Visa bolsters support for SMBs globally and across APEC

By Gloria Mathias

Visa Foundation has pledged $100 million to support underserved and women-led SMBs in APEC economies over five years. Visa announced it has exceeded its three-year goal of digitally enabling 50 million SMBs globally by June 2023 and has now helped nearly 67 million SMBs.

Visa and Visa Foundation have made several announcements related to their ongoing commitment to support small and micro businesses (SMBs) across APEC and the world.

To deepen its support for global SMBs, Visa launched a new initiative to further accelerate the digital enablement of underserved SMBs in the United States and developing economies, with an initial focus on APEC economies including Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, the Philippines, and Vietnam.

Visa and Visa Foundation made these announcements as part of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum Economic Leaders and CEO Summit hosted by the United States.

To accelerate access for underserved and women-led SMBs in APEC economies, the Visa Foundation seeks to advance digital financial inclusion, stimulate job creation, and increase access to capital to drive economic mobility. Through this pledge, the Foundation will collaborate with and complement the work of local partners to drive access for underserved communities.

Recognising the critical needs of SMBs, Visa announced new SMB accelerator initiatives in the United States and more than 15 developing economies. In the economies where Visa will focus, cash still accounts for most of the ways businesses and individuals buy and sell, and much of the population does not have access to digital payments.

“Small businesses are anything but small to Visa. Over the past three years, we’ve seen them shift from leveraging digital payments to survive to now harnessing the power of digital to improve efficiency and reach new customers,” said Alfred F. Kelly, Jr., Executive Chairman at Visa, and Co-Chair of the APEC CEO Summit 2023.

These expanded SMB accelerator initiatives will also focus on a wider set of partnerships with ecosystem participants that serve smaller sellers and seek to fast-track solution deployment for SMBs.