SM Investments Corp. (SMIC)-backed PayRex is expanding in the local market with an approach that bypasses the growth-at-all-costs gospel of the financial technology (fintech) sphere. Instead, it favors the unglamorous over the flashy, and resilience over explosive expansion.

Jaime Hing III, co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of PayRex, is driving this strategy, viewing the digital economy not just as a series of transactions, but as a critical infrastructure play for the nation’s future.

Presented with the boardroom scenario of deploying a hypothetical ₱1.26 billion in fresh capital, Hing’s response avoids marketing blitzes or aggressive acquisition targets. Instead, he focuses on the foundation.

Having navigated the volatile waters of the startup scene before, Hing noted that fintech’s priority is building a company that can endure for decades rather than chasing temporary market trends.

For many executives, a ₱1.26 billion windfall represents an opportunity for radical expansion. For Hing, however, the number is staggering because it represents a leap far beyond the typical startup trajectory.

“Actually, I was overwhelmed with the number,” Hing told Manila Bulletin during a virtual interview, noting that PayRex’s actual first major round of venture capital funding was a more modest $2 million, or around ₱120 million.

If given ₱1.26 billion, Hing’s capital allocation strategy would prioritize the less glamorous but vital components of fintech: infrastructure, reliability, and security. Less flashy investments, he added, spare a firm from excessive spending.

“Sometimes, the less glamorous your investments are, the more they help you manage uncertainty,” Hing said.

Hing likewise argued that in the payment space, the primary currency is trust.

“We believe that for fintech, trust is a very important foundation—trust from our merchants that we will take care of their money, and trust from their customers that we will ensure the money we process on their behalf is delivered to the merchant.”

To solidify this trust, a large portion of the capital would be directed toward what he calls “five nines” reliability—an information technology (IT) standard for 99.999 percent uptime. This involves strengthening developer tools, improving payment orchestration, and ensuring merchants receive bank payouts reliably on time.

Beyond uptime, the capital would flow into fraud detection and compliance—sectors often neglected during periods of hyper-growth. Hing believes that if the push for a cashless Philippines is to succeed, it must be safer than the cash-heavy status quo.

“If people are forced to change their behavior and adopt cashless payments, but the system isn’t safe, that would be detrimental to the success of cashless transactions,” Hing asserted. “If there is a crack in that trust, who would trust cashless transactions?”

While PayRex is a young company, a long-term mindset is embedded in its DNA. Hing is no novice; he describes this as his “second rodeo” after co-founding PayMongo, a small and medium enterprise (SME) payments platform.

His departure from his first venture in 2023 was driven by a need to focus on personal family decisions. However, his return to the fintech arena alongside PayRex Co-founder and President Edwin Lacierda was sparked by a desire to build something that provides a “multiplier effect” for the local economy.

Upon his return, Hing asked himself whether he was still okay with payments. The answer was yes—“as long as it’s an infrastructure play,” he said. “I like the idea of building something that serves as a foundation for progress because when you help other businesses succeed, there’s a multiplier effect.”

This perspective allows the executive to focus on resilient growth, moving away from the aggressive expansion models that defined the industry five or six years ago.

“Don’t run a business with a growth-at-all-costs mindset. Focus instead on resilient growth,” Hing said.

This philosophy of operational discipline ensures that capital is not wasted on hype. Instead, Hing pushes for keeping the team lean and maintaining sustainable margins—a lesson hard-won from the peaks and valleys of the global startup ecosystem.

By solving actual problems instead of chasing industry hype, Hing said the goal is to build a company with strong fundamentals that can outlast market cycles and continue creating value over the long term.

PayRex believes that profit and social impact are inextricably linked. Hing noted that evolving global expectations require businesses to align their growth with tangible social benefits, specifically through financial inclusion.

Hing’s definition of inclusion goes beyond simply giving someone a digital wallet; he views it as the democratization of business efficiency. By helping a provincial school automate its tuition collections or assisting a retail merchant with reconciliation, PayRex provides the infrastructure for competitive survival.

“Profitability and inclusion are not necessarily opposing goals. When you reduce the friction and challenges businesses face, you’re also improving access to digital payments,” Hing said, adding that he hopes the company will reach profitability over the next two to three years.

This approach is visible in PayRex’s recent work with the education sector. The CEO pointed out the reality that payment reconciliation remains a tedious process, with enterprises forced to match every transaction to individual orders—sometimes requiring schools to employ personnel dedicated solely to the task.

“True inclusion means giving businesses access to infrastructure that helps them operate more efficiently and competitively,” Hing said. “That requires investment—and using that capital properly so it creates a compounding effect, enabling enterprises to operate more efficiently as well.”

Further, Hing sees the government as a vital partner in this pursuit, noting that while PayRex is funded, the real bottleneck for inclusion is the ease of business registration. He envisions a future where policies are tailored to bring value, much like a well-run business.

Looking two decades into the future, Hing’s vision for the capital he would deploy today transforms PayRex into a financial highway.

Hing envisions a Philippines where “cashless by default” is the standard—not because cash is eliminated, but because digital systems have become so efficient and trustworthy that using physical money feels like an unnecessary hurdle.

“I envision PayRex as the financial highway. If you were to audit the movement of money from one point to another through payments, you’d see that PayRex is the highway processing those transactions,” Hing said.

For the CEO, the ₱1.26 billion deployed today would have matured into a system where payments are “the least of a concern” for a business owner. By removing friction in reconciliation, PayRex seeks to liberate human resources from administrative drudgery, allowing entrepreneurs to focus on the core of their business.