SINGAPORE (5 July): SMEs make up 99% of all companies in Singapore, but are still considered the underdogs of the Singapore economy.
With less than $100 million in receipts and not more than 200 employees, SMEs find themselves facing financial gaps, and are often struggling with cash flow problems.
This is exactly what Teo and his co-founder Reynold Wijaya are trying to resolve with their brainchild - Funding Societies.
Founded in 2015, Funding Societies is a lending platform that helps SMEs obtain loans through its platform from a variety of investors. With a quick turnaround time and the short-term nature of its loans, Funding Societies has emerged an attractive alternative for many SMEs.
To date, Funding Societies has disbursed nearly $680 million in loans, boasts a headcount of nearly 400 people and has more than 150,000 investors on its platform.
Moving forward, it is no easy path ahead for the company – as it expects to face challenges such as the lack of infrastructure support and market awareness. Teo and Wijaya are also bracing themselves for a softening of the market, especially since Funding Societies has yet to go through a credit cycle.
To find out more about Funding Societies, read Peer-to-peer lending platform lends a hand to SMEs in The Edge Singapore (Issue 889, week of July 8) which is on sale now.
