Grab names SoftBank dealmaker as president - Mobile World Live

Grab names SoftBank dealmaker as president

17 OCT 2016

Grab, Southeast Asia’s most popular ride-hailing app, appointed Ming Maa, a dealmaker at SoftBank and former VP at Goldman Sachs, as president.

Ming, who will be based in Singapore, joins Grab from the Japanese giant, which is also a strategic investor in Grab. He played a key role in overseeing SoftBank’s investments in companies in the ridesharing and e-commerce industries, including SoftBank’s Series D investment in Grab last year and additional Series F investments in September.

Grab raised $750 million from investors in that latest funding round last month, which Bloomberg said was the largest-ever for a Southeast Asian consumer technology company, increasing its valuation to more than $3 billion.

The company plans to expand its services in Southeast Asia at a time when rival Uber has been pulling back in the region.

“Ming is incredibly strategic, and his insights from over a decade of investing in the US and Asia will be of tremendous value as we continue to extend Grab’s market leadership across Southeast Asia,” Anthony Tan, group CEO and co-founder of Grab, said in a statement.

Prior to joining SoftBank, Ming was a principal at Ancora Capital Management in Jakarta and between 2000 and 2012 worked as a VP in Goldman Sachs’ merchant banking division.

Author

Joseph Waring

Joseph Waring joins Mobile World Live as the Asia editor for its new Asia channel. Before joining the GSMA, Joseph was group editor for Telecom Asia for more than ten years. In addition to writing features, news and blogs, he...

Read more

Related

Tags