Bringing Together Great Minds, Visionary Partners, and Next-Gen Technology: Oriente

Today, the lack of affordable credit, even for the salaried middle-class, is a trillion-dollar problem. It is the result of a broken financial system that has undervalued millions of people. Credit should always be used as a tool for progress and opportunity rather than a weapon against it, and Oriente firmly believes in that.

Oriente was established in 2017 by the co-founders of revolutionary internet companies Skype and LU.com who saw an opportunity to build a better, more equitable financial system for underserved consumers in Asia’s fastest-growing economies. Its secret sauce is its way of developing meaningful digital solutions designed to democratize access to financial services. Oriente partners with companies that share its vision of a future that is financially fair and inclusive, and it’s proud to have forged strategic partnerships with the largest, most diversified and respected local conglomerates in Indonesia and the Philippines.

Building a Future Accessible To All

Oriente is committed to unlock a future where millions of underserved people have access to the credit infrastructure and services they deserve. It brings together highly successful teams with a wealth of experience working in emerging markets. Leveraging cutting-edge technology and data-science combined with our strategic partnerships and their resources, the firm builds bespoke-to-market financial solutions that put more people in control of their financial lives.

It is building the largest and most innovative financial services company in Asia’s fastest-growing economies. Oriente’s mobile-first solutions are designed to unlock financial freedom and opportunity for unbanked and underserved people and ignite the economic potential of our merchant partners by enabling access to credit affordably, easily and timely.

Financial Solutions Designed To Democratize Access to Credit

Oriente dedicates its product success to its people and the technology. Its team is highly talented and is always excited to take risks. Together with them, Oriente brings the best global talent - in technology (AI, blockchain, data science), in finance (asset management, banking, credit, private equity), in operations (retail, sales, support), in alternative credit (micro-finance, consumer lending).

Oriente’s products are built using proprietary, next-generation technology to put more power in its customer’s hands – unlocking their potential and enabling greater economic freedom and opportunity. The company says that being local and collaborative is at the core of their quest to deliver the most complete suite of smart financial services tailored specifically for people in emerging Asia’s fastest growing economies.

Its products are bespoke to each market and designed locally to bring greater access and equality to millions of financially underserved consumers and MSMEs - empowering them to do more. It is creating a new infrastructure using next-gen technology: purpose-built to serve consumers wherever they are, offline and online, through a range of lending products and services. These include powerful app-based, O2O (offline-to-online) and POS financing solutions.

• Philippines - Oriente’s first venture is a mobile-app that gives unbanked and undeserved customers and micro-entrepreneurs access to credit and offline-online (O2O) financing on-demand, using hundreds of alternative data points.
• Indonesia - Its second venture is a consumer lending mobile-app that empowers underbanked consumers and MSMEs with access to convenient and secure financing solutions.

Meet the Leading Light

Hubert Shio-Hsien Tai, Chief Executive Officer

Hubert is a seasoned executive with over 20 years of professional experience in scaling internet-based ventures into successful companies across markets in Asia and the US. A true believer in using internet/mobile technology and big data to create solutions that deliver affordable credit to underbanked societies, Hubert co-founded Oriente to bring greater financial inclusion to Southeast Asia’s fastest-growing economies. As CEO, he leads all teams and efforts focused on business expansion, operations, marketing and product development. 

Before this, Hubert was a founding member of LU.com where he also served as COO and CTO between 2011 and 2016. At LU.com he led overall platform development and grew the business from a P2P platform to become the biggest online wealth management platform in China. Under his leadership, the customer-base grew to over 20 million with USD 40 billion in assets under management. As of the last round of funding in 2016, LU.com had a valuation of USD 18.5 billion. From 2006 to 2011, Hubert served as the CTO of dangdang.com, leading the technology and logistics operation. Here he was responsible for transforming the company to become China’s first profitable B2C e-commerce company. He managed their listing on the NYSE on 8 December 2010 at an IPO valuation of USD 2.3 billion. 

Earlier, at the start of his highly successful career, he held senior technical positions at Accenture, eBay.com, and Oracle in the US, and with Yahoo! in Hong Kong. He was among the first 100 employees at eBay.com. Being part of the first wave of internet pioneers since 1998, he has been passionate about revolutionizing business using cutting-edge technology. 

Hubert has a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and a Master's of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

“At Oriente, we see and do things differently, challenging the status quo every step of the way. We are creating the largest and most innovative financial services company built around the principles of inclusion and innovation specifically for Asia’s fastest-growing economies.”