Globe to invest $100M in new venture company

Globe Telecom Inc. is investing around $100 million in 917 Ventures, a new unit to develop startups within the company.

The new venture is envisioned to develop technological ideas and spur the company to reach new vertical markets, Globe CEO Ernest Cu said in an interview at the company’s headquarters in Taguig City on Thursday.

“The initial thought is around 100 million US. This will be to leverage all of the assets we have in the company to start new businesses, very similar to what we did with GCash,” Cu noted.

“Various areas … areas that are consumer oriented. And for now, we will look at ideas, internal ideas we can sort of develop over time and build into valuable startups,” he said.

917 Ventures will be similar in nature to Kickstart Ventures, but for developing products within the company.

“We already have Kickstart Ventures that takes care of the external innovation and the incubation of external companies. This is internal, the same way that GCash evolved inside Globe and became a large entity and a valuable entity,” he said.

Kickstart Ventures is a subsidiary of Globe, backed by Ayala Corporation and Singapore Telecommunications Limited.

GCash or G-Xchange Inc. is a subsidiary of Mynt (Globe Fintech Innovations Inc.) which provides financial services such as payments, remittances, loans, business solutions, and platforms. —VDS, GMA News