Blockchain payments company Ripple Appoints MD For Southeast Asia

By Leandra Monteiro

San Francisco- based Ripple has appointed Brooks Entwistle as managing director of Southeast Asia, to lead and scale the company’s operations in its fastest growing region. Brooks joins at an exciting time for RippleNet, which now includes Singapore-based remittance company BKK Forex, adding to Ripple’s fast growing customer base in the region like Siam Commercial Bank, iRemit, DeeMoney and others. BKK Forex joins Ripple’s global financial network to process SME and remittance payments from Singapore to Thailand.

Brooks Entwistle will be based out of Ripple’s Southeast Asia headquarters in Singapore. He brings with him three decades of senior management experience in both the financial services and technology industries. His appointment comes at a time when we the company is deepening and expanding its presence across this region for RippleNet, which includes 14 countries.

Most recently, Brooks led the regional growth strategy as Chief Business Officer (International) at Uber, launching the company into new markets and navigating through regulatory challenges across Asia Pacific. Prior to joining Uber, he spent over two decades at Goldman Sachs, and was partner and chairman of the bank’s Southeast Asia business.

Ripple’s Asheesh Birla, General Manager of RippleNet explained, “Southeast Asia’s payments ecosystem is extremely dynamic with fairly complex, country-specific schemes which require a lot of in-depth knowledge. The adoption of RippleNet among the region’s many fintechs, payments service providers and SMEs makes Southeast Asia our biggest market for both customer demand and transaction growth. We’re excited to welcome Brooks to lead the charge as Ripple doubles down on efforts to further our phenomenal growth in the region.”

“I’m thrilled to join Ripple to scale the company’s footprint in this pivotal region. Having helped build and scale companies across both the financial services and technology industries for the past 30 years, joining an industry leader like Ripple was an obvious choice given the convergence between finance and technology — and even more so in a region that’s at the cusp of accelerating payments innovation. I look forward to leading this talented team as we fuel the future of finance with RippleNet adoption in Southeast Asia and beyond,” shared Entwistle.