capital has formed a partnership with EQ Insurance to provide investor protection for invoice financing loans.
SPRING enters MOU with city authorities of Austin, Texas
SPRING Singapore, the enterprise growth agency of the city-state and a statutory board of the Singapores trade ministry, has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) yesterday with The City of Austin, Texas.
This agreements is aimed at facilitating the international expansion of startup ventures based in either city, creating a partnership in which startups in either city can expand into either Singapore or Austin, using them as gateways and establishing a resource network to expand their presence.
According to the terms of the agreement, Austin will provide entrepreneurs with access to attorneys, accountants, digital marketers, with the Greater Austin Asian Chamber of Commerce offering assistance. Moreover, Austin incubator Capital Factory will participate in the partnership.
Targeting business owners with traction in their native market and seeking a support network to expand or entrepreneurs with less traction seeking to experiment in the market, Austin is argued to be the best startup environment in the US outside of New York and Silicon Valley, given its geographic position permitting entrepreneurs to access both the US and Latin American (LATAM) markets.
This complements another partnership with Taiwan, creating a convergence between either ecosystem.
The Austin startup ecosystem is considered the most rapidly growing startup ecosystem by Startup Genome, with opinions that it is a promising startup ecosystem.
QT Vascular discusses potential sale Chocolate PTA Balloon Catheter assets
On Monday, 18 July 2016, QT Vascular entered into a non-binding term sheet with a corporate entity it described as an “international industry player”, in relation to a potential transaction involving its Chocolate PTA Balloon Catheter assets.
The term sheet is non-binding, due to the commercial terms for the potential transaction remaining indicative. These terms are currently subject to discussions among the parties. Concurrently, the company is evaluating these terms and may need to seek further clarifications from the potential party as discussions progress before the signing of a definitive agreement.
Validus Capital to provide investor protection for invoice financing loans
Validus Capital, an SME lending platform, will be providing investor protection for invoice financing loans through a partnership with insurance provider EQ Insurance.
The partnership sees Validus Capital connecting a curated pool of growth-oriented, SMEs to investors, with EQ Insurance underwriting the risk and liability involved for investors in funding invoice financing loans.
As part of this process, an 80-point due diligence and risk assessment process is conducted on Singaporean loan applicants, backed by data from Dun & Bradstreet, as well as the not-for-profit Credit Research Institute (CRI), which will capture the Probability Default (PD) of SME’s.
According to Validus capital, this risk control, with an additional daily credit monitoring report on borrowers, means greater visibility and investor protection.Currently, it claims to provide an average loan of S$200,000 with a tenor of six months, with 61 per cent of loans being to borrowers with a Dun & Bradstreet credit risk grade of less than or equal to 3, indicating a fair rating. To date, it claims to have had a zero default rate, coupled with annualised returns in excess of 18 per cent to investors.
Data released by Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) measures the business loan market in Singapore at $357 billion in 2015. Over the same time-period, global peer to peer lending market was valued at US$26.16 billion according to Transparency Market Research.
Ronald Cheng, CEO of EQ Insurance said, “We commend the stringent risk assessment process undertaken by Validus Capital in approving the SMEs on-boarding their platform. Our partnership will not only provide investors with greater reassurance but will also present great opportunities for those SMEs in these tightened economic times. We look forward to what our partnership will achieve.”
Also Read: SG Dealbook: ST Engineering launches new JV, Ezion teams up with PIO
Philippine boxing icon Manny ‘Pacman’ invests in Singapore startup Gtoken
This Singapore startup wants to convert every minimart into an ATM!
Facebook co-founder Saverin takes a shine to Singapore startup 99.co
