Month: April 2020

Two weeks ago, e27 made a decision to help as many startups in the ecosystem as possible, and today, we have come across over 400 companies offering discounts on their products and services.

And the list keeps growing.

We aim to publish these deals on our website eventually. In the meantime, we have created a temporary sheet to showcase the deals that we have received, which we will be populating until our site is fully developed.

In case you missed our previous article and would like to submit your product for a showcase, you can fill up the form here.

To kickstart this, here are five such companies, which are providing services that could be useful for the current widespread work-from-home arrangements:

Lark Technologies

What is the product: Lark is an all-in-one platform that addresses businesses’ collaboration needs, allowing everyone to work remotely and effortlessly. 

To support fellow businesses, Lark is giving away free three-year subscriptions.

Click here for more details.

Use Case: With remote working becoming the norm, companies have turned to various online tools and software in a bid to become more productive with the arrangement. 

However, with numerous tools and software like chat, video conferencing and project management, employees might find themselves struggling to keep up.

Ever find yourself spending unnecessary time trying to explain something to a colleague over a message? Jump on a five-minute call, instead! Not only does Lark have various chat features to facilitate conversations, it also offers unlimited audio and video conferencing for users to hop on a call anytime. 

With 200GB of cloud storage, users would be able to store their documents and files online for others to have easy reference and retrieval, too.

Interestingly, Lark also has an Integrated Health Tracker that allows employees to update their health statuses daily.

This would especially be relevant to the current COVID-19 outbreak.

Managers would be able to keep track of their employees’ health and well-being and take immediate action when any red flags pop out.

EngageRocket

What is the product: EngageRocket is a cloud-based software that helps organisations make better people decisions through employee life-cycle surveys, 360 feedbacks, and continuous performance management.

To help companies ensure that their employees are adjusting well and performing effectively with the current remote working environment, the firm has made its service available for free until May 31, 2020 for all companies. 

Click here to view more details.

Use Case: For companies that have recently adopted the work-from-home arrangement, many employees often struggle to adjust to it. Coupled with the personal concerns and issues that employees might have, their well-being, productivity and performance levels would be adversely affected.

Thus, it could be useful for companies to make use of EngageRocket to get continuous feedback from the employees. This could be related to the overall effectiveness of working from home, or any general issues they are facing, allowing companies to enact changes fast with the real-time data provided. 

There are many other productivity tools out there that are also offering discounts to aid businesses in making effective use of remote working. You can check out the full-list here. 

Toasty 

What is the product: Toasty is an audience engagement platform for virtual meetups, workshops, and team meetings that facilitates highly interactive experiences and real human connections.

To help recreate in-person experiences online during the COVID-19 period, Toasty has lowered its price to US$39 (from US$59), which includes a one-month free trial.

Click here to view more details.

Use Case: With the outbreak of COVID-19, many events and company activities around the world have little choice but to be postponed or cancelled. Some companies are, instead, looking to bring things online and provide attendees with a different experience, while delivering the same results.

Toasty is not the platform for online conferences, webinars or 1-to-1 meetings, but it can be a good choice for companies looking for a more interactive platform that’s for team discussion, team building, and workshops & training.

With the various features it has to keep the participants active and engaged, external virtual events and meetups could now be a viable option in place of the physical ones. Internally, you can also keep team meetings organized with seamless breakout rooms that allow for smaller, more focused discussions.

Pigeonhole

What is the product: Pigeonhole is a platform for live Q&As, polls, quizzes, and surveys, and a perfect companion in driving more engagement at your virtual meetings. 

To help companies hold more effective and interactive meetings amid the current situation, PigeonLab is upgrading the free plan to support video conferencing and live-streaming tools until June 30, 2020. 

Click here to view more details.

Use Case: With most companies adopting the work-from-home arrangement, video conferencing is now the go-to, whether it is for internal meetings or external workshops. 

However, unlike physical meetings where interactions have easily facilitated both ways, online sessions present a new set of challenges. It is not easy to have the same level of engagement in online meetings.

With all the integrations and features linked to video conferencing and live-streaming tools now available with the free version of Pigeonhole, companies can tap on this for more interactive and productive meetings.

There are other similar services in the market that help complement video conferencing in businesses. Check out the full list here.

JANDI

What is the product: JANDI is a collaboration tool for effective teamwork and smoother workflows. It aims to provide users with convenient communication, file sharing and quick feedback without the need for emails — all on a single platform. 

To support fellow businesses to improve their efficiency of remote working in these difficult times, JANDI is offering a free enterprise version for one year to all businesses.

Click here to view more details.

Use Case: Communication is crucial in companies to ensure that everyone is on the same page and is kept abreast of each other’s progress and tasks at hand. The physical environment of working together allows for short huddles for quick communication and decision making. 

In contrast, employees have to rely on chats and emails to communicate with one another during remote work, causing important conversations and files to disappear in the everyday noise. 

With constant communication happening among employees, different topics often get mixed up, and essential files often get buried under the stack of documents sent around. JANDI’s features, including the Chat Rooms and File Search, allow users to keep track of vital conversations and materials in an organised way while being able to access them at their convenience.

These are currently five out of the many companies, which have stepped forward to offer a helping hand to other businesses in the community.

To view the other discounts and offerings by other companies to help support the ecosystem, click here.

Have an offering/discount for the community? Fill up this form. 

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Indonesia-based accounting app BukuWarung raises seed funding led by East Ventures

BukuWarung, an Indonesia-based accounting app for MSMEs to digitise their bookkeeping, has raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding in a round led by East Ventures.

AC Ventures (previously Agaeti Ventures & Convergence Ventures), Golden Gate Ventures, Tanglin Venture Partners, and Indonesian billionaire Michael Sampoerna joined the round, with strategic angel investment from Grab, Gojek, Flipkart, PayPal, Xendit, Rapyd, Alterra, ZEN Rooms, and others.

The company will use the funds to strengthen its market leadership and expand its team to grow across engineering, product, design, growth, and partnerships based out of Jakarta.

BukuWarung was founded in late 2019 by Abhinay Peddisetty and Chinmay Chauhan — both previously worked together at Carousell.

The app enables customers (merchants), who are mainly from tier II and III cities, to receive credit repayments three times faster than the traditional method, claims the company. This helps them improve cash-flow due to automated payment reminders sent by the app.

PLDT, KKR, Tencent, others invest up to US$120M in Philippines’s Voyager Innovations

Voyager Innovations, a tech company based in the Philippines, has secured US$120 million in funding commitments from tech and investment grants, such as PLDT, the Philippines’s leading telco and digital services provider.

Other investors are KKR, Tencent, IFC, and the IFC Emerging Asia Fund, a fund managed by IFC Asset Management Company.

Also Read: Tencent invests in the Philippines’ fintech firm Voyager, aims to battle Alibaba

The investment is part of a broader fundraise for Voyager and is intended to support its fintech product PayMaya’s growth, as it pursues its mission to accelerate digital and financial inclusion in the Philippines and enable the wider Filipino population to participate in the digital economy.

In 2018, KKR, Tencent, IFC, and IFC Emerging Asia Fund made initial investments totalling US$215 million into Voyager. In doing so, they showcased their supports of Voyager and its strategy to provide access to digital financial services across the Philippines through PayMaya.

PayMaya a digital payments ecosystem enabler offering platforms and services cutting across consumers, merchants, and government. Aside from providing the acceptance of the payment for the largest e-commerce, food, retail and gas merchants in the Philippines, PayMaya also enables national and social services agencies as well as local government units with digital payments and disbursement services.

Wing Bank’s parent company to make investment in online ticket booking platform CamboTicket

Inter Logistics (Cambodia), the parent of Wing Limited Specialised Bank, has expressed its intention to invest in CamboTicket.

According to Khmer Times, the investment is aimed at scaling up online tickets and holiday bookings in Cambodia.

Operated by Sea Venture, CamboTicket offers online ticket booking and holiday planning experience in the country through Wing App and CamboTicket.com.

Established in early 2015, the startup expanded its presence into Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos covering the route to and from the major destinations of the region such as Phnom Penh, Siem Reap, Sihanoukville, Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh, Kep, Kampot, Battambang, Pakse, and others.

The deal is subject to approval from the authorities, and both partners will provide strategic support on key functions.

Singapore-based edutech startup KooBits launches home-based learning, live tutoring

Singapore-based edutech startup KooBits has announced the launch of two new products — ‘Home-Based Learning’, an online mathematics learning platform, and ‘Live Tutoring’, an AI-enabled online live tutoring service — both with accompanying apps for parents to track learning progress.

This makes the first official launch of KooBits e-learning products to the consumer market, catering to parents and kids across households in Singapore and beyond.

Also Read: These Indonesian edutech startups are helping students cope and thrive during the COVID-19 crisis

The KooBits platform uses personalisation technology and gamification to support students to learn on their own; and at the same time, uses AI and big data to generate learning insights and make them visible to parents and teachers.

Through a short pre-class assignment that is part of every session, the platform automatically identifies each child’s weaknesses and gaps in learning and automatically groups them, so tutors can personalise their lesson and address relevant issues for the students during each class.

The platform also enables assignment of homework to follow up on the concepts that require reinforcement, to ensure that understanding has been achieved. Parents can also monitor what milestones their children have reached in relation to the national syllabus, and can also benchmark their child’s progress against their peers.

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Image Credit: BukuWarung

The post Morning News Roundup: MSME-targeted accounting app BukuWarung snags seed funding, Philippines’ Voyager receives funding from host of investors appeared first on e27.

 

Singapore Press Holdings, Snapask partner to offer students support for online learning

SPH, a media organisation based in Singapore has partnered with online learning website Snapask to offer students support for online learning.

Snapask will be providing over 10,000 free subscriptions for Singaporean students of all levels, while SPH is offering students 14 days online access to all news content by its flagship publication The Straits Times.

Snapask has offered similar services in Taiwan, Japan, Korea, and Indonesia amid the virus outbreak.

“Education is a vital part of our society, and we are honoured to collaborate with SPH to contribute via this subscription pledge,” said Timothy Yu, founder and CEO of Snapask.

Indian food delivery startup Swiggy raises US$43M from Tencent

Bengaluru, India’s food delivery startup Swiggy has raised US$43 million in new funding led by Tencent, according to TechCrunch. Ark Impact, Samsung Ventures, Korea Investment Partners and Mirae Asset Capital Markets, also joined the investment for this round. This round reportedly brings the company’s valuation to US$3.6 billion.

The new capital will be used for Swiggy’s expansion into grocery delivery services in select parts of the region.

“As we continue to strengthen and expand our services that offer unparalleled convenience to our consumers, we are humbled by the faith shown by our investors year-on-year and welcome the new investors on board. Our focus remains to execute on our vision while building a sustainable path to profitability,” said Rahul Bothra, CFO at Swiggy in a statement.

Agritech platform DeHaat bags US$12M in a Series A growth round

The Indian agritech platform DeHaat has raised US$12 million in a Series A round according to YourStory. The round was led by Sequoia Capital with participation from FMO, and existing investors Omnivore and AgFunder.

With the added capital the company aims to automate its supply chain and develop its data analytics further to increase supply chain efficiency.

Founded in 2012 by Shashank Kumar, Amrendra Singh, Adarsh Srivastav, Shyam Sundar Singh, and Abhishek Dokania, the AI-enabled platform provides end-to-end solutions and services to the farming community in India.

Also Read:  News Roundup: RaRa Delivery raises over US$800K funding; Nusantics completes COVID-19 test kit prototype

These include distribution of high-quality Agri inputs, farm advisory, access to financial services, and market linkages for selling produce.

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Image Credit: Unsplash

 

 

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Agaeti Ventures and Convergence Ventures, two active venture capital firms in Indonesia, has announced their merger this morning. AC Ventures (ACV), as the new entity is known, will continue to make early-stage investments.

The merger has been in the works since the third quarter of last year. According to Adrian Li, one of the Partners of ACV, the objective is to consolidate the resources of both firms “to create a platform of exponential value that can provide significant support to our portfolio founders as they build and scale successful businesses across Indonesia, the largest market in Southeast Asia”.

In this interview with e27, Li talks about ACV’s plans, the COVID-19 crisis, and more.

Edited excerpts:

What was the primary motive for the merger? Where do you see a ‘convergence’ of interests for both? Does it have anything to do with the current COVID-19 crisis?

Our primary motive was to combine the experience, network and teams of both platforms to form a stronger overall venture firm. Our prior firms both had similar strategies — our focus on Indonesia, early-stage technology, as well as we believe in being strong operating partners of founders.

Also Read: Indonesian VC firms Convergence and Agaeti merge to form AC Ventures

It has nothing to do with the current crisis as the merger has been in the works since Q3 2019.

What is the total size of ACV?

We are currently in the process of working on the new fund. Given the present macro environment, we do not have the total size confirmed.

The press release says ACV will continue to make early-stage investments in Indonesia. Do you expect to cut bigger cheques, given the rapidly-changing market dynamics?

Our plan for ACV is to invest in early-stage companies from a few hundred thousand to a few million US dollars.

Does ACV have special focus on any particular vertical? Also have you made any investment from ACV yet? Can you share the names?

The investment thesis of the new fund continues their prior funds’ respective successful investment strategies of investing in Indonesia-focused, early-stage, technology opportunities.

In particular, the teams are seeking investment opportunities into areas of e-commerce, digital content enabled services, financial technologies and MSME enabling technology.

We have made investments in several ventures to date. We will be announcing them in due course.

The COVID-19 is ravaging industries. Do you think the crisis will alter the startup landscape for ever if the situation persists longer than expected?

COVID-19 crisis is different compared to previous financial recessions; in this situation, there are serious health considerations. Quarantines and lockdowns are forcing people to change behaviours and driving faster adoption to technology such as online education, health consultation, digital entertainment and e-commerce.

Also Read: The global financial crisis gave birth to fintech. What will COVID-19 recession bring?

Like all crises, economies and societies will recover. This time, technology- enabled businesses will be better positioned than ever to serve consumers and businesses.

How can startups come out of this crisis?

The COVID-19 crisis affects startups asymmetrically. Some are experiencing a surge in demand such as online education and e-commerce and delivery. Others, such as travel and hospitality, have seen revenue go to zero.

In all cases, startup ventures, which are dependent on investor funding and are still burning cash, will need to focus on conserving cash and ensuring their survival during this period. Once the market recovers, those who are best capitalised will be best positioned to gain market share and grow.

What are the trends in the early-stage VC investment space in Indonesia?

Increasingly funds are seeking out opportunities that focus on the MSME space and moving on from pure consumer-focused opportunities. The 60 million MSMEs drive half of Indonesia’s economy but the vast majority do not use any technology-enabled services or applications. This is a huge opportunity for efficiency and value and it is drawing strong investor interest.

I recently read in an interview that Indonesia is facing an early-stage investment fatigue. What is your view?

I don’t think so. We believe there is still plenty of opportunities for early-stage investment and the market is ripe for further disruption by technology-enabled companies with better talent, consumer/SME adoption and capital available for entrepreneurs than ever before.

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Same-day delivery service startup RaRa raises over US$800K in seed funding from 500 Startups

RaRa Delivery, a last-mile, same-day delivery service for e-commerce businesses in Southeast Asia, has secured US$834,000 in a seed funding round, led by 500 Startups, with angel investment from Angel Central led by Der Shing Lim.

Other investors in the round are GK-Plug n Play; Royston Tay, Co-founder and former CEO at Zopim (acquired by Zendesk); Yang Bin Kwok, Co-Founder and ex-CTO at Zopim; Vidit Agarwal, Head of BD at Stripe; Neelesh Suryavanshee, VP Marketing, Unilever Indonesia; and Vishal Gupta, VP Digital Transformation, Unilever.

Also Read: Indonesia is ripe for further disruption by tech-enabled firms: Adrian Li of AC Ventures

Karan Bhardwaj, Founder and CEO of RaRa Delivery, said that the funds will be used to acquire talent in Business Development, Operations, and Technology to further expand RaRa’s business in Indonesia.

With e-commerce GMV in Indonesia expected to reach around US$97 billion by 2025, consumers are now looking for faster and convenient delivery options, preferably a one-day delivery.

E-commerce giants such as Lazada, Shopee, and Bukalapak have already leveraged RaRa’s express same-day delivery services. RaRa is a graduate of GK-Play and Play Indonesia Batch 4 in April 2019.

Indonesian genomic startup Nusantics completes a COVID-19 qPCR test kit design prototype

Nusantics, an East Ventures-backed genomic startup, has finished a design prototype of qPCR diagnostic that can specifically detect SARS-CoV-2 virus on Friday.

The design process and laboratory testing of the test kit, named NUSANTARA TFRIC-19, was carried out by Nusantics as a member of COVID-19 Research and Technology Innovation Task Force (TFRIC19) formed by Indonesia Technology Assessment and Application Agency (BPPT).

CTO of Nusantics Revata Utama explained that Nusantics designed the NUSANTARA TFRIC-19 using genomic data from the SARS-CoV-2 Asia strain. Nusantics conducted a bioinformatics analysis of aligning the genetic sequences of the SARS-CoV-2 strains to specify target genes.

Based on the result, Nusantics decided to target two SARS-CoV-2 genes called as RDRP gene (that the virus uses to self-replicate after infecting a human cell) and N gene (which protects its nucleus).

It then tested the sensitivity and specificity of the prototype using RNA isolates acquired from abroad. Isolates from other countries are used to accelerate development while waiting for local RNA isolates to be available.

The test showed that NUSANTARA TFRIC-19 can specifically detect the SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19, and not sensitive to the genome of SARS-CoV-1 or other Coronaviruses.

Also Read: BIT, parent of Myanmar’s e-book store Wun Zinn, nets “7-figure USD” Series B funding

As the next step, Nusantics will validate the kit using samples from local COVID-19 cases. The BPPT Task Force for COVID-19 is currently still waiting for samples from the Indonesia Agency of Health Research and Development (Litbangkes). After the local sample is available, the validation process will take two to three days.

Indian omnichannel beauty retailer Nykaa raises US$13M funding from Steadview Capital

India-based online beauty and skincare retailer Nykaa has raised US$13 million in funding from Steadview Capital, just a year after it closed a Series E financing round led by TPG Growth.

According to EconomicTimes, the company was founded in 2012 by former merchant banker Falguni Nayar. So far, it has expanded into newer categories such as the men’s grooming segment, and launching Nykaa Pro, and also stepped into an offline retail business.

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Image Credit: Nusantics

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Updates: The article has been updated on how users will be contacted 

Singapore-headquartered Madison Technologies has launched an independent contact-tracing website, called CovCT, to control and limit the spread of the virus globally.

The platform requires users to scan a QR code at different locations or visit the URL on the browser, where they can check in with their details. This will allow them to remember the places they have been to and help local authorities trace and isolate cases of the virus with the information.

Building management, business owners and community leaders can get the QR Code poster by registering their venue on the CovCT website. After this, a CovCT kit will be provided along with instructions.

If a positive case has been detected at a location, it will be highlighted in the user’s history. Authorities can request for the data and choose to notify the users in the event of an outbreak in certain locations.

According to the company CovCT will never reach out to users with the personal details collected.

Also Read: [Updated] Singapore develops contact tracing app to limit COVID-19 spread

While governments around the world have directed for a lockdown, there is still some room for the virus to spread as asymptomatic carriers come into contact with others when they go out to buy essential items.

“Currently, our platform requires users to scan a QR code or visit a URL on a browser. However, we are working on solutions where this can be rolled out in a “kiosk mode” where visitors can check in the absence of a smartphone or working internet connectivity,” an employee of the company told e27.

According to the firm, this is not a money-generating project but is an initiative that aims to contribute to the collective war against COVID-19. ” CovCT was built to provide authorities from different countries a solution to gather information on the movement and spread of the virus,” said CEO Praburaajan Selvarajan.

Many people worldwide have expressed their concern about data privacy when using contact tracing apps. However, CovCT ensures that data remains anonymous for users, claims the CEO.

“The CovCT platform will protect all personal data. The data collected will be stored privately and anonymised on the platform and will not be shared with any individuals, businesses or the locations where the users have checked in. Instead, the data will be held in trust until requested by relevant local authorities who will, with their respective contact tracing protocols, choose to contact these users,” he added.

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Image Credit: CovCT

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I have been having really dramatic dreams lately that including falling, crying and waking up with regrets. But when I read a similar NYT article on how this is not uncommon, I felt comforted.

The COVID-19 pandemic has promulgated a sense of uncertainty amongst all of us that is not letting us sleep very peacefully on most nights.

From work to eating and especially to social interaction; all aspects of your lives are undergoing a massive shift. While the hope is that the situation will improve soon, and we all will go back to ‘life as usual’, managing the ensuing anxiety and stress are necessary.

Instagram influencers, hustlers, VCs, and governments cannot stress enough on the need to remain calm and focus on the positive. In India, PM Modi even organised a nation-wide ‘light a candle’ movement to reinforce a sense of unity and calm in the mind of the billions in India struggling with the lockdown.

But how can one do it at an individual level? MindFi founder, Bjorn Lee said it only takes 100 seconds for our mind and body to calm down. I almost didn’t believe it until the e27 webinar last week.

Not only did Lee, share his 100-second mindfulness technique, but he also helped us all experience a sweet sense of calm in the middle of a busy day and week for most of us.

From calming our nerves to checking in with every part of our body (even the often ignored wiggly toes), he guided us to shirk off any stress hidden anywhere inside our body, such that our minds could feel lighter.

If you missed it, here’s the session recap. Find a quiet spot, sit in a comfortable position and slowly follow his lead. I bet you will feel refreshed.

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Register for our next webinar: Best practices for communications during the COVID-19 crisis

Image credit: Victor Garcia on Unsplash

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Lifetrack Medical Systems partners with Philippines government to identity COVID-19 patients

Lifetrack Medical Systems, a health-tech company based in Singapore, is partnering with the provincial government of Antique to identify and prioritise molecular testing for potential COVID-19 patients using CT scans.

The company will be providing its software platform for free so that hospitals can perform the tests easily.

“The CT tests will determine the patients who have a high probability of having COVID-19, giving them a basis for isolating and further testing themselves, given the current situation of  limited test kits being available,” said Carl Nicholas Ng, COO of Lifetrack.

Prior to this initiative, the company had launched a secure, anonymised COVID-19 image repository on March 6 to aid radiologists and researchers identify potential COVID-19 cases quicker via chest CT scans. A method which was proven to be useful for screening in China.

“With the COVID-19 cases in the Philippines rising exponentially over time, additional measures should be taken to contain the spread of the disease,” said Antique Governor Rhodora Cadiao.

“We partnered with Lifetrack Medical Systems to provide Antique with remote reading capabilities for chest CT scans as well as the added assistance of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology to support the triage of potential COVID-19 patients. With this partnership, we can assure each of our Kasimanwa (citizens) we are covering all fronts to battle COVID-19,” aded the Governor.

UiPath appoints Andrew McBean As Director of Thailand

UiPath, an American Robotic Process Automation (RPA) software provider, has appointed Andrew McBean as its Director of Thailand, according to a company statement.

McBean’s new role will include managing all operations in Thailand, including recruitment, client servicing, and business development.

Also Read: News Roundup: RaRa Delivery raises over US$800K funding; Nusantics completes COVID-19 test kit prototype

McBean brings in experience from large corporates like Microsoft and IBM but more recently he was appointed as the CEO of PKF, business accountancy and advisory firm in Thailand.

“RPA is a catalyst for helping human workers exceed their own expectations by taking away the mundane and repetitive tasks and allowing them to focus on what matters most. I’m a strong believer in UiPath’s vision of a robot to assist every worker, to unleash value and performance within today’s enterprises,” he said.

India’s healthtech startup Akna Medical raises US$7M funding

Akna, which aims to streamline healthcare equipment delivery in India, has raised a new round of US$7 million from LGT Lightstone Aspada, according to EconomicTimes.

The company will be investing the money in scaling operations across the region within two years. A portion of the capital will also be used to enhance the technology and analytics offering.

“The healthcare value chain in India is primed for intervention through systemic changes and technological innovation…Our strategy is to back high-growth platforms like Akna Medical, which have the ability to leverage technology, transform supply chains and support delivery of healthcare outcomes at scale,” said Kartik Srivatsa, Managing Partner of LGT Lightstone Aspada.

Popular hospitals such as Fortis, Max Healthcare, Medanta and Cloudmine are some of the company clients.

Zenius, gojek support students with free lessons amid virus outbreak

Edtech startup Zenius has partnered with ride-hailing super app gojek to offer free lessons to students on the gojek app as Indonesian schools suspend classes amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

Zenius will offer direct services such as live teaching and study planning through the app. The edtech company claims to offer more than 80,000 learning videos and practise questions for elementary- to high-school students.

Also Read: Afternoon News: gojeks senior management donates 25 per cent of annual salary to COVID-19 affected partners

“Since the start of this pandemic in Indonesia, Zenius Education has not stopped exploring various innovations to give students the easiest access to independent study at home,” said Zenius CEO Rohan Monga in a statement.

Singaore’s Grab to temporarily suspend GrabHitch from April 7

As Singapore announced partial lockdown many businesses participate to reduce the risk of exposure. Grab, a ride-hailing super app based in Singapore has announced that it will be temporarily suspending its service from April 7th onwards.

However, other services such as transport, food delivery, and parcel delivery services will continue to operate.

Grab has also suspended GrabShare service during the virus outbreak in February.

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Image Credit: Markus Spiske

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In the wake of a two-week lockdown announced by the government, some 30 million Malaysians are now restricted to leave the comfort of their house unless necessary (P.S. going for a walk at the park does not count).

Alarmed by the government’s drastic measure to combat the COVID-19 outbreak, citizens have begun to practice social distancing. For many, this means not using cash for shopping or ordering from delivery services such as GrabFood and Foodpanda to avoid physical contact altogether.

This brings a new light on the perks of having an e-wallet installed on your smartphone. Being an avid debit card user for years, never did the writer foresee that he would one day face the need to sign up for a mobile wallet – and he is not alone in this.

In fact, Nielsen revealed that only eight per cent of Malaysians use mobile wallets for payments. Granted, there are a plethora of e-wallets in Malaysia, each offering different promotions and cashback, but they have not been able to spur widespread adoption as what we see in China, a country acclaimed for its e-wallet success.

So, why is that?

Higher bank account penetration

Historically, China has a larger unbanked population compared to Malaysia (16 per cent in China vs seven per cent in Malaysia). Accustomed to making payments with their cards, Malaysians are simply not incentivised to desert the banking system for mobile payment.

Also Read: Today’s top tech news: Ant Financial invests in Vietnamese e-wallet, Facebook acquired a five-person startup

Au contraire, due to its massive unbanked population and insufficient banking infrastructures, e-wallets offered unprecedented convenience to China’s cash-based economy.

Fragmented industry

Quite evidently, Malaysia’s e-wallet market is extremely fragmented, with more than 10 players battling for market share. This is in stark juxtaposition with China’s consolidated industry where WeChat Pay and Alipay account for more than 90 per cent of the market.

Tencent and Alibaba have been successful in creating an all-embracing ecosystem in which users pay for their food, utilities, insurance and more. Meanwhile, e-wallets in Malaysia lack usability as merchants and users alike have to choose from a dozen platforms.

Notwithstanding that, the government recognises the benefits of a digital economy – i.e. traceability of money, elimination of corruption, and effective monetary policy formulation, etc. It has also taken an active stance in encouraging Malaysians to go cashless, showcased through the introduction of e-wallet regulations as well as the central bank’s commitment to deploy a system that unifies all e-wallets under a single system.

More recently, the government launched an MYR450 million (US$104 million) programme (e-Tunai Rakyat initiative) to promote the use of Grab, Boost, and Touch ‘n Go’s e-wallet. However, up until now, policymakers’ endeavour has been lacklustre, to say the least, as the uptake of mobile wallets remains tepid. In that case, what can be done to foster the adoption of e-wallets?

Also read: The case of e-wallets: which e-payment apps do Singaporeans use the most?

Educating Malaysians

In this day and age where money laundering and pilferage are ubiquitous, the primary hurdle for e-wallet adoption remains that users associate them with debit and credit card fraud. However, the truth is all local e-wallet players are governed by the BNM and subject to data protection and security regulations.

In response, the government and market players first need to address the misconception. The population should be informed of the multi-factor authentication process, and money-back guarantee offered by e-wallet providers to ease the adoption.

Targeting the right audience

The disappointing attempt by the government to stimulate e-wallet usage could be that they failed to target the right group of people. To elaborate, under the recent e-Tunai Rakyat initiative, only Malaysians above 18 years of age who earn less than MYR100,000 (US$23,000) annually are eligible to receive the RM30 (US$6.9) in an e-wallet of their choice.

By doing so, the government has essentially omitted individuals earning more than MYR100,000 annually. Ironically, these are the people with higher disposable income, who are far more likely to be regular shoppers or spenders. They should, therefore, be part of the audience for subsequent programmes in the future.

Reaching out to the rural community

Looking at China as a reference, it is obvious that the unbanked population in rural areas have the biggest incentive to adopt e-wallets. Unfortunately, the majority of merchants and residents in Malaysia’s underdeveloped areas are unfamiliar with such technology.

To encourage the use of e-wallets, the government needs to introduce the concept to rural dwellers through workshops, billboards, word of mouth, and other forms of marketing.

 As an integral building block of a digital economy, e-wallets present a remedy to the daunting corruption issues in Malaysia. Needless to say, the country has a long road ahead in its journey towards cashlessness.

Hence, the government and citizens share equal responsibility in building a cash-free nation where business transactions are facilitated, and money laundering can be curtailed.

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Image Credit: RHL Ventures

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COVID-19: It’s here. It’s real. And it’s threatening the survival of startups. In this ICE71 Mentor Series webcast, Thibaut Briere, founder of Growth Marketing Studio, shares three actionable tips for cybersecurity startups to survive the coronavirus pandemic.

Work on your brand

Tell the world what you stand for by sharing the “why” of the work you are doing. This is especially important for startups. “It links back to the values of the founders,” said Thibaut.

Be very human as a brand. Reach out to people even if it wasn’t for business. Engage your customers, partners, suppliers, and employees. Thibaut said, “You could ask how the coronavirus situation has affected your contacts.”

Communication builds trust and top of mind recall that will pay dividends later. So get on the phone or connect with people through different channels like Slack and WhatsApp.

The post 3 things cybersecurity startups can do to reinvent business amid COVID-19 appeared first on e27.