Higala-RCBC tie up onboards 8 rural banks to InstaPay

GMA Network

3 days ago

In an effort to expand the digital footprint of rural banks, the partnership between Yuchengco-led Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC) and homegrown instant payments infrastructure provider Higala Group Inc. has onboarded eight rural banks across the country to InstaPay.
Higala and RCBC have jointly created Synerfi, an open payments platform that reduces barriers and accelerates the participation of smaller financial institutions in InstaPay.
The companies developed Synerfi to help rural banks as well as microfinance institutions expand their digital transactions through InstaPay as 'traditionally, many rural and community banks have been excluded from the digital financial ecosystem due to regulatory and technological constraints.'
Among the onboarded rural banks in Synerfi include Rural Bank of San Antonio Inc., Rural Bank of Lipa City (Batangas), Inc., Progressive Rural Bank Inc., Banco Abucay Inc., Rural Bank of Hermosa (Bataan) Inc., Money Mall Rural Bank Inc., First Philippine Partners Bank Inc. (A Rural Bank), and Lagawe Highlands Rural Bank, Inc.
'This marks the beginning of empowering the underserved banking sector by enabling them to offer digital banking services that are otherwise available only to mainstream and traditional banks,' said Winston Damarillo, president and CEO of Higala.
"Connecting rural banks to Instapay and the wider digital ecosystem is not simply an act of digitalization, but a deeper commitment to accelerate financial inclusion in underserved areas. SynerFi continues to demonstrate its promise to drive financial access beyond urban areas and materialize the government's sustainable agenda," said Lito Villanueva, executive vice president and chief innovation and inclusion officer of RCBC.
"RCBC is excited to welcome more participants with the shared mission to make banking services accessible to all Filipinos into the instant payment ecosystem," Villanueva added.
The RCBC official said the bank and Higala are 'targeting 40 rural banks to be onboarded.'
Under their partnership, Higala is providing the technology to operationalize SynerFi while RCBC is acting as the sponsor platform bank and manage the essential regulatory requirements, such as compliance, clearing, and settlement.
'SynerFi seeks to empower rural banks like Rural Bank of San Antonio to access world-class digital banking capabilities. Launching these services with zero capital intensity and without the heavy burden of building dedicated in-house tech and compliance teams is invaluable, enabling us to offer customers top-tier technology and services, truly digitizing our reach.' said Ronaldo Recto, president of the Rural Bank of San Antonio.
Meanwhile, Higala also secured a fresh seed funding of $4 million from venture capitalists Talino Venture Studios, Chemonics International, Kadan Capital, Tenco Capital, and 1982 Ventures.
'Fresh funds from our investors will help accelerate Higala's capabilities of powering SynerFi and helping more financial institutions grow and expand their services to their customers and become active players in the digital economy,' Damarilio said.
'After successfully raising our target seed funding of $2.8 million, we've expanded our round to $4 million due to increased interest in Higala and signaling investor confidence in our product,' said Chemonics International president and CEO Jamey Butcher. —AOL, GMA Integrated News