Fintech startup BayaniPay raises $4.5M from investors

Financial technology startup BayaniPay said Thursday it has raised $4.5 million in seed funding from venture capital investors East West Bank, Wavemaker Partners, and Talino Venture Labs.

In a statement, BayaniPay said the fresh capital from East West Bank and Wavemaker Partners will allow it to expand its technology team as the company scales its product lineup and expands into more geographies.

BayaniPay said that early this year it contracted East West Bank, the largest independent bank headquartered in Southern California, to offer Filipino American customers banking services, including a Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) insured checking account.

It said East West Bank joins BDO Unibank, the Philippines’ largest bank; Asian Journal, one of the leaders in the Asian American media industry; and Seafood City, the largest Filipino-owned supermarket chain in the US, in BayaniPay’s roster of collaborators.

The collaboration, BayaniPay said, positions it as the first cross-border, digital financial service for the Filipino American community, which is 4.2 million strong and accounts for $146 billion or 14.4% of the Asian American market in the US —a segment that has been previously underserved by traditional banks and other financial institutions.

BayaniPay offers easy, convenient, and low cost cross-border financial services from the United States to the Philippines.

Its customers enjoy a host of benefits from its feature-rich platform, including access to a digital checking account, a debit card that maximizes spending power, and zero fee remittance and market-leading forex rates for Filipino Americans who are sending money home.

In cooperation with BDO Unibank, BayaniPay said will deliver more financial solutions to Filipinos in the US soon.

The fintech startup said it is collaborating with BDO Unibank to enable its users in the US to directly pay services in the Philippines through paycode technologies.

Local businesses and services can simply provide Filipino American customers pay codes that they can use for easy and convenient cross-border payment of bills, tuition and school fees, medical expenses, and even real estate, it said.

BayaniPay said it has gained over 7,000 users a year since it launched.

"We are excited about how quickly BayaniPay has grown since we first launched," said BayaniPay CEO Winston Damarillo.

"Our ongoing efforts are driven by the desire to eliminate the financial hardships of new immigrants and minority communities,” said Damarillo. —LBG, GMA Integrated News