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How blockchain technology is impacting cloud accounting and tax?

 

For example, AI-based optical character recognition is transforming the way in which businesses log and store expense information. Blockchain technology delivers interoperability between traditionally siloed tax data structures, streamlining compliance and reporting.

The most profound way in which technology is changing the tax ecosystem, however, is the rise of cloud accounting.  

What is cloud accounting?

Cloud accounting allows businesses to eliminate the need for expensive local financial data storage, which presents security risks and take advantage of powerful taxation software and services based on remote servers.

Cloud accounting services include payroll, accounting, invoicing, accessibility, and third-party integration features, and can significantly reduce the overheads associated with executing an effective tax strategy. Businesses that use cloud accounting services benefit from a cost reduction in hardware maintenance, and an improved user interface.

Enterprise and the cloud

The use of cloud accounting has dramatically increased over the last decade. Data published by Forbes demonstrates that 80 percent of major enterprise organizations now operate critical financial software on cloud-based platforms that significantly improve overall business efficiency. 

Also Read: How I led a startup within a MNC

Getting cloud-based tax and accounting software set up at your business is relatively simple, but it’s best to enlist the help of accountancy services to ensure you’re collecting data and reporting in a compliant manner, which automates tasks that would be time-consuming tasks. 

Cryptocurrency payments

The third-party integration offered by cloud accounting platforms are extremely flexible — many online merchants, for example, accept digital currencies such as Bitcoin as a payment method. Traditional taxation software can struggle to track cryptocurrency payments, whereas third-party applications are able to provide full reporting functionality designed specifically for digital assets.

Another modern tax tech is able to assist with the complex nature of cryptocurrency tax reporting. Major cryptocurrency exchanges can work to keep customer data extremely secure and private, which can make it difficult to track trades for capital gains, income tax reporting and atomic swaps

Financial sensitive data

Data breaches are extremely costly for businesses of all sizes. Both large and small scale enterprises are often the target of hackers that attempt to steal sensitive financial data. A single breach can incur a heavy cost.

Also Read: What I’ve learned from building lean in Asia

Data published by IBM reveals that the average data breach costs businesses almost $4 million, with each individual breached record valued at over $150. Cloud-based tax solutions and accounting software help to keep your business data safe with enterprise-scale security, eliminating the threat of data breaches. 

Key takeaway

Many businesses operate under tight budget constraints that doesn’t leave much room for professional full-time accounting staff. Cloud-based tax tech reduces the total amount of time businesses must direct toward financial strategy and tax reporting, freeing up capital that can be reinvested into the business itself. 

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Join our e27 Telegram group here, or our e27 contributor Facebook page here.

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India’s CarDekho buys Carmudi Philippines, aims to digitise the country’s auto ecosystem

CarDekho Group, which owns and operates a string of auto portals in India, has acquired car classifieds site Carmudi Philippines.

It is the second Southeast Asian country where CarDekho has started operations after its launch of Indonesia operations under OTO.com in 2016

The acquisition of Carmudi is aligned with CarDekho’s business strategy to expand and fortify its footprint across the region. In the Philippines, CarDekho will aggressively focus on building up and digitising the ecosystem and offer solutions to both new and used car buyers.

Also Read: ‘We’re burning money’, says Lippo Group’s Mochtar Riady; to sell 70% stake in e-wallet OVO

“The Philippines’s underlying macro fundamentals make it an extremely promising market. The market demand for new private vehicles in the Philippines has grown at a CAGR of 14 per cent during 2014-2018 with new car sales crossing 380,000 units in 2018. We see this growth as a big opportunity to digitise the Philippines auto ecosystem and engage with consumers throughout their online car buying journey. Our strong ecosystem play has made us a leader in India and Indonesia. And now we are expecting the same for the Philippines,” Umang Kumar, Co-founder and President, CarDekho, said.

“CarDekho’s backing will help us in further strengthening our position in this region. This means added enhancements in technology, processes, and platform resulting in great user experience. Carmudi is already known for quality listings, powerful search, and one-stop convenience but the collaboration with CarDekho will enable us to digitalise and simplify the entire auto ecosystem,” said Cholo Syquia, Country Head, Carmudi Philippines.

Founded in 2008 and headquartered in Jaipur, CarDekho currently operates auto sites such as CarDekho.com, Gaadi.com, ZigWheels.com, BikeDekho.com and PowerDrift.com in India. The group recently launched an insurance portal called InsuranceDekho.com offering services in motor and health insurance, and Gaadi.com is a one-stop destination for selling pre-owned cars.

The group also runs specialised portals like TyreDekho.com and TrucksDekho.com.

Also Read: 10 mistakes that new entrepreneurs tend to make and should avoid in 2020

CarDekho also works actively with over 4,000 new auto dealerships and 3,000 used car dealers across India. Also, it works in collaboration with more than ten financial institutions and 18 insurance companies across the country to facilitate used car financing and insurance for both buyers and sellers.

CarDekho has raised funding from marquee investors which include Sequoia IndiaHillhouse CapitalCapitalG(formerly known as Google Capital), Tybourne Capital, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, Times InternetRatan Tata, and Trifecta.

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How learning like babies can be the future of AI?

 

 

A three-year-old Stacy sat with her dad beside her one beautiful Sunday morning. It was the one day where she got to interact and play with him. The rest of the week, John was busy experimenting with theories and building machine learning models that could have an impact on the world. Like an enthusiastic toddler, Stacy would get up early on Sunday mornings to do all her favourite things with her father. One of them included building Lego structures.

This Sunday was different than the rest because it was Stacy’s birthday and John had her brought her a brand new Lego set with unique characters. As Stacy and Jon sat in the backyard early morning, John gave her the present.

An excited Stacy immediately unwrapped the Lego box and took out the pieces. Just like every other time, she started building it in an upward direction. Stacy loved building towers, traffic lights, and skyscrapers and was going to do the same this day.

The only difference being she would now make the all-new Lego character sit on top of those structures. But, that’s when John interrupted and suggested building it sideways.

Also Read: How Chinas Greater Bay Area initiative will create a testbed for AI and decentralised tech industry

Could Stacy build the Lego sideways or in any other direction, because she had only been building it upwards? Five minutes later, Stacy starts sticking tapes to the wall. Its fifteen minutes now and little Stacy exclaims, Here Dad! Batman is now sitting on my Lego train track that enters the wall!

A machine inspired experiment

John’s attempt to encourage Stacy is an example of an experiment. Stacy could easily apply her knowledge and experience of building Legos upwards to building them sideways. And all this she could do within minutes. What Stacy demonstrated can be called as mere common sense, which even the most advanced computers of today’s generation fail to display.

Unlike Stacy, who could quickly learn to apply her existing knowledge to a new context, modern artificially intelligent systems still find such a case hard to reproduce. Like John, many other scientists and experts believe that artificial intelligence could learn from babies. While this could open many possibilities for the future, it could also impact the world in ways we can’t even imagine.

Scientists in the past have tried feeding direct knowledge to computers to create artificial intelligence. However, since that approach failed miserably, we now have machine learning to the rescue.

Today’s machine learning techniques enable the computer to learn on their own by figuring out what to do upon looking at a large dataset. Researchers from all across the world claim that these machine learning models can be trained to learn almost anything and everything. It even includes one of the human’s most prized possesions-common sense.

The idea of common sense

But it seems like these researchers are ignoring decades of scientific work in the field of cognitive science and developmental psychology that demonstrate that humans have some innate abilities. The inherent capabilities of humans are nothing but programmed instincts that appear in a child as they are born and grow up. These help us think abstractly, clearly and fundamentally attribute to what we call common sense.

For a more precise distinction, our machine learning models today rely on a large number of data sets to produce accurate results. Even the meta-learning models that learn only from a limited number of data sets need a few hundred for the task. But, the underlying question is, do children learn in this manner? Did John show Stacy a thousand cases of building a Lego sideways before she could make it?

In another instance, let’s take a much simpler problem, where a child learns to identify objects around them. Do we need to show a child a few thousand apples, before they recognize it as one? The answer is no, and it sounds radically mindless when we apply machine learning methods to human beings. The answer to why such practices are inapplicable to even the most underdeveloped human brains lies in our innate abilities.

Artificial Intelligence researchers ought to bring these qualities and instincts of a child’s learning to complex machines. However, most systems that are riding high on machine learning’s success seldom find this of importance. Computer scientists appreciate the simplicity and one of their goals involves reducing the debugging of complex Java development code.

Also Read: How Chinas Greater Bay Area initiative will create a testbed for AI and decentralised tech industry

Josh Tenenbaum, a psychologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, says that big companies like Facebook and Google are another reason why artificial intelligence has reached its limits and is being further pushed in that direction. These companies are merely interested in solving short term problems using machine learning.

Some of these are facial recognition and the web search that can be done by training a model on a vast number of data sets. Since such models work remarkably well, there seems no need for exploring an intelligence that is innate like a child.

The way machines learn

However, there is no doubt that the existing techniques have led to some out of the ordinary breakthroughs. Today, you can give a machine some millions of pictures of animals and label them like a cat or a dog. Even in the absence of any further information about the characteristics of cats and dogs, the machine will be able to classify new examples of cats and dogs. To achieve this, the machine learning models abstract some statistical patterns from the pictures and then use them for classification.

Similarly, a machine called Google’s Deep Mind’s Alpha Zero can be trained to play a game of Chess or a video game right from scratch. The logic behind it is simple. When a computer performs a game, it gets a score. Over time, as it keeps on playing millions of such games, it learns to maximize its score. Alpha Zero has also been able to beat IBM’s Deep Blue, another trained model, at Chess. The surprise comes when these models don’t even understand the mechanics of the game and go on finding statistical patterns to increase their learning. In other words, they are not intelligently learning but learning from their experiences.

In spite of being a great use, the problem is that these algorithms have developed a limitation. The more you feed them with data, the better they will learn. But when it comes to generalizing from all this data, they fail miserably.

Imagine this in the context of babies. They don’t need millions of samples to learn. They learn much more generally and accumulate a more robust kind of knowledge when compared to artificially intelligent machines. For researchers, the future of artificial intelligence lies in unravelling the mystery behind the way babies learn, and the way devices can implement it.

Thinking about the big picture or the future, scientists need to develop AI so that it can solve many fierce problems involving common sense and flexibility than today. If we want to imagine a world with autonomous cars that can run in chaotic traffic, or bots that explain the news to a reader, we need a build AIs to solve problems in a more generalized environment.

However, with some research going on in the world, there is some hope left for the future. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) recently launched a research initiative called Intelligent Quest to understand human intelligence in terms of engineering. The initiative is already raising millions of dollars by now and in some ways, trying to answer a similar issue like that of nature versus nurture in learning theories.

Even the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is working on a project called the Machine Common Sense to understand how babies and young children learn. As astonishing as it sounds, the government research lab that helped invent the Internet and the computer, is now partnering with child psychologists and computer scientists for the task.

A different approach to learning

There might be evidence for developing a system with childlike learning capabilities because many credible organizations across the world are investing in such research. But there are problems with machines that we seek to solve. Human babies, the smartest among all other species, learn by the trial and error method. Apart from this, cognitive development scientists say that as babies, we are born with some basic instincts that help us quickly gain a flexible common sense.

For machines, it has been challenging because we haven’t since any conceptual breakthroughs in machine learning since the 1980s. Most of the popular machine learning algorithms came into the picture back then. To date, all we have seen in the name of advancements is ever-expanding sets of data that are being used to train machine learning models on a large scale.

Young children, on the other hand, learn differently from the machines. The kind of data that the machine learns from are generally curated by the people and of good quality and clear category.

You won’t find people posting blurry pictures of themselves. All they try is to display the best shot. Similarly, games like Chess are defined by people to work within a fixed range of possibilities and under specific rules. But when it comes to children, it is the opposite of clarity.

Ongoing research at Stanford University suggests that babies see a series of chaotic and poorly filmed videos that consist of a few familiar things such as toys, parents, dogs, food, etc. These move around at odd angles and are the opposite of millions of clear photographs present in an internet data set.

Another factor comes into play when machines learn. It is called ‘Supervision’. Machines need to be told what they’re learning. When images are annotated, they are given particular labels. Similarly, when machines play games, each of their moves is scored. All this helps the machine see what it exactly needs to learn.

The data for children is, however, largely unsupervised. Parents do tell their babies notions such as ‘good job’, ‘danger’ or tell them what animal is given in a picture. But it is mostly to keep them safe and sound. A large part of the baby’s learning is spontaneous and motivated by one’s self.

Also Read: Today’s top tech news: Tourplus raises US$400K, developer school 42 launches in Malaysia

Even if we provide large data sets of data to a machine, they cannot figure out the same kind of generalizations as children do. Their knowledge can be considered shallow, and they can be fooled very easily with what is known as adversarial examples. For example, if you give an AI an image that has jumbled pixels, it will most probably classify it as a cat if the pixels fit the right statistical pattern of its learning. However, a child will seldom make that mistake.

In a similar instance, advanced AI models such as Alpha that we have today, do not imply common sense in their learning. If an AI learned the game Go on a standard 19 * 19 board, it wouldn’t be able to demonstrate the same playing skills on a 21 * 21 board. Instead, the AI would have to learn the game anew. Scientists have also tested this theory with the domain of odd and even numbers. A network was trained to take input as an even number and simply spit it out. However, when the same number was tested with odd numbers, it immensely faltered. This isn’t the case with a child.

Conclusion

AI as a program keeps an eye on the learner and dictate them whether they are right or wrong at every step of the way. This is quite unlike human children, who under helicopter parenting might be able to do a designated task well but fail in critical matters such as creativity and resiliency.

Alter the problem even with the smallest degree, and they will have to learn all over again. That’s the case with machines, and it is exactly how they differ from human children.

No doubt we are far away from approaching a human-like intelligence level in machines. While this might not be our sole purpose, we still want an AI like C3PO that can make us even smarter. Our only solution to achieve a desirable AI is to take cues from babies and create more curious AIs than obedient ones.

Editor’s note: e27 publishes relevant guest contributions from the community. Share your honest opinions and expert knowledge by submitting your content here.

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Image Credit:  Franck V

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Fintech startup Halofina secures pre-Series A funding led by Mandiri Capital Indonesia, helping millennials managing finances

Indonesian financial management startup Halofina announces that it has raised an undisclosed amount of pre-Series A funding round led by Mandiri Capital Indonesia, backed by Finch Capital, DealStreetAsia has learned.

The company said that it will use the fresh capital for product development, organization and talent enhancement, as well as strategic partnerships.

This is the company’s second round of funding, as it previously received funding from Singapore-based Plug and Play, and Rekanext as well as Indonesian firm Radika in late 2018.

Halofina was founded in 2017 by Adjie Wicaksana and financial industry veteran Eko Pratomo. It is an AI-based personal financial planning application that helps its users manage their finances and build investment strategies.

Halofina said that its users are largely the millennial generation and middle-upper income group.

Also Read: Plug and Play Indonesia brings in 17 startups into its 3rd batch

The company first launched its app in March 2018, and started off as a company that operated in the field of offline and online personal finance education, said Halofina co-founder and CEO Wicaksana in an interview with DealStreetAsia.

According to studies, the middle-income class in 2020 is expected to be 140 million people. And the majority of the middle-income group is the millennials. Upper middle income, millennials and digital savvy population amount to around 35 million people in Indonesia.

“The number is significant, particularly when we take into account the fact that the investors in our capital market are only over 1.5 million,” Wicaksana said.

Halofina’s main feature is LifePlan, which helps users calculate and plan their future financial needs for life goals like marriage, housing, education, vehicle, by giving them a cost estimate and calculating how much needs to be saved per month. The feature also gives a recommendation on asset allocation, based on users’ goals, risk profile, and financial profile, helping users decide on the investment products to purchase, which currently consists of mutual fund and gold.

The platform then continues to provide users with the option of the products they need, as well as track and monitor it afterward.

Also Read: Meet the 10 Indonesian fintech startups you may have never rooted for before

“In the first quarter of next year, we will work with third parties to develop educational content such as an audiobook, podcast, video, and even online consultation which will enable experts to make content and provide consultation service,” Wicaksana said.

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Today’s top tech news: Lynk gets new funding, Ola considering IPO and layoffs

ola cabs

Global “Knowledge-as-a-Service” platform Lynk announces successful funding round- Press release

Lynk, that spearheaded the “Knowledge-as-a-Service” (KaaS) sector, announced the close of a funding round led by Singapore-based MassMutual Ventures Southeast Asia (MMV SEA). Alibaba Entrepreneurs Fund and Wavemaker Partners, who led the seed round, also participated.

Lynk allows customers to access expertise and insights from advisors to innovate, enter new markets, and quickly understand business risk and evaluate opportunities. Unlike other expert access products, Lynk is focused on its KaaS technology platform that utilizes natural language processing, conversational AI analytics, and machine learning with human-in-the-loop to enable expert knowledge acquisition and sharing at scale.

Anvesh Ramineni, Managing Director at MassMutual Ventures Southeast Asia said, “Lynk’s unparalleled growth and proprietary approach to harness unstructured data in building out a platform that can enable a wide range of potential applications made it an obvious choice for us. We look forward to supporting the company’s expansive growth across various regions of the world.”

Indian insurtech startup Acko raises funds from Ascent Capital- DealStreetAsia

Insurance tech startup Acko General Insurance has raised US$16 million in fresh funding from growth capital provider Ascent Capital, according to the company’s filings with the registrar of companies (RoC), said a report by DealStreetAsia.

Founded by Coverfox co-founder Varun Dua in 2016, Acko offers general insurance products, including auto, smartphone, and travel insurance. The startup has built a diverse base of partnerships with consumer internet platforms across e-commerce and travel categories, besides auto manufacturers, to expand its customer base. Acko has a tie-up with cab-hailer Ola and other online travel aggregator platforms, such as RedBus and Goibibo, for offering online travel insurance. It has around 45 million registered customers and around 20 digital partners, including travel, cab-hailing, and e-commerce platforms.

The Mumbai-based insure-tech startup had earlier raised money from Binny Bansal, SoftBank’s Kabir Mishra, Amazon Inc., Accel Partners and Infosys founders Narayana Murthy and Kris Gopalakrishnan.

In March, it had secured a US$65-million Series C round led by Bansal. In May 2018, Acko had secured a US$12 million round led by Amazon India and Ashish Dhawan, founder of homegrown private equity fund ChrysCapital. In 2017, it had raised US$30 million in seed money from Accel Partners and SAIF Partners, among others. To date, it has raised over US$100 million.

Facebook caught in the crossfire of Singapore’s ‘fake news’ law- Bloomberg

The Singaporean government on Friday invoked its recently enacted “fake news” law, this time ordering Facebook Inc. to publish a correction notice on a post made by an anti-government blog, according to a news article by Bloomberg.

In the third such order in a week, an arm of the Ministry of Communications and Information instructed Facebook to correct a States Times Review post accused of using falsehoods to criticize the ruling People’s Action Party. The government had previously denounced the report that police had arrested a government whistle-blower and taken down information that exposed a plot to turn the affluent city into a Christian state.

Also read: The world should wish the Singapore fake news law is Fake News

Singapore introduced its controversial fake-news law as it prepares to hold general elections by April 2021, though the ruling party has called for early polls in recent cycles. Officials, including Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam, have openly questioned the ability of internet companies to handle widespread misinformation — a growing scourge of elections around the world. But critics worry the new legislation can be used to clamp down on free speech. A Facebook representative acknowledged it has received the government request but declined further comment.

Ola may lay off 225 employees as SoftBank-backed firm gears up for IPO- Reuters

Softbank-backed Indian ride-hailing firm Ola, aims to begin the IPO process by the end of March 2021 and plans to cut its 4,500-strong workforce by up to 5% or 225 heads as part of preparations, people with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

The news comes as tech investor SoftBank smarts from the abandoned share sale of major portfolio firm WeWork, as well as its first quarterly loss in 14 years after an $8.9 billion hit to its Vision Fund, through which it is Ola’s top stakeholder.

Ola, officially ANI Technologies Pvt Ltd, is India’s home-grown rival to US peer and fellow SoftBank portfolio firm Uber Technologies Inc. Local media have previously reported Ola was targeting an initial public offering (IPO).

As part of that effort, Ola has engaged McKinsey & Company and EY as consultants said the executive. At the same time, Ola plans to reduce its 4,500-strong permanent workforce by 4% to 5%, said another person.

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Today’s top tech news: FEBE Ventures launches US$25M fund in Vietnam; TransferWise rolls out in Malaysia

FEBE Ventures launches US$25M Vietnam-focused early-stage VC fund [press release]

FEBE Ventures, an early-stage VC firm, has announced the launch of a US$25 million fund, which will invest in Vietnam-based and cross-border startups.

“We believe that Vietnam is a great place to invest in outstanding founders at the beginning of their startup journey and to support them to become regional champions,” said Eric Merlin, Co-founder of FEBE Ventures.

“We invest in entrepreneurs who want to become regional leaders and we are acting on two main corridors: Southeast Asian startups that want to enter Vietnam early and Vietnamese founders who want to expand regionally,” said Olivier Raussin, Co-founder of FEBE Ventures.

FEBE Ventures is sector and business model agnostic (B2B, B2C, education, healthcare, logistic, fintech, O2O, mobility, etc.) and is looking for startups that can scale exponentially and quickly dominate their market.

The fund is focused on early stages, which can be Powerpoint or MVP phase, or ‘pre-seed’, or ‘seed’ rounds. Despite its early stage focus, the fund can also be flexible to make investments in pre-series A and series A deals.

FEBE, the acronym of ‘For Entrepreneurs, By Entrepreneurs’, is founded and managed by three entrepreneurs with 28 years of experience building and scaling companies in Vietnam and Southeast Asia as well as investing in tech startups in Asia, Europe and South America. Prior to forming FEBE, the five-person team together have invested in a total of 31 companies.

FEBE Ventures’ third Co-founder is Olivier Raussin, also the fund’s Managing Partner.

The three co-founders have personally committed 10 per cent of the fund as Limited Partners (LPs). The fund is accredited by the MAS in Singapore and it aims to complete the second closing in 2020.

FEBE Ventures has made its first investment in Zenyum’s Series A round alongside Sequoia Capital and others VCs.

Malaysia risks falling behind Indonesia, Vietnam: Pikom’s Ganesh Kumar Bangah [DigitalNewsAsia]

Malaysia runs the risk of falling behind neighbours in the region if the country doesn’t pick up the pace of digitisation, warned outgoing Pikom chairman, Ganesh Kumar Bangah, in his final media briefing as chairman on Tuesday in Selangor, Malaysia.

“It is very important for us to be adopting technology faster than our neighbouring countries to ensure that we remain competitive,” he said. “Our competitor today is not Singapore. Our competitor today is Indonesia, our competitor today is Vietnam.” Pikom is the Nasional ICT Association of Malaysia.

TransferWise rolls out in Malaysia, allows cheaper cash transfers to 83 countries [The Star Malaysia]

British cash-transfer service provider TransferWise has rolled out in Malaysia, allowing customers to send money to 83 other countries at competitive exchange rates.

TransferWise chairman Taavet Hinrikus said the entry into Malaysia was due to a high number of requests from potential customers – over 15,000 altogether.

“Along the way, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) and other government departments were very professional in the way they handled our application. By allowing and encouraging more nonbanks to provide financial services in Malaysia, BNM is ensuring consumers benefit from better and more affordable services,” he said.

she1K angel syndicate invests in New York-based Farmshelf [press release]

she1K, a global corporate executive women angel network, has made a syndicated investment into Farrmshelf, headquartered in New York.

Farmshelf aims to democratise farming, enabling anyone to grow where they live, work and eat by offering a plug & play indoor bookshelf-like farming system.

Farmshelf’s smart, hydroponic growing systems evoke a space commitment to design, innovation and sustainability while providing meaningful yield in an automated, internet-connected bookshelf-sized device. The system is equipped with all the sensors and tools necessary to monitor the produces’ needs every step of the way and notify the user when to its ready to harvest.

EOS VC invests in blockchain games developer Biscuit [press release]

EOS VC, the venture capital arm of blockchain software company Block.one, has announced an investment in innovative blockchain games developer Biscuit.

Biscuit is the creator of EOS Knights, the first mobile game to run on the EOS blockchain.

“Our direct investment in Biscuit extends our strategic focus of working with some of the smartest minds in the gaming blockchain sector,” said Mike Alexander, CEO of EOS VC. “Biscuit has taken the powerful qualities of blockchain’s smart contract and combined it with the traditional Role Playing Game elements to produce one of the best-loved gaming apps on the market.”

“Block.one has closely supported us in the successful development and operation of EOS Knights from the very start,” said Jay Lee, Founder of Biscuit. “This new investment from Block.one’s venture arm EOS VC confirms our strong continuing partnership and underscores our belief that gaming dApps like EOS Knights are catalysts for the mainstream adoption of blockchain technology.”

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RHL Ventures launches accelerator programme for startups in emerging technologies in Malaysia

Private investment firm RHL Ventures has announced the launch of an accelerator programme to identify and scale Malaysian businesses dealing in emerging technologies.

The VC firm has also inaugurated its new office in Kuala Lumpur.

RHL Ventures made the announcement during a press conference hosted by its Managing Partners, Rachel Lau and Raja Hamzah Abidin, as well as General Partner Jo Jo Kong. During this session, they shared RHL’s upcoming plans to nurture Malaysian companies that have high potential in scaling their innovations within the domestic market and abroad.

This was followed by a panel discussion comprising Yang Berhormat Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman (Minister of Youth and Sports of Malaysia), Yang Mulia Tengku Dato’ Sri Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz (Group Chief Executive Officer & Executive Director of CIMB Group Holdings Berhad) and En. Jalil Rasheed (President and Group CEO, Permodalan Nasional Berhad). Their deliberations centred around the state of Malaysia’s SME and entrepreneurial ecosystems.

The discussion particularly focused on what efforts they need to take to scale in a new era of industry underpinned by business innovation and technological transformation, as well as the significant role that investors need to take to promote sustainable economic growth.

Meet the VC: RHL Ventures on sniffing out a good deal and why VCs need to work together

“Our new accelerator programme underlines our firm’s stronger refocusing of efforts to grow Malaysia’s entrepreneurial and investment ecosystem along more sustainable lines,” said Lau. “With Malaysia’s innovation landscape now being more vibrant and dynamic than ever before, we are looking forward to identifying and working with the country’s best and most forward-thinking businesses. This way, we want to help them scale their innovations and grow them to become local and global champions.”

As part of its drive to support the growth of local businesses and entrepreneurs, RHL Ventures earlier this year announced the launch of RM100 million (US$24.3 million) fund to support the growth of local SMEs.

Founded in 2016, RHL has invested several tech startups, including healthcare SaaS company HealthMetrics, and healthy snacks e-commerce platform Signature Market. In February, RHL invested an undisclosed sum in Atap.co, an online marketplace for interior designer sourcing and hiring.

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Meet the 3 startups graduating from the PwC-MDEC Immersion programme

PwC Malaysia and the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) on Wednesday celebrated the graduation of three startups from their PwC-MDEC Immersion programme, a six-month mentoring programme with partners PwC’s Assurance, Deals and Tax practice.

The Immersion programme is a two-way mentoring programme with the goal to “immerse, exchange ideas and discover new paradigms for businesses in the digital world.”

“We would like to congratulate the startups for completing this mentoring journey. They have demonstrated commitment and tenacity in learning and exchanging knowledge with the PwC partners they were paired with. The insights they brought to our partners in the programme were invaluable to PwC as it deepens our understanding of the investments they have made in digitising their organisations and their approach in disrupting the business,” said Sridharan (Sri) Nair, PwC Malaysia Managing Partner, in a press statement.

Through the Immersion programme, the startups had access to PwC’s network through sharing sessions on selected topics such as funding and raising an IPO, as well as access to thought leadership.

They also attended PwC’s Building Trust Awards 2019, a flagship initiative under PwC’s Building Trust programme.

Also Read: Meet the 5 regional finalists of Alibaba-MDEC Jumpstarter 2020 competition

Those startups are:

Supahands
CEO and Co-Founder: Mark Koh

Supahands is a platform that connects companies to a remote workforce called SupaAgents, based around Southeast Asia. SupaAgents specialise in working with large volumes of data, helping businesses scale projects and processes accurately on demand while reducing fixed overheads by up to 75 per cent.

Koh was paired up with PwC Malaysia Tax Partner Yap Sau Shiung for the Immersion programme.

Dropee
CEO and Co-Founder: 
Lennise Ng

Dropee is a B2B marketplace that brings together suppliers and retailers. It aims to help small- and medium-sized retailers such as convenient stores and F&B outlets source for products directly from qualified wholesalers, manufacturers and brand owners at a faster, cheaper and more reliable way.

Ng and Aizat Rahim, COO and Co-founder of Dropee, were paired up with PwC Malaysia Deals Partner Yennie Tan for the Immersion programme.

Involve Asia

CEO and Founder: Jimmy How

Involve Asia is a performance marketing company delivering affiliate marketing and digital advertising solutions for brands around the Asian region. The company’s ‘Involve’ platform is recognised as a well-established network for advertisers and publishers to connect for marketing campaigns, performance and results.

How was paired up with PwC Malaysia Assurance Partner Kelvin Lee for the Immersion programme.

Image Credit: PwC-MDEC

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10 mistakes that new entrepreneurs tend to make and should avoid in 2020

Entrepreneurship is one of the most challenging career paths anyone can, and naturally, the journey is filled with challenges. Success is determined by the decisions you make as an entrepreneur and you need to strategize on how you will leverage your strengths to ensure that you propel your business forward.

In business, mistakes happen, but part of effective leadership during the organisational crisis is being able to prevent certain mistakes and focusing on growth. 

1. Making uninformed decisions

This is the worst mistake you can ever make because it can result in irrecoverable damage and loss of profits. With any decision or product change or investment, you need to ensure that you are taking the best course of action by conducting thorough research.

This particularly applies to the new entrepreneur who might still be caught up in the passion of a growing business and prone to making impulsive decisions.

Also Read: How Taiwan can boost your startup in unexpected ways

Any decision you make should be backed by the desire to learn the possible outcomes and how your business will benefit from the decision.

2. Attachment to ideas

As an entrepreneur, ideas will come and go and you need to get used to them going more than coming. Not every idea is a good one and we tend to get carried away with bad or impractical ideas that barely serve us in the long run. As a business person, you need to listen to those around you and present yourself as a receptive person to receive honest and productive feedback.

There is a theory that nothing is new under the sun. Therefore, it is highly likely that someone tried your idea before. Research, again, goes a long way in understanding the viability of a new idea. Before investing large amounts of money – some businesses develop a minimal viable product to test the market.

Becoming attached to your ideas can be dangerous and lead you holding on to and implementing a bad idea. Learn to let go of ideas, even those you are super passionate about.

3. Fear of getting your hands dirty

As the leader of a business, your involvement in the overall process allows you to understand how the daily operations of business work. As a business grows, the CEO may grow distant from operations leading to making decisions that may not be good for the business.

As your business grows, your engagement in daily activities is vital and this impacts the growth of your company. Your employees will also value you as an employer if you are invested in understanding their challenges from a practical standpoint.

Investors are also looking for someone who is not afraid to go the extra mile to improve their business and operations. 

4. Ignoring the financial aspect

Money is everything. In business. That is why you are in business: to make money. This is the number one reason why businesses fail within a short time. As the CEO, you need to keep up to date with every financial decision you make and how it will impact your company and its development.

Understand that nothing comes for free and that any business decision you make has a financial implication, whether immediate or delayed. As a business person, this means you should be well-versed in financial management.

Also Read: Is your entrepreneurial journey just another rat race? Here are 20 things that say it might just be so

You should also be able to group expenses according to needs for the business and ensure that you stick to your business plan. The idea is not to reduce your expenses to maximize your profits. 

5. Taking on too many things at once

The beauty of business is that you now own your time. Yay! However, you need to be careful not to fill it up with too many things that will distract you from your business.

Success in business is cultivated through focus and dedication to helping your business succeed. Be wary of starting something else on the side or adding to your range of products or services. The growth of your business is very important, and it needs a lot more attention than you might think. 

6. Not organizing your days

Being organized saves time. Keep a good diary and use different apps on your phone to ensure that you are on top of your tasks. As you grow as an entrepreneur, it does become demanding on your time. Keeping a solid list and commit yourself to complete tasks that grow your business daily.

A diary helps you to prioritize tasks as they come in and completing them in time to ensure that you are on track. If you are also working towards your degree, you can use the best essay writing service to assist you in completing coursework. 

7. Not seeing the bigger picture

Along the way, there will be failures and mishaps; however, these should not determine your overall path. As an entrepreneur, you will encounter mistakes, and they should form as part of a lesson in the bigger scheme of things.

A lot of the time, certain mistakes lead to a decrease in confidence and losing hope to the point of no confidence in oneself. This is detrimental to the growth of your business, and you need to take a knock but not stay down for long. Pick yourself up and keep moving. 

8. Having a DIY mentality

This is a great trait, but not always. As a business owner, delegation becomes more important with time. In reality, trying to do everything by yourself can lead to complete burnout.

Furthermore, as your business grows, you need more skilled labor to take on project management, financial management, and administration. Thus, you need to let go a little bit to make room for yourself to grow. 

9. Cutting corners

At first, this may seem like a good idea to save time or make a quick buck, but it is not a good business practice. Cutting corners can lead to things like diminishing the quality of your product or selling your product at a loss, which is simply bad for business. 

10. Not saving money

Yes, saving is difficult, but in business, it is vital to actively improve your trade and ensuring that if everything falls apart, there is a way out. If you have an emergency, you should be able to tackle it and resolve issues without having to compromise on your business.

Conclusion 

In any business venture, mistakes are common, but they do not define the rest of your path. You need to be aware of your mistakes and correct them immediately. The best way to correct your mistakes is by preventing them from happening in the first place.

Editor’s note: e27 publishes relevant guest contributions from the community. Share your honest opinions and expert knowledge by submitting your content here.

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Image Credit:  Thomas Drouault

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Matching-making for loans: Why online lending platform Lendela has set its eyes on Asia

fintech

I filled in many forms. I spent days understanding the terms. I waited for approval. But I failed.

That is a typical cycle of a layman applying for a loan. If there is one time when you really dislike banks is while applying for a loan or even worse trying to understand how it will work. Bringing Scandinavian chic to Fintech in Asia, Lendela is introducing its lending platform in Southeast Asia.

It is a consumer-centric online lending platform, a “first” in this part of the world. Founder and CEO Nima Karimi has spent over two decades in the Nordic banking and finance industry with platforms like Zmarta and Lendo, building them up from scratch. And hopes to bring his expertise to become the “most reliable lending space” in Asia.

“Europe is a fairly mature market and Africa is too slow and after experimenting with the model in Brazil, Southeast Asia seemed exciting,” said Karimi. With Cocoon capital as lead investors and IMO, Lendela started in Singapore in July last year. It has since entered Thailand, Malaysia and Hong Kong with local teams lead by country managers.

Playing cupid

Karimi told me it was simply the dissatisfaction on one’s face while chasing a loan that led him to build this. Loans are a unique product and probably the only one where the seller can deny it. It also lacks transparency as the seller (banks) have a lot of information about the consumers (loan applicant) but not vice versa, necessarily. “That’s what Lendela wants to change,” added Karimi.

Almost as if matchmaking, Lendela works with the consumer right from the start of the loan application to disbursement. “Borrowers don’t know where to find a loan, so at Lendela they just fill in one form and we match them to the right loan partner,” said Karimi. For now, Lendela is focussed on consumer loans like auto, home, etc.

Its a win-win as for lenders or banks it saves user acquisition cost, the effort, and process to screen applicants and processes. They have about 18 lending partners in the region and 30 in the Nordics. This increases the chances of loan approval as consumers have a wide range to match with. Karimi added that the model works effectively when they have a great variety of banking partners. Lendela works on a commission basis with banking partners as they “want to share the risks and success of the business”.

To Asia with love

“In the Nordics, it is hard to sign banks as compared to Southeast Asia,” said Karimi. Since it is not a very widely used concept and not all loans are formalised via banking in this region getting both consumers and partners can be a challenge sometimes.

Also, each country in the region is different and so are their regulations but the market is ripe and there is a thirst for innovation. For eg: In Singapore, banks can market loans but money lenders can’t. In Thailand, credit reports are generated manually by non-banking institutions only.

The Hong Kong lending market is regulated through HKMA which set in motion the Open Banking initiative last year that enables fintech firms to connect to banks via APIs and over time enable users to manage more of their traditional banking services, including loan applications, via connected platforms.

So governments in Southeast Asia are adapting to fintech friendly regulation with the likes of Singapore’s MAS Sandbox and Thailand’s digital identity (NDID). Hence Karimi feels his “timing is right”.

Karimi believes the novelty of Lendela’s platform, its product-driven approach, and Nordic-inspired UX will work to their advantage to attract consumers in Southeast Asia.

Also read: Cocoon Capital announces US$22M second fund to invest in enterprise tech startups

Let’s take a microscopic look at how it is faring in some of its Asian markets:

Thailand: It launched in May this year and signed an exclusive partnership with Kaidee- Thailand’s largest online marketplace. This enables Kaidee’s customers to apply for loans and compare loan offers online at Lendela.th and has been a huge success for both parties so far said Lendela country manager Jear Worrawut.

It is very complicated for consumers to understand where they can find the best loan offer and the level of financial education in Thailand is low. The process of applying for a loan is rarely digital. It is very common that consumers have to visit a bank branch to be able to sign the loan. So there is potential for Lendela to help customers.

Hong Kong: It is a market with over 160 banks and 2,000 money lenders that fiercely compete for the attention of intending borrowers. With Lendela, each lender can reduce their customer acquisition cost, the marketing risk of acquiring those customers, and overall reduce administrative tasks related to each loan application. Consequently, resources at banks and lenders will be freed up to focus on core business activities such as underwriting, expanding product offering and customer monitoring.

“In Hong Kong, there are some bad connotations with lending money, including companies that act as agents, third parties or intermediaries to banks and lenders so we spend a lot of our time explaining how we are different, and how we are empowering consumers,” said Peter Edsinger, General Manager Lendela Hong Kong.

Malaysia: The Malaysian economy is expected to grow at a slightly faster pace in 2020 according to the Economic Outlook 2020. The government’s plans to implement the ‘Shared Prosperity Vision 2030’ which aims to raise the living standards of all Malaysians to a decent level by 2030, may also increase spending over the next 10 years. For individual retail clients, the loan landscape in Malaysia is a very tricky to navigate due to non-standardised rates and processes of all loan providers (both banks or lenders); the availability and aggressiveness of unlicensed lenders; level of the Malaysian public’s financial awareness on their own credit score or financial status and their eligibility status.

“The Malaysian public may not be completely open and trusting of an online platform which deals with helping them find loans, simply because of the many unlicensed moneylenders that are available. Clarity, transparency, and security on that will have to be assured by us at Lendela, that we only partner with licensed and registered loan providers,” said Firdaus Nejim Al-Asedi, country manager, Lendela Malaysia.

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