SINGAPORE-BASED Thunes has secured US$60 million in funding led by global private equity and venture capital firm Insight Partners, almost doubling its share price from S$2.13 in its previous Series B round to S$3.70. This extension round will value the startup at about S$690.3 million, according to data intelligence platform VentureCap Insights.

Existing investors of the business-to-business cross-border payments network company joined the round, including Helios Investment Partners, Checkout.com, GGV Capital and Future Shape. The round takes the company's total funds raised to US$130 million, following its US$60 million round less than a year ago.

Thunes, which loosely translates to "pocket money" in French, has seen its top line and transaction volume double over the past year, as it scales up its infrastructure across emerging markets, chief executive officer Peter De Caluwe told The Business Times. These markets often have fragmented and complex payment ecosystems, where consumers often have to deal with slow, costly and unreliable ways of moving money.

The startup, which is regulated by the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the Financial Conduct Authority in the UK, connects popular e-wallets, banks and other payment players in these emerging markets, providing the back-end infrastructure for consumers to move money to another country in Thunes' network quickly and securely. The company, founded in 2016, now connects different payment players in more than 115 countries.

Its customers include Grab, PayPal, Kenya's mobile money wallet M-Pesa, the Commercial Bank of Dubai, global money transfer operators Western Union and Remitly, as well as Singapore insurance firm NTUC Income.

The money raised will be used to expand its team and deepen its infrastructure in the countries it is in. Mr De Caluwe noted that while the startup has since built a "critical mass" for its network, the focus now is to establish more contact points it has in each country, for deeper market penetration. It plans to set up 10 to 20 stations in each country, partnering local banks and tech players to increase transactions and money moved.

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It charges a fee - ranging from US$0.03 to US$5 - for each transaction, as well as a currency conversion fee. This ranges from 0.05 per cent to 0.5 per cent, depending on the volatility of the currency.

Mr De Caluwe said that the startup is planning to "double the headcount in its Singapore headquarters" to about 180 staff over the next year or two. Its focus will be on hiring tech engineers to work on machine learning and artificial intelligence software for currency exchange. Thunes currently has over 150 staff across 40 nationalities, of which 90 staff are based in Singapore.

He further noted that the company is moving to a new office in Raffles Place later this year, and is launching a new service in a couple of months. This new service will allow end users to pay suppliers or receive money directly.

Through this strategic investment, Insight Partners will provide financial and operational resources to promote Thunes' growth, it said. "We are looking forward to helping (Thunes) scale up," added Deven Parekh, managing director at Insight Partners. The firm has invested in more than 400 companies globally and has over US$30 billion in capital commitments.

The latest funding will help us "speed up investment in our operations, product and technology", said Mr De Caluwe.

Jenny Lee, managing partner of GGV Capital, said that the firm is "excited" about the impact Thunes has made in addressing the many challenges in the cross-border payments ecosystem.

"Since leading the Series A funding round in 2019, we have witnessed incredible growth from Thunes and have seen Peter's ability to attract management talent from around the world to join Thunes in fulfilling its mission and vision," she said.