Nium raises $200 mn to become first global B2B payments unicorn from Southeast Asia

B2B payments platform Nium announced on Tuesday that it has raised over $200 million in its Series D funding round. The funding was led by US-based tech investor Riverwood Capital. Nium’s current valuation is over $1 billion, making it the first global B2B payments unicorn from Southeast Asia.

Launched in 2014 as Instarem by Prajit Nanu, Nium currently has Temasek, Visa, Vertex Ventures, Atinum Group of Funds, Beacon Venture Capital, Rocket Capital Investment, DoorDash executive Gokul Rajaram, Chief Product Officer at FIS Vicky Bindra and, co-founder of Tribe Capital Arjun Sethi as investors.

So far the payments company has raised $300 million, including the latest round.

The new funding will be used to embed fintech services, continue building their payments infrastructure, accelerate geographic and vertical growth, explore regional opportunities and strategic acquisitions of new technologies and companies.

“We started Nium with the humble goal of taking out regional complexity in cross-border payments. Today, our sights are set higher. We believe we can be a global catalyst to increase global commerce, removing some of the payments friction which has traditionally held businesses back,” said CEO Prajit Nanu.

Nium provides access to pay-outs, pay-ins, card issuance and banking-as-a-service. Users can send funds to more than 100 countries, pay out in more than 60 currencies, accept funds in seven currencies and issue cards in more than 40 countries, the firm said in a statement. 

The firm says it processes $8 billion in payments annually and has issued more than 30 million virtual cards so far. Revenues, it claims, grew by more than 280 per cent y-o-y.

Financial Technology Partners (FT Partners) served as exclusive strategic and financial advisor on its Series D round.

Nium has regional offices in Mumbai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Melbourne, Kuala Lumpur, San Francisco, London, Tokyo, Jakarta and Vilnius.

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