Ant International’s WorldFirst Accelerates SEA Growth with Malaysia MSB Licence
7.8.2025 09:04:00 CEST | Business Wire | Press Release
Ant International has obtained approval from Bank Negara Malaysia to carry out business under a Class A Money Services Business licence. The licence will empower Ant International’s WorldFirst—an all-in-one digital cross-border payment and treasury account service for global businesses—to operate in Malaysia, adding to its 60+ global licences worldwide.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250806541491/en/
WorldFirst's All-in-One Business Account for Global Payments
The licence will enable WorldFirst to expand its product offerings and roll out new services in Malaysia, facilitating international payments, especially in receiving foreign currency payments globally, with a focus on supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to manage their cross-border transactions more efficiently. It further strengthens WorldFirst’s capabilities in supporting businesses expanding both into and out of the Malaysian market.
The Going-Global: Seizing the Next Great Opportunity in Digital Trade report (Deloitte & WorldFirst) identifies Malaysia as a High-Potential Market with strong digital trade growth. The country's digital economy is now a key growth driver, with e-commerce GMV projected to reach $16 billion by 2025 and $25 billion by 2030.
The rapid digitalisation is fuelling demand for innovative financial services across Southeast Asia, with Malaysia emerging as a regional leader. WorldFirst finds Malaysian merchants more actively seeking multi-currency solutions and adopting more diverse payment methods than regional peers. They prioritise these key factors: faster transaction settlement, competitive FX rates with hedging solutions and diversified financial product offerings.
Recognising the specific demands of Malaysian merchants, WorldFirst aims to deliver tailored solutions featuring global coverage, secure transactions and operational efficiency—essential foundations for Malaysian SMEs’ success in today's digital economy.
Central to this offering is the World Account, WorldFirst's flagship product that combines global payments, collections, FX conversion, and treasury management in one single account. Sellers can effortlessly collect from 130+ marketplaces (including Amazon, Walmart, etc.), while buyers can gain easy payment solutions for international sourcing.
WorldFirst has also established localised operations in Malaysia to provide tailored support for SMEs pursuing global expansion. This move aligns with its parent company Ant International's strategic investment in the country, including the launch of a Digital Business Centre focused on harnessing local tech talent to drive global innovation.
“The licence marks a significant milestone in WorldFirst's commitment to Southeast Asia. More importantly, it enables us to better serve Southeast Asian SMEs with secure, compliant cross-border financial services while contributing to the region's digital ecosystem,” said Clara Shi, Vice President of Ant International and CEO of WorldFirst.
In 2025, WorldFirst leverages its experience serving over 1.2 million SMEs worldwide through products like the newly launched World Card with Mastercard. Currently available in other markets, the World Card provides the ease, security, and international reach SMEs need to scale globally while managing spending efficiently.
About WorldFirst
WorldFirst offers cross-border payments and treasury services through its global business account, empowering growth for SMEs in e-commerce, trade, and the broad platform economy. WorldFirst simplifies key financial operations, including international payments, collections, currency conversions, and treasury management, all in a one-stop account. Leveraging the technological strengths of its parent company Ant International, WorldFirst delivers industry-leading transaction security and reliability. WorldFirst has supported over 1.2 million customers, enabling payments in 100+ currencies across more than 210 countries and regions. Learn more about WorldFirst at https://www.worldfirst.com.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250806541491/en/
Contacts
Chloe Zhu
jingchong.zhu@ant-intl.com
(c) 2024 Business Wire, Inc., All rights reserved.
Business Wire, a Berkshire Hathaway company, is the global leader in multiplatform press release distribution.
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
TSMC Debuts A13 Technology at 2026 North America Technology Symposium22.4.2026 21:00:00 CEST | Press Release
TSMC (TWSE: 2330, NYSE: TSM) today debuted its latest innovation in its most advanced process technology at the Company’s 2026 North America Technology Symposium. TSMC’s new A13 process is a direct shrink of its industry-leading A14 node announced in 2025, enabling even more compact and efficient designs to address insatiable customer demand in computational requirements for next-generation artificial intelligence, high-performance computing (HPC), and mobile applications. Representing TSMC’s commitment to continuous improvement, A13 provides 6% area savings from A14. Design rules are fully backward compatible with A14, enabling customers to quickly migrate their designs to TSMC’s latest nanosheet transistor technology. In addition, A13 delivers increased power efficiency and performance gains through design-technology co-optimization, and is scheduled to enter production in 2029, one year after A14. A13 was one of many technology innovations highlighted at TSMC’s North America Technol
Galderma Shareholders Approve All Annual General Meeting Proposals22.4.2026 17:45:00 CEST | Press Release
Galderma Group AG (SIX:GALD), the pure-play dermatology category leader, announced that shareholders approved all proposals put forward by the Board of Directors at its Annual General Meeting (AGM), held earlier today via live webcast. This includes the payment of a gross dividend of 0.35 CHF per dividend-bearing share1, to be distributed out of reserves from capital contributions. Shareholders approved the election of Harry Kirsch as independent member of the Board of Directors, as well as the election of Samuel du Retail and Delphine Viguier-Hovasse, representatives of L’Oréal, as non-independent members of the Board. In addition, Thomas Ebeling (Chair), Daniel Browne, Maria Teresa Hilado, Karen Lee Ling, Roberto Marques, Sherilyn McCoy and Dr. Flemming Ørnskov were re-elected to the Board. The AGM also approved the company’s 2025 Annual Financial Statements, Non-Financial Report and Compensation Report. Detailed voting results and the official minutes will be published on Galderma's
Altrove and Bloomineral Named Winners of the 2026 Grand Prix ACF AutoTech22.4.2026 15:21:00 CEST | Press Release
Altrove and Bloomineral have been crowned winners of the 2026 Grand Prix ACF AutoTech, the international startup competition recognizing the best of automotive innovation. The ninth edition was held on Wednesday, April 15 at the Automobile Club de France in Paris, where IoT.Bzh also received the first-ever Industrialization Prize. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260422236542/en/ Picture of the end of the event with the winners : Bloomineral, Altrove and Iot.Bzh + all the Jury Members from French Automotive OEM and Tier1 Hosted by competition founder Richard de Cabrol and Simon Degiovanni, the evening gathered more than 250 leaders from the automotive, technology, digital, business and media sectors, with attendees joining both on-site and online. Six finalist startups, selected from more than 100 applications representing 28 countries, pitched their innovations before a jury of senior automotive and finance ex
I/ONX Shatters the Host Tax: New Symphony SixtyFour Architecture Delivers 50% TCO Savings Across AI Inference and Fine-Tuning Lifecycle22.4.2026 15:00:00 CEST | Press Release
I/ONX High Performance Compute (HPC), a leading provider of heterogeneous AI systems, today announced the global launch of the Symphony SixtyFour, a high-density platform designed to collapse the physical and economic footprint of AI inference and fine-tuning infrastructure. By supporting up to 64 accelerators on a single node, I/ONX eliminates the redundant Host Tax—the massive overhead in power, hardware, and licensing that negatively impacts ROI in enterprise AI. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260422485327/en/ I/ONX Introduces Symphony SixtyFour: The Host Tax is Over. Save 30-50% on your AI Infrastructure Costs. While inference now accounts for 90% of enterprise AI workloads, enterprises are entirely limited to deploying inference on training hardware platforms. Symphony SixtyFour provides significant advantages for reduced CapEx and OpEx for inference and fine-tuning workloads. In training comparisons, th
Thales Introduces Imperva for Google Cloud, Bringing Its Enterprise-Grade Application Security Capabilities Directly into Google Cloud22.4.2026 15:00:00 CEST | Press Release
Thales today announced the Controlled Availability of Imperva for Google Cloud, bringing the industry's most trusted application security platform directly into Google Cloud. Designed to operate within Google Cloud, the new offering enables organizations to protect web applications and APIs by leveraging Google Cloud’s Service Extension traffic, preserving existing pipelines, integrations, and monitoring workflows. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260422746638/en/ ©Thales As enterprises accelerate cloud adoption, development teams increasingly standardize on native cloud services to improve speed and reduce operational complexity. Many security solutions, however, require external routing that introduces latency and friction. At the same time, native cloud security tools often lack the depth required to protect mission-critical applications at scale, creating friction between development and security teams. Imp
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom