This week, Grab put $1.49 billion behind its ambition to become more than a ride-hailing company, agreeing to buy a 60% stake in fintech unicorn Atome Financial, confirming a DealStreetAsia report from June. The Nasdaq-listed superapp also plans to acquire the remaining 40% of Atome around two years after the first transaction is complete.
My colleague Katrina Bianca Cuaresma spoke to Grab’s President & COO Alex Hungate on the deal—the company’s biggest cash acquisition to date. Hungate pointed to the revenue upside as the deal’s strongest strategic case. “For me, this is the acquisition for Grab that has the best revenue synergies possible…I can’t think of another company that could create this level of revenue synergy.”
The Atome deal underscores how the financial services sector is becoming increasingly central to Southeast Asia’s superapp model.
Staying with Grab, drivers in Vietnam have been up in arms against the ride-hailing app, protesting policies they claim are eroding their take-home earnings, as Quynh Nguyen reported from Hanoi. The call by some of Grab’s drivers to boycott the app has raised a broader question for the country’s growing gig economy: how can platform workers negotiate their earnings when they are not employees in a traditional labour relationship? The debate is pushing calls for stronger worker protections and algorithmic transparency.
Zooming out of Southeast Asia, this week was also marked by a global sell-off in AI-connected stocks—SoftBank, SK Hynix, and Samsung Electronics, to name a few—after Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei called on AI companies to slow the rate at which they advance model capabilities amid mounting fears of misuse of AI. Both Elon Musk, who runs xAI, and Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, said that they agreed with Amodei, who penned his thoughts in an essay ‘We Must Pace the Frontier’. Anthropic released a threat intelligence report detailing how several actors had used its Claude AI for activities ranging from weapons development to surveillance and fraud.
Then, in a statement echoing Isaac Asimov’s laws of robotics, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella chimed in: “Any pursuit of superintelligence has to be grounded in the core principle that if the AI we build is not helping humanity and under human control, it’s not worth pursuing,” he wrote on X.
Microsoft unveiled a draft code of conduct for its in-house AI, requiring future systems to remain open to correction and shutdown, communicate in ways humans can understand and treat violations of the code as failures.
Amid AI’s rapid evolution and the changes it has brought forth, LPs and GPs require a front-row view of technological breakthroughs, which is exactly what we are offering at the Growth, Technology & Private Markets Forum sessions on the second day of the Asia PE-VC Summit 2026 in Singapore next week. Secure your tickets to join us there.
Moving on to other stories that made the headlines:
Interviews and analysis
The Indonesia Investment Authority‘s CEO Oki Ramadhana spoke extensively to DealStreetAsia this week on the wealth fund’s second phase. The wide-ranging interview covered Ramadhana’s views on strategy and investor conviction, portfolio deployment, governance and independence, exits, currency and industrial growth, regional partnerships, future sectors and the mid-market. The CEO will also take part in a fireside chat on the first day (Sept. 23) of the Asia PE-VC Summit 2026.
In another interview, Nitin Gupta of Flexstone Partners said Asian LPs are turning to secondaries either to gain diversified initial exposure to private equity or rebalance existing portfolios. “Secondaries give LPs in the region that have been slow to enter private equity a toehold in the asset class in a more diversified manner. They’re starting to allocate to private equity, but as a first step, they’re doing secondaries,” said Gupta. Flexstone’s recent acquisition of Boston-based Glouston Capital Partners has significantly expanded its US secondary capabilities by strengthening its mid-market offering.
Granite Asia managing partner Ming Eng spoke about the firm’s pan-Asia private credit strategy, Libra Hybrid, which has now crossed its $500-million target. What makes Libra Hybrid interesting is its approach to combining debt-like risk with equity-like upside. The strategy lends to traditional, non-tech-native businesses while drawing on Granite Asia’s private equity heritage. As Eng puts it: “We believe this is the right structure for investing in Asia.”
In an analysis, we looked at how Southeast Asia is emerging as an important destination for Australia’s super funds, which are increasingly looking overseas for investment opportunities. The challenge for AustralianSuper, Aware Super and IFM is not simply finding investments that can generate returns, but finding opportunities large enough to absorb ever-growing pools of capital while maintaining portfolio diversification. The Australian super funds see opportunities in Asian private equity, infrastructure and private credit, but deal size, liquidity, regulation and exit depth are key constraints.
LP-GP news
Singapore-based private equity firm Ikhlas Capital has closed its $370m second fund and attracted a broader set of LPs compared to its debut vehicle. The investors include sovereign wealth funds and family offices across Southeast Asia, including investors from Thailand, Malaysia and Brunei.
Tata Capital Healthcare Fund (TCHF) is currently raising about $261 million for its third fund, with a final close targeted by the middle of next year. The firm reached its first close earlier this year after securing “significant capital”, with many of its existing backers returning for the latest fund.
Vietnamese investment firm 3V Partners and its partner Hanoi Innovation Center (Hanovation) are seeking to raise $300 million for their maiden private equity vehicle to back established local companies. The Vietnam Go Global Fund I (VGG I) is targeting a first close of $50-100 million this year followed by a final close next year.
Goldman Sachs’ asset management said its alternatives unit has raised $11.7 billion across three private equity funds—$9.6 billion for its flagship fund West Street Capital Partners IX, $1.6 billion for its Asia-focused strategy West Street Asia Equity Partners I, and $500 million for related co-investment vehicles.
Neuberger has raised about 70 billion yen ($460 million) for its first dedicated Japan-focused private equity fund, as the investment manager seeks to expand its exposure to the country’s growing buyout market.
Funding and corporate news
Marquee private equity firms, including KKR, EQT and Blackstone, are understood to be vying for a stake as TPG weighs a partial exit in Asia OneHealthcare. The potential secondary transaction is being pursued alongside preparations for a public listing that could value the healthcare platform at around $7.4 billion.
Xora Innovation, a Singapore-based early-stage AI and deep tech venture firm backed by Temasek, has anchored a $53-million seed round in the American enterprise AI services firm Hang Ten Systems, founded by former Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka. Mayfield and Aramco Ventures also participated in the financing.
Peak XV is in early discussions to exit its investment in India’s C2i Semiconductors, less than a month after German chipmaker Infineon Technologies acquired the semiconductor startup. The venture capital firm had led a $15-million Series A funding round in C2i Semiconductors earlier this year.
Green SM, the electric ride-hailing unit of Vietnam’s Vingroup, has rolled out its e-scooters service in Jakarta, adding one more new player to the city’s crowded two-wheeler ride-hailing market, dominated by Grab and Gojek. Meanwhile, Tesla has set up a subsidiary in Vietnam with a charter capital of $3 million, marking a potential commercial presence in one of Southeast Asia’s fast-growing EV markets.
Mynt, the parent of Philippine financial app GCash, has won approval from the Philippine Stock Exchange for a planned initial public offering of up to $1.47 billion, which could become the biggest in the Philippines if offered at the maximum price, eclipsing Monde Nissin’s debut in 2021.
And that’s a wrap for this week. As AI giants introspect on the roll-out of ever more powerful systems, perhaps it’s worth remembering Asimov’s ‘zeroth’ law of robotics: “A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm.” For investors, the bigger question is where the technology is taking capital next. We’ll be digging into that and much more at the Asia PE-VC Summit 2026 in Singapore next week. Hope to see you there.
