In the second half of 2024, Cento Ventures made its very first investment outside of Southeast Asia, and into a South Korean startup called CrePASS.
In a world where data is key to any form of decisioning, many countries are still facing limitations of traditional credit ratings as they lack tools to precisely judge the credit of the growing middle class, including South Korea.
Traditional credit scoring systems often fails to capture the creditworthiness of thin-filers—someone with little to no credit history—based solely on financial transaction history. As a result, only super-prime consumers are able to secure credit or loans from financial institutions while others find it difficult to obtain credit products at reasonable interest rates.
The same issue persists even more in emerging markets like Southeast Asia where many are unbanked and underbanked.
Thus, CrePASS has crafted its own alternative consumer credit scoring platform that supplements traditional credit ratings with alternative data-based credit assessment based on non-financial data — a solution that is applicable in both developed and emerging markets.
CrePASS’ patented solution is timely as the Korean government has been actively promoting the utilisation of alternative credit scoring for consumer lending in order to lower their overall borrowing costs. In 2021, CrePASS snagged the republic’s Specialty Personal Credit Evaluation Business License — the sole holder of such license so far.
The unique license allows the company to leverage non-financial data sourced from telecommunication companies, mobile meta-data and other alternative data sources to identify lending opportunities missed by financial-data only analysis. It also makes CrePASS the natural go-to partner for financial institutions looking to incorporate alternative credit scoring to grow their customer base.
To date, CrePASS has worked on over 130 credit scoring projects in South Korea. Through its Korean partners, the company’s solutions are also starting to make an appearance in other parts of Asia such as Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Cambodia and Indonesia.
We are committed to driving financial innovation and expanding access to smart credit solutions across emerging markets through our solutions in alternative credit risk assessment. We always believe that everyone should have a ‘pass’ to access credit and that’s what CrePASS — credit + pass — will focus on in the years to come.
— MJ Kim, founder and CEO of CrePASS
Its founder and CEO Minjung Kim or more fondly known as MJ, is no stranger in the credit scoring space. Prior to founding CrePASS in 2015, MJ boasts 25 years of experience in credit evaluation and risk management.
MJ’s credit scoring journey began in 1999 when she worked with FK BCG (formerly known as FICO Korea), the exclusive partner in Korea for FICO, the global credit scoring company. She played an instrumental role in pioneering alternative credit scoring in the South Korean market.
In 2020, she led CrePASS to acquire both FK BCG and alternative scoring platform Lenddo Korea, the latter being a joint venture unit between FK BCG and Lenddo, a Singapore-headquartered alternative credit scoring startup.
Cento is excited to be a part of CrePASS’ journey in enabling credit access to the growing middle class across South Korea and other emerging markets. We believe the MJ and her team have the right expertise and drive in opening up greater possibilities for financial institutions to better serve the credit needs of consumers.
You can find out more about CrePASS here.