For me, the highlight of this year’s International Women’s Month was this article published by The Next Web.

It highlighted how startups in India are calling for the government to cancel the regulation that obliges startups and small businesses to implement a six-month paid maternity leave policy for their employees. A petition in a local community platform argues that for businesses with an annual turnover of less than INR10 crore (US$1 million) should be exempted from the rule, and apply a three-month paid maternal leave policy instead.

The report further detailed that, despite the law’s good intention, as soon as it was passed, the country experienced a 10 per cent dip in women employees in its total workforce. The law is seen as a burden for startups and small businesses as they would also need to pay for a replacement during the employee’s maternal leave.

This is an unfortunate situation as paid maternal leave was one of the forms of support that women need to further continue their career, leading to more women in executive positions and a more diverse workplace in general.

If I understand correctly, the barrier that prevented companies from providing the necessary support for women to succeed is cost –and the goodwill to actually open the wallet.

Also Read: With 2 successful business exits, this ex-CEO of Rocket Internet (SEA) is now championing gender parity in startup world

After some musings, I came into the conclusion that profitability is not merely a sustainability issue for the startup ecosystem.

It is also a matter of inclusivity.

A healthier finance, a healthier culture

 

Let us take a look back into 2019 –to those particular moments that had triggered a change of perspective in the global startup ecosystem, including Southeast Asia.

Since the failure of coworking space giant WeWork to IPO, followed by other similar incidents, both startups and investors are putting heavier focus to become a sustainable business. They would no longer opt to pump truckload of money to burn, in order to pursue rapid growth. They would focus on making profits instead.

In general, this has been a piece of great news. But there is one angle that we have not explored: Inclusivity.

Being a sustainable company means that startups will have a stronger foundation to provide support for their employees to excel in their career, particularly those who need it the most due to the structural barrier.

Also Read: Malaysia’s boardrooms lack diversity in gender and age representation, finds study

For this piece, I reached out to startups understand more about the kind of support that they give to their employees.

Companies such as Indonesia-based coliving platform Rukita, who had recently closed their seed funding round, are providing “skills upgrade benefits” to support its team members to accelerate their competency according to the latest industry standards.

If an early-stage startup is able to provide that kind of support for their team members, then it would be instinctive for us to expect more from bigger companies.

Certainly, it would be naive to think that money alone is enough to support a sociopolitical cause such as gender equality. There has to be goodwill from industry players to allocate their resources into the cause; that willingness has to start from having the awareness.

Having awareness aside, in times of a global crisis like today, when many businesses are barely surviving, it might be insensitive to even talk about profit. However, I am going to take that risk to point out that this moment further highlights the importance of having efficient financial management. Gone are the days when startups would burn money to attract customers with cashback programmes and the like.

This time, it is all about staying healthy.

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Image Credit: Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash

 

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Malaysia PM announces US$58B stimulus package for COVID-19-affected businesses

Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin has announced an economic stimulus package amounting to US$58 billion to help alleviate people and businesses, especially small-and-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) whose source of income had been affected by the COVID-19 outbreak.

Ministry of Communications and Multimedia Malaysia (KKMM) and Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) welcomed the initiative, which upholds the slogan “No one will be left behind” and is focussed on the development of the multimedia and telecom industry as well as the digital economy as a whole. An allocation of US$138 million in the special package of free internet service will be introduced to the people of Malaysia in collaboration with the telecommunications companies.

Saifuddin Abdullah, Minister of Communications and Multimedia Malaysia (KKMM),  believes that the package will help the telecom and multimedia industry as a whole. He stated that an additional US$92 million to increase network coverage and capacity to maintain high availability and quality of telecom and multimedia networks will assist in the development of the digital economy sector.

“KKMM, together with MDEC will continue to enhance the efforts to enable the Malaysian business community to tap into digital technologies, assist them to discover new markets, enable cashless transactions and virtual marketing,” Abdullah said.

The aid for SMEs including micro-entrepreneurs with additional funds of US$1 billion in collaboration with Bank Negara Malaysia covering five key initiatives. This would also be of great benefit as there is currently more than 86 per cent of 907,065 SMEs using technology and digital adoption in business operations.

Also Read: Time is ripe for startups around the world to capitalise on Malaysia’s potential as the heart of Digital ASEAN: MDEC’s Surina Shukri

Meanwhile, MDEC CEO Surina Shukri said the third thrust, which provides US$115 million worth of grants under the Micro Credit Scheme to help micro-entrepreneurs, including the creative industry and online traders, will further accelerate growth in both sectors, as the sectors are also MDEC’s main focused areas.

She also welcomed the US$115 one-off assistance to 120,000 e-hailing drivers with an allocation of US$14 million, which will provide more opportunities for workers in the Gig Economy sector, who are now feeling the economic impact on their income.

E-commerce unicorn Tokopedia invests in Indonesian last-mile delivery company SiCepat

Looking to boost its logistic capabilities, Tokopedia has made a strategic investment into SiCepat, an Indonesia-based last-mile delivery operator, DealStreetAsia has reported. The deal was signed last year as part of SiCepat’s US$50 million Series A funding round.

Tokopedia is said to have co-invested with Kejora-Intervest growth fund and Barito Teknologi, the investment arm of Indonesia’s largest petrochemical group Barito Pacific.

In April last year, Kejora and Barito were named as investors in the round, but there was no mention of Tokopedia’s investment.

This would be Tokopedia’s second investment in a last-mile delivery startup. Previously, the e-commerce company put in an initial investment of US$50 million alongside local conglomerate Triputra Group and China’s SF Express to set up a last-mile delivery platform, Anteraja.id.

Founded in 2014, SiCepat caters to e-commerce and online merchant requirements and offers couriers, warehouses and air and cargo delivery across Indonesia.

Singapore’s medtech firm Biolidics acquires laboratory operator Biomedics

Biolidics, the Singapore-registered medical technology company, has announced that it has acquired Biomedics Laboratory for a consideration of up to US$2.6 million, DealStreetAsia has learned. Biolidics said it will pay US$70,000 upon completion of the acquisition, with the remaining consideration can be deferred for up to 24 months post the deal.

Also Read: News Roundup: Indonesia’s mPOS firm Cashlez to raise US$6M via IPO to acquire IT firm

The company will acquire Biomedics from SAM Laboratory, a subsidiary of Clearbridge Health. Biolidics will continue to collaborate with Clearbridge to tap into its established customer base in Brunei, Myanmar, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, China, and Australia.

Offering clinical diagnostic tests, Biomedics focusses on genetic tests and other cancer related diagnostic tests for oncology which laboratory operation is accredited by the College of American Pathologists programme for its detection of circulating-tumour-cell (CTC).

Biolidics has a novel patented CTC-based technology that it deems to be compatible with Biomedics’ CTC programme.

Thai bank SCB to tap into RippleNet remittance market

Thailand-based Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) has reportedly entered into a partnership with Ripple’s enterprise-grade digital payments solution RippleNet to assist citizens in making instant low-cost cross-border payments from their mobile devices, as reported by BTC Manager.

Ripple is a San Francisco-based distributed ledger technology (DLT) startup that SCB has appointed to take the charge in spearheading its digital banking operation in the country.

Arthit Sriumporn, SCB’s SVP of Commercial Banking, said: “Siam Commercial Bank is more than 100 years old and has more than 1,000 branches across the nation. We support a wide range of customers from retail to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and corporations. Our focus is always on enriching the customer experience and RippleNet has helped us to do this with remittances.”

Currently, Thailand’s total remittances value is close to a whopping US$68 billion. SCB said that it’s currently working on a QR code-based app that enables tourists to use their home country mobile app for Thailand’s QR code payment.m by simply scanning the QR code to pay for something instantly without dealing with exchange rates or having to carry around large amounts of local currency.

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Picture Source: Tokopedia

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Barely a month after making the official Budget 2020 announcement, Singapore, like many other nations, took an unexpected economic downturn due to the rapid COVID-19 transmission, which originated in Wuhan, China in December 2019.

However, the Lion City became one of the countries that had its guards up early in the event because it remains the strongest economy and the entrance to the region’s prosperity.

In order to mitigate the crippling effect of the spread of the virus and to ease the lives of its citizens, the country’s Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat on Thursday announced a US$34 billion Resilience Budget. Its goals are to “Support Workers. Stabilise Businesses. Build Resilience”.

The key highlights of the “Resilience Budget” are:

• Jobs Support Scheme (JSS), in which the government will pay 25 per cent of monthly wages to every local worker in employment, with higher support for sectors more affected by COVID-19 (up to 75 per cent)
• COVID-19 Support Grant, a cash grant of US$561 per month for three months for low- and middle-income Singaporeans who lost their jobs due to COVID-19
• Temporary Relief Fund, which provides immediate financial assistance for families whose livelihoods were affected by COVID-19
• Support for self-employed Singaporeans, who will receive US$702 a month for nine months upon eligibility along with training support with allowance
• Enhanced care and support package, which ensures enhancements on Singaporeans who received Workfare payments for work done in 2019 up to US$2,105 in cash
• NTUC Care Fund (COVID-19), a relief for a union member, up to US$211 per union member
• SGUnited Jobs that pledges for 10,000 jobs available over the next year
• SGUnited Traineeships, which seeks to support employers in providing traineeships to fresh graduates entering the labour force to help boost employability for new graduates, and courses support through SkillsFuture Credit.
• And greater flexibility on government fees and loans.

The sectors to benefit from the Resilience Budget are aviation; tourism; meetings, incentives, conferences, exhibitions (MICE) venue operators; food; and land transport such as taxi and private hire cars, as well as art and culture.

Also Read: MatchMove acquires stake in P2P lender MoolahSense to strengthen its SME financing capabilities

The type of reliefs provided to help people cope with the effect of the pandemic are varied — from wage offset, special relief payments, loans, subsidies, tax rebate up to a year and parking waiver for up to six months, support package, to digitisation efforts.

One of the tech angles of the Resilience Budget -aside from supports in forms of waivers and rebates as well as fund for those who are eligible- is the support in capability development. The Deputy PM announced the support for both ready-to-adopt and advanced digital solutions that reduce face-to-face contact.

Deputy Prime Minister Heng underlined that the government will enhance training support, comprising higher course fee subsidies and absentee payroll support, to more sectors and till end-2020.

Positive responses from tech community

e27 approached several tech companies in the country seeking their comments on the Resilience Budget.

According to Singapore Association of Convention and Exhibition Organisers and Suppliers (SACEOS), the Resilience budget is a welcome move as it is vital to the MICE community.

“The announcement of key measures to protect livelihoods, save jobs and support enterprises shows that the government understands the difficulties that the MICE community is facing as a result of the continued impact of COVID-19 on the Singaporean economy and has taken important steps to address the impacts on our members,” it said in a statement.

“The expansion, extension, and enhancement of wage support measures in the jobs support scheme to 75 per cent of wages will help workers and business owners in our community survive COVID-19 and retain the capability to rebound quickly in the recovery that follows. The support for self-employed persons will also provide valuable support to freelancers in the MICE community,” the statement reads.

Furthermore, SACEOS also mentioned the measures to ease business cash flow by deferring income tax payments for three months as something that will relieve immediate pressure on business owners in the short-term.

Property tax exemptions will also reduce overheads and respond to a key concern held by the MICE community. Changes to the enterprise financing scheme including increased credit limits and deferred payment schedules will make credit more available and affordable for companies to maintain their capabilities throughout the crisis and into the recovery.

Also Read: oCap Management expands into India with GoCapital Finance investment

Taken together, these measures will enable SACEOS members to retain staff and maintain business viability throughout the ongoing crisis.

As a response, SACEOS said it will embrace capability-building initiatives to make the Singaporean economy more resilient, digital-ready, and innovative throughout recovery. It will also provide itself as a point of contact on detailed advice to navigate any help SACEOS members might need with the Resilience budget.

Lien Choong Luen, General Manager, gojek Singapore, said the stimulus package and the additional support that will be rendered to private-hire operators and drivers is a good move.

“The extension of the point-to-point operator license fee waiver by the Land Transport Authority is a helpful move for the industry. We believe that a further postponement of the ride-hail service operator license start date would allow operators like gojek to focus more of our efforts on assisting drivers and addressing business and operational challenges,” he explained.

“Similarly for our driver-partners, the extension of the government’s Special Relief Fund would be essential to further help them minimise their financial burden,” Lien continued.

gojek remains hopeful by operating on its mission of safety movement.

Therefore, to provide for a safer ride environment, gojek has been distributing masks, hand sanitisers, and anti-bacterial wipes to its driver-partners since January.

The ride-hailing giant has also been providing education to driver-partners and commuters on the precautions they can take, such as increasing ventilation of the car by not using the recirculation mode of the car’s air-conditioning system, and observing good hygiene practices such as regularly sanitising high-human contact points such as door handles.

Nisha Paramjothi, Senior Vice President, Investments & Strategy, fintech startup MatchMove, said.

“It is heartening to see the government’s swift actions in rolling out the Resilience Budget targeted at job retention with the Job Support and Wage Credit Schemes. While saving jobs is important, it is equally essential to prepare students and the current workforce alike for jobs of the future. Programmes like SGUnited Traineeships and SGUnited Job Initiatives can help Singaporeans find employment, learn new skills, and gain work experience,” Paramjothi added.

“Given the dynamic fintech landscape in Singapore with the upcoming launch of digital banks in Singapore, we anticipate more jobs to be created,” she continued, adding that in sync with what the Resilience Budget is apparently aiming, the company recently launched the MatchMove FinTech Academy to support the development of digital talent to enable a new level of innovation and nurture a foundation for future fintech talent in Singapore.

Also Read: Finaxar joins hands with Indovina Bank, Cathay Financial to provide SME financing in Vietnam

Finaxar, a small business-focussed fintech company, also lends its insights. Vihang Patel, Co-founder and CEO of Finaxar, said: “The Resilience Budget sees enhanced schemes such as EFS and support from MAS that will undoubtedly provide a shot of confidence for SMEs.”

“In response, Finaxar is launching new measures such as a working capital line with a longer repayment period to lighten the burden and a supplier financing line to ensure that our local supply chains are well supported. Our clients are also working closely with their existing customers to ensure that they are able to meet their financial obligations through various loan restructuring plans where required,” he said.

Fintech firm oCap, that offers access to sustainable, fast, flexible, and affordable financing solutions, also shared how the Resilience Budget might impact its business.

oCap’s CEO Carlos Haeuser said: “The Budget has been designed to provide relief and strengthen the capacity of businesses in order to recover quickly from the impact of the pandemic. From a business survival standpoint, the ability to pay wages and cover operating expenses has become crucial. The expansions to the SME Working Capital Loan and Temporary Bridging Loan Programme will ensure that all businesses will continue to have access to credit.”

Overall, the responses of the tech community in Singapore has been positive. Singapore can be the beacon of hope on what a nation can and should aspire to achieve to come out together whole, leaving no one and no industry behind.

It’s all about supporting each other in tough times and with the speed of how the Resilience Budget was designed to adjust with the nation’s need, the rest of Southeast Asia, even the world can learn a thing or two in doing their best and doing their part in protecting the country from the collapsing economy.
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Photo by Peter Nguyen on Unsplash

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Meet the three startups selected for VIISA’s new accelerator programme

Vietnam’s startup accelerator VIISA has selected three startups for its 7th batch.

These startups were selected from nearly 100 applications after over 40 interviews. Instead of traditional face-to-face meetings, a large number of the interviews were conducted through conference calls due to the Covid-19 fears.

These three startups are from traveltech, edutech and medtech.

The three-month programme provides startups with investment in cash plus an undisclosed amount of supporting services such as co-working space, Amazon Web Services, HubSpot, Google Cloud, Digital Ocean, Mapbox, Zendesk, etc.

Also read: Meet the VC: Stephanie Strunk of Amadeus Ventures on why women should support women

Startups that graduate will have a chance to get a follow-on funding of up to US$200,000 from VIISA Investment Track when they secure a new round of funding from other investors.

Below is the description of the three startups:

AskVietnamese: It focuses on tourist mapping services. Its mapping platform integrates traditional paper maps with the online map infrastructure to provide authentic experiences for independent travellers.

AskVietnamese maps help tourists navigate around their desired destination by promoting local culture, traditional delicacies and unique experiences.

Medigo: It provides remote healthcare 24×7 for everyone. The team started with a mobile app where users can upload doctor’s prescriptions, search for pharmacies, be advised by pharmacists and have medicine quickly delivered to their doorstep.

Since its launch, Medigo has been serving customers in most areas of Ho Chi Minh City. The team is working on expanding to major cities in Vietnam and providing online consultation with doctors via telemedicine.

Testuru: An online testing platform, it is currently focusing on IELTS test. The test includes all parts of an official IELTS test which are listening, reading, writing and speaking. The test results also come with feedback for test takers to improve and better prepared for the later attempts.

AISing secures US$6.5M to strengthen AI platform used in robots and self-driving cars

Japan-based AISing has announced the closing of a US$6.6 million Series B funding round from Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Venture Capital, according to DealstreetAsia. Sparx Group, Dai-ichi Life Insurance and Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Venture Capital also participated in this round.

The capital will be used to further enhance the developmental system of the Algorithm Development Group (ADG) and train human resources to develop and commercialize new edge AI.

The company is known for its AI technology which used in industrial robots and self-driving cars.

Unicorn India Ventures makes the final close of Fund II at US$12M

Mumbai-based early-stage VC fund Unicorn India Ventures has announced the first close of its second fund at US$12 million.

The second equity fund of INR 400 crore (US$13 million) was announced last year. Unicorn India has raised funds from domestic investors comprising of family offices and investors from the first fund.

The Fund expects to reach final close in next 12 months, which is expected to see participation from large institutional investors.

With the first close, Unicorn India has also announced its first investment in a Trivandrum -based startup SaScan Meditech.

The fund will exclusively focus on seed and Series A stage enterprise startups, including SaaS, fintech, health tech, robotics, gaming, and digital content sectors.

Also Read: For the startup ecosystem, profitability is a gender equality issue

Indonesia’s VC East Ventures seeks US$609K for COVID-19 detection, cure

Venture capital firm East Ventures is targeting to raise a total of US$609,000 to produce 100,000 coronavirus test kits and finance a vaccine research project in Indonesia, says a Dealstreet Asia report.

East Ventures will be working with its portfolio company Nusantics on the project. Nusantics is a genomics tech company which recently raised an undisclosed amount of seed capital from the seed company. 

The money will be raised through a crowdfunding donation campaign that will begin on March 30, 2020. Anyone can contribute to the campaign by accessing Indonesiapastibisa.com to donate money, equipment, or skill.

Ezay raises US$200K for e-commerce platform

Ezay, a Yangon-based e-commerce platform for rural retails outlets, has raised US$200,000 in funding from Japanese impact investor Seiji Kurokoshi, according to a statement.

The capital will be used to continue the rapid expansion of its retail and wholesale network within the region. 

Ezay connects rural mom ‘n’ pop retailers to wholesalers via its platform and provides same day delivery (more than 90 per cent of these shopkeepers are women).

Previously they would have to leave the shop to travel to town or convince their spouse to do the same, but with Ezay they receive deliveries to their store and get a wider selection and better prices of products.

Ezay currently has over 1,600 retailers.

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Image Credit: Ezay

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Storehub’s cofounder and the team were extremely excited to move into their new, swanky office. And just when they did, the COVID-19 lockdown struck Malaysia. Unfortunately for the Storehub team, the much-awaited new office suddenly became a make-shift desk at home.

The COVID-19 mayhem not only forced their team –spread in four countries– to transition from work-from-office (WFO) to work-from-home (WFH) but also instantly pushed them all into a war zone. The team launched a new feature from their own respective homes, Co-Founder Wai Hong asserted on the e27 Webinar: How to manage remote teams last week.

The global pandemic is intensifying each day and while businesses adapt to WFH setup, the worry of an economy driving towards recession lurks on. This is no less than a war zone kind of a situation for most, especially for companies that were fully working from an office.

At such times, it is even more important for managers and founders to keep their employee morale high and keep the ball rolling. WFH sure comes with its perks. One can save even the few minutes to go from one meeting to another when doing so virtually, spend time with family and take afternoon naps.

But the homely comfort also runs the risk of working all day and forgetting to take a break. Lack of social interaction with colleagues also affects productivity levels (after all, we miss those casual watercooler moments) and disturbs trust and credibility amongst team members.

Also Read: 3 things cybersecurity startups can do to reinvent business amid COVID-19

Decode what is better with Sean Liao, CEO and Founder of Imaginato and Wai Hong, Chieftain and Cofounder of StoreHub in this webinar re-telecast and make the most of their remote work tips and business best practices to help your teams stay connected and coordinated.

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The e27 Webinar series is an effort to share actionable insights with the startup community to improve their day-to-day work life. These interactions are laced with advices, inspiration, and productive human connection for learning and development and sharing the best practices with the e27 community in Southeast Asia.

Next webinar: Join e27 for a live meditation session with Bjorn Lee, founder of mental wellbeing startup MindFi, and learn to keep your cool through the COVID crisis. Register now!

Image credit: NeONBRAND on Unsplash

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