Melissa Ho joins QED Investors focusing on Southeast Asia fintech investments

KUALA LUMPUR: QED Investors, a leading global venture capital firm focused on investing in disruptive financial services companies, has announced the hire of Melissa Ho.

She joins QED as a principal focusing on fintech investments across multiple stages in Southeast Asia, with an emphasis on early stage companies.

“Mel is passionate about working closely with the companies she invests in and has a sense of humility and realism which takes her a long way there.

“She is a driven and energetic investor and a determined and intentional partner. Her diverse breadth of experiences and depth with the Singapore and Southeast Asia ecosystem will be brilliant additions to QED as we advance to help founders at the earliest stage of their journeys and build our on-ground presence in Asia,” said QED Investors Partner and Head of Asia, Sandeep Patil in a statement.

Previously, Ho led the investment team at Wavemaker Partners, one of Southeast Asia’s leading seed venture capital (VC) funds investing in enterprise, deep tech and sustainability companies, and was responsible for the Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Bangladesh markets, plus the primary verticals of Software as a Service (SaaS), business-tobusiness (B2B) marketplaces, proptech, edtech, commerce and consumer internet.

She started her career at Singapore Airlines where she gained operational experience across product innovation and management, corporate strategy, as well as fuel procurement and hedging.

Before transitioning to VC, she founded and led the regional marketing, partnerships team at Shopee, Southeast Asia’s largest ecommerce firm.

Ho graduated Summa Cum Laude with a B.A. in international relations and economics from New York University.

Founded in 2007, QED Investors based in the United States, has invested in more than 200 companies, including 28 unicorns, and has US$4.3 billion under management. (US$1