Author: Business News Asia

Holey Moley, the first mini golf club and bar in Singapore is set to open its doors in December 2018. Located at Clark Quay, where the former Shanghai Dolly used to be until it shut down in April this year, the Holey Moley will be a welcome change in nightlife activities by incorporating a mini golf course and a vibrant cocktail bar in one establishment. The 27 holes of the course will feature popular TV show and board game themes including the Simpsons, Game of Thrones, nostalgic movies such as Jaws and E.T. Holey Moley promises great fun, music, and is…

Singapore is a great country with a low cost of living, low taxes, and numerous job opportunities if you have the right career guidance. It is the hub of Asia and a rapidly advancing nation with good career advancement opportunities for qualified professionals. However, the finding a job is extremely competitive especially for a fresh graduate straight out of university or anyone seeking to change professions. Living and working in Singapore is everyone’s dream but if truth be told, entry-level job opportunities are highly competitive. So how does one rise above the competition and land his or her dream job? Well,…

Centara Hotels & Resorts, Thailand’s leading hotel operator, announced the appointment of Andrew Langston, a British national with over 34 years’ experience in hospitality management and development, to help execute their ambitious 5-year expansion plan. Langston will assume the position of Senior Vice President Business Development in the company’s development team, reporting to Deputy CEO Markland Blaiklock. He has held senior management positions with major hotel groups such as Banyan Tree and Intercontinental Hotels group [IHG] and most recently he held the position of Executive Vice President, Strategic Advisory & Asset Management, at Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels & Hospitality Group,…

Local Search Engine Optimization, also known as SEO, is a great way for local companies to boost their business through effective online marketing and promotion. The secret behind the effectiveness of local SEO lies in its ability to increase your website’s visibility on Google so that it’s easier for users to find your business when they search for relevant keywords. SEO is particularly important for local businesses that want to grow their customer base and expand. Also, Google says that four out of five users who search for stuff online are looking for locally optimized results, which often results in…

Listed online money remittance firm I-Remit Philippines announced its partnership with Travelex, a foreign exchange specialist in Bahrain, to further serve Filipino remitters in the gulf country. In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, I-Remit said Filipinos in Bahrain can now remit through Travelex’s 25 branches across the Kingdom, including five airport stores, which offer remittance and FX products. Founded in 1976, Travelex Worldwide is present in 70 countries across the globe, with more than 1,500 stores. It processes over 70 million transactions yearly, with products encompassing FX, VAT refunds, remittance, prepaid cards, and international money transfer. The Philippines…

Standard Chartered announced a collaboration with Siemens Financial Services, the financing arm of Siemens, and TradeIX, a digital trade provider, to carry out an industry-first client pilot to create an end-to-end blockchain-based smart guarantees proposition in trade finance. With a view to transform the traditionally paper intensive Bank Guarantees business, this is the first blockchain client pilot that fully digitises the process, from initiation of the bank guarantee to the claim handling. “This is an industry-defining solution which we believe will transform the way guarantees are issued and processed in the UAE. Siemens Financial Services has been a key partner…

Grab, Southeast Asia’s leading O2O (online-to-offline) mobile platform, today launched Grab Ventures, the company’s innovation arm, in Indonesia with plans to invest IDR3 trillion (US$250 million) in Indonesian startups. Grab Ventures aims to help select Indonesian startups scale up nationally and across Southeast Asia, by providing a unique blend of Southeast Asian market access, mentorship, technology capabilities and strategic investments. Grab Ventures is the latest initiative of the ‘Grab 4 Indonesia’ 2020 Master Plan to support Indonesia’s goal to be Southeast Asia’s largest digital economy by 2020. Grab Ventures also announced Grab Ventures Velocity, their programme to specifically support startups…

AirTrunk, a specialist in hyperscale data centres, has successfully completed an AU$850 million ($621 million) financing process to fund a major expansion of its Australian data centres in Sydney and Melbourne, and across key Asia-Pacific markets, according to a report by AsiaPEVC.com. The expansion has been driven by strong customer demand for hyperscale data centre solutions, the company said. Deutsche Bank is the lead arranger, underwriter and sole bookrunner for the new senior secured debt facilities. The financing will be the largest by a data centre company in Australia. AirTrunk founder and CEO, Robin Khuda, and shareholders, Goldman Sachs and…

Manila-based restaurant reservation app BigDish has acquired local food and travel discovery platform looloo for an undisclosed amount, according to a BusinessNews.ph report. The acquisition comes less than a month after BigDish went public on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and raised £1.8 million (US$2.3 million) from its IPO. Founded in 2012, looloo is one of the leading place discovery and review apps in the Philippines. looloo allows users to explore and discover restaurants, hotels, tourist attractions and other places of interest all over the Philippines through crowd-sourced reviews. It currently has over 330,000 reviews covering over 36,000 places in…

Australia-listed iCar Asia, owner of a network of automotive portals in Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia, announced the launch of CarlistBid.my, a new platform connecting car sellers to dealers in a safe and trusted environment. Taglined Malaysia’s Most Trusted Car Bidding Platform, CarlistBid.my utilises iCar Asia’s existing database of sellers and buyers, the largest network in the country, with over three million ready sellers and more than three thousand dealers. Following the launch in Malaysia, the platform will be rolled out to iCar Asia’s operations in Thailand and Indonesia. Along with the launch of the platform, iCar Asia also launched the…

Australia-listed conglomerate Wesfarmers today announced it has agreed to sell its Kmart Tyre and Auto Service (KTAS) business to Continental AG for $350 million, AsiaPEVC.com first reported. On successful completion of the transaction, Wesfarmers estimates it will report a pre-tax profit on sale of approximately $270 million to $275 million, subject to completion adjustments. The sale is subject to certain consents and approvals including from the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the Foreign Investment Review Board. KTAS is one of Australia’s largest tyre, automotive service and repair retailers. The business has 258 stores across Australia with over 1,200 employees.…

Keppel Capital Ventures Pte. Ltd., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Keppel Capital Holdings Pte. Ltd. (Keppel Capital), the asset management arm of Keppel Corporation Limited, has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Vicinity Centres (Vicinity), a leading Australian retail property group listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, to establish a new private fund. According to a BusinessNews.ph report, the proposed fund intends to invest in an initial A$1 billion portfolio of Australian retail properties currently owned by Vicinity. The MOU is subject to due diligence, definitive documentation and final board approvals of both parties. The parties intend to manage…

Private property developer Northern Star Gaming & Resorts Inc. (Northern Star) and government-owned Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (CEZA) are pooling their resources to build Crypto Valley of Asia (CVA), a planned development estate designed to push economic growth further in Northern Luzon. Northern Star has secured international and regional companies to locate within the CVA estate, which will be rolled out in three (3) phases. It has also committed gross investments valued at US$100m over the next 10 years. Guest of Honor Philippine President Rodrigo R. Duterte described the important role of attracting investors. “We should embrace investors to help…

Israel-based AnyVision, a developer of artificial intelligence and computer vision technology, announced that it has raised $28 million in Series A financing led by German multinational technology group Bosch. In a statement, AnyVision said the latest funding round also saw the backing of two US private equity groups, which the company did not identify. “The new capital will allow the company to meet global demand and enhance product innovation, research, and development,” AnyVision said in a press statement. Founded in 2015, AnyVision has created a software technology that the company said learns on the feed, is customizable, and runs on…

Private equity real estate (PERE) deals reached a five-year high in the first quarter of this year, marked by 1,403 deals worth an aggregate $67 billion, according to the latest report released by Preqin. While the amount declined from the fourth quarter of 2017, the first quarter figure represents a five-year high for deal activity in an opening quarter, both in terms of the number of deals and their aggregate value. Encouragingly, the PERE deal market is also seeing signs of diversification: office assets remained the most sought-after property, but represented just 29 per cent of total deal value in…

Luxury magazine and digital media publisher Heart Media Group has announced a strategic partnership and investment into Luxify, the Hong Kong-headquartered luxury marketplace. This investment in Luxify by Heart Media further enlarges the digital portfolio of Asia’s leading luxury lifestyle media and event group. A first mover in Asia, Luxify, launched in 2013, is an online marketplace with a global reach which connects affluent buyers and established luxury dealers. From supercars to yachts, luxury watches, handbags, rare antiques, Luxify offers one of the Internet’s largest collections of luxury products and experiences for sale with an inventory worth more than US$160…

Electrify, Singapore’s first retail electricity marketplace, has raised US$30 million in funding from institutional and individual investors via its token sale, according to a company announcement. This funding will be used to power Electrify’s expansion into priority markets outside of Singapore, including Southeast Asia, Japan, and Australia. It will also help drive company growth, recruitment, and product development. “Bolstering this effort, the backing of strategic investors such as Jun Hasegawa, CEO of OmiseGo and Wendell Davis, one of Ethereum’s original Co-Founders, and prominent Japanese VC Global Brain, Electrify is well poised to make electrical energy more accessible, sustainable, and affordable…

Commercial information firm Dun & Bradstreet has announced that Joshua L. Peirez, President and Chief Operating Officer, has resigned from the company to pursue other opportunities, effective March 15, 2018. The Company intends to announce a transition plan in due course. Peirez leads all aspects of Dun & Bradstreet’s customer-facing operations, including the company’s lines of business, multi-channel sales platform, and service of client solutions, as well as strategy and mergers and acquisitions. He joined Dun & Bradstreet in September 2010 as President of Marketing & Innovation and has held several prominent roles within the company, including President of Marketing…

LaSalle Investment Management, one of the world’s leading real estate investment managers, has acquired, on behalf of a consortium of Japanese investors, Ocean Gate Minato Mirai, a 14-storey large-scale office building located in Yokohama’s Minato Mirai 21 area, the city’s business and central core. Completed in July 2017, Ocean Gate Minato Mirai enjoys an ideal location on the corner of Kokusai Odori, also known as Minato Mirai 21’s main street, and Keyaki Dori. The building is a 2-minute walk from “Minatomirai” Station on the Yokohama Minatomirai Railway, which is connected to the Tokyu Toyoko Line. The building features ceiling heights…

Savills Singapore has launched Workthere, a new venture that helps growing businesses find flexible, co-working, and serviced office space across the city-state. Workthere will service the entire flexible workspace market in Singapore, including well-known brands such as Servcorp, The Executive Centre, The Work Project, District6, Centennial BusinessSuites, GreenHub Suited Offices, WeWork, Collective Works, The Great Room, JustCo & Just Office, as well as a variety of independent providers. The new venture by Savills was launched in the UK in February 2017 and, following this success, the firm is now expanding across Europe with Ireland Germany and most recently, in the…