Wise appoints first female directors to board

Wise, the fintech formerly known as Transferwise, has added two new female directors, the first women to join the board of the fintech unicorn.

Tan Hooi Ling is co-founder of Grab, a Singaporean ‘super-app’ that started life as a ride-hailing firm. It now offers customers services from food, grocery and parcel delivery to digital payment, insurance and other financial services across eight countries in Southeast Asia.

Also joining is Clare Gilmartin, the former Trainline CEO. Trainline started off as a UK-only app selling rail fares. But now it is live in 45 countries.

The last time Wise expanded its board was in 2019 with Ingo Uytdehaage, CFO at Adyen and David Wells, former Netflix CFO, joining co-founders Taavet Hinrikus, Kristo Käärmann as well as its two of its investors Alex Rampell from Andreessen Horowitz and Roger Ehrenberg from IA Ventures.

Wise, which recently rebranded after 10 years of being known as Transferwise, is expanding both its product offering as well as its geographical footprint. 

The firm’s strategy is to move from being an extremely competitive solution for international money transfers and more towards a holistic banking app offering a range of services from accounts to wealth management.

“Wise is building the world’s most international account, allowing our customers to send, spend and hold money in over 50 currencies, with real bank details and a debit card. Wise Business brings these same benefits to businesses, along with tools that make starting and scaling internationally a lot faster, easier and cheaper, while Wise Platform gives banks and other larger institutions the ability to offer the same Wise experience to their own customers, said Käärmann in a blog post. 

Käärmann also says that Hoo Ling’s experience will help bring Wise to more diverse markets, especially in Asia Pacific.

“Wise is now live in seven markets in the region and we hope to expand this footprint meaningfully in the coming decade,” he said.

Gilmartin, meanwhile, will help Wise scale its operations and services as its product and global audience diversifies. 

With its mission to make money borderless, Wise is striving to build a new global standard for the financial industry, and levelling the playing field for more people and businesses around the world. This is an ambition I share and one that’s particularly close to my heart as someone who lives and works in Southeast Asia where many are financially underserved. I’m excited to join the Wise Board and join them on their journey,”  said Tan Hooi Ling

“Wise is a trailblazer 一 using technology to fundamentally reimagine how we manage our finances in an internet-driven, international world. I’m delighted to have this opportunity to come aboard and contribute to their mission to build a better global standard for the financial industry,”  said Clare Gilmartin.