Much has been written about the economic damage that COVID-19 is wrecking.

While there has been a fair bit of general positive-thinking advice written for SMBs and start-ups, there haven’t been that many practical advice condensed into bite-sized tips that are actionable in this difficult period.

I would divide the road ahead for startups into the short-term and mid-to-long-term, each with a different set of priorities.

Tactical short-term on cashflow survival

The immediate priority for startups is two-fold: cash flow and liquidity. Companies have to ensure sufficient cash flow (perhaps for at least the next six to 12 months). Those that have accumulated strong capital reserves over the years have less to worry, but the rest might have cashflow concerns.

Businesses have to start with scrutinising the balance sheet line by line and consider the five steps below.

• Single out unproductive and risky assets. Put idle assets to use or convert to cash

Under-utilised assets may include production and manufacturing plants, equipment, real estate. Rather than to leave them idle, businesses should try to optimise cash-earning potential by leasing or licensing to others that require them now. Businesses may also prepare to sell these, if they are not integral to business operations, to others who might be looking to acquire.

Also Read: Using design sprints to solve COVID-19 business problems

• Chase for account receivables. Sell off exposure to risky assets.

Beyond chasing outstanding receivables, companies might also prepare to sell off exposure to risky assets. Risky assets include stakes in or receivables owed by companies with weak balance sheets and high leverage or companies in sectors ill-poised to weather the downturn.

Companies should be prepared to write down or off assets that seem non-recoverable to do accurate cashflow forecasting for the immediate term.

• Allocate resources. Cut spend and reserve cash for high-impact projects

Overhead expenses (e.g. rent, expenditure, professional fees) should be cut where applicable. Cash should be reserved for projects that have an immediate and material impact on profits.

Businesses should prepare to build up cash reserves for the prolonged economic fallout ahead.

• Go through every single contract and obligation for payables. Check if remedies available if needed.

Re-negotiate favourable payment schedules to vendors, suppliers, and other creditors where possible. If impossible and your contract performance has been affected due to Covid-19, notice if there is a force majeure clause in the contract and consult your lawyers on whether it can be used as a protection in the specific circumstance.

Also Read: The essentials of managing your business financials at 4 stages of its lifecycle

• Monitor liquidity, forecast cash flow and make use of digital tools

Companies should go through every single contract and map out what is owed to them and when they are to be paid. The same applies to map payables. Consider digital tools such as QuickBooks which have invoice chasing capabilities or Qwil which help with liquidity through managing on-demand payments (for contractors and freelancers).

Where applicable, start-ups should avail of government support – the requirements for these schemes have been shared on both offline and digital avenues (personal finance forums and communities). Given that the cost of credit is low now, businesses can also consider taking government-assisted loans.

The general rule of thumb now is to optimise liquidity and cash conversion. Aggressive strategies may even include broader restructuring, such as closing businesses or products that weigh down overall financial performance. Start-ups should also be on the lookout for sell opportunities as there are acquirers out there with cash looking for strategic assets.

Strategic mid-to-long-term on durable survival

As of now, nobody really yet understands the entirety of the economic fallout ahead. To prepare, start-ups should look to build a strong balance sheet, shore up capital reserves, and be strategic about adapting quickly their business model and operations to changing realities.

I suggest the following to keep in mind for post-COVID-19 preparation.

• Digitise to cut costs and to reach new customer segments

As seen from global lockdown, digitisation in some cases can indeed make a difference in survival. Retailers that have digital storefronts are able to resume operations digitally (even if not fully) and be unhampered by closing physical operations would have had higher survival chances.

Also Read: Digitalising cashflow management and what it means for businesses

Even better if they had already been operating digitally, with a stable following of customers – they would not have had to worry about low brand awareness or the costs of switching customers to a digital platform.

I would divide digital tools into two categories:

• Automate operations, cut costs

There are tools for automating various aspects of operations, such as digital accounting solutions (Xero, Quickbooks), some of which even have automated invoice chasing capabilities to ensure that you are paid timely. SchedulePay (by PayDollar) automates payments and payments collection, while Qwil facilitates on-demand payments and liquidity management.

Other solutions help with sales, marketing etc. These tools either provide savings by cutting hours and labour, or preventing payments from slipping through the cracks.

• Reach new customer segments in the digital economy

If you’re operating an offline start-up, other tools help you reach into the digital economy. Tools such as Shopify, WooCommerce help businesses set up digital storefronts. Solutions such as PayPal, Stripe facilitate digital payments.

These all enable businesses to reach a specific audience on digital channels. For other retailers that need not have their own dedicated storefront, they can consider channels such as Etsy or Shopify.

• Agile work processes that are design-thinking oriented

Startups have to be intentional about building agility into their processes, test ideas and innovate quickly. Slow decision-making can spell the difference between survival and death.

While this, of course, is dependent on the nature of the business (industries such as healthcare, biotech, manufacturing require extensive capital and longer R&D durations), startups should strive to be lean and agile where possible.

This goes beyond just the size of teams but into deeper aspects of bureaucratic management, hierarchy, and paralysed decision-making that pervade even startups these days.

Also Read: 10 principles of great strategy inspired by design thinking

As conserving cash and being quick to adapt to changing realities are key to outlasting the crisis, adopting lean and agile workflows achieves both aims.

Having a design thinking-oriented approach is also important to ensure that teams think in terms of iterations and sprints, allowing start-ups to test the effectiveness of new products and strategies quickly without spending too much in time or in cash.

• Manage the global supply chain and geopolitical risks

The global climate now suggests that future global supply chains will be at risk due to nationalistic industrial responses to the pandemic. Start-ups might want to keep in mind when planning for the future that deglobalisation will likely intensify in the future ahead. Strategic goods will be increasingly produced within national borders as countries strive to be independent and to build domestic capabilities.

Businesses might start looking into diversifying their supply sources so they do not end up bearing the brunt of shifting geopolitics. Those that have been trade-dependent so far might want to start looking at domestic sources. Across the board, businesses should pre-empt rising procurement costs and find ways to manage or hedge these.

Summary

The full sum of the economic loss ahead is not a fact yet fully known to us. What startups can do is to adopt a defensive, risk-management strategy while keeping a lookout for and taking advantage of opportunities.

These opportunities may come in the form of new products or businesses aligned with durable themes from this pandemic (remote collaboration, healthcare, essentials, amongst others).

Geopolitical realities on the ground are also shifting every day. While these are beyond our control, businesses that are lean and agile will find it much easier to do the following: adopt defensive strategies, adapt to changing situations, develop the foresight to pre-empt obstacles ahead of time, and take advantage of emerging opportunities.

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We Singaporeans love our food. That goes without saying, but as with other developed nations, we are also getting more conscious about eating right – both in terms of health, and environmental impact.

Demand for vegetarian and vegan options is booming and the consumption of healthier alternatives such as wholegrain bread and brown rice has increased, driven in part by greater awareness of the environmental costs of food production and aggressive public health campaigns against diabetes and hypertension.

Yet, many are still hesitant to make changes to their everyday meals for a simple but important reason: taste. BCS spoke to two homegrown startups, Alchemy Foodtech and NamZ, who are challenging the notion that healthier alternatives necessarily have to taste different from the dishes we know and love.

Tackling the problem of starch, not sugar

Including more whole grains in a diet is associated with many health benefits including lower cholesterol levels and reduced risk of developing Type II diabetes. Carbohydrates in whole grains are digested more slowly than those from refined sources, such as white rice or bread, thus providing a gradual increase in blood sugar levels rather than large fluctuations following a meal.

However, whole grain products don’t have the same taste and texture as their conventional, refined counterparts, says Verleen Goh, co-founder and Chief Food Fighter at Alchemy Foodtech. As a result, some popular local dishes such as chicken rice or curry just don’t work as well with brown rice, making it difficult to adopt on a regular basis – especially for those who regard these dishes with nostalgia.

To address this issue, Alchemy Foodtech has developed an ingredient that promises to slow down the digestion rate of refined carbohydrates to the same extent as whole grains, without altering the taste of the final product. The ingredient, called Alchemy Fibre, is derived from plants such as peas, corn, tapioca, beans, and legumes and can be used as a partial replacement for flour in recipes. This means it can be incorporated into products like bread, noodles, and buns. “We wanted to create a product for consumers who want the taste of white rice or bread, but at the same time have the benefit of slowed down glucose release,” says Goh.

Also Read: (Exclusive) Singapore’s new AI foodtech startup Easy Eat raises pre-Series A funding

The idea of targeting staple foods such as rice, bread, and noodles resulted from preliminary research into food innovations for diabetic patients. “I noticed that most food innovations for diabetics were mainly happening in the confectionery and artificial sweetener space,” says Goh. “However, Type II diabetes patients tend to be a little older and don’t actually eat that many sweets! They do eat a lot of rice though.”

The founders of Alchemy Foodtech then realised that targeting staples could make a much bigger overall difference, for both diabetics and non-diabetics alike. “We may not eat desserts everyday, whereas staples are consumed in large amounts daily, so we realised that targeting staple foods created a larger impact than desserts,” said Ms Goh.

Alchemy Foodtech is working with food manufacturers such as Gardenia bread, Kang Kang noodles, and Lim Kee steamed buns as well as various restaurants, bakeries, and cafes to incorporate Alchemy Fibre into existing products. The company has worked with industry partners to test that products incorporating Alchemy Fibre have the same texture as those currently on the shelf through sensory evaluation, as well as using a texture analyser that measures the hardness or springiness of foods using pressure.

They have also conducted studies with starch digestion assays in the laboratory and on volunteers by measuring carbohydrate availability in the blood after consuming products made with or without Alchemy Fibre. The idea is to then have manufacturers label their products as ‘made with Alchemy Fibre’ to promote brand awareness and communicate their mission to consumers, says Goh. The first of such products are scheduled to launch in June 2020, subject to current conditions.

A smorgasbord of sustainable options

For the more ecologically-conscious consumer, NamZ is another homegrown food technology company that aims to develop healthier and more sustainable alternatives without trade-offs in taste.

Also Read: News Roundup: Agri foodtech startup DiMuto, B2B learning platform ProSpark secure funding

Their first product is a low-fat instant noodle made with proprietary technology that replaces the deep-frying step during production and incorporates a blend of natural oils and spices.

“While some air-dried noodles may have quite a nice texture, everyone is used to the ‘deep fried’ taste that you expect from an instant noodle,’ explains Mark Lim, Strategist at NamZ, ‘so we found this blend of ingredients that, when added at a low dosage, actually gives you that ‘deep fried’ taste.” The result? Noodles that have 70 per cent less fat but taste as addictive as conventional instant noodles.

Cutting out the deep frying step has other benefits, such as allowing the company to incorporate more unconventional crops into their noodles. In particular, future-fit crops like the bambara groundnut and moringa, a plant commonly found in India, have already been included in some of NamZ’s noodles to boost nutritional content.

“Deep-frying is a harsh process – high temperatures, happens very quickly – so when you try to incorporate ingredients like the bambara groundnut or moringa into the dough, you lose a lot of the nutrients in the process,” says Lim. “With our technology, because it’s not that harsh, it actually retains all the macro- and micronutrients.”

Future-fit crops refer to plants that are packed with nutrients, resistant to an increasingly dry climate, and can be farmed economically. They are therefore touted as the key to a sustainable food system of the future by the United Nations and other experts.

For instance, the bambara groundnut has well-balanced proportions of carbohydrate, protein, and fat and can thrive in dry, sandy soil. It is native to semi-arid regions of Africa such as Ghana, from which NamZ currently sources its groundnuts.

Also Read: Bringing innovation to the table: Why foodtech is the next frontier in Southeast Asia

Although NamZ’s noodles are predominantly wheat-based, the company has plans to develop a wide range of food products using the bambara groundnut as a primary ingredient. Blended soups, hummus-like spreads, dairy alternatives, and even soy sauce replacements are currently in the pipeline.

In order to scale up production, NamZ is also in talks with palm oil companies to use spare capacity of degraded land in Southeast Asia – old palm oil plantations that can no longer support cultivation – to grow the groundnuts. “What is useful with the bambara groundnut is that it is a legume, so it can bind nitrogen and rejuvenate the soil,” says Margit Langwallner, a research scientist at NamZ.

Nonetheless, taste remains a key consideration for all their products. ‘You can have the healthiest, most environmentally-friendly quick noodle, but if it doesn’t taste good, no-one is interested.’ says Ms Langwallner. NamZ has been working to create a formulation that mimics the taste and texture of conventional deep-fried instant noodles, and plans to launch their first direct-to-consumer products in Q2 2020.

Investors tuck in but will consumers come to the table?

Food technology has attracted a lot of investor attention in Singapore over the past few years, with the government leading the way by allocating S$144 million (US$101 million) for food-related R&D under the Research, Innovation and Enterprise 2020 (RIE2020) plan. Temasek Holdings, a government-owned investment company, has also reportedly invested US$5 billion in the agrifood sector over the last five years.

This interest stems from a push towards self-sufficiency in food production as well as better nutrition to combat common health problems like Type II diabetes. In 2017, about 430,000 or 14 per cent of Singaporeans aged 18 to 69 years were diagnosed with pre-diabetes, a condition that puts them at high risk of developing Type II diabetes in the next eight years without intervention. Goh estimates that Alchemy Foodtech has received a total of approximately S$1 million (US$700,000) through government-funded grants and prizes alone.

The past two years, in particular, has seen the formation of several Singapore-based agri-food specific investment firms such as Food Ventures, Germi8, and VisVires New Protein (VVNP) and the opening of Singapore’s first food innovation incubator, Innovate 360.

Also Read: How Killiney Kopitiam is evolving their heritage brand with foodtech

Set up by Singapore’s oldest sugar manufacturer Cheng Yew Heng, Innovate 360 not only provides food manufacturing facilities but also business networks and connections to various distribution channels for early-stage food startups.

In addition, startups looking to grow their business here can also apply to local alternative protein or agrifood tech accelerator programs run by New York-based Big Idea Ventures and online venture capital platform AgFunder, respectively.

These accelerator programs seek to help later-stage startups by providing them with facilities, funding, and mentorship needed to scale up their operations.

Of course, food tech startups need not be limited to industry-specific investment funds. The social impact aspect of NamZ’s business clinched the company a DBS Foundation Social Enterprise Grant in 2019. The same grant scheme awarded a total of S$1.3 million to nine social enterprises that year.

Aside from raising funds, Alchemy and NamZ have seen successful business-to-business (B2B) sales, but with their first consumer products launching this year, this represents a critical moment for both companies to find out if their mission and price point appeals to the average Singaporean.

Both Goh and Lim are optimistic that their products will be well received. “Most of the food manufacturers we worked with saw it as a win-win situation for us and them to show consumers there could be a healthier alternative that feels and tastes just like their regular products,” says Goh about Alchemy Fibre.

Lim cites positive customer feedback from NamZ’s existing B2B partners. “Some of our clients, including a high-end hotel and a prata chain, are already serving our noodles to their customers, but they’re not telling [the customers] because they want it to be a surprise at the end, that you can have this healthier noodle that tastes the same,” he said.

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This article was originally posted on the Biotech Connection Singapore website on 11 May 2020.

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 and earn a byline by submitting a post.

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The outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease has devastated businesses across the globe. The spread of the deadly virus pushed many into bankruptcy, as revenue sources dried up and working capital depleted. The travel & hospitality sector was worse-hit.

As the crisis unfolded, businesses were thrust into a situation where they had to either shut down or push hard to survive. Unable to withstand the impact, numerous companies winded up. Most managed to stay afloat but their survival still hinges on several factors. Certainly, it doesn’t look easy.

As a last resort, organisations began to cut workforce/furlough employees. However, this decision came with huge emotional and psychological costs; thousands of affected employees slipped into depression as they lost their only livelihood. Allegations of poor handling of layoff surfaced in several markets, which further added to their misery.

Unavailability of new opportunities has badly affected the mental health of the disgruntled workforce.

As the situation exacerbated, one thing became loud and clear: empathy and compassion were in short supply. Most organisations didn’t even bother to take into account the massive psychological impact the layoffs could make on people.

Experts have time and again emphasised the importance of compassion at the time of crisis like this. A compassionate approach to retrenchment could have made a difference to the lives of employees and even the organisations themselves but many ignored this part.

This is where Airbnb‘s simple, yet creative way is winning the hearts. The short-stay accommodation booking honcho, while announcing the layoffs, allowed employees to leave with grace.

The accommodation booking giant firm laid off about 1,900 employees workforce, or a quarter of its workforce last week. While taking this tough step, Airbnb did something unusual: it posted the talent directory (the names and profiles of the retrenched employees) with a carefully-drafted note on LinkedIn.

“To support teammates departing Airbnb, we’ve launched an Alumni Talent Directory. Please click here if you’re currently hiring or looking for incredible talent: https://lnkd.in/gn7n6AZ
We hope we can connect these individuals with new opportunities. It’s been an honor to work with such a talented team committed to our mission of belonging, and we’re confident any company would be lucky to have them”.

“What a great example of leadership and HR skills. Kudos for transparency, ownership and empathy when managing a large-scale involuntary employee exit ”, reads a comment to the post.

Another LinkedIn member said, “This speaks volumes! Great job for creating a new best practice! Love this talent directory!!!”

Setting an example

Airbnb, known for its appreciable work culture, is showing the world what it means to be sympathetic and compassionate.

According to well-known angel investor Arnaud Bonzom, Airbnb’s talent directory is a ‘best practice’ if former employees can opt-in and opt-out at any point of time, which it seems to be the case.

“When I accessed the directory for the first time on May 8th, only one profile was listed in Singapore,” he told me.

“As of today, on May 14th, it’s 43 talents. Also, you can read this mention on the bottom of their website: ‘To manage your talent directory profile, please email alumni-recruiting-support@airbnb.com.’”

“Such directory,” Bonzom continued, “will give the former employees more visibility and will increase their likelihood to secure a new position in a shorter period of time.”

Bonzom has already recommended the resources to several of his portfolio companies. He is even using it personally to look for a designer for a short-term assignment, he said.

Indeed, Airbnb was not the first to create and publish a talent directory. Down east, Singapore-based HOOQ published a similar directory to boost the chances of retrenched employees.

Another example came from a group of VC firms in Southeast Asia, which include Saison Capital, FutureLab, Jungle Ventures, and Alpha JWC Ventures.

Together they launched a ‘community-led’ initiative — known as SEAriously Awesome People List – Startup COVID-19 Layoffs — in March to help retrenched startup employees find new opportunities.

“I think it’s a great practice assuming there’s buy-in from employees, which I think is so most of the time,” Chia Jeng Yang, Principal at Singapore-based Saison Capital, told me.

Yang is part of the team spearheading this novel initiative in the region.

“It’s a great way for companies to reduce any friction in the job market and help employees quickly find their next role as fast as possible. It is also easier for HR to find talent since it is quite common to be on the lookout from talent from large tech companies in the same industry,” added Yang.

As of yesterday, the initiative has approximately 1,000 talent registrations and 400 job posts.

Also Read: Going big? Then Go e27 Pro.

When the COVID-19 pandemic is lashing industries and causing job losses around the world, empathy and compassion become all the more important. If more organisations come forward to emulate this great practice, should help create a more compassionate world.

And as they say, kindness is contagious, and let this ‘contagion’ spread around the world.

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Image Credit: 123rf.com

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Spark Systems, an online FX trading platform based in Singapore, has raised US$15 million in “Series BB” funding round from a host of new and existing investors, including Citi, HSBC, Goldman Sachs, and Malaysia’s OSK Ventures.

Also Read: Going big? Then Go e27 Pro.

Vickers Ventures, Dymon Asia Ventures, Dymon Asia Capital, Jubilee Capital, and FengHe also returned to invest in the new round.

The company said that the funding would be used to enhance its current platform, develop analytics, advance its team training and build rapid modules that can onboard clients quickly.

Spark Systems also added that it intends to gradually expand into major financial centres of New York and London and develop a marketplace for G10/emerging economies currencies with a low latency trade matching data centre, which will be located in Singapore.

“This can catalyse and enhance price discovery, transparency and deepen market expertise. This is expected to reduce trading costs significantly,” the company said in a statement.

Founded in 2016, Spark Systems is a trading platform that aims to enhance usability and optimise user experience by providing a stable and ultra-low latency market place with an aggregator and algorithms for execution.

The firm has previously closed a funding round about four years ago. This brings its total funding raised to date to over US$22 million.

Trading has, in general, zoomed across the globe earlier this year as many individuals begin to panic-sell currencies, equities and commodities in the coronavirus-induced market.

Also Read: In conversation with Will Klippgen and Michael Blakey of Cocoon Capital

“This funding is occurring during a period of significant macro-economic upheaval further underscoring the strategic nature of the FX industry infrastructure requirement we are addressing,” said Wong Joo Seng, Founder of Spark Systems.

Spark Systems is a grant recipient of the Financial Sector Development Fund (FSDF) under the Financial Sector Technology and Innovation (FSTI) scheme from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).

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Image Credit:  Avinash Kumar

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LeadIQ, a SaaS platform that aims to simplify lead management and sales prospecting processes, has raised up to US$10 million in Series A funding round, led by Eight Roads Ventures.

Tim Draper of Draper Associates and angel investor Jason Calacanis’s LAUNCH Fund also participated.

The fresh capital will be used by the company to invest in R&D, and for market expansion and hiring talent.

Founded in 2015 by Mei Siauw and Angelo Huang, LeadIQ is a workflow-centric lead data and sales prospecting SaaS platform focused on enterprise and mid-market clients.

With offices in both Singapore and the US, the firm aims to help users research and capture potential leads easily, enrich leads with further details, and integrates into various sales acceleration and customer management platforms, such as Salesloft, Outreach, Hubspot and Salesforce.

“We are building LeadIQ to simplify the workflow of sales teams, so they can focus on meaningful and relevant activities. Every second that a rep is wasting on repetitive tasks, chasing the wrong prospect, is not only hurting their company but our economy as well,” said Mei Siauw, CEO of LeadIQ.

Also Read: Compassionate layoff; Airbnb shows the way

“Organisations need a solid sales tech stack that is integrated, where data flows seamlessly across. This is where LeadIQ makes a difference. The platform allows reps to do more and quicker, cutting down unwanted manual processes,” commented Dave Ng, Head of Southeast Asia at Eight Roads Ventures.

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This article was co-written by Anisa Menur

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GoodWork, Philippines-based home services provider startup, has received US$1.6 million in seed funding round led by Chaac Ventures, with participation from Elysium Ventures, Kairos K50, and Facebook’s and Snapchat’s angel investors.

The company said it plans to use the funding to expand its business in Southeast Asia, as reported by TechCrunch.

Andrew Koger, co-founder, and CEO of GoodWork said that GoodWork plans to expand into Vietnam and Thailand by the end of this year or early 2021.

The company that was founded in 2018 has its operation based in the Metro Manila region. It offers services such as home cleaning, laundry pickup, air conditioner cleaning, and home repairs, as well as spa services such as manicures.

Using GoodWork, services providers are free to determine their pricing with around 70 per cent daily bookings from repeat customers.

GoodWork was founded in 2018 by Koger, who is a bachelor of arts graduate of Princeton University. Previously, he was a part of Lazada team, leading Fulfillment, the logistics branch of the company.

Also Read: Chinese home service robot startup ROOBO raises US$100M to grow speech tech

COVID-19 impact

The COVID-19 pandemic has left no stone unturned, and GoodWork is no exception. Due to the government policy of community quarantine and suspension of operations, the company deals with this situation by adding health services into its app that include online medical consultations.

Besides that, the services that are most needed during the community quarantine are laundry pickup and delivery services, since many people don’t have washing machines at home and rely on laundromats.

With the lockdown situation dials down, GoodWork has been prepared to add the relevant services such as disinfection cleaning services and implement new safety measures for services providers, such as the standard body temperature monitoring feature in its app, and safety training and protective equipment for cleaners.

Koger is optimistic that home service will see a good increase in demand in the months ahead.

“We’ll continue the work from home policies, which will increase air-conditioning usage, that in the past has led to an increased demand for servicing, and like a domino effect, it means an increased need for home cleaning for many people,” Koger said.

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Gobi Partners, MDEC launch SuperSeed II Championship, to invest up to US$3.5M each in winners

Gobi Partners has partnered with the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) to launch a pitching competition, called SuperSeed II Championship, for startups affected by COVID-19.

The winning companies will get the opportunity to secure equity investment from from Malaysia SuperSeed Fund II, a fund jointly announced last year by Gobi, MAVCAP, and Sunway, as well as be a potential MDEC grant recipient.

Additional prizes include the chance to attend an entrepreneurship programme organised by Alibaba Business School and the iLabs Accelerator Program by Sunway Group.

Also Read: MDEC partners 9 Digital Transformation Lab for tech enabling support

The SuperSeed II Championship’s participants must be companies incorporated in Malaysia or have Malaysian founders or shareholders. They can be companies that have substantial operations in the country or have concrete plans to expand their business into the market.

The key verticals that will be considered are retail and enterprise (AI, B2B, B2C, Big Data, e-commerce, and logistics), fintech (crowdfunding, insurtech, mobile payments, P2P lending, and robo-advisors), smart cities and circular economy (construction solutions, e-hailing, environment solutions, IoT, mobility solutions, and public transport solutions), and Taqwatech (companies providing products and services to Muslim consumers and communities).

The deadline for entries is 12 am, June 16, 2020.

The preliminary round is scheduled to take place at the end of June, while the qualifying rounds and final round is set to be held in July and August.

Interested startups can register here.

Openspace Ventures, MDI Ventures, AC Ventures to #SupportStartups during SEA ground-up movement

Openspace Ventures, MDI Ventures, and AC Ventures have launched a national initiative harnessing consumer and business spending in an effort to uplift the Southeast Asian startup ecosystem during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This initiative followed the initial success of Singapore’s #SupportStartups initiative that was launched by Openspace Ventures, 500 Startups, and Cocoon Capital.

The offers will be featured on a combined website (id.supportstartups.com), leveraging the strength of the ecosystem to drive traffic to startups.

The 30 businesses currently listed on the website include B2C and B2B outfits across multiple sectors including fashion, F&B, logistics, e-commerce, enterprise SaaS, co-working space, and digital wealth management.

To each eligible startup registered in the programme, Amazon Web Services is offering US$5,000 in promotional credits.

In Indonesia, the initiative is led by MDI Ventures with the launch of a number of initiatives such as weekly webinars and IndonesiaBergerak.com, with the purpose of spreading information on the outbreak and insight on how businesses can operate in current times.

Interested startups with businesses in Indonesia are encouraged to submit their promotions via the website here.

Malaysian data labelling startup Supahands launches The Supahands Opus Infrastructure

Supahands, a Machine Learning- and Artificial Intelligence-based data labelling startup, has announced the launch of its Opus Infrastructure (OI).

Also Read: Human-powered training data provider Supahands raises Series A funding

The OI offers a fully-managed customer experience for a wide variety of data labelling needs, such as image annotation, sentiment tagging, and data transcription.

Featuring Supahands’s proprietary technology, the OI enables organisations to boost operational agility and engage in end-to-end managed service that produces quality training data for Machine ML and AI at scale, with customisable technology and project-specific workflows.

CEO and Co-founder Mark Koh said that with the demand for AI solutions steadily on the rise, Supahands’s OI supports the technological automation landscape by providing an agile and flexible solution for data labelling workflows.

Singapore fintech Aleta Planet welcomes new hires, focussing on business growth

Singapore-based fintech Aleta Planet has made two senior hires to support business growth as clients ramp up digitalisation efforts.

Jesline Teo will join on June 1, 2020, as Managing Director, Group Finance, while Laurens Lim will come on board as Director, Group Finance, on May 18, 2020.

Teo spent more than 20 years with PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory Services before joining Aleta Planet. She has led more than 200 merger and acquisition projects with a total value of over US$20 billion, including in- and out-bound as well as cross-border deals.

Lim was Vice President and Team Head of Retail Reconciliation and Investigation at United Overseas Bank prior to joining Aleta Planet. He has been with UOB for the last 17 years, leading investigations and liaising with authorities on matters related to retail and card payments.

Aleta Planet operates from its offices in Singapore, Hong Kong SAR, Australia and Dubai, and plans to expand to five new markets within the next two years.
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Singapore’s Temasek joins Facebook’s global payments system Libra

Singaporean investment firm Temasek Holdings has joined Facebook-backed Libra Association as its third new member, according to KrAsia.

The association’s two other members are cryptocurrency investment firm Paradigm and private equity group Slow Ventures.

“The addition of three new members to the Libra Association shows our commitment to building a diverse group of organisations that will contribute to the governance, technological roadmap, and launch readiness for the Libra payment system,” said Libra Association’s Vice Chairman Dante Disparte.

Facebook with other tech players had proposed starting a new currency named Libra early in 2019.

Also Read: Compassionate layoffs; Airbnb shows the way

However, in April this year, some partners like Visa, Mastercard, eBay, Stripe, and Paypal decided to pull out of the project.

MRT Jakarta plans to launch accelerator for startups in all industries

Government-owned company MRT Jakarta has revealed that it plans to launch an accelerator for startups with no particular focus on any one industry, according to TechInAsia.

The accelerator will welcome all startups to take their products and services to the mainstream market.

The mentors of the six-month programme, which begins on June 8, includ Bukalapak, BeliMobilGue, BRI Ventures, MDI Ventures, East Ventures, and Vertex Ventures.

Startup Genome, T-Hub partner to promote innovation and improve startup support in India

T-Hub, India’s innovation ecosystem, and Startup Genome, a  research and policy advisory organisation in the US, announced today that they would together foster Hyderabad’s innovation ecosystem and showcase success stories of the city’s entrepreneurs.

“Hyderabad’s tech ecosystem has enormous potential to reshape the economy locally and nationally,” said JF Gauthier, Founder and CEO of Startup Genome, in a statement.

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More than 140 leading names in the regional startup ecosystem –from venture capital firms, accelerators or incubators, to other organisations– announced the launch of Mentor For Hope, a programme aiming to raise the equivalent of 50,000 meals for those in need while supporting startups in the time of crisis at the same time.

Vertex Ventures, Sequoia India, Big Idea Ventures, Saison Capital, Qualgro, e27, Golden Gate Ventures, Insignia Ventures Partners, Openspace Ventures, Antler, BLOCK71 by NUS Enterprise, SGInnovate, StartupX, SheVC (a SoGal Foundation initiative), SoGal Ventures, NTUitive, STRIVE, Hustle Fund, Asia Institute for Mentoring, Wantedly and VentureCap Insights are among those supporting the initiative so far.

The programme includes a month-long fundraising campaign where mentors pledge nearly 1,400 hours to provide mentorship to founders affected by the COVID-19 crisis and raise funds for charity at the same time.

All donations raised during the campaign, from May 18 to 16 June, will be dedicated to two beneficiaries: Beyond Social Services and Willing Hearts Soup Kitchen.

Aspiring entrepreneurs, founders, and members of the public are encouraged to donate. Public donations will enable founders who face financial challenges to benefit from investors’ mentoring sessions or experts’ coaching classes during the campaign.

Also Read: Using design sprints to solve COVID-19 business problems

The programme was launched with the background of the COVID-19 pandemic, which had impacted the startup ecosystem. According to VentureBeat, 41 per cent of startups globally are struggling with a cash runway of three months or less.

In Singapore alone, there are at least 20,000 jobs attributed to 3,800 startups, according to the Singapore Department of Statistics’ data as of December 2018.

“What we have created in a short time is a mini accelerator programme for founders across all stages to receive one-on-one mentoring with industry leaders, group mentoring with senior investors and masterclasses organised by experts, with a purpose to give back as well,” says Elise Tan Yee Ling, who organises the programme.

Mentor for Hope evolved from the “Gratitude-COVID mentoring initiative” started by Tan in Singapore when her role at a venture firm was made redundant a month ago. Feeling inspired to keep on helping the startup ecosystem, she was later joined by Sharon Yeo Mei Ching and Gwen Sim, both final-year students at National University of Singapore (NUS).

In addition to them, the main organisers of the programme also include Janet Neo, Aparna Saxena, Jeng Yang Chia, Minh Vu Hong, Clinton Swan and Dr Dalal AlGhawas, all of whom met through the Gratitude-COVID mentoring initiative.

Over 120 introductions have been made between founders and mentors since April 1.

Also Read: Why SEA startups should not go back to office post-COVID-19

Application details

To participate in the programme, interested founders and aspiring entrepreneurs can sign up via the FutureLab e-mentorship platform and make a request for the mentors they wish to meet. They will then receive instructions on how to make or raise at least SG$50 (US$35) donation on give.asia.

Every participant will receive a Mentor For Hope care package, worth S$500 (US$350) in total, that comprises of:

– One hour mentoring session by a suitable mentor
– Free virtual coaching group classes led by professional experts
– Free two-month access to VentureCap Insights, an online venture investment database

Founders facing financial difficulties may also apply to reduce or waive the donation recommendation.

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Image Credit: Mentor For Hope

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