Southeast Asia’s ride-hailing company Grab has acquired Bento Invest, a leading Singapore-based robo-advisory and digital wealth management solutions provider.
Through the acquisition of Bento Invest, Grab will venture into the wealth management business in Singapore.
According to reports, Bento Invest will be rebranded as Grab Invest and the new products will be available in Singapore during the first half of the year. The new wealth management products will be available in the Grab app.
The size of the deal was not disclosed.
Chandrima Das, who currently serves as the chief executive at Bento Invest, will continue with her role after it rebrands to Grab Invest. She has 23 years of experience in wealth and asset management across Asia and the UK. She also served as the managing director at Bank of Singapore and chief executive at ING Investment Management Singapore.
She told the media, “The Bento and Grab Financial teams share a common vision to democratise investments for our customers irrespective of their wallet size. I am grateful for the opportunity to be part of the Grab ecosystem as we work together to make wealth management solutions to serve the financial needs of millions of Southeast Asians.”
Recently, Grab Financial started offering loans and credit lines to small and medium-sized businesses in Singapore.
Businesses can apply online and borrow up to S$100,000 with interest rates as low as 0.7 percent per month. Grab Financial does not demand any security deposits and the loan sizes are calculated based on the financial status of the businesses.
Last year, Grab launched SME lending as well as micro-insurance for drivers in Singapore.