cashless
Digital Garage and its payment business subsidiary, DG Financial Technology, have partnered with the All Japan Real Estate Association (Zennichi), which comprises about 30% of real estate companies nationwide, to provide "Rabby Pay Powered by Cloud Pay Neo" service to over 35,000 Zennichi member companies nationwide using
banking
Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, and Sumitomo Mitsui Card will launch "Trunk," a digital comprehensive financial service for corporate customers, in May 2025. Background and Purpose In recent years, with the advancement of digital technology, technological evolution, and entry of players from different industries, financial
payments
PayPay Corporation announces that four new services used in six countries can now process payments at PayPay merchant locations that use "Alipay+". The newly added services are "K PLUS" (Thailand), "Kaspi.kz" (Kazakhstan), "Bluecode" (Germany, Austria), and "BigPay" (Thailand, Malaysia,
credit card
Nudge has obtained a license as a "Certified Comprehensive Credit Purchase Intermediary" based on the Installment Sales Act. When entering the credit card business as a startup, Nudge initially operated as a "Small-Amount Comprehensive Credit Purchase Intermediary", offering credit cards with limits of 100,000 yen
broker/dealer
The total number of SBI Securities financial product accounts intermediated through Sumitomo Mitsui Card and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation has exceeded 1 million, and the monthly investment amount for "Sumitomo Mitsui Card Regular Investment" has exceeded 85 billion yen. Since June 2021, Sumitomo Mitsui Card has partnered with
Insurance
Sumitomo Mitsui Card, Sony Life, and Next Solution (Nexsol) have formed a business alliance for collaboration in the insurance sales business through insurance agencies. Sumitomo Mitsui Card and Sony Life will also invest in Nexsol, a multi-carrier insurance agency. Background and Purpose of the Alliance In recent years, changes in
cashless
PayPay Corporation announces that the number of "PayPay" payments in 2024 has exceeded 7.46 billion, accounting for approximately 1 in 5 of the total 38.8 billion cashless payments in Japan. The total number of QR code payments increased by 23% year-on-year to over 11.5 billion,
digital
Digital Garage has integrated three group companies - Naviplus (main business: marketing support for EC businesses), DG Commerce (main business: EC site development), and Scudet (main business: fraud detection and prevention solutions) - and launched a new company, DG Business Technology, to provide comprehensive digital business support. Under the group
payments
Filippino conglomerate Ayala and Mitsubishi have executed an investment agreement for the Japanese multinational’s acquisition of a 6.5% stake in e-wallet giant GCash, according to a stock exchange filing. Mitsubishi will subscribe to 18.03 million common and redeemable preferred shares of AC Ventures Holding (ACV), which holds
stablecoin
Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, TIS, Ava Labs, and Fireblocks have signed a basic agreement concerning joint exploration of stablecoin utilization with a view toward future commercialization. Overview of the Agreement SMBC Group, TIS, Ava Labs, and Fireblocks have formally agreed to begin joint exploration of stablecoin
banking
Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Sumitomo Mitsui Card Company announced that the number of accounts opened for "Olive," a comprehensive financial service for individual customers, has surpassed 5 million. Olive is a completely new service that seamlessly combines bank accounts, card payments, financing, online securities, online insurance, and
venture capital
Vertex Ventures Japan (VVJ) has completed the first closing of its inaugural fund, Vertex Ventures Japan Fund I (“VVJFI”), targeting JPY 10bn. This milestone was achieved with the participation of LP investors representing key sectors across industry, government, and academia, with the support of government institutions. VVJ will commence investments