Private funding has inched upward, rising 15% to $ 7.7 billion over the past 12 months, a cautious recovery that still sits roughly 70% below the 2021 peak. While momentum has returned, the rebound trails the global pace of PE/VC activity, which grew by 25% over the same timeframe.

Interestingly, digital financial services have now become the clear focal point for investors. They captured the lion’s share of funding, drawing 45% to 50% of total deal value in the past 12 months, a sharp incline from about 30% in the previous period.

5. SEA Leads the World in Finance App Adoption

Southeast Asia is outpacing global peers in digital financial adoption, driven by a robust fintech ecosystem and rising consumer confidence in digital financial service platforms. Singapore mirrors the behaviour of other mature markets, with diverse usage and strong traction.

Across the rest of the region, where banked penetration remains lower, the landscape tends to be dominated by a small number of large players.

6. Over $2.3 billion invested in AI-related SEA startups

SEA is quickly becoming a hotspot for global AI giants, with rising investments in cloud infrastructure and data centres. Yet the region still captures only around 2% of global cumulative capital flowing into AI startups, despite accounting for about 4% of global GDP.

While there are 680+ AI startups in SEA, Singapore remains the region’s AI nerve centre, home to the majority of its startups. Notably, the AI companies attracting the most VC interest are those built with a global outlook from day one. In a recent CNBC interview, Fock Wai Hoong, the Southeast Asia Head of Temasek, shared,

“There are close to 700 AI startups across Southeast Asia, and they’ve actually garnered a very significant portion of funding capacity that has been flowing into the markets.”

AI-driven startups now account for more than 30% of all funding, with many positioning AI as a core feature across their products and services.

7. Why SEA’s Unique Mix Will Shape AI Adoption

SEA is home to one of the world’s most digitally engaged populations, creating a large and receptive user base primed for rapid AI adoption. Its leading superapps, built as integrated ecosystems offering a widespread range of digital services, deliver unmatched distribution channels for scaling AI-driven products.

Sapna Chadha, Vice President of Southeast Asia and South Asia Frontier of Google Asia Pacific, explained in her opening remarks of the report,

“Now, we stand at the dawn of a new era, and that era is defined by one thing: AI.”

But success in this region demands true hyper-personalisation. ASEAN’s linguistic and cultural landscape is one of the most complex globally, with more than 1200 living languages across the ten member countries and around 350 distinct ethnic minorities, triple that of the EU.

This diversity requires AI models to account for nuance, context and cultural specificity from the outset.

8. Singapore Leads With $1.31B in AI Funding, Digital Finance Gains Momentum

Singapore has strengthened its position as Southeast Asia’s AI investment hub, drawing $1.31 billion in private AI funding between H2 2024 and H1 2025, 55% of all ASEAN-10 AI investment. Revenue from apps marketing AI features almost doubled over the same period, reflecting strong commercial traction.

AI adoption is now deeply embedded in everyday behaviour. 65% of users interact with AI tools daily, and 89% are willing to grant data access to AI agents. This high level of trust makes Singapore an attractive launch market for agentic AI and AI-powered financial products.

Digital financial services are also progressing steadily, with clear momentum across payments, lending, wealth, and insurance. The graphic below highlights this trajectory.

Within the sector, Singapore’s digital banks are narrowing losses and carving out sustainable niches in SME banking and micro-consumer credit through ecosystem partnerships and data-driven loan underwriting.

9. Digital Wealth Platforms Gain Momentum Across SEA

Users are increasingly gravitating toward digital wealth platforms for their lower fees, seamless onboarding, and clear, easy-to-understand product offerings.

A common playbook has emerged: acquiring customers with high-yield cash management products, then gradually upselling them into higher-risk investment portfolios as balances grow.

To deepen engagement and differentiate value, leading platforms are offering fractional shares, curated thematic portfolios, automatic macro-driven rebalancing, multi-market access, and other specialised features.

Several players are now turning profitable, and multiple digital wealth startups have surpassed $1 billion in AUM, driven largely by effective upselling and continuous product innovation.

10. SEA Needs Its Own Path to Agentic Payments

While global card networks are racing to enable agentic payments, Southeast Asia cannot simply inherit those models. The region actually runs on ewallets, interoperable QR codes, and national payment rails, each built differently across its markets.

This creates a unique opening for SEA players to shape agentic payments on their own terms.

By leveraging digital ID systems and aligning regulatory frameworks, SEA nations are well-positioned to build agentic-ready infrastructure that reflects how its people pay.

Instead of retrofitting card-based models, the region can design agentic layers directly on top of instant payments, real-time authorisation, and wallet ecosystems.

If done right, SEA could define what agentic payments look like in an ewallet-first world.