Helping businesses transact faster as part of Singapore’s move towards a Smart Nation
Extensive paperwork and lengthy application processes are two major pain points cited by business owners when transacting with government agencies.
Administering a business is hard work all on its own, and business owners need to feel supported when dealing with government transactions.
Solutions for this and many other everyday issues are continually being looked at by the Government Technology Agency of Singapore (GovTech), the government’s digital transformation arm. GovTech harnesses the power of digital technologies to strengthen Singapore’s tech capability and interconnectedness within government networks, in an endeavour to improve the quality of life in the island nation.
In an effort to enable faster, fuss-free and more secure digital transactions, and as part of a greater framework to foster a Smart Nation, GovTech spearheaded MyInfo Business in 2019.
Bringing it up a notch with MyInfo Business
This digital service is an extension of the existing MyInfo platform. Personal data services found in MyInfo have now been expanded to include corporate data with MyInfo Business. Since January 2019, MyInfo Business has been in a pilot with three local banks – Development Bank of Singapore (DBS), Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC) and United Overseas Bank (UOB) – to facilitate speedier credit assessments for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).
With the consent of the SME business owner, MyInfo Business automatically populates bank forms with business data including the basic profile of the owner, business address, UENs and names, shareholders, capital, financial highlights, grants and more. Banks retrieve the information digitally from government agencies in a secure manner, which effectively eliminates the need for paper documentation and verification, thus saving precious time for business owners.
Through MyInfo Business, banks were able to process account openings and loan applications faster, cutting down transaction time by 60 to 70 percent on average.
SMEs would also enjoy the benefit of streamlined operations, shortened application times, reduced reliance on hard copy submissions, and improved access to commercial services.
“It’s a hassle-free experience with MyInfo Business. All we have to do is login and submit already-verified information to the bank. This would have taken us days to complete in the past, but now it only requires a streamlined eight minutes to process,” said Mr Eric Chua, Chief Executive Officer at Rocket Buzzer.
A springboard for business management
Beyond the pilot, MyInfo Business APIs are scheduled for release in the second half of 2019. This would further promote the development of intuitive and convenient digital commercial services for SMEs, and is part of the Singapore government’s efforts to co-create a Smart Nation with the private sector. It is expected that around 220,000 SMEs would gain from this initiative.
Enterprises looking to offer B2B digital services via MyInfo Business can visit https://business.myinfo.gov.sg to find out more, and subscribe to the mailing list to receive updates on the service.
A national digital identity in a Smart Nation: the future and beyond
MyInfo Business is a vital component of Singapore’s National Digital Identity (NDI) platform, which also encompasses SingPass, CorpPass, and MyInfo. With NDI as a key enabler for Singapore’s Smart Nation vision, citizens and businesses alike will benefit from the growth of seamless and secure digital transactions. The NDI platform will also be a core infrastructure which industry partners can utilise to build innovative services. As Singapore gears to accelerate adoption of technology, services like MyInfo Business will contribute greatly towards a vibrant Digital Economy.
The sale includes ownership stake in some notable businesses
Axiata Digital Sdn. Bhd. (AD), the digital services arm of Axiata Group Berhad (Axiata), announced that it has agreed to sell its Digital Ventures portfolio at a valuation of USD 140 million.
The portfolio companies currently under management are StoreKing, BIMA, FreedomPop, 11street and etobee. Co-investors that include Allianz X, Kinnevik, Millicom, LetterOne, Intel Capital, Atomico, Mangrove Capital Partners, LeapFrog Investments, and Kejora Ventures.
“The partners in Pegasus 7 understand our vision, our markets and our portfolio companies which we’ve built to focus on our ecosystem of telco and digital assets. We strongly believe this handover will ensure the assets continue to thrive through access to our customer base, joint marketing, and other synergistic activities,” said Mohd Khairil Abdullah, CEO, Axiata Digital.
Under Gautam Saxena’s leadership, founder and CEO of Pegasus 7 Ventures, Pegasus said that it will drive the growth of the portfolio. Saxena is a senior investment banker and former Head of Asia Telecom and Media with Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
“The addition of these assets to the Pegasus 7 portfolio is synergistic with our thematic focus and will serve as an enabler for our future growth path,” said Saxena.
Currently, the existing portfolio is largely focussed on companies that address the needs of underserved consumers and encompass services such as micro-insurance, online to offline (O2O)/rural commerce, e-commerce, last mile solutions for banks, and e-mobile virtual network operator (e-MVNO) segments.
Pegasus has stated that it plans to accelerate value creation by scaling these companies and enhancing their access to global financial, strategic, and operational partners.
In the meantime, Axiata Digital said that it will continue to focus on its three core verticals which include digital financial services (Boost), digital advertising (ada), and digital platform (Apigate).
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e27 TOP100 winners will be awarded a fast-track pass to compete at SLINGSHOT!
Every major city in Southeast Asia has a goal to become the major startup hub in the region. They all have their own unique characteristics — be it market size, specific industry or gaps that have not been filled by a competitor.
For Singapore, its advantage is access to capital and corporates. According to Enterprise Singapore, the city-state is home to 150 VCs that facilitated 353 deals worth US$10.5 billion. Furthermore, many corporates like Google, Facebook and Microsoft have made Singapore their APAC headquarters.
This has helped create a honeypot effect that has resulted in the city hosting over 4,000 startups employing 22,000 people.
It is in this context that Enterprise Singapore is officially opening its SLINGSHOT 2019 programme. The international pitching competition is part of the agency’s mission to “deepen efforts with global and local partners to strengthen the startup ecosystem in Singapore”.
It has also partnered with e27‘s TOP100 programme. The winning startups at Echelon Asia Summit 2019 will be fast-tracked to pitch at SLINGSHOT.
This year, the competition is introducing a few new programmes. They are as follows:
Dealmaking: The startups will be selected according to investment and co-innovation interests from judges and corporates. This means that startups can feel confident at least a portion of the prizes up for grabs. This includes S$25,000 (US$18,300) in cash and an investment opportunity from ST Engineering. FundedHere is also offering a S$200,000 (US$147,000) investment opportunity.
Startups will also have an opportunity at S$25,000 (US$18,300) from Danone, L’Oréal and Rolls-Royce.
Other non-financial prizes include 18 months of workspace at JTC LaunchPad, 3-months access to Found8 community programmes and hot-desking space and cooperation possibilities with Ascott, Philips and WeAre Group. The startups will also receive a free booth at the tech conference SWITCH.
Meetings are necessary, but often viewed with dread by employees. So how do we fix it?
It was Friday at 4pm.
Our product teams were presenting the results of a fun hack week. One group shared a QR code, so we installed their multiplayer quiz app and started to compete.
The first quiz was called, “How well do you know JotForm?”
Given that I founded the company 12 years ago, you would think I’d have an unfair advantage.
I placed 18th.
I got stuck on a question about our mascot, Podo. I was slower than my staff, too.
Regardless, the afternoon was so much fun. We laughed and talked and I felt proud of what the teams created. It was like a productive party.
Technically, this was a demo day, which is one of our few scheduled meetings. Every Friday, our teams show what they’ve learned or built throughout the week.
Demo days aren’t status meetings; we share tangible results, not droning updates. And we keep it short. An hour, max. Show your work or a quick video clip and let’s move on.
I share this story, because I believe that all meetings are not created equal. They’re not necessarily a “scourge” on your company.
Meetings are part of life as a founder or entrepreneur, but they’ve also become a hotly-debated topic — especially in the tech industry.
In a leaked email to his Tesla staff, Elon Musk says large meetings are the “blight of big companies and [they] almost always get worse over time.”
Musk also tells his staff to “walk out of a meeting or drop off a call as soon as it’s obvious you aren’t adding value. It is not rude to leave, it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time.”
That’s a pretty clear directive.
So, what’s the solution?
Before JotForm had over 100 employees and 3.5 million users, I didn’t think much about meetings. It was just me at first, and the business grew slowly.
Now that we have three offices on two continents, I approach meetings much more strategically.
I don’t want to waste my time — and I really don’t want to lock my employees into pointless status updates. They’re the brains and the engine behind this business.
I want to empower them to do their very best work, and to enjoy the process.
Ultimately, every entrepreneur needs to set their own boundaries and create a meeting strategy that fits their organization. Here’s what works for us.
1. Individual team offices
Our company has small, cross-functional teams of 4–6 people. Each group includes a designer, developer, UX specialist, and any other roles they need to create new product features, from start to finish.
Each team also has its own office, with a door that closes.
By working in the same space, teams don’t have to plan formal meetings. They can share ideas and feedback all day long.
It’s continuous self-management — and not only does this model inspire great work, it also prevents that dreaded calendar Tetris, where your schedule becomes a colorfully-unproductive puzzle.
Clearly, people also need quiet work time. Our teams set their own rules around interruptions and breaks — but the key here is that they decide.
I know this structure might not work for everyone, but it’s worth considering what could slash those lengthy meetings.
Maybe your team uses Slack or Messenger for quick requests. Or you could create a weekly “office hours” period when everyone is available for informal questions and connections. Experiment and see what works.
2. No status meetings
“It’s hard to come up with a bigger waste of money, time, or attention than status meetings.” — Jason Fried
I spent my summers in our İzmir offices which are by the incredible blue/green waters of the Aegean sea. After a recent status meeting with our San Francisco team, I decided to cancel these updates for the summer.
I do know that I want to spend those evenings with my family at the Çeşme beaches, instead of staying late at the office. We’ll schedule ad-hoc meetings instead. And I know I’m not alone in this change.
Pinterest engineering manager Brian Donohue recently described a three-day, no-meeting schedule the company is testing with product engineering teams:
“It’s not a big revelation that software development requires long stretches of uninterrupted time to focus.
As Pinterest has grown, we’ve noticed the number of meetings also has increased.
Having so many meetings can fragment an engineer’s entire day, eliminating the stretches of uninterrupted time required to build software.”
Donohue says that this “seemingly small change” has already had a big impact. Over 91 per cent of the developers say the switch has made them more productive and 80 per cent say the no-meeting schedule is respected.
Pinterest is still experimenting, but it’s fascinating to see how another company is trying to balance uninterrupted work time with effective team communication.
3. Walking meetings
Given that the typical American sits an average of 9.3 hours a day, walking meetings can boost your health and creativity, tear down hierarchies, improve communication, and make people happier, among other reported benefits.
Steve Jobs, Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, and Mark Zuckerberg have also been known to take it outside when they’re meeting with one or two other people.
I’m a fan of this meeting style, too. I always try to go for lunch and a walk with new employees, for example. We get to know each other in a relaxed way, and (hopefully), they start to see me as more than just “the boss.”
Don’t try to bring seven people on a walking meeting, of course. But if you have the time, ability, and appropriate weather to escape the office, give it a try.
4. Email feedback
A recent Fast Company article quotes interaction designer Don Norman, who says email is “the office memo turned cancerous, extended to home and everyday life.”
I get it. Most people hate email. At worst, the inbox can feel like a Sisyphean to-do list or an extended leash.
But if I’m going to pick between email and a meeting, I’ll go electronic — and it’s not because I don’t want to talk to my teams. Instead, I can give them thoughtful, considered feedback, and I do it on my time.
The “interruption” (which is really my job) comes at the end of the day when I sit down and pursue that all-important Inbox Zero.
5. Specific goals
Productive meetings have a clear goal and introduce new, useful (and usable) information.
There are two weekly meetings I look forward to: one with our Data Team and one with our User Research Team. Data Team share data analysis, conversion rates, test results and other helpful stats. The User Researchers tell me what they’ve learned from user interviews and usability tests they have completed.
If there’s unusual behaviour on a metric, we talk about it and try to generate solutions. I always learn so much — and the details they share directly influence my work.
The anti-meeting backlash can make founders feel like every conference call or briefing is a waste of time. I don’t think that’s true.
A meeting that quickly and efficiently accomplishes its goal, while effectively aligning the participants is well worth the space in your schedule.
Business is a team sport. Nothing great is achieved in isolation. We all need to talk over plans and ideas, but finding a more strategic approach is valuable for everyone.
6. The power of “no”
Author Kevin Ashton says “the word ‘no’ has more creative power than ideas, insights and talent combined,” but most people aren’t taught to use it:
“We are taught not to say “no.” “No” is rude. “No” is a rebuff, a rebuttal, a minor act of verbal violence. “No” is for drugs and strangers with candy.”
Clearly, the ability to say “no” is a privilege and a form of power. Not every employee can flex that power in all situations. But, when you can — and especially if you’re making the rules — let’s say no to unproductive meetings.
After all, meetings shouldn’t be a four-letter word. The act of sharing ideas and updating our colleagues shouldn’t be something we dread. It should fuel the organization, not drain its momentum.
So, maybe we can’t all walk out of meetings or hang up on long-winded calls, but we can be more strategic. More respectful of each other’s time.
Let’s try to change how we work and communicate, for everyone’s benefit.
Maybe it was the youthful nature, but all 10 companies had some sort of altruistic mission
An entrepreneur pitched a product that helped deaf people with day-to-day communications. One company was educating young people about technology and another was trying to radically alter how cafes approach interior design.
At the inaugural *SCAPE HubQuarters Fellowship Demo Day, young companies spent the evening pitching to a host of judges, mentors and audience members to further validate whether or not their idea can grow into the next sexy startup story.
A major reason why these companies were in their infancy has to do with the mis-sion of *SCAPE, which is a platform designed to empower people in Singapore’s un-der the age of 35. For a lot of participants, *SCAPE became the necessary support group to give them confidence to chase their startup dreams.
The *SCAPE event was the conclusion of a 6-month-long fellowship programme that hosted 21 qualifying teams across 22 sessions to help them get their business off the ground. 10 of them were pitching at the Demo Day.
“This space is really meant for the youth. Last year, we curated 5,000 square feet ofspace to turn it into a co-working space for our young entrepreneurs to incubate. My congratulations again to our 10 teams that [pitched] today,” said Goh Kok Wee, the Executive Director of *SCAPE.
The jury present for the pitches were as follows:
David Ding, Head of Fintech (Regional), DBS Innovation Group
Lavanya Karthikeyan, Business Development & Legal, PBA Group
Ori Takemura, Assistant Vice President, Design Director, Singapore Press Holdings
Low Jian Liang, Co-Founder, Reactor Ventures
For StaffAny, a *SCAPE participant and a winner of the 2019 e27 TOP100 Singapore regional qualifiers, the biggest value-add from the programme was access to mentors and connections.
“They introduced us to good mentors from the F&B industry. Through their experiences, we are able to identify potential pitfalls we might have because they are in the F&B industry. They know their stuff the best; inside-out,” said Eugene Ng, a Co-founder of StaffAny.
StaffAny was approaching the pitching competition as a BD lead generation exercise, hoping that a few of the tenants of the *SCAPE space (a mall-type building in Singapore’s Orchard neighborhood) could become future clients.
For Lena Toh, the Founder of goodgoblins, a recycling company, *SCAPE provided her an opportunity to take an idea that was not yet a company and transform it into a concrete startup.
“I had a normal job and just an idea. It helped me bring the idea to the stage where I have validated and [built a] prototype. We did a month-long pilot so that validated my idea about goodgoblins,” she said.
Toh ended up jumping into the deep end by quitting her job to pursue the company full-time. One takeaway of the event was a sense that the companies all had an altruistic mis-sion. Maybe it is the youthful energy, but the startups were more consistently trying to solve societal problems than other Demo Days. Let’s have a look!
Telelay
Telelay wants to make the day-to-day communication for deaf people more convenient. The strategy is to integrate video calls and a translator into the phone call process. Think about booking a restaurant, which can be challenging for a person with hear-ing impairments.
In Telelay, the user will use video chat to call an online interpreter, who would then facilitate the call with the recipient. The company wants to charge a small fee per call.
Shift
Shift wants to make cafes more flexible and dynamic with customisable furniture. The idea is to use magnetic blocks to allow people to “build what they need” in an open space.
For example, if you want to pop-in for a quick break, then placing two blocks on top of one another to create a standing table. Or for meetings, you can put 4-5 next to each other to create a table. The company wants to bring people in by making it a space for workshops and advocacy groups.
The idea is that the space will be free for these groups and their “fee” will be the price of coffee/food.
goodgoblins
goodgoblins is a home recyclables collection service that wants to help Singaporeans build the habit of recycling.
The company allows people to sign-up for a subscription service that pays for people come to their apartments on a regular basis and pick-up the recycling to take to the plants. The company will also generate revenue by selling the waste back to recycling companies.
What is interesting about the service is that it wants to measure trow-away habits and give feedback to users to help motivate them to reduce their consumption. For example, if a person recycles 5kg of waste one week, and then 7kg the next, the app will let them know so that they need to be more mindful about how they buy goods.
Successpedia Asia
This media company wants to help people find motivation by publishing the “journey behind successful people”. It also wants to “empower Asians for Asia”. The company’s main service is as a content creator but it also wants to get into events, live sessions and more complicated production services.
BoomX
BoomX wants to ‘skill up’ older folks to help them take advantage of their experience and make money either freelancing or starting small businesses. While there are a lot of support networks aimed towards the silver generation, some of the jobs offered to elderly people lack dignity (think of the typical hawker center cleaning auntie/uncle).
BoomX wants to figure out what skills these people have and teach them how to leverage it to make money in a more meaningful avenue. The Founder also runs a company called Boomercise, which is an exercise pro-gramme to help older folks stay healthy.
Omnitree
Omnitree has built an app for collaborative education in the classroom. It wants to be a one-stop-shop for in-classroom lessons. For example, it is building products that facilitate Q&A with the classroom, trivia questions/answers and other collaborative projects.
It wants to stop teachers from having to flip through multiple apps while going through a lesson. The company wants to target teachers and administrators and charge them for a subscription.
Increa
Increa tries to understand individual learning needs to provide customisable lessons and help people adapt to how they learn. The company offers workshops, activities like nature walks and even a variety of spaces to be able to adapt to the best learning environment.
It has hired a group of trainers who are experienced educators and know how to engage individual students.
Crop
Crop is an independent design studio that tries to stand apart by not following de-sign trends, finding alternative perspectives and being a craft-centric agency. It wants to build a culture whereby the craftsmen are valued as part of the design process.
The company approached the Demo Day as a means to find long-term collaborators.
Innovation Garage
A company that hopes to inspire the next generation, Innovation Garage is a STEM education service for kids between the ages of 8-12. So far, the team has taught in 5 schools and over 600 students. It charges various prices based on the complexity of a 10-hour course.
The goal is to build a company that can consistently lead these classes across the entirety of Singapore.
StaffAny
Easily the most mature of the companies, StaffAny is an hourly-worker staff management platform. StaffAny is really growing, having enjoyed a 25 per cent month-on-month expansion rate. Actually, when asked by the judges, the startup said navigating this growth is the current top challenge for the startup.
The service is used by 51 companies and has a projected 6x LTV:CAC ratio. A number that allows new clients to essentially pay for their acquisition cost. In the near future, the company sees itself as a solution to unsolvable problems like payday loans, shift-based hiring, performance-based resumes and part-timer insurance.
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The inaugural *SCAPE fellowship is in the books! Make sure to keep an eye out for announcements, calls for applications and updates from the next cohort of fellows!
Social commerce is a big deal in Indonesia, and TokoTalk wants to seize this golden opportunity
The votes are in –and the e27 Community has voted for Indonesian social commerce platform TokoTalk as Startup of the Month!
Owned by South Korean tech startup Codebrick, TokoTalk is a chat-based e-commerce platform built specifically for online sellers on social media such as Instagram.
Social commerce is a big deal in Indonesia. In fact, data by the country’s Ministry of Finance revealed that 64 per cent of all e-commerce transactions occurred through social media.
This is the opportunity that TokoTalk wants to tap into. The startup aims to make the social commerce process more simple through integration of its service with various social media platforms.
It recently stole our attention through a US$3.2 million funding round by Silicon Valley-based Altos Ventures.
As a runner-up, the e27 Community picked Singapore-based Saleswhale.
Using proprietary AI technology, Saleswhale describes its service as supporting sales and marketing teams by automating the lead engagement and qualification processes.
The platform uses natural language processing (NLP) to classify the intent of an email lead, detect sentiment, and extract named entities (including locations, dates, times, and competitor keywords).
The startup recently raised a US$5.3 million Series A funding round led by Monk’s Hill Ventures.
The funding round included the participation of GREE Ventures, Wavemaker Partners, and Y Combinator.
Congratulations and best of luck to the two startups!
