NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Thailand’s Kasikorn Bank has launched ‘Beacon’, its inaugural FinTech fund with an initial bankroll of 1 billion baht (approx. $30 million) to invest in startups in South East Asia and beyond.

As Thailand’s largest bank by revenue, Kasikorn’s foray to back and invest in FinTech startups underlines the growing appetite for digital banking in the country. Between April and September 2016, the Bank of Thailand – the country’s central bank – revealed a marked 26% uptick in commercial mobile and internet banking transactions.