Southeast Asia’s rapid digital growth is creating major opportunities for high-growth enterprises, but when it comes to managing cross-border payments, many businesses are still held back by fragmented infrastructure, currency complexities, and inefficient payment processing systems.
Cross-border payments remain a critical barrier to regional scale, especially for companies operating across multiple currencies and regulatory environments.
Ershad Ahamed, newly appointed Head of Southeast Asia at Airwallex, speaks about how the fintech company is tackling these challenges through enterprise payment solutions that are scalable, integrated, and built for regional expansion.
Drawing on his experience at Grab and Rakuten, Ershad shares how Airwallex is helping companies streamline their multi-currency transactions, reduce FX costs, and gain more control over their payment infrastructure.
Q1: Ershad, congratulations on the new role. What excites you most about leading Airwallex in Southeast Asia?
Ershad Ahamed: Thanks very much! Southeast Asia is one of the most dynamic, fragmented and high-growth regions in the world – and that makes it incredibly exciting for a fintech like Airwallex.
We’re here to help fast-growing enterprises navigate the complexity of receiving payments and moving money across markets with speed, scale, and simplicity.
Q2: Tell us about yourself and your professional experience so far.
Ershad: I’ve been fortunate to work across some of the most exciting growth stories in tech and consumer.
I’m based in Singapore, and over the years I’ve held regional and market-level leadership roles across Southeast Asia.
Most recently, I was with Grab, where I served as Chief Commercial Officer for GrabFin in Indonesia and Regional Head of Payments Acquiring.
I helped scale their payments and lending business across multiple markets.
Before that, I led growth, marketing, and go-to-market efforts at Rakuten, and started my career at Procter & Gamble.
Across all these roles, what’s driven me is the challenge of building impactful, scalable solutions that deliver real value for customers.
Q3: What have you been busy with since joining Airwallex?
Ershad: It’s been quite an eventful and productive few months.
Besides learning all about Airwallex and our suite of products, I’ve gotten occupied almost right away.
I’ve been meeting with our existing customers, engaging prospects, and being present at industry events and conferences to represent Airwallex and deepen our connections across the ecosystem.
Within a month or so after joining, I hosted a press briefing in Singapore, where I shared updates on how Airwallex is performing both locally and across the region, and highlighted findings from a recent SME survey we commissioned, alongside Reuben Lim, CEO of the Singapore Fintech Association.
Most recently, I spoke at GITEX Asia on a topic close to my heart – scaling cross-border payments in Asia.
We also had a booth at the event, which was a great way to engage directly with founders, operators, and enterprise leaders.
Q4. What are some challenges enterprises face and asking you to solve?
Ershad: A common frustration we hear is the complexity of managing payments across multiple markets – different currencies, systems, timelines, and providers.
Enterprises often end up stitching together fragmented solutions, which slows them down and drives up costs.
What they really want is a simpler, more integrated way to move money – and that’s exactly where Airwallex comes in.
Q5: There’s been a lot of buzz around embedded finance and virtual cards – but what’s Airwallex’s unique angle when it comes to enterprise payments?
Ershad: What really sets us apart is our ability to support the entire payment value chain – especially for enterprise merchants operating across borders.
Think: acquiring, holding, settling, issuing, and paying out – all within one infrastructure.
We’ve built a cross-border acquiring solution that’s optimised for high-growth industries like travel, e-commerce, SaaS and regional marketplaces.
Local acquiring in multiple countries powered by our 60+ licenses and permits means merchants see higher success rates at checkout, reduced operational complexity, and reduced cross-border fees.
Most other providers can only settle in USD or SGD, whereas we support like-for-like settlements in 14 local currencies.
Once again, this dramatically reduces FX costs and the finance team’s workload.
Q6: Can you walk us through a typical enterprise use case?
Ershad: Absolutely. Take a regional online travel agency (OTA) that operates across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.
They want to accept local card payments in each market, settle those payments in the same currency to avoid unnecessary conversions, and then issue virtual cards to pay airlines or hotel suppliers.
Today they are having to work with different payment processors in each country, which adds immense operational load, and sometimes also work directly with various payment methods if these payment processors do not support said payment methods. This is a fragmented nightmare for the client.
However, with Airwallex, they can:
• Accept local card payments via our acquiring solution
• Have access to 160+ local payment methods globally
• Hold and settle those funds in SGD, MYR, THB or VND
• Issue virtual cards for supplier payments
• And make payouts in over 150+ countries globally
That’s a huge step up from cobbling together multiple providers or being forced to convert everything into USD and end up with double conversions for each pay-in and payout.
Q7: Where do you see the most urgent demand coming from?
Ershad: We’re seeing a lot of momentum from travel businesses, regional tech companies in e-commerce and healthtech, and even MNCs, such as ones in traditional insurance, who are scaling regionally and globally.
These are organisations that want fewer intermediaries, better reconciliation, and more control over their payment stack.
Q8: Final thoughts?
Ershad: Enterprise businesses today are looking for more than just payment processing – they want partners who can simplify operations, improve margins, and help them expand globally.
That’s the space Airwallex plays in, and I’m excited to grow that footprint here in Southeast Asia.
Featured image: Ershad (left) sharing updates on the findings from the Airwallex SG SME Survey 2025 alongside Reuben Lim from the Singapore Fintech Association
