Surge, a rapid scale-up programme for startups run by Sequoia India, has announced the 15 early-stage startups selected for its third cohort, which is underway.

The programme combines US$1 million to US$2 million of capital for each startup, with company-building workshops and support from a community of exceptional mentors and founders from companies like gojek, ONE Championship and Tokopedia.

The Surge 03 cohort includes startups from Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam and India, who are solving a wide range of problems across a diverse set of industry verticals, including SaaS, development tools, consumer, F&B, education and Health.

Also Read: Vietnam’s BuyMed raises US$2.5M to expand its pharma distribution marketplace in Southeast Asia

The founders are from eight nationalities, including India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore, Italy, Canada, Barbados and Sweden.

More than half the current cohort is from Southeast Asia, while one-third of Surge 03 startups have at least one female founder.

The 15 startups have collectively raised US$39 million as part of the programme.

Since its launch in March 2019, Surge has grown into a community of more than 110 founders from 52 startups, spread across six countries.

Surge 03, which started on 13th April, is taking place completely online for the first time. Day-long sessions held once a week for 16 weeks, include online company-building workshops, small group discussions and interactive fireside chats with Surge mentors such as William Tanuwijaya, Founder and CEO of Tokopedia; Doug Leone, Global Managing Partner, Sequoia Capital; and many other experienced founders and investors from Vietnam, Indonesia, India and the US.

The eight startups from Southeast Asia are:

Bukukas (Indonesia): Helps owners of MSMEs understand and manage their financial flows more effectively with an easy-to-use digital ledger they can download on their smartphone.

Hangry (Indonesia): A cloud kitchen that serves up multiple in-house ‘virtual restaurant’ brands for online orders and delivery.

CoLearn (Indonesia): An edutech platform that empowers tuition centres and tutors to create online learning experiences for their students.

Thuocsi (Vietnam): An online B2B marketplace for pharmaceutical, health and personal care needs.

Pencil (Singapore): Brings the scale of algorithms to the creative process by generating ads that are predicted to work. It is the first generative creative platform for performance advertising teams in brands and agencies.

Pentester Academy (Singapore): Trains security professionals on the art and science of defeating hackers and making the internet safer. It does this by replacing theory classes with practical experiences that are both fun and edifying.

Tigerhall (Singapore): A mobile learning platform that aims to help professionals achieve their career and life goals by learning directly from Asia’s most successful people.

Tinvio (Singapore): A communication and commerce platform built around the idea that merchants and suppliers should be able to work smarter together.

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Image Credit: Surge

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Updates: The article has been updated on the funding amount

Singapore-based communication and commerce platform Tinvio has secured US$5.5 million in seed investment from Sequoia Capital’s accelerator Surge, according to a company statement.

Other backers include Berlin-based VC Global Founders Capital and Silicon Valley-based investment platform Partech Partners. This brings Tinvio’s total raised to US$6.5 million.

The company plans to use its newly-raised capital for product development and market expansion, primarily focusing on Australia, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia (SEA).

“Our 12 months goal is to provide financial services to businesses and extend our market leadership in current cities and launch in more languages in different places,” said founder and CEO Ajay Gopal.

The startup that was launched last year by an ex-investment banker is on a mission to help small and mid-sized business owners keep track of their orders, accounts, and receivables in a more simple and efficient manner. 

Most of the merchants in F&B, retail, and healthcare supply chains today still place orders over email, WhatsApp, or phone calls, while invoices and payments are exchanged mainly in paper form, he said. 

Also Read: Unlike in the west, layoffs are only the last option for Asian firms during a crisis: TranSwaps Benjamin Wong

“Tinvio’s frictionless chat-to-order mobile experience enables users to send messages and orders to their suppliers in just a few taps,”

The mobile app also creates digital ledgers of all orders, invoices, and issues for real-time monitoring and analysis, so that merchants can keep a track on all their orders. 

Tinvio’s claims that its customer base has significantly grown to over a thousand businesses, with 50 per cent monthly user growth and 80 per cent cohort retention. Its platform is currently available in over ten cities from Hong Kong and Singapore, with plans to provide digital financial services to businesses.

During COVID-19, the commerce startup has stepped up its efforts by initiating a movement called “Save Our Nomnoms“ to help local F&B brands raise immediate awareness and enable direct discovery for their restaurants through their website. 

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Image Credit: Tinvio

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Anthony Tan, co-founder of Grab, urged companies to stay strong together and support one another during the COVID-19 crisis in a letter originally sent out to investors stating the impact of the pandemic on Grab.

In a LinkedIn post titled Note to Investors on Addressing the Challenges of COVID-19, the ride-hailing giant provided direct insights on how COVID-19 has impacted Grab along with advice on why this is the most crucial time to remain collaborative.

Tan quoted Victor Frankl’s popular book Man’s Search For Meaning on how difficult times are simply a test for individuals to rise above challenges and unleash their true potential.

On that note, Tan believes that even though there may be rough roads ahead, one cannot lose sight of their “north star” which he refers to as the people and businesses who depend on the company for a living.

Even though hard times can run longer than expected, Tan believes that we, as a generation, still carry the tools and technology to find innovative solutions to tackle it.

Also Read: Morning News Roundup: Chilibeli raises US$10M, gojek denies staff layoff and Grab merger reports

Below is the note:

I hope this note finds you and your family safe and well. It has been a trying period for all of us, and I wanted to take this opportunity to have a frank discussion about the impact COVID-19 is having on our business and our ecosystem of partners.

COVID-19 is the single biggest crisis to affect Grab in the eight years of our existence. It has had an unprecedented impact on our operations, our business and the livelihoods of our partners.

Viktor Frankl once wrote, when humanity is faced with an impossible set of challenges, we are challenged to change ourselves. COVID-19 and the global economic devastation in its wake are those impossible challenges, and we are rapidly changing our business to overcome that challenge.

Impact on our Business

In cities and countries where there are movement restrictions, we have seen a sharp decline in our ride-hailing business with volumes in some countries down by double-digit percentages.

Our deliveries business is faring better. Stay-at-home measures are prompting consumers to order in food and groceries, contributing to demand for GrabFood and GrabExpress. To better serve our users who remain at home, we are expanding GrabMart, Grab’s daily essentials delivery service, and Grab’s on-demand concierge service, GrabAssistant to more cities and countries. This, in turn, creates additional income-opportunities for our drivers during this critical period.

Also Read: Stressful times ahead: How this e27 webinar will help you keep calm and carry on

While the full economic cost of the COVID-19 pandemic is unclear, there will be tough decisions and trade-offs to make as we continue to evaluate its impact on our business. We will right-size our costs, manage our capital efficiently and make the necessary operational adjustments in order to weather the storm and carve out a path to profitability.

Community Assistance

The spread of COVID-19 has devastated the livelihoods of our partners and upended everyday life for millions of our customers. Our driver-partners are now finding it difficult to support their families, and our merchant friends are facing store closures and disruptions to their supply chain.

Our immediate priority in the last couple of months has been to support our driver- and merchant-partners during this very difficult time, including a committed spend of US$40 million in relief initiatives for the region.

The relief initiatives include a financial assistance scheme for driver-partners who are stricken with COVID-19, so they can focus on recovering rather than worrying about putting food on the table. We are also working with NGOs to distribute food staples to needy driver-partners. For example, we recently distributed 80 tonnes of rice to drivers in Vietnam.

For restaurants and small food merchants, the crisis has led to a decline in footfall. To help small food merchants stabilize their business, we are moving them online as quickly as possible and offering commission rebates, commission deferrals and marketing support so they can better manage their cash flow during this period. Open-air bazaars and wet markets that have not changed their operational models for centuries now face an existential threat in COVID-19, and we are actively bringing them online so they too can reach more customers.

Frontline healthcare workers are risking their lives to protect ours. We are working closely with governments and hospitals to aid frontline workers by providing specialized dedicated services like medicine delivery and non-emergency ambulances, in order to ease the burden on public healthcare systems.

Also Read: Afternoon News Roundup: Grab-IMDA partnership aims to help Singaporean startups expand overseas

Stronger Together

Ultimately, the impact of COVID-19 and the resulting acts of community kindness remind us that we are nothing without each other. At Grab, we are committed to serving others. Though the impact of this crisis may last years, we cannot lose sight of our north star – the people and businesses who depend on us for a living, our customers who rely on our services more than ever, and our broader community that is working hard to adapt to a new normal brought about by this pandemic.

We will devote our operational resources to alleviate the pain felt by our partners; we will use our technology to aid governments and healthcare providers; and we will build relevant services to give customers what they need, now.

COVID-19 is an exceptionally difficult generational challenge. But while it looks dire, we are in better stead to face this crisis today than decades ago, because we have the tools and technology to help us find solutions. COVID-19 will require exceptional effort from all levels of society to overcome. We must rise to meet this challenge with new solutions, so that decades from now when facing another generational crisis, we can say that the tools of the future were built today.

I’m praying for all of us. Stay safe and strong.

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Image Credit: Grab

 

 

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Japanese edutech startup Manabie eyes Southeast Asia expansion after stepping into Vietnam

Japanese edutech startup Manabie is expanding into Vietnam after raising US$4.8 million in its initial year, according to Japantimes.

Funded by individual Japanese investors and VCs such as Genesia Ventures, the edutech platform revealed that it intends to scale up its services across Vietnam and other parts of Southeast Asia.

Manabie has experienced a surge in demand for its learning platform after COVID-19. The company currently has more than 100,000 users and has partnerships with 30 private and Japanese schools.

Also Read: Morning News Roundup: Tigerhall, Growthwell Group raise funding rounds

Google-Senti AI partnership aims to “unburden people” from sifting through numerous documents

Filipino AI company Senti announced a partnership with Google to roll out a knowledge management tool for the Department of Health (DOH) in the country, according to Rappler.

According to Google, the partnership will make it easier for DOH to sift through substantial amounts of documents more efficiently.

“The tool will unburden citizens from sifting through hundreds of documents with different versions of the same policy. This will help guarantee that important information communicated by all DOH partners is updated and consistent across all channels, and that major cities and remote areas can all be in-sync with the latest and official guidelines,” the company added.

LiveIn, CapBay join forces to offer financing solutions for property owners

Malaysian proptech company LiveIn (formerly known as Hostel Hunting) has partnered with financial services company CapBay, according to a statement.

Property owners can apply for financial assistance from CapBay to furnish, renovate or improve units and simultaneously become a partner of LiveIn as one of its rental owners.

Also Read: Quoting Victor Frankl’s book, Grab CEO urges businesses to stick together during tough times

“CapBay’s financial solutions help business owners optimise their cash flow and support their business growth. This collaboration with LiveIn offers a greater value proposition to customers and creates the opportunity for more owners to come on board as LiveIn partners,” said Ang Xing Xian, co-founder of CapBay.

According to the company, 40 per cent of LiveIn’s customers are students and young working professionals. Despite an economic downturn, LiveIn expects to expand into Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines.

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Image Credit: Tra Nguyen

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Qoala, an Indonesia-based insurtech company, today announced its US$13.5 million Series A fundraise led by a JV between funds from South Korea’s Kookmin Bank and Telkom Indonesia, Centauri Fund.

The round also saw participation from Sequoia India, Flourish Ventures, Kookmin Bank Investments, Mirae Asset Venture Investment, and Mirae Asset Sekuritas. It also includes existing investors such as MassMutual Ventures Southeast Asia, MDI Ventures, Surge, SeedPlus, and Bank Central Asia’s Central Capital Ventura.

The company said that it will use the funding to invest further into its technology, people, and brands to fuel its multi-channel strategy.

Founded by Harshet Lunani and Tommy Martin, the company provides customers with a multi-channel insurance solution offering two business models:

• Working with large scale platform partners to drive awareness about insurance with consumers due to the low penetration of insurance in Indonesia.
• Supporting the traditional offline insurance channels, which currently contributes 99 per cent of insurance premiums, to become digitally enabled through Qoala’s app for agents/brokers; and supporting the creation of new intermediaries in the future.

Also Read: Indonesian bank BCA’s VC arm gets US$14 million boost

In addition to its currently available offerings, the Jakarta-based company also plans to accelerate its new COVID-19 support effort within the next month for consumers and MSMEs across Indonesia to provide pay-outs to those affected by the pandemic. This includes those who have had their treatment partially or fully subsidised by the government and are hence ineligible per usual insurance plans.

According to Kenneth Li, Managing Partner of Centauri Fund, Indonesia has a considerably low gross written premium (GWP) to GDP ratio in comparison to other emerging countries, coupled with the large growing middle class in need of more security in their financial planning.

“This allows for an immense potential for the insurance sector to take off in Indonesia through innovative propositions,” said Li.

Just over a year after launch, Qoala claimed to have processed over two million policies per month, up from 7,000 policies in March 2019. It has diversified its partnership portfolio to serve five core industries: travel, fintech, consumables, logistics, and employee benefits.

The startup has a number of partnerships with prominent brands across Indonesia, including Grabkios, JD.ID, Shopee and Tokopedia. Qoala’s customers also include other digital platforms such as Investree, PegiPegi, and RedBus, as well as retail giants such as MAP Group.

Their go-to-market approach is supported by over 20 insurers including global players such as AXA Mandiri, Tokio Marine, Great Eastern as well as local insurers such as ACA, Adira and BRI Life.

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Image Credit: Qoala

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