Salutat Closes seed round from 500 Startups, Expara Ventures, and IIX, to help lenders improve customer communication

Social enterprise led by former IFC banker and Agoda developer take on the financial institution communication problem in emerging markets

Startupbootcamp Fintech alumnus, Salutat, announced today the close of its debut funding round with leading Southeast Asian venture funds. Salutat helps its emerging market financial institution partners to boost their customer engagement and move to OTT (over the top) channels such as Whatsapp and LINE. It does this by automating and enhancing digital customer conversations using neuroscience and machine-learning techniques. Salutat goes further by addressing the shortfalls in customer relationship management software to help partners facilitate internal coordination on customer interactions. It also leverages real-time data analytics to mitigate operational risks. In doing so, Salutat reduces staff communication time and costs significantly and drives superior customer repayment, sales, retention, and financial inclusion.

Caption: Cofounders - Left (Sam Upra CTO) / Right (Mike Driver CEO)

Cofounder and CEO, Mike Driver, spotted the opportunity for Salutat whilst working at ADB and IFC (the World Bank’s private investment arm). “I saw a major transformation taking place in our financial institution portfolio companies from offering branch-driven financial products to becoming providers of financial and non-financial services” he said. “Traditional lenders are under strain to deliver better service across more and more channels, despite their staff managing as many as 500 customers each. Salutat allows traditional lenders to fight off fintech lenders which are enticing customers away with better UX but often extremely high pricing” said Mike. In this respect, Salutat is levelling the playing field for the bricks and mortars lenders.

To do this, Mike teamed up with Cofounder and CTO Sam Upra, then working at Agoda’s machine-learning and content team. True to the Salutat way, the two met via a Linkedin chat. “Increasingly business is taking place in a digital environment. Banking should be no different as customers want to do it on their own terms. Customers want service that is fast, on-demand, secure, and personalized the apps they use on a daily basis. This lowers barriers to entry and costs, compared to SMS or call centers. We help partners adapt to this world of customer service.” says Sam. The duo also teamed up with renowned psychologists from top universities University of New South Wales (UNSW) and National University of Singapore (NUS). Together they conducted a massive research effort of almost 1,000 low-income borrowers in Asia and Africa to understand their financial, business, and digital needs. “It is amazing what you learn when you just listen to the end-users of financial services. We exposed several avenues to deploy innovative neuroscience methods”, said Joel Pearson, Salutat advisor and UNSW Professor. Salutat has since added management talent including a senior front-end developer from Bangkok booking-app Eatigo and an experienced head of operations with a Harvard MBA.

Although Singaporean by incorporation, Salutat is proud of its Thai origins. It had its first pilot client in Thailand’s rural northeast and now manages its technology out of Bangkok’s T-one WeWork office. This is something that caught the attention of 500 Tuktuks (the Thai fund of VC trailblazer 500 Startups), as well as leading South-east Asia-focused early-stage investors, Expara Asia Ventures and Impact Investment Exchange (IIX). “Salutat helps its partners harness new opportunities and mitigate emerging risks. The problem they are solving affects many global emerging markets” said Expara Managing Partner Douglas Abrams. Salutat has harnessed this global interest, adding pilots in Myanmar, Kenya, and Zimbabwe. It is also in discussions for partnerships in Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Latin America. “2019 is shaping up to be a defining year for Salutat, we are very excited by the enthusiasm of both clients and investors, our singular focus is to bridge the gap between customers and lenders across developing economies to drive greater social impact and financial inclusion” said Mike.