Credit check system scores in Cambodia

The Cambodian deal will get more lucrative as the economy grows. Photo / Thinkstock

Auckland technology that creates comprehensive credit profiles is hitting the mark with officials in Cambodia's first credit bureau.

Veda Advantage announced yesterday that it had won a global tender to provide the credit-check systems and take a 49 per cent stake in the Cambodian agency.

A credit bureau provides credit information on prospective borrowers for money lenders.

Veda Advantage managing director John Roberts says foreign banks are keen to pour money into Cambodia, but need a standardised form of credit assessment before making financial decisions.

That's where Veda's software comes in.

The company's technology searches and pools information from a variety of sources and pieces it together to create a business' credit profile.

The Cambodian deal is initially worth $2 million, but will get more lucrative as the economy grows.

"The way it works is that every time there is a [credit] inquiry, you get paid. So of course as credit demand in the economy grows, so does the usage of the bureau, as do the fees [Veda receives]," Roberts said.

The move into Cambodia is Veda's fourth foray into Asia and the Middle East in the past eight years.

In 2002, it sold software in Singapore in a joint development to build a consumer credit bureau for the Bankers Association of Singapore.

It has also established a bureau for the Central Bank of Malaysia and for the Central Bank of Saudi Arabia.

These operations are supported on a daily basis by Veda's Auckland staff.

Roberts said each new contract created more momentum for the company, which hoped to have success next in Indonesia and the Philippines.

"They're the two other opportunities in that part of the world and from a population point of view they're enormous markets."

Besides the opportunities in emerging economies, Roberts said Veda was also making ground in some mature markets and had been talking to the People's Bank of China.