Emerging economies are characterized by the presence of institutional voids which challenge and constrain the behavior of economic agents. In this paper we report on one set of agents, angel investors, in Malaysia, which investors fear is experiencing a middle income trap whereby economic growth and new venture formation stalls due to persistent institutional voids.This research addresses this question through interviews with 19 Malaysian business angel investors in 2015, utilizing a mixed methods approach. Results indicate that business angels in our sample generated strong returns, though they did find it a challenge to invest in and monitor new ventures in a highly uncertain and competitive environment where there is high political uncertainty, weak legal and financial support for investors and SMEs. In order to overcome weak institutional support, business angel investors develop informal institutions by co-investing and networking with family members and government officials. They also conduct careful due diligence before investing and closely monitor their investee companies after investing. This research provides several theory and practice contributions with respect to business-angel investing in emerging economies with weak formal institutional regimes.

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Integrating gamification into mobile payment platform incentivizes people to use digital alternatives for payment and could spur user-centric, platform-mediated interactions. This study examines the relationship between perceived convenience and perceived security on individual users’ intention to use a gamified mobile payment platform in Malaysia; a developing country envisioned to build a cashless society. The partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) technique is employed on a final sample of 388 online users. The results show that perceived convenience has a strong but indirect effect on the intention to use. Perceived security has a strong and direct effect on intention to use and mediates the relationship between perceived convenience and intention to use. Furthermore, the reliability aspect of security is a top priority concern for users interested in using mobile payment. The multi-functional aspect of convenience is a top priority concern to attract users who are not interested in using mobile payment at first. The study discusses theoretical and practical implications for developing a dual strategy of ‘ensuring convenience’ and ‘assuring security’ to encourage the gamified mobile payment platform adoption in developing countries.

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Freedom, choice, and simplicity brought about by the e-commerce and technologies are creating the next internet and mobile wave. The single platform e-payment interactions have emerged in the consumer-centric world. The combination of evolving business drivers, globalization, downsizing, changing customer demands, and the evolution of enabling technology is constructing the customer-centric e-payment solutions. In this chapter, the authors discuss and analyze the e-commerce payment systems with the focus on single platform e-payment. This chapter presents an empirical study of e-payment systems and the implications of the findings on e-payment systems in Southeast Asia. Marketing and management personnel of the e-payment organizations will be able to utilize the study information for developing products and services that encourage the usage of single platform e-payment.