Singapore-headquartered venture capital firm EV Growth has announced the close of its first fund at US$250 million, exceeding the firm’s initial target of US$150 million.
The VC firm’s new Limited Partners (LPs) include several Asia-based family offices and two of Asia’s largest sovereign wealth funds, including Temasek.
EV Growth was launched in March 2018. A joint venture among East Ventures, SMDV and Yahoo! Japan Capital, the fund focusses on providing growth capital to startups in Indonesia and the rest of Southeast Asia with an industry agnostic focus.
EV Growth aims to bridge the gap in VC growth funding with the goal of creating a diversified portfolio of Southeast Asia early growth tech stage leaders.
The firm is led by three partners — Willson Cuaca from East Ventures, Roderick Purwana from SMDV, and Shinichiro Hori from Yahoo! Japan Capital.
To date, EV Growth has invested across different sectors in Southeast Asia. Its portfolio firms include Ruangguru (US$150 million Series C round with General Atlantic and GGV Capital); Sociolla (US$40 million Series D round with Temasek), Shopback (US$45 million round with Rakuten and EDBI), Sendo (US$61 million Series C round with Softbank Ventures Asia and Thailand’s Kasikornbank), Koinworks (US$16.5 million round), and Warung Pintar (US$27.5 million Series B round with Vertex and Pavilion Capital).
EV Growth claimed that it has deployed more than 50 per cent of its total funds in 20 deals. About 80 per cent of its portfolio companies are Indonesian.
Cuaca of East VC said: “The inflection point in Southeast Asia is now and we are lucky to be here early. Our firm’s operating experience, deal velocity, local knowledge, and regional networks have helped us capture some of the best deals in the region. We plan to deploy US$325 Million for Southeast Asian startups combining active funds size, for both seed and growth stage.”
Just this year, East Ventures was named the most consistent top performing VC fund globally by Preqin and the most active investor in SEA and Indonesia.
dtac Accelerate, the startup accelerator programme backed by Thai telco company dtac, has been discontinued.
In an interview with e27, Sompoat Chansomboon, former Managing Director of dtac Accelerate, explained that the discontinue was due to the “new business direction” that the telco has set up.
“The direction of the corporate has been changed with the appointment of the new CEO of dtac at the beginning of the year,” he said.
Chansomboon also announced that the team members that run the programme have all resigned from the company.
As an accelerator programme, dtac Accelerate provides participating startups seed funding and access to dtac and Telenor Group companies in 13 markets.
Its most recent batch was the seventh batch, which saw 15 startups graduating from the programme in May 2019. It has worked with startups from various verticals, from health tech to travel tech.
The announcement about the programme’s discontinuation was made in an Instagram post from December 27, where it expressed gratitude for the continuous support in the past seven years.
A day later, in a Facebook post, Chansomboon highlighted some of the milestones and achievements that dtac Accelerate has made: It has worked with 60 startups and 151 founders with a total valuation of US$227 million.
The startups have raised a total of US$36 million with 70 per cent success rate, working with a network of more than 350 VC and CVC firms.
When asked about his plans for the next year, Chansomboon stated that together with the team that used to run dtac Accelerate, he is preparing to announce “something big” in the “next few weeks.”
“The ecosystem will still continue with the help of our team,” he said. “It will be bigger than how it had been.”
Every person who wishes to become a successful entrepreneur has the primary aim of making maximum profits out of business. However, merely wishing for the same is not going to reap the desired results as one has to work towards business success and profitability literally.
As per the Small Business Administration (SBA) Office of Advocacy, almost 80 per cent of small businesses survive the first year, and 90 per cent of startups do not succeed owing to the wrong choices made by their owners.
According to the Wells Fargo Small Business Index, US$10,000 is the average startup amount. As per a YouGov survey conducted on 503 business executives, 97 per cent of them cited customer service as the most significant driving factor for business success.
The largest valued startup at US$75 billion is ByteDance, a Toutiao maker.
There are a lot of roadblocks on the path to success, and one needs to have adequate solutions in place, along with a firm determination and positive attitude to taste success in the business world. So, let’s get started and understand the transformation of a business from the startup phase into the successful phase in detail.
Development of an idea
The very first stage of the business lifecycle is nothing but the development of an idea. It is the idea only that paves the way for success or failure for a business. You should clear every doubt in your mind through industry experts, friends, and colleagues before you proceed with planning for the idea.
Ideally, before you plan, you should get answers for the following:
Is this idea filling a market need?
Is my idea going to get acceptance in the market?
What steps should I take to establish a business structure?
Will this idea bring in any profits for me?
Startup
The next phase of the business lifecycle is the startup phase, which is considered to be one of the most stressful phases. The simple reason being it is the platform where your idea meets reality and may or may not meet the perfect execution.
Mistakes at this stage may leave an effect on the company even in the later stages of the business.
Some of the major challenges faced by business owners at this stage include:
Looking for investments (raising money)
Looking for quality staff
Handling expectations from cash reserves and sales
Establishing market presence and customer base
Management of financial accounting
Establishment
This is the ground state for your business’s success. If you have reached this far, you must be having an adequate amount of customers and positive cash flow. Your expenses should be easily adjusted against the net income generated by your business.
The challenges which the business owners face at this point include managing time for operations and customer service, adopting new strategies for client acquisition, dealing with the competition, and more.
This is the stage where your business is growing at a steady pace and is ready for scalability. There are a different set of challenges faced by business owners at the growth and scalability stage which are discussed below.
Business growth challenges:
Dealing with increasing revenues and customers
Increasing the volume of the profit
Dealing with competitors
Streamlining operations, and more…
Business expansion challenges:
The never-ending challenge of competition
Dealing with additional services and stocks
Entity expansion
Competitor acquisition
Strategic decision making, and more…
Maturity
This is the final stage of a business lifecycle, which every owner wishes to reach as this is the stage where the business has flourished thoroughly during the initial stages and is looking to evolve itself into a brand.
However, this type of business expansion involves multiple risks owing to the competition from the established brands and the management’s ability for scalability. At this stage, the same questions repeat themselves that existed at the initial stage of expansion. These include:
Are there subtle opportunities?
Is the business financially stable for such a risk?
Does the business have the potential to sustain further growth?
What is the exit plan in case things do not work out the planned way?
Also, a number of companies opt for new leaders like having an additional CEO for dealing with the new set of challenges.
As per research by CB Insights, problems with cash pave the way for the exit for small businesses. In order to deal with this challenge, businesses should:
Focus on the sales and profits strategy to bring in more cash flow revenue
Use technology to process invoices quickly so as to start the payment process quickly
Collect account receivable ASAP to aid revenue
Extend the date of accounts payable as long as possible to maintain a positive cash flow
Negotiate with vendors or partners to save money and reduce unnecessary expenses
Competition exists at every phase of the business lifecycle. The only difference that is seen is in the form of intensity at every level. However, it is imperative that businesses are prepared to tackle their competitors at every phase. They should continue doing what they are best at and also adopt new strategies for gaining an edge over their peers. These include:
Learning when to delegate
During the growth stages of a company, owners are faced with multiple responsibilities. It is important to understand the importance of that responsibility and its overall impact on the growth and operations of the business.
This means owners need to delegate some tasks to their leaders, which can be managed by their expertise. Also, it is imperative that they make some strategic business decisions by themselves, which demands their immediate attention.
Dealing with the market changes
Every industrial sector experiences market changes owing to technological advancements, customer trends, or an enhanced demand for product or service quality. Irrespective of which business lifecycle stage you are at, you are required to keep compliance with the market changes if you wish to retain current customers and acquire new ones.
For this, it is imperative that you train your employees against the latest technology use regularly, and work on marketing strategies that boost your customer base, along with leaving no stone unturned to have unmatched product/service quality.
Deciding on strategy abandonment
There are times during the initial stage when businesses are looking to experiment to create an early impact. This type of strategy may work or may not work. So, it is important to assess the forthcoming possibility of success or failure and make decisions regarding the continuation and abandonment of the strategy.
This brings us to the conclusion that every business witnesses the startup phase, but only a few of them are able to turn themselves into a brand. It is important for businesses to work on strategies that aid business growth and profitability at every stage of the business lifecycle, to meet customer demands and be at par with the competitors eventually.
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It’s not science fiction anymore. AI is transforming healthcare beyond our imagination. The power of AI is echoing across healthcare subindustries, and it is truly life-changing.
AI is bringing a paradigm shift in the healthcare industry, with its ability to mimic human cognitive functions. It is the catalyst to self-running growth by leveraging advanced technologies that enable machines to sense, understand, act, and learn to perform diverse administrative and clinical healthcare functions to augment human activity.
Which healthcare industries will transform?
From early detection to improved medical diagnosis, AI is positively contributing to the welfare of humanity. AI and ML are reshaping healthcare in multiple ways — how consumers access it, how the providers are delivering it, and what health outcomes may achieve.
In this article, we identify seven healthcare sub-industries that will see a significant impact and massive transformation in the coming years.
‘Diagnostic errors contribute to approximately 10 per cent of patient deaths, and account for six to 17 per cent of hospital complications.’ – National Academies
Physician performance is not the only factor that causes these errors. There are many others, such as:
Inefficient collaboration and integration of health information systems
Communication gaps among clinicians and patients
A traditional healthcare work system that does not adequately support the diagnostic
Applications of AI in medical diagnoses are currently in the early adoption phase due to limited data available on patient outcomes. However, by around 2022, AI may advance in its potential to impact how healthcare providers and health care systems approach diagnostics. It will play its role in reshaping the ability for individuals to understand changes to their health in real-time
Medical billing
Coding accuracy is an ongoing challenge for healthcare providers. These errors are increasing claims denial rates and eventually affecting their ROI. On the other hand, billing is a manual and tedious task that requires efficiency.
The role of AI in medical billing is that of an expert billing assistant who is accurate, fast, and highly efficient.
Medical billing and coding is a core element of how healthcare is delivered and received in the US. The risks of inaccurate billing are still a challenge in this field, and the vast amounts of data involved are prime territory for AI applications.
The sheer volume of billables requires quick processing, and AI can address these hurdles through intelligent text analysis, denial management analysis, and more.
Pharma
Over the last five years, the use of AI in the pharma industry has redefined how scientists develop new drugs, counter diseases, and more.
AI may have a crucial role in the pharma industry in developing new drugs, helping in drug adherence, and in-depth analysis of clinical trials.
As per a report published by the HIMSS Analytics 2017 Essentials Brief, less than five per cent of healthcare organisations are currently using or investing in AI technologies.
The current IT infrastructure of Pharma companies is traditional and based on legacy systems, lacking in interoperability and tagged data. AI-based systems in pharma can solve these challenges. It can cut costs down, create new, effective treatments, and above all else, help save lives.
Medical imaging
Deep learning technology can identify specific features in images, enhance image quality, and spot outliers and abnormalities. Many imaging research laboratories are rapidly moving towards advanced techniques to achieve efficiency and expertise to the optimum level.
AI in medical imaging can enhance a broad spectrum of an essential process such as medical image reconstruction, noise reduction, quality assurance, segmentation, triage, and more. Many upcoming AI-based applications are claiming to have potential in radio genomics, computer-aided detection, and classification.
In the coming years, AI will remodel current healthcare systems to offer a powerful impact on current clinical imaging practices. To make it happen, we need to focus on building novel pre-trained model architectures tailored for medical imaging data along with means of data exchange with seamless interoperability.
Dubbed as the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT), this advanced technology can enable connecting different medical devices and sensors with the internet to gather vast amounts of critical patient data.
This collected data can be analysed and utilised to understand patient conditions, faster and accurate medical diagnosis and to understand resource utilisation patterns at a healthcare facility.
Though it requires a substantial initial investment, many healthcare facilities are taking an interest in the merits of IoMTs. It can bring great relief to patients and providers related to chronic diseases.
These patients can be monitored in real-time from the comfort of their homes.
Pathology
Traditional pathology practices are nearing an end as digital pathology with AI is quickly replacing them. With the rising workload and need for accuracy, AI will mark its impact in the coming years at a full-scale level.
Advanced technologies hold the power of taking current pathology procedure labs beyond the limits of the microscope and human sight.
AI in pathology can simplify image analysis, rare object identification, morphology-based segmentation, and digital whole slide imaging. The accelerated adoption of artificial intelligence and digital pathology in recent clinical practice has ushered in new horizons for value-based care delivery.
Advancements of AI in radiology domain can be a crucial breakthrough in our efforts of revolutionising patient care. AI can power an integrated cloud-based RIS/PACS platform to help radiologists review the cases automatically in real-time.
The current predictions for the upcoming future of radiology with AI are pro-AI mostly. If these predictions are realised, then clinicians, patients, and payers will undoubtedly gravitate toward modern-day radiologists who have figured out how to work efficiently alongside AI.
AI is becoming highly ubiquitous, and we have yet to realise its game-changing clinical, administrative, and financial opportunities that await us in healthcare. With current experiences, we can say that AI has multiplied productivity across a range of human endeavors.
AI has already progressed rapidly to solve process inefficiencies, manual and expensive procedures, guard against human error, and provided assurance to redefine the whole idea of patient care. Unlocking the power of AI will need closer collaboration between the healthcare IT stakeholders and the end-users in the industry.
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The e27 Community has become a cohesive and forward-thinking network of thought leaders in the ecosystem. And we could not have done this alone. Thank you to all the engaged stakeholders in the Southeast Asia tech industry — investors, entrepreneurs, and more — who made this collaboration possible by sharing their views and opinions.
Today, this community of contributors has become integral to our platform’s growth. They complement our core team of reporters by providing in-depth and critical insights into the industry on top of our daily news and features coverage.
With each year the popularity of our community posts is growing and many of them have become some of the top-read articles on our site in 2019.
Continuing this annual tradition, without further ado, we present to you the 10 most read e27 community articles of 2019!
Note: the articles are arranged in no particular order.
What I learned from procrastination while scaling my startup to 4.2M users
For anyone considering the shift –yes, that ultimate shift from a fulltime job to being a full-time entrepreneur– this post is an eye-opener. Balancing a full-time job with the responsibilities of scaling his startup is a self-journey and might reveal fascinating aspects of yourself.
5 ways Augmented Reality is redefining the gaming industry
Did you know? The first commercial application of Augmented Reality (AR) technology was the yellow “first down” line that began appearing in the football games in 1998.
The integration of game visual and audio content with a user environment in real-time is what we know today as AR. Now don’t confuse it with virtual reality which creates completely an artificial environment. AR in the gaming industry uses the existing environment and creates a playing field within it.
AR games can be played on smartphones, tablets, and portable gaming systems. It is the integration of digital information and overlays new information on top of it. Still confused? Read on…
Modernising your venture’s marketing tactics by understanding how to communicate effectively
One thing is never going out of fashion. And that is communication. In fact, it just gets better and layered, thus making it that subtle art one must constantly hone.
It’s hard to sustain your business growth without marketing. Remember: the right kind of communication defines a business’s journey, mission, and vision.
The battle between private and public blockchains
Blockchain and its applications are multiplying and so are the regulatory and social challenges around them. The race to lead and capitalise on this trend has led to a surge in players in this industry. More than one player can co-exist and thrive in its niche market.
Building a digital to the core public service for Singapore
There is no doubt Singapore is the most technologically advanced nation in the Southeast Asian region. And with the Digital Government Blueprint (DGB) – released in June 2018 — it has set out an ambitious goal of transforming Singapore’s public sector into one that is both “digital to the core” and “serves with heart”.
The DGB — with a list of 14 targets to be achieved by 2023 — challenges the Singaporean government agencies to provide easy-to-use, seamless, secure and relevant digital services to citizens and businesses.
10 crazy blockchain ideas for Facebook
2019 brought in Facebook’s Libra and 2020 may bring in more innovations from the house of the most popular social media.
The word is that Facebook is hiring aggressively for blockchain roles. With the long term cryptocurrency utility and adoption of blockchain technologies, things can get pretty creative.
Differences between AI and Machine learning –and why it matters
Often mistakenly synonymised, artificial intelligence and machine learning are changing the world entirely. They are indeed parallel advancements and changing everything from how we watch TV to how we buy clothes. But if you want to use these two in an effective and useful manner, you must understand the differences between these.
What role does big data play in the insurance industry?
If big data were tangible it would be the biggest currency of the decade. From e-commerce to banking, consumer data is the key to a digital business. Extracting massive volumes of relevant customer data is also transforming the insurance industry.
The factors driving the success of Grab and what it took to become a market leader
The StartupViet Bootcamp in 2019 hosted 80 startups for an in-depth dialogue with Grab’s representative in Vietnam. Thanks to the interesting discussion, this contributor was able to shed light on what were the key components to Grab’s success in Vietnam.
How Google is slowing innovation
For all those who like brand wars as much as I do! What and how Google did outsmart its competitors? Was it fair? What can we all learn from their moves and where in the world of innovation headed. Find answers to them and more.
Improving blockchain awareness in Asia through the hardware
While Asia is playing catch up with the world when it comes to new and emerging technology, the scope potential is massive.
Blockchain is most visible in the digital space, with a majority of blockchain-powered projects being digital platforms like electronic wallets and decentralised apps. But digital alternatives to physical assets are paving the way. Several tech firms are extending blockchain’s presence outside of the digital space by creating blockchain-compatible hardware.
The future of remote work is happening now. Here’s how to make it work for you
If there is a coworking space within 20 minutes of where you live, you know this phenomenon in real. Not only does working remotely call for greater ownership but the productivity boosts of working from home are also higher. The skill sets required to succeed in working from home are the new in-thing. The movement is broader and growing faster than most realise.
Editor’s note: e27 aims to foster thought leadership by publishing contributions from the community. Become a thought leader in the community and share your opinions or ideas by submitting a post.
Join our e27 Telegram group here, or like e27 Facebook page here.
