CANADA

Mastercard has announced the latest recipients of the Mastercard Small Business

Fund. Now in its fourth year, the programme supports women-owned small businesses by providing critical resources to help them scale and succeed. Awarded with a CA $ 10,000 grant, access to resources to fuel business growth and a priceless experience in Toronto offering expert mentorship, community building opportunities and actionable insights, the initiative is designed to help small businesses build for tomorrow. The Mastercard Small Business Fund integrates recipients into a broader ecosystem of cybersecurity support, digital enablement resources and partners to fuel growth.

USA

The Acceleration Project( TAP), a non-profit organisation empowering under-resourced small business owners through high-impact consulting and mentoring, has announced the expansion of its Economic Development and Growth for Entrepreneurs( EDGE) Programme for small business owners, with support from Truist Foundation. Through no-cost coaching, small-group sessions and one-to-one guidance, the EDGE programme provides hands-on support to help small business owners build a stronger financial foundation. It is built around the Financial Health Network’ s FinHealth Score framework, focusing on four key pillars – spending, saving, borrowing and planning – to help entrepreneurs develop stronger financial habits, improve long-term stability and grow their businesses with confidence.

TAIWAN

Acer has announced four new TravelMate business laptops designed to bring the latest performance and AI capabilities to enterprises and small- and medium-sized businesses. The flagship model is the premium TravelMate P6 14 AI, an ultra-lightweight Windows 11 Copilot + PC powered by Intel Core Ultra Series 3 processors with Intel vPro. The new line-up also debuts Acer’ s first commercial laptops powered by the latest Intel Core Series 3 processors – the TravelMate P2 Spin 14, TravelMate X2 15 and TravelMate X2 14 – designed to deliver dependable performance, built-in security, broad compatibility and accessible AI acceleration, helping to reduce fleet downtime, simplify support and maximise employee productivity.

SINGAPORE

Zaihui( Shanghai) Network Technology is helping to drive Digital Transformation across China’ s restaurant industry through its end-to-end digital operations platform. To date, the company has supported more than 43,000 mid-market restaurant operators across 28 provincial-level regions and over 110 cities nationwide. Through digital solutions spanning online operations, community building and influencer matching, Zaihui helps mid-market restaurant businesses gain greater access to customer traffic and compete more effectively with major chain brands. Its goal is to help ambitious small- and medium-sized restaurant owners grow from a single location into enduring brands.

Intelligent SME. tech

33