Flush with capital after a $26 million Series A funding round, Singapore-headquartered Beam Mobility is set to expand in five other markets where it operates: Malaysia, Australia, New Zealand, Korea and Taiwan.

The company, which announced its latest funding round earlier this month, is receiving the capital in tranches. Based on share allotment data compiled by DealStreetAsia’s DATA VANTAGE database this week, the company has raised $40.5 million in paid-up capital since January last year, of which $18 million was secured in the last 12 months.

Beam is currently valued at $113.8 million, per its latest highest preference share price.

Hana Ventures owns the largest stake in the company at 39.1%, followed by founders Deb Sekhar Gangopadhyay (16%) and Alan Julian Jian (10.6%). Sequoia Capital India is Beam’s second-largest institutional investor.

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Shareholders of Beam Mobility Pte. Ltd.

Beam plans to roll out new features to keep parked scooters safe to minimise vehicle loss, while also introducing online training to ensure rider and pedestrian safety.

As micro-mobility grows more popular in Asia, a series of accidents has prompted regulators to enforce more stringent regulation.

Indonesia unveiled one of the most stringent regulations last year, demanding users to be at least 12 years of age and limiting speed to 6 kilometres per hour.

In Australia, one of the most e-scooter-friendly nations, Beam is competing with fellow Singaporean company Neuron Mobility, which won a tender to supply Brisbane with micro-mobility vehicles. In May, Neuron announced its expansion to Canada.

Price crunch

Electric mobility may become a victim of its own success. Lithium prices have continued to rise on the back of demand for lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries.

Fitch Solutions expects lithium prices to trend higher at least until next year as accelerating demand for Li-ion batteries and a tight upstream supply keeps prices high. Fitch forecasts Chinese lithium carbonate to average $13,450 per tonne this year and $15,025 per tonne next year, more than double from $6,375 per tonne in 2020.

Affordability will continue to overshadow the adoption of electric vehicles. A study published in March by Deloitte finds that the switch from fossil fuel to EV is often perceived to be “expensive” due to the higher cost of batteries.

A majority of consumers in Southeast Asia are still not willing to pay more to choose EV over vehicles with internal combustion engines, the study shows.

Consumers’ expected EV price range after incentives

For example, in Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest car and motorcycle market, the purchasing capacity of most middle-income consumers for a four-wheeler is about 300 million rupiah ($21,400), which is significantly lower than the price of a mid-size electric car at about 800 million rupiah.

Indonesia seeks to remedy the situation by luring global manufacturers to set up production plants in the country. As an incentive, the government has slashed the luxury tax on full-EVs to zero and plans to also eliminate the tax on hybrids from 5% at present.

Other updates by Singapore-registered companies

Following the exit of Lazada’s president Jessica Liu in late May, two more members of the Alibaba-owned company have resigned, filings submitted to Singapore’s Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) last week show.

Two new Alibaba appointments were also made to replace the departing executives. Lazada has seen a string of senior-level exits in recent years, following its acquisition by Alibaba in 2016.

Singapore-headquartered fintech firm C88 Financial Technologies allotted new shares to three of its existing shareholders last week worth a combined 2.6% stake in the company (details available to DATA VANTAGE subscribers). The company, which owns and operates Southeast Asia’s financial e-commerce websites such as CekAja and Premiro in Indonesia and eCompareMo in the Philippines, has raised $122.8 million to date.

Tip Biosystems, the maker of innovative spectrophotometers under the Photopette brand, has issued new shares worth close to $100,000 so far this year, bringing its total paid-up capital to $4.2 million.

SaaS startup ServiceQuik, the company behind SME business management software Zing, has raised over $700,000 this year and welcomed new shareholders last week, ACRA filings show.