Alibaba, Capify to offer alternative financing for Australian small businesses
Securing financing for small businesses in Australia just got easier. Chinese ecommerce conglomerate Alibaba has announced a new partnership with alternative lender Capify to provide new financing options to SMEs in Australia.
According to the Australian Financial Review, the partnership will open the door to working capital for small and medium-sized enterprises in Australia, allowing users to obtain unsecured loans of between $5,000 and $400,000 from Capify using a unique credit scoring model.
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“We want to help make financing as accessible and efficient as possible for the 1.9 million Australian small and mid-sized enterprises that do business through Alibaba.com,” said Michael Mang, head of business development and marketing for Alibaba.com and for the Asia-Pacific, Middle East and North Africa regions.
With nearly two million buyers signed up to purchase products on the site, Australia is currently the third largest market for Alibaba.com.
“By linking the buyers on our platform to a leader in the alternative business lending space such as Capify, [and by offering] innovative financial packages for our members, we hope to help Australian SMEs to address their financing challenges and therefore encourage them to engage and capture opportunities from the global trading scene to further grow their business,” said Mang.
Since 2008, Capify has provided more than $1000 million unsecured loans in Australia. According to John De Bree, Australian managing director of Capify, the company expects to lend around $40 million to Australian SMEs over the next 12 months.
"We lend money to SMEs that can't get loans through banks because they're worried about risks and reputational risks. The banks won't give them overdraft or personal loans they come to us. It's unsecured, and it's the higher risk market we're going for.”
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“The collaboration will satisfy Alibaba.com’s customers’ financing needs with a tailored product to help grow their business,” said De Bree.
According to Alibaba, the company is committed to its core business of buying and selling.
"The purpose of the collaboration with Capify is to increase traffic and encourage more people to buy things on the internet. We're not competing with banks and we're not trying to create competition here. Buying and selling is the core of our business. We want to make it easier to buy online anywhere, any time." Mang said.
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