How Nuren Group, Fave, and DahMakan are shaking up the Malaysian digital marketplace ecosystem

As with all traditional forms of trade, when it comes to eCommerce it is important to gauge consumer behaviour. This ranges from what consumers want to what consumers need, and bridging those interest points with capturing a market that’s actually willing to make a purchase.

This is the beauty of eCommerce: it revitalises conventional markets by introducing new and innovative ways to deliver products and services anchored on wants and needs. More importantly, eCommerce puts these products and services in a digital platform, making it accessible and convenient to use.

In the attempt to harness the power of digital as a means of powering Malaysia’s growing economy, three startups are coming up with ways to innovate the marketplace through smart solutions and to revolutionise customer experience.

Digital platforms enable businesses to cut costs and offer goods affordably

One problem that’s being solved by a startup is the need for healthy meals amid a fast-paced and busy lifestyle. Because of society’s growing demands, people have less and less time to prepare food for their daily meals. DahMakan, a startup from Malaysia, seeks to solve this problem by providing hassle-free, high quality everyday meals to make people’s lives easier.

They achieve this by delivering affordable and ready-to-eat meals at the push of a button through their purely digital platform, cutting out traditional F&B business costs. This allows them to regulate their prices and make sure their products stay affordable.

“Starting in Malaysia was the best choice we made. There is so much support from the ecosystem and people are generally curious and super supportive of new ideas and concepts. Malaysia is truly outstanding compared to the many other countries I’ve visited,” said Jonathan Weins, CEO and co-founder of DahMakan.

Weins credits much of his success to the collaborative help he has received from various entities. He enthusiastically adds, “the ecosystem and government linked organisations such as Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) are doing an outstanding job, and we are excited about the many upcoming initiatives!”

Also read: How Malaysia helps bolster the less glamourous side of tech

DahMakan has expanded to Thailand with their Thai office growing twice as fast as the one in Malaysia. Weins said, “The best way to deal with cultural differences and customer types has been to approach a new country with a completely open mind and without any assumptions.”

The food delivery startup was part of Y Combinator’s summer 2017 programme – the first-ever Malaysian company to participate in Y Combinator. It has since raised $1.3 million seed round in 2017, and a $2.6 million pre-series A in February this year.

He added, “we are about to close another funding round which will give us additional capital to continue attracting incredible talent, and to make high quality food accessible for everyone.”

Important for startups to have a strong sense of identity

Another thriving Malaysian startup is the Nuren Group, the largest female engagement platform in Southeast Asia.

Guiding women through their journeys of wedding and motherhood, Nuren Group operates content-driven marketplaces, which enable thousands of small, medium, and large global brands to sell their products and services. On top of that, they also run digital content and activation campaigns with their community of female influencers and celebrities.

The idea behind the company was simple: three years ago, they started as a wedding platform. But as their customers aged and shifted to different interest points (from wedding to motherhood), they knew there was an untapped market waiting to be addressed.

Their platform allows the company to retain existing clientele through a simple paradigm shift. What had to be consistent was making sure that their products and services always empowered women and catered intrinsically to their best interests.

“There are many opportunities and challenges ahead for eCommerce. Domestic players are facing competition from marketplaces that heavily subsidised and offer cross border cheaper OEM products. Merchants and platforms like us will have to master the combination of showrooming and webrooming, events, product demos, in-store experiences – focusing on after sale customer service,” said Petrina Goh, CEO and co-founder of the Nuren Group.

“We also foresee ecommerce companies that use data to predict consumer spending and trend setting to perform above the peers,” she added.

Nuren Group currently maintains a solid community of over 1,000,000 moms, 5,000 wedding businesses and 1,000 baby’s and children’s brands. With their regional presence in Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand, they are assessing borderless transactions that enable their sellers to sell and fulfill across the countries.

Supporting the “old” by harnessing the new

The third startup we spoke to doesn’t appear to fit the eCommerce model that we know, but they are also certainly revolutionising the market in their own unique way.

Fave is a startup that focuses on helping offline businesses to succeed, by bringing them to new customers (Fave Deals), retain their existing customers (FavePay, Fave stamp cards), and reengage customers who haven’t come back to their stores, as well as leverage on their customers’ behaviour, trend and demographics. In addition, Fave provides comprehensive merchant solutions (FaveBiz) to enhance their understanding their businesses, and drive further growth.

Essentially, Fave digitally optimises brick and mortar retail stores that do not have the understanding and the capacity to digitalise their business practices. Doing this helps offline businesses to take advantage of data and tech in gathering new customers and retain old ones.

“It’s been great experience so far. We have built up a team of 200 people in Malaysia where all our products, technology, innovation, data, and so forth are performed from Malaysia for the region,” said Chen Chow Yeoh, co-founder of Fave, which has expanded its brand to Singapore, Indonesia, and built some presence in the Philippines, and Hong Kong.

“MDEC has been instrumental in helping us through this journey, especially in facilitating the process to enable us to bring in quality knowledge workers to join the team here, and make Malaysia our hub,” he added.

As of today, Fave is doing over 100 million USD worth of sales per year within its first two years of starting up. They are currently gunning to find breakthroughs that will score them their first billion-dollar sale.

Next steps for Malaysia’s eCommerce

All three startups agree that some work still needs to be done. Goh said Malaysia could provide more support through projects, endorsements, and recognition. “There should also be more collaborations or partnerships between conglomerates and startups to support innovation and growth,” she added.

This sentiment is echoed by Weins who believes that better terms should be made between investors and startups. He said the current investment frameworks tended to be unfair, which reflects poorly on how money is being funnelled into businesses – and the kind of businesses that are willing to accept those investments.

Also read: Navigating through Southeast Asia’s startup industry the Malaysian way

“Investment terms should be standardised, similar to other global ecosystems. I have heard from other entrepreneurs in Malaysia about very ‘erroneous’ terms from investors. We have to change this mindset here regarding this,” said Weins.

Yeoh on the other hand thinks there should be more industry-relevant academic training for tech-based professionals at a university level. He believes this would help the pool of talent in Malaysia become more ‘startup aware.’

Ultimately, all three startups are happy with many things that they have experienced in the Malaysian framework. Much of their success derives from support received from other startups in the ecosystem, as well as government-sponsored initiatives under MDEC’s helm.

This paints to a hopeful future for Malaysia’s startup ecosystem, and consequently enhances the positive view of the nation’s vibrant digital economy bolstered by its eCommerce sector.

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Patients can check clinic crowd and queue online, and receive queue notifications via text messages, in the comforts of their home

On a fine day, when his baby fell ill, Online Travel Agency (OTA) veteran Frederick Wong took him to a clinic to consult the doctor. Upon reaching the clinic after travelling more than 30 minutes, he found himself squeezed in the huge crowd. Wong had to wait for more than two hours before his turn came.

“There was no way for me to be informed on the queue status beforehand,” Wong tells me. “It was particularly baffling to me as to why this problem exists even today. So, I set out and committed to solving this problem once and for all.”

Wong started ClickClinic in Singapore in late 2017. ClickClinic is a web-based real-time online queue and notification platform for clinics. Patients can check clinic crowd and queue online and receive queue notifications via text messages. It tells you how many patients are waiting for the doctor, so you can make better planning.

Also Read: 10 social impact startups in Southeast Asia that caught our attention in 2018

“You can get a queue online for yourself and your loved ones without having to be at the clinic. We will send you real-time queue status notifications so you can stroll nearby the clinic vicinity at ease,” adds Wong, who previously worked at companies like OctopusTravel, Travelocity, and Expedia.

ClickClinic launched its first pilot in October this year. Wong claims currently it has a total of five clinics on board and has over 2,000 registered users.

“We recently on-boarded Island Family Clinic, which operates five clinics in Singapore. Thousands of their patients can now check their clinic crowd, get an online queue in the comfort of their home, and receive queue notifications nearer to their turn,” explains Wong, who until recently led the APAC business of OTA company TrustYou.

According to Wong, there are quite a few online doctor booking platforms in Singapore to help patients bypass long queues in clinics, but the majority of them are appointment and app-based.

“ClickClinic, on the other hand, is solving the problems of clinics. For our small market, there are over 20 million queue based visits per year. This does not include the queue-based specialists such as paediatricians, traditional Chinese medicines, vets and other queue-based alternative care providers,” he says. “Also, we find that is is not necessary to build an app for our use case, as it creates more friction than a web-based solution.”

ClickClinic considers itself a QaaS (Queue-As-A-Service), and charges an annual subscription fee from its clinic partners. The web app is free for the end customers.

“We are currently focused on growing in Singapore. Having said that, we already have enquiries coming from clinics in our neighbouring country,” he claims.

Talking about the challenges in the industry, Wong says that onboarding customers and training them is an arduous task. “B2B services require onboarding and training that I have very limited capacity. We can only grow as fast as I can onboard and train.”

Also Read: Doctor scheduling and healthcare news portal GetDoc raises US$1.6M to expand to Thailand

Bootstrapped so far, the venture is now seeking funding to grow quickly and aggressively. “Our product is now proven and scaling is now the priority for us. Hopefully, we will be able to get a good investor partner soon,” he signs off.

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According to Chao Cheng-Shorland, Co-founder and CEO of ShelterZoom, Government will allocate resources and funding to accelerate blockchain projects and solve real problems

The concept of blockchain and cryptocurrency gained a lot of attention in 2018. Hundreds of companies new cropped up in these two segment, while some integrated blockchain with their products and tweaked the business model to disrupt the industry they are operating in. Cryptocurrencies also got a lot of eyeballs .

According to Chao Cheng-Shorland, Co-founder and CEO of ShelterZoom, a blockchain-based, real estate purchase and rental platform, 2019 will most certainly see a continuation of this trend and disruption.

In this article, she makes five predictions for 2019:

1- More people will build their business models on blockchain

The slow pace blockchain spending in previous years will change in 2019. Due to the growing consensus of blockchain’s potential impact in major areas of business – and proof of development – more corporate leaders and entrepreneurs will venture into building their business models on blockchain. As reported by PwC, on an individual basis, most firms have spent less than US$500,000 on blockchain. However, a solid 11 per cent of the survey’s respondents have spent more than US$10 million.

Also Read: The extraordinary tale of a Filipino geek who swam against the odds in life

Blockchain is offering not just the technology to build on, but also a reduction and streamlining of operations that incorporates speed and accuracy. Because of this, more companies will allocate additional funds to blockchain in the next few years. International Data Corporation expects annual blockchain spending to reach almost US$12 billion by 2022. More projects will build their business models on blockchain and a “snowball effect” will ensue.

2- Government will allocate resources and funding to accelerate blockchain projects and solve real problems

Governments will continue to take notice of the advantages that blockchain is offering. Although many governments are skeptical of the applications of blockchain and cryptocurrencies, several countries, such as Estonia, are now incorporating cryptocurrency and blockchain applications into their official operations.

Estonia has been a leader in the embrace of blockchain. Almost all of their public services have access to X-Road, a decentralised digital ledger that contains information about all residents and citizens. The platform uses an advanced encryption technology and includes two-factor authentication, enabling people to control their own data and ensure its security.

3- Cryptocurrency will be much more widely used

In their research paper “Cryptocurrencies: Overcoming Barriers to Trust and Adoption,” Dr. Zeynep Gurguc and Professor William Knottenbelt highlight the fact that digital currencies already fullfill one of the three criteria for fiat currency: a store of value. A major change in the medium of currency exchange – from coins, notes and payment cards to digital currency – is possible in the near future. Although the replacement of money as we think of it today by technology still causes significant apprehension for most people, the ability to transfer value from one person to another is a proven cryptocurrency use case.

A great example of this trend is Japan, where Bitcoin and several cryptocurrencies can be used as legally accepted means of payment. This is actually not surprising given that blockchain has been welcomed by the government. In fact, Japan accounts for a large share of the global bitcoin trade. Japan’s Financial Service Agency (FSA) mandates strict anti-money laundering protocol on the exchanges, and if an exchange plays by the rules, the government encourages it.

4- Companies will come up with new solutions for legal digital contracts beyond existing smart contracts

Beyond cryptocurrencies, a powerful blockchain use is the “smart contract“. A smart contract automatically executes whenever the terms and conditions agreed to by the parties involved are met. In 2019, the smart contract function is expected to explode in popularity by not only administering the execution of agreements between parties, but also implementing other aspects of legal contracts, such as resolving contractual dispute settlements by forming a legal digital contract that is fully binding between the parties.

5- More useful utility tokens will be delivered by blockchain

“Token economics” is the rapidly expanding study of new economic models brought on by the proliferation of digital tokens. The plethora of blockchain use cases has only added to the complexity and importance of these new token-based economic models.

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Plus, Clifford Chance launches innovation lab and South Korea explores maritime blockchain programme

Hundreds line up outside Ofo to demand return on deposits — [South China Morning Post]

Concerned about the future of Ofo, hundreds of Chinese residents travelled to the corporate headquarters in Beijing on Monday to demand a refund of their deposits, according to the South China Morning Post.

The so-called bank run was prompted by media reports that people could receive their deposit more quickly if they visited the office in-person. Typically, it takes 15 days to receive a refund on the deposit but users have been complaining that it has not been returned.

Ofo is struggling with finances, which the SCMP highlighted by pointing to various lawsuits from manufacturers who are not getting their bills paid on time.

Law firm Clifford Chance launches innovation lab — [Press Release]

Clifford Chance, a milti-national law firm, announced today the launch of its new innovation lab in Singapore called Create+65. The goal of is to incubate, test and hopefully integrate new legal tech tools that Clifford Chance hopes it can pass on to clients.

The programme is supported by the Singapore Economic Development Board and the Future Law Innovation Porgramme (which is under Singapore Academy of Law).

“In line with Singapore’s aspiration to be at the forefront of technology and innovation in the legal sector, Create+65 builds on our ongoing commitment to contribute to an ecosystem of collaboration and innovation as we anticipate the increasing pace of change,” said Singapore Managing Partner Kai Schneider in a statement.

Startups can register their interest here.

Aeon is partnering Go-Jek to help proliferate its O2O strategy in Indonesia — [e27]

Aeon, a Japanese homegrown retail group announced that it will partner with Indonesia’s ride-hailing unicorn Go-Jek to go all-in on digital payments and home delivery. The service as part of its overseas expansion, as reported by Nikkei Asia Review.

The two companies will begin the collaboration sometime in the middle of this month.

Aeon will accept payments using Go-Pay by Go-Jek, starting in its two malls in Jakarta, Indonesia. That will be followed by a home deliveries option using Go-Jek drivers.

Moglix nabs US$23 million Series C — [e27}

India-based B2B commerce company Moglix has secured US$23 million in Series C round of funding, led by existing investors Accel Partners, Jungle Ventures and International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group.

Venture Highway, Shailesh Rao (former VP at Twitter and Google), and InnoVen Capital also participated in the round.

The company plans to deploy the raised fund to expand to newer markets and geographies besides increasing its logistics network and supply chain across India. It also continues to beef up its integrated digital supply chain technology solutions with data science and machine-learning capabilities.

South Korea exploring blockchain for marine logistics — [CoinDesk]

The South Korean government, keen to make the shipping industry more efficient, is exploring blockchain as a means to achieve its goal.

The trial will begin this month in Busan with the goal of piloting projects that provide real-time information sharing between businesses. It will go for the next year.

Assuming the trial goes well in Busan, the government will expand the programme across South Korea.

—

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The strength of the European tech startup industry lies in its availability of talents and its ability to attract these talents

The year 2018 is a “record-breaking” year for investment in the European tech sector, and the sector is “powering growth” in the continent’s stagnant economy, according to the State of European Tech report by London-based venture capital (VC) firm Atomico.

Published in partnership with startup conference SLUSH and legal firm Orrick, the report detailed that a total of US$23 billion had been invested into the sector in 2018, up from just US$5 billion in 2013.

Europe also contributed three of the top 10 largest tech IPOs globally in 2018.

Apart from the impressive number of startup investment and IPOs, the strength of the European tech startup industry lies in its availability of talents and its ability to attract these talents.

There are 5.7 million professional developers available in Europe in 2018, compared to 4.4 million in the US.

Europe is home to at least 30 different hubs with 50,000 or more professional developers in each hub. Its three largest hubs for developers –London, Paris, and Amsterdam– are home to about 15 per cent of the region’s total developers.

Also Read: Malaysian fintech startup MyCash in talks to raise US$2M for expansion into Australia, Europe

There are many factors that contributed to Europe’s strength in attracting and developing talents, but two stood out in the report: Talent migration and competitiveness building.

In Europe, 28 per cent of founders and employees of private European tech startups are working outside of their home countries.

Migration of talents happen not only within the continent itself, with Germany and the UK being the top destinations for intra-Europe talent migration. But the continent is also a destination for local talents returning from work or study in the US as well as for foreign, non-European talents.

For foreign and non-European talents, India and the US made up more than 50 per cent of their origins, followed by Brazil, Tunisia, and Australia.

In fact, Europe is dubbed as a “destination of choice” for US software engineers who are looking for opportunities overseas.

Of all the existing tech hubs in the continent, London and Berlin are two of the most dependent on migrant talents. In these two tech hubs, 44 per cent of tech talents are immigrants.

With the great influx of talents, startups found themselves competing with global tech companies for these talents, with 54 per cent of founders experiencing an “increase or significant increase” in competition.

“The effect of increased competition for talent plays out in different ways, including salary inflation, greater employee churn, and more difficulty in filling roles. On the last point, for example, the number of job postings for ‘software engineer’ roles that prove hard to fill has increased in every European country for which data is available, except Denmark,” the report stated.

The report also added 56 per cent of founders claimed an increasing awareness among employees of stock options as a form of compensation.

Also Read: TWBIO, Valpas win the Taiwan x Finland Demo Day

Lessons for Asia

Published on the first day of SLUSH Helsinki 2018, the report provided several lessons that can be taken by the Asian startup ecosystem, particularly Southeast Asia.

Lack of talents have often been dubbed as the main challenge that startups are facing in expanding and growing their business in the region; the numbers and trends presented in the State of European Tech report may serve as an inspiration on what the region needs to focus on.

For example, the report mentioned Germany as “the most distributed country for professional developer talent.” It explained that only 19 per cent of the country’s professional developers are based in its largest developer hub Cologne; the rest are concentrated in other countries such as Belgium, Denmark, and Ireland.

It might be a wise move for startup industry players to expand beyond tier-one cities and seek for talents in emerging tech hubs, instead of the more established ones.

Bandung and Jogjakarta in Indonesia are examples of such tech hubs. Instead of looking for talents in Jakarta, where living costs tend to be higher, many high profile local startups are setting up offices in one of these two cities. Bukalapak has recently opened an R&D centre in Bandung, while Sale Stock also has a presence in Jogjakarta. Even French gaming company Gameloft set up its base in Jogjakarta when expanding to the market.

Migration of talent is also big theme in the report. In Asia, this is one of the sectors where governments can contribute in order to support its tech industry: By making talent and knowledge exchange more feasible through ease of visa and work permit application.

The report also mentioned about returning talents from other global tech hub such as Silicon Valley –a phenomenon that is known in China as “sea turtle.”

Sea turtles are startup founders or tech professionals who had been spending years studying and working abroad, but chose to return to their home countries to build or join a startup there. VC firms such as Intudo Ventures included networking with sea turtles as part of their investment strategy; cities in China have also taken active steps in luring the sea turtles home by hosting job fairs in countries such as the US.

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These 10 startups are making a positive impact on the deprived and marginalised people amongst us

The key objective of any startup is to turn profitable and make it to the “Unicorn club”, and possibly launch an IPO. Their contribution to the global economy is significant, and they create millions of jobs, thus becoming part of a social change.

But there are a few startups whose ultimate objective is NOT to make profit or get a “billion dollar” exit. Instead, they want to make a positive impact on the society. Such startups are rare but are there in almost every sector, and they change the lives of millions of the marginalised and deprived in the society.

In this article, we have picked a few ventures who are making a positive impact on the society in Southeast Asia.

TreeDots

Food waste is one of the most pressing problems the world is facing. As per a study, roughly one third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year — approximately 1.3 billion tonnes — gets lost or wasted. Food losses and waste amounts to roughly US$680 billion in industrialised countries and US$310 billion in developing countries.

Singapore-based startup TreeDots has developed a solution to this problem. Started by Nicholas Lim, Tylor Jong, and Jiacai Lou, TreeDots’s mission is to minimise the amount of food waste through a self-sustaining ecosystem via its aggregation of F&B businesses on different points of the value chain within the startup. It recently collaborated with National Environment Agency (NEA) in their food wastage reduction (FWR) outreach programme.

ThreeDots is also the winner of Echelon 2018.

EcoZen

Farmers across the world are a deprived lot. They often lack adequate support to keep their produce safe even after a good harvest. The problem is serve in developing and under-developed countries of Asia and Africa.

Probably, this agritech startup could bring in a change. Ecozen — based in Kerala, India but targeting the markets in Southeast Asia and Africa — has aims to improve farm-to-fork movement of perishable goods by providing solar-based cold rooms at the farm level. The startup has already implemented its solutions in Southeast Asian region, including in Indonesia and Vietnam with the help of high-tech polymer manufacturer Covestro. It is looking forward to expand its business further into Southeast Asia and Africa.

EcoZen is the winner of the inaugural Rabobank Food Loss Challenge Asia.

SolarHome

Most households in the developing countries in Southeast Asia are still living in the dark, as electricity is still a dream for most of them. Green energy solutions have been out of their reach. But not any more. Singapore-based SolarHome is finding a way out for them.

Founded by FORUM, a Singapore-based fintech venture builder, SolarHome brings pay-as-you-go solar solutions into off-grid households in Southeast Asia. It offers off-grid households a solar lighting system at a low-cost 24-month subscription plan, with an initial US$10 down payment, followed by daily, weekly, or monthly repayments through scratch cards or mobile money.

The company plans to bring “reliable, affordable and clean energy to more than 40,000 homes in rural Myanmar by the end of 2018″. The firm also intends to increase distribution throughout Myanmar, advance its mobile money platform, as well as expand its product range to more premium products, including systems with bundled television sets. Technology built into the system ensures that it won’t function if a payment is not made, giving lenders the confidence that they will be able to recover their investment.

The firm recently secured US$10M in debt financing from a consortium of international investors,

MyCash Online

Being migrants themselves, the duo knows the major challenges faced by the massive 40 million migrant population in Malaysia — one being the inability to access various financial services, as most of them are unbanked. The duo’s urge to solve this problem drove them to start MyCash Online, an online financial marketplace for the underbanked migrant population in Southeast Asia.

Incorporated in 2015 and headquartered in Singapore, MyCash provides a tailor-made platform for the unbanked migrant population, where they can purchase products and services online without using any bank account, credit cards, or prepaid cards. Users can reload phone credit, pay bills, and buy bus tickets through MyCash.

Also Read: Malaysian fintech startup MyCash in talks to raise US$2M for expansion into Australia, Europe

It offers many services, including local and international mobile recharge, utility bill payments, cross- border money transfer, wallet transfer, bus and air ticket, e-commerce voucher, dry foods and other products, PA insurance and many more. Migrant worker can fulfil all most all their needs through our platform.

Ark

The number of cancer patients is growing at an alarming rate across the globe. Cancer is a genetic disease—that is, it is caused by changes to genes that control the way our cells function, especially how they grow and divide. Doctors and experts in the healthcare industry claim that early detection can prevent the disease to be aggravated.

Ark, a Singapore-based company, is harnessing advanced data science and proprietary microRNA detection technology to develop non-invasive and cost-effective blood tests to detect early stage cancers before clinical symptoms appear.

Established as a result of a merger between MiRXES (a microRNA diagnostic test developer) and Venturecraft, Ark has kicked off by launching a blood test for early detection of stomach cancer in Asia. The firm plans to develop and launch new blood tests for early detection of other high prevalence cancers such as lung, breast and colon cancer.

Ark has research collaborations with top medical research institutions globally. Having recently completed a 5,000-patient gastric cancer trial in Singapore, Ark is planning to launch Asia’s largest clinical studies targeting at least 50,000 participants through partnerships with local governments and medical institutions.

Ruma

Low-income communities in Indonesia often have limited access to products and services that could improve their lives. The goods available are at a higher price than similar products sold in department stores.

Ruma provides financial and information services in the country through a trained agent network. The company aims to increase access to such services in a country with only 3,600 bank branches that serve a population of 245 million across a sprawling island archipelago.

Ruma recruits agents from Indonesia’s two million independently owned ‘mom and pop’ stores and provides them with technology, training, and support. These shops can then provide local consumers with a range of services, such as pre-paid airtime top up, utility and loan payments, mobile money services, and insurance.

Based in Jakarta, Ruma has served millions of customers through thousands of agents across Indonesia.

Enablecode

People with disability are often looked at with derision. There are quite a few NGOs and organisations working for the upliftment of dibbled people, the attitude of the society towards these people hasn’t changed much.

This is where Vietnamese software company Enablecode makes a difference. With a goal to transform the Vietnamese perception of people with disabilities, Enablecode employs computing experts who are not as physically able as the majority of society. Established in 2014, this startup blossomed from a team of freelancers who have been working together on a variety of web projects in Ho Chi Minh City since 2010. Their goal is to use technology to deliver services and run a strong business as a means to raise awareness of those living in a disabled condition.

Based in Ho Chi Minh City, the company specialises in complex custom web application development, and offers all aspects of innovative, creative, complex web design, including graphic layout, custom coding, advanced functionality and SEO.

Happi

Market research should benefit the clients who pay for it, the people who participate in it, and the groups, causes and communities those participants care about. Singapore startup Happi was started with this intention.

The Happi mobile app rewards users for responding to 5-question surveys with chances to win prizes they select, donations to the charity group or cause they select, and, possibly, connections to career opportunities — all free. Clients pay Happi for the responses and a portion of this money goes to pay for the prizes people win and a portion goes to the donations to the partner groups.

Clients get fast, easy, and cost-effective insights from and engagement with consumers. Everyone wins.

Impact Terra

Farmers account for more than 40 per cent of Myanmar’s GDP and 60 per cent of the workforce. But they often don’t get adequate attention from the government or the tech community, despite the growth and penetration of smartphones and internet.

Erwin Sikma saw an opportunity here. He saw a huge potential to improve the livelihoods of rural smallholder farmers through the use of digital solutions such as smartphone apps by providing them with real-time agricultural information, access to markets, and proper access to financing options. This leads to the birth of Impact Terra.

The company has come up with a platform, Golden Paddy, for farmers which offers real-time, personalised information about local crop prices, weather-based advice like flood or drought warnings, and pest risks.

The platform also collects data on farmers, such as their location and details about crops, which helps financial service providers deliver financial products that meet their needs and correspond to their specific risks. This enables these farmers to get the capital they need to improve or expand their farms at accessible rates.

billionBricks

There are one billion people in the world without a home. The lack of adequate housing continues to be a problem to which we cannot find a solution. Housing is a human right and the first step of empowerment towards emerging out of poverty.

Also Read: How these two school girls are helping Rohingyan refugees find a good shelter in Bangladesh

billionBricks was founded by a team of architects, designers, engineers and urban planners committed to solving the global housing problem. A non-profit, billionBricks used design and technology as its tools to innovate shelter and infrastructure solutions for the homeless and vulnerable. Its approach empowers communities to replicate its solutions on their own.

Last year, billionBricks created WeatherHYDE (a reversible, light-weight, all-season tents) to help the Rohingyan refugees find a good shelter in Bangladesh.

Photo by Kyle Glenn on Unsplash

The post 10 social impact startups in Southeast Asia that caught our attention in 2018 appeared first on e27.

Another exciting year has passed. How is it going to impact the Indonesian tech scene in the next year?

As players in the Indonesian tech scene, we ended the year 2018 with a sense of relief for all the achievements that we have made this year.

As we prepare to welcome the new year, we also begin to formulate how 2019 is going to be better –and how the foundation that we have set up in 2018 can help us get there.

Moved by this belief, e27 has compiled a list of stories that has happened to Indonesian tech scene (and the market in general) that will affect the course of things in the year 2019.

Revisit this article in December 2019 to see what we have predicted correctly (and wrongly).

1. Go-Pay is available for offline merchants transaction

For many years, the woes that e-commerce and fintech industry players faced in Indonesia is the market’s reluctance to embrace cashless payment methods. But 2018 saw a chance when Indonesian ride-hailing unicorn Go-Jek announced that it is enabling transactions using its e-wallet feature Go-Pay in offline merchants, from bubble tea chain to supermarkets to street food stalls.

The move has led to the rising popularity of Go-Pay, followed by competitors OVO (which is now the official e-wallet feature of Tokopedia), Tcash (by state-owned mobile operator Telkomsel), and DANA (the result of a joint venture between EMTEK Group and Ant Financial).

Indonesia’s cashless revolution was also led by the government’s move to oblige all toll road users to pay using e-money cards released by major banks in the country.

How is it going to impact the market next year? Basically competitions between major players will be tougher. Customers might  see promotional efforts that will lead to “price battle” between major players; they will also see more offline and online merchants including the existing e-wallet players as payment method options.

We will also see more foreign and local players introducing e-wallet services to the Indonesian market.

Also Read: 10 social impact startups in Southeast Asia that caught our attention in 2018

2. Government crackdown on illegal fintech services

On December 12, CNN Indonesia reported that the financial services authority has shut down 404 illegal fintech services, with the majority of these companies hailing from China.

The story was the latest update in the Indonesian government’s move to crackdown illegal fintech operations in the country, which are mostly offering peer-to-peer (P2P) lending services. Apart from harming customers’ data privacy, the potential harms that these companies have include money laundering, tax evasion, and terrorism financing.

Next year we will continue to see these moves by the Indonesian government as customer protection is one of the points that the government aim to pursue in the e-commerce roadmap.

We will also see the government making more strict requirements for financial services license, particularly in the lending sector. Customers will also be more aware of the risks of using online lending services; businesses will have to go the extra miles to convince potential customers that their products and services are safe to use.

3. Tokopedia raises another US$1.1 billion

Tokopedia ended 2018 with a high note as it confirmed a US$1.1 billion funding round led by SoftBank Vision Fund and Alibaba Group, which has been reported to push its valuation to US$7 billion.

Fellow Indonesian unicorn Go-Jek has also been reported to be in a fundraising spree.

Next year, we will definitely see the results of these fundraising efforts, which may come in the form of new products and features, or market expansions.

These funding rounds may also impact startup investment trend in general. In 2017, as the four unicorns –Go-Jek, Tokopedia, Traveloka, and Bukalapak– secured their massive funding rounds and unicorn status, the market saw a shift in investors’ attention to late-stage startup investment, leaving a gaping hole in early stage startup investment.

For 2019, the trend can go either way: Investors will continue focussing on late-stage investments, or reconsider early stage investments.

Also Read: The 10 most-read e27 Community articles of 2018

4. Go-Jek expands to Southeast Asia

After being laser-focussed on the Indonesian market for years, Go-Jek has finally begun its international expansion move by launching services in Vietnam (as Go-Viet), Thailand (as GET), and Singapore (as GOJEK).

This may not have that big of an impact for fellow unicorns such as Tokopedia and Bukalapak, which have been focussing heavily on local market.

But Go-Jek’s expansion move may create an impact for other early stage startups: it has the possibility to make them more attractive for investors due to their ability (and willingness) to expand beyond Indonesia and enter the regional market.

5. Indonesian general election on April 17

Indonesia is set to have a general election on April 17; an election which has been dubbed by local media such as The Jakarta Post as “haunted” by identity politics.

As with previous elections and transitional period in the nation’s history, there is always the possibility of security threats during elections. This kind of situation has been known to impact business and the economy in general, not excluding the tech industry.

Foreign investors might be a bit cautious about investing in the market leading up to election dates; Indonesia might also see several startup community event being rescheduled to adjust to the date.

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Image Credit: Elijah O’Donnell on Unsplash

The post These 5 stories will impact the Indonesian tech scene in 2019 appeared first on e27.

Group-IB talks about cybersecurity trends, launching a new HQ in Singapore, and why preemption is a key element in protecting institutions

As we gear towards a more data-driven world, we find that information and security are inextricably linked to each other. With the world’s technological advancement growing rapidly, we see the same rapid growth in the risks surrounding tech—ones involving data privacy infringement, online fraud, and other high-tech crimes.

Finding themselves at the frontlines of this tumultuous war against cyber security threats is Group-IB, a global leader in preventing and investigating cybercrimes.

Having been in the business since 2003, the company has been active in the field of computer forensics and information security, protecting the largest international companies against financial losses and reputation risks.

What ultimately prompted the creation of Group-IB was its founder and CEO, Ilya Sachkov’s first-level education in information security while based in Moscow. He said it was mere coincidence that he read an American book on cybercrime investigation as a business written by Kevin Mandia.

Intrigued by the prospects of mounting a company based on digital forensics, a point of curiosity for him was how despite the number of cybersecurity companies in Russia, nobody at the time offered the specific service of cybercrime investigation.

From day one, Group-IB team has been relentlessly gathering and analyzing information about cyber criminals and their activity, as well as developing threat data collection tools. These technologies formed the basis of adversary-centric security solutions.

Also read: From Moscow to Singapore: How a global leader in cyber security found its way to Southeast Asia

In late 2013, GIB Threat Intelligence service came out of stealth mode. Later, the company introduced TDS (Threat Detection System) – intelligence driven network security solutions for proactive threat hunting and response, and Secure Bank – advanced fraud defense and user authentication technology, currently protecting over 70 million clients of online banking platforms.

Fast forward to 2018, Group-IB is now recognized as one of the leading threat intelligence vendors by Gartner, Forrester, and IDC for providing unique insights into cyber threats. More importantly, Group-IB has helped prosecute hundreds of cybercrime organized groups across many countries.

As of today, Group-IB has announced expanding its work in Asia-Pacific, moving its headquarters to Singapore with Ilya Sachkov himself leading the ship in the region.

Navigating the tech side of Group-IB’s digital forensic service

An important starting point for digital forensics is tracking the digital footprint of a cyber criminal. The general idea is that prior to the act of hacking itself, a cybercriminal undergoes a series of preparations.

The key is to detect attacks in their early stages by predicting a threat based on preparation patterns. Sachkov parallels this to physical threats where, for example in the instance of a bombing, it is best to preempt the attack as it is being planned out versus when the bomb is already approaching its target.

Group-IB also houses sophisticated data on the infrastructure of cybercriminals spanning fifteen years of digital footprint—providing patterns and changes on how cybercrimes are carried out, making it easier for them to predict attacks.

Why expand to Singapore?

The company entered the APAC market 3 years ago. Group-IB’s portfolio of clients in Asia includes banks, financial and government organizations in Singapore, Thailand and other countries. Southeast Asia accounts for more than 30% of the company’s international revenue. Those are not the only reasons why Group-IB has decided to open its Global HQ in Singapore.

According to Group-IB’s annual Hi-Tech Crime Trends report findings, Asia is one of the most actively attacked regions in the world. Over the past year, 21 state-sponsored groups were detected in the area, which is exceeds Europe and the US combined.

Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul, Shanghai, and many other financial powerhouses in Asia are likely to become primary targets of financially motivated hacker groups in the near future. Group-IB aims to empower local companies and government organizations with the knowledge and tools to better prepare for rapidly evolving cyber threats targeting the region.

For Sachkov, it is important to bring Group-IB to Singapore because he recognizes and trusts the grasp of the Singaporean cybersecurity ecosystem on the matter. He highlights that it is crucial to develop synergy between the Group-IB experts and specialists originating from Singapore because of their level of understanding of local threats. Group-IB already partners with the INTERPOL Digital Crime Centre located in Singapore

Singapore’s rapid economic growth has ramped up the interest of financially motivated hackers and state-sponsored hacker groups. He argues further that what Group-IB can bring to the table is to share more technical information to the local atmosphere, highlighting that work is still needed in terms of achieving difficult technical levels in certain cybersecurity professions like malware researchers.

Also read: Singapore’s financial sector cyber security guidelines have received praise

In order for Group-IB to further establish itself as a global independent entity, it has to establish itself as a structure in different countries.

Good intellectual property protection, good government institutions, and zero corruption were some of the basis Group-IB decided on in choosing Singapore as a new home for its headquarters where the company will manage and keep developing its global threat-hunting infrastructure aimed at adversary-centric detection and proactive threat hunting. “A lot of Michelin restaurants,” Sachkov jokes is an important personal factor.

By 2019, Group-IB is planning to launch CyberCrimeCon in Singapore and Moscow, with the Singapore leg being its largest.

The post On Cybersecurity and Digital Forensics: How Group-IB is Reshaping What We Know appeared first on e27.

Through this acquisition, the financial products comparison startup aims to further boost its credit card business

Masii.com, a financial products comparison platform in Thailand, has acquired 100 per cent shares of One Place, an events discovery and ticketing platform in the country, for an undisclosed amount.

Through this acquisition, Bangkok-headquartered Masii aims to further boost its credit card business. Masii’s Co-founder and CEO Maxwell Meyer told e27 that their aspiration is to make One Place the leading ticketing site for cultural events in Bangkok and all Thailand.

One Place will join the Masii.com family and will move its office to the fintech firm’s headquarters. As per the deal, One Place Co-founder and CEO Eliot Delunas will stay on board in 2019 to transition the company and customer relationships.

Also Read: Thai customers are much smarter than the websites out there

“Events and promotions surrounding ticket booking are among the most high conversion points of sale for a new credit card,” Meyer said. “Our banking partners are eager to design unique promotions to attract more customers. With One Place, Masii.com and our partners will be able to offer better pricing, better seating, and unique experiences (backstage with the performers or curators) to users who also apply for new credit cards, or make bookings with our existing banking partners.”

One Place was started in 2011 by four entrepreneurs —  Delunas, Adam Selley, Liam Cooper, and Andy Jones. It is the exclusive online ticket agent for many of the artistic venues and shows around Bangkok, including the Bangkok Comedy Club.

“Masii.com is the top result on Google Thailand for nearly every credit card-related search. There are lots of promotional synergies where we can promote special credit card deals to ticket buyers, especially group ticket buyers. We immediately add on partnerships together with the Royal Bangkok Symphony Orchestra, Thai Polo, and other companies to ticket exclusive events,” Meyer stated. “We don’t plan to focus on rock concerts, etc, but rather comedy shows, community theatre, museums, Thai traditional arts, classical music and others.”

The fintech company will invest by dedicating full time teams for content, business development, and marketing, as well as integrating One Place’s website with Masii.com for greater transaction security, and to offer special deals through its partner network of 10-plus banks in Thailand.

Also Read: The extraordinary tale of a Filipino geek who swam against the odds in life

“We have worked hard to create a great event discovery resource combined with ticketing and other event organiser tools. The site has experienced strong growth over the past years, and we are confident Masii.com is well posotioned to continue building on that,” Delunas commented.

Founded by Meyer (a US native), Matthias Jürgens (German) and Tom Kiatcheeranun (Thai), Masii.com enables users to compare financial products such as credit cards, insurance and personal loans. The company claims that nearly 75,000 customers apply for financial products on Masii.com each month.

In February this year, Masii.com secured 77 million baht (US$2.43 million) in Series A funding led by B.Grimm, a 138-year-old multi-billion dollar Thai conglomerate, and European Venture Capital fund.

The post (Exclusive) Thai fintech startup Masii.com acquires events ticketing platform One Place appeared first on e27.

One company pops up fairly frequently. No prizes for guessing which

This year has been marked by a hive of activity across the Southeast Asia tech ecosystem, which is great because it means that the industry is growing at a healthy pace.

While the biggest newsmakers were naturally unicorns such as Grab, which acquired Uber’s operations in the region and expanded its services in its bid to become an all-encompassing WeChat-esque platform, far smaller companies in frontier markets like Myanmar also started to feature more frequently on our site.

Today, we will present to you the 10 most-read articles written by our reporters. Have a look!

Note: the articles are arranged in no particular order.

1. Grab acquires Uber’s assets in Southeast Asia

Ride-hailing giant Grab’s move to buy Uber’s transport and food delivery operations in Southeast Asia was arguably the most watched acquisition in the regional tech ecosystem this year.

Uber received 27.5 per cent stake in Grab as part of the deal, allowing it to focus on its core markets in the US and prepare for an IPO, which it expects to file next year.

2. Tik Tok’s parent company buys Musical.ly

Chinese-based internet company Bytedance grabbed headlines when it announced it would acquire US-based video social network Musical.ly and merge with a similar app of its own, Tik Tok.

This is a fairly significant development for the Southeast Asia internet market as Bytedance has pursued an aggressive expansion strategy to attract more users in the region.

Indonesia is its biggest market in Southeast Asia (although it was temporarily banned). It is building partnerships with local media companies such as Ismaya Live, RCTI, Warner Music Indonesia, Universal Indonesia, Sony Music Indonesia, and Indosat Ooredoo.

Outside of Indonesia, the platform has also helped grow internet celebrities such as Thailand’s YouTube star, Kaykai Salaider. Using Tik Tok, she was able to add at least 1.9 million more fans.

3. Grab acquiring Uber’s data trove is a major red flag

This is an opinion piece by our editor Kevin McSpadden. In it he highlights why Uber users should have the option to opt out of having their personal data transferred to Grab’s platform post-acquisition.

“Some folks may decide they want to change their lifestyle and start using public transportation and street hailing more often,” he said.

He also said that as Grab moves deeper into the financial services space (and other verticals), the utility of this data will naturally move beyond just transportation.

For these users, they are inevitably drawn into a more complex relationship with the company — and without their input; what if this data is one day used to determine their credit worthiness? Can Grab guaranteed that its algorithms won’t be bias?

Also read: The 10 most-read e27 Community articles of 2018

4. How the son of a humble watch repairer became the owner of a multi-million dollar realty tech startup

This is a classic rags-to-riches story. Nay Min Thu is the son of a modest watch repair shop owner in a small town in Myanmar.

Being one of seven siblings, the family’s finances were naturally stretched. So Thu went to Singapore to study while juggling a multitude of odd jobs to support himself.

Today, he’s doing pretty well running a realty tech startup.

Do check out the link above, it’s a great and uninspiring read. If you are an entrepreneur who has fallen into a funk, this story will uplift you — I promise.

5. Grab CEO’s courier stunt is disheartening

Another opinion piece on Grab by our editor Kevin McSpadden — this was pretty controversial.

For context, in October, Anthony Tan, the CEO and Co-founder of Grab, worked as a GrabFood delivery driver for a couple of weeks to better understand the system and its pain points.

While the CEO was able to understand some of the system’s inefficiencies, our editor felt that he had missed the bigger picture: the “huge financial burden” that the contract workers faced.

“Grab treated ‘courier-partners’ as if they are enthusiastic employees working to build a great company. In reality, they are more often a person who really needs money and view companies like Grab as band-aid solution to pay next month’s rent,” he said.

6. Snapcart, an app that gives cashback for receipts, launches in Singapore

Jakarta-based startup Snapcart operates a platform that allows users to receive cashback by scanning their shopping receipts into the app, and this year, it made its debut in Singapore.

Snapcart covers groceries, medicine and cosmetics receipts, and is also available in the Philippines.

I’m guessing this app is probably gaining some decent traction in Singapore if the article is attracting so much views. Maybe it’s because everyone uses smartphones in the country and grocery shopping, like in all countries, is a big part of our everyday lives.

The company raised US$10 million in Series A round of funding last year, led by existing investor Vickers Venture Partners.

7. A gym with a view of the bay: Check out Grab’s awesome new R&D office at Marina One

Grab gave us a little tour of their new office at Marina One. It’s a pretty cool office and being situated near the sea, the views are spectacular. Check out the photos here.

During the tour, the Grab team told us that CEO Anthony Tan is a huge exercise buff and actually does planks while conducting conference calls. Upon hearing that, I ruefully left the office with a deep guilt over my life choices (just kidding, I tore into a high calorie meal afterwards).

Also read: 2018 was a good year for e27, and we look forward to bigger things in store for 2019

8. Southeast Asia is setting itself up for disappointment with Go-Jek entrance

Go-Jek has just soft launched in Singapore, and so far, most people are pretty happy with their low prices (as compared with Grab). But it only offers its Go-Car ride-hailing option and nothing else.

This is a far cry from its Indonesian version, which offers a whole plethora of peripheral services such as manicure, food delivery and massages.

Back in April when rumours were still swirling on when the Go-Jek would arrive in Singapore, our editor argued that the company is facing a tough market, mainly because it will be bleeding money giving out subsidies to entice drivers to use its platform over Grab.

He also argued that if Go-Jek wants to make a serious logistics play like it did in its home base, it will come up against well-established incumbents such as Ninja Van and SingPost.

9. Singapore’s StashAway raises US$5.3M Series A funding round, will launch in new markets

In March, Singapore-based robo advisor platform StashAway raised a cool S$7 million (US$5.3 million) from a group of family offices and individual investors.

The company has raised a total of US$8.4 million. It said will focus on enhancing the platform’s AI tech (which should lead to better automatic investment decisions).

In April 2017, StashAway became the first robo-adviser to receive retail license in Singapore.

On why this article received such widespread attention, my guess is that robo advisors are a burgeoning service in the fintech arena, and that StashAway is one of the first few consumer-facing robo advisors to operate in Southeast Asia.

StashAway is also fairly active in promoting its services; it conducts regular finance workshops to coach users on best financial practices and frequently updates them on the state of the financial markets.

(Disclosure: I’m a StashAway user).

10. Looking under the hood: How Grab’s data science team optimises a fleet of 2.4 million drivers

Grab is a massive company and it manages thousands of drivers and riders across Southeast Asia daily —  which is over 10 terabytes of information everyday.

In this article, we spoke to Kong-wei Lye, Grab’s Head of Data Science, to understand how the company optimises its data analytics so that its operations can run smoothly.

“We have automated models that are trained, simulated and optimized to process all data from the Grab app’s users and their environment,” he said. Click on the above link to find out more.

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Image Credit: Marcel De Grijs

The post The 10 most-read e27 articles written by our content team appeared first on e27.