Airwallex

Airwallex is a global cross-border payments and financial platform founded in Melbourne in 2015 by four Chinese-Australian entrepreneurs, including CEO Jack Zhang and president Lucy Liu. It provides businesses with multi-currency accounts, global acquiring, foreign exchange, corporate cards, and embedded finance solutions, positioning itself as a "financial operating system" for companies operating across borders .

The company took a deliberately capital-intensive path early on: it absorbed losses for roughly its first four years to build out a proprietary global payment network and acquire local licenses, rather than pursuing regional profitability sooner . This strategy has resulted in one of the most extensive regulatory footprints in fintech—over 80 licenses and permits across 60+ jurisdictions as of late 2025, supporting real-time or near-real-time payments in more than 90 countries .

Airwallex's business model has shifted significantly over time. Initially focused on Chinese cross-border e-commerce and SaaS clients, it has since broadened to serve global enterprises headquartered outside China; by 2025, Europe and the Americas accounted for roughly 30% of revenue, with the broader Asia-Pacific region at 70%, while mainland China and Hong Kong had fallen below 50% . Its partnership with Visa—being Visa's earliest fintech issuing partner in Asia-Pacific—has also become a material revenue driver, with co-branded cards contributing nearly 30% of total revenue .

Financially, Airwallex has scaled rapidly: annualized revenue exceeded $7.2 billion by March 2025 and surpassed $10 billion by October 2025, with annualized transaction volume crossing $235 billion . The company raised $300 million in May 2025 at a $6.2 billion valuation, followed by $330 million in December 2025 at $8 billion, and reportedly reached an $11 billion valuation by mid-2026 . It counts Sequoia China, Tencent, DST Global, Salesforce Ventures, and Visa Ventures among its backers, and has drawn strategic investment from U.S. and European institutions including Addition and T. Rowe Price .

More recently, Airwallex has leaned into AI infrastructure for finance—supporting Chinese large-model companies such as Kimi, MiniMax, Zhipu, and DeepSeek with specialized billing and payment architectures, and launching products like its AI assistant Kai and AgentOS to automate treasury and expense workflows . It is also establishing a second global headquarters in San Francisco, with plans to double its U.S. team to over 400 and invest more than $1 billion in the American market between 2026 and 2029 .