Voyager receives $120 million in fresh capital

MANILA, Philippines — The stakeholders of Voyager Innovations Inc. are injecting up to $120 million in fresh capital to fuel the technology company’s expansion.

Stakeholders that include telecommunications giant PLDT, global investment firm KKR, China’s internet value-added services provider Tencent, World Bank Group member IFC, and the IFC Emerging Asia Fund committed to infuse up to $120 million in new funding to expand Voyager Innovations.

The investment is part of a broader fundraise for Voyager and is intended to support PayMaya Philippines’ rapid growth as it pursues its mission to accelerate digital and financial inclusion in the country and enable the wider Filipino population to participate in the digital economy.

Voyager is also in talks with other strategic and financial investors.

“This fresh round of investment is a testament to Voyager’s success in providing Filipinos with access to convenient, relevant and inclusive digital financial services through PayMaya,” PLDT, KKR, IFC, IFC Emerging Asia Fund and Tencent said in a joint statement.

“This is also a recognition of the significant role that the Philippine financial technology industry can play in providing meaningful digital solutions to many of the crucial and very-human challenges that the Philippine community faces today,” they said.

In 2018, KKR, Tencent, IFC and IFC Emerging Asia Fund made initial investments totaling $215 million to Voyager to support the company and its strategy to provide greater access to digital financial services across the Philippines through its financial technology arm PayMaya.

PLDT chairman and CEO Manuel V. Pangilinan earlier said Voyager’s existing shareholders have agreed to provide the interim financing as the company faced difficulties in finding new financial investors.

Orlando Vea, CEO and founder of Voyager, said the fresh funding would boost PayMaya’s ability to reach more Filipinos, especially as access to digital financial services becomes even more important.

“This investment will enable us to better support our financial inclusion thrust, while allowing us to expand to adjacent services,” Voyager and PayMaya president Shailesh Baidwan said.

PayMaya is the only end-to-end digital payments ecosystem enabler in the country with platforms and services that cuts across consumers, merchants and government.

Aside from providing the payments acceptance for the largest e-commerce, food, retail and gas merchants in the country, PayMaya is enabling national and social services agencies as well as local government units with digital payments and disbursement services.