SEA’s blockchain-based zero-commission ride-hailing firm TADA raises US$5M led by Korea’s Central; TADA plans to distribute and sell about 10K electric auto-rickshaws, E-TukTuk, in Cambodia by 2021; TADA says that over 81K drivers, 550K+ users have used its service in Singapore, Vietnam and Cambodia. e27

SEA to see 310M digital consumers by end-2020; This means ~70% of the population that are 15 years old and older will go digital by end-2020, and the average online spending per person will triple from 2019 to US$429 in 2025; SEA’s e-commerce GMV grew 23% per year between 2018 and 2020, faster than China, India and the US during the period. DealStreetAsia

Thai agro-industrial conglomerate CP Group to buy HK e-commerce startup Chilindo for US$18M; The acquisition by its digital arm, Ascend Commerce, will complement its online shopping WeMall platform and develop Thailand’s digital economy; WeMall competes with Lazada, Shopee and JD Central. Reuters

How COVID-19 will pave the way for deeper tech cooperation between LatAM, SEA; LatAM has much to gain from the technological know-how of SEA; The similar population sizes, economic realities, and rapid increase in internet penetration rates underscore the adaptability of digital solutions across both regions. e27

Is construction tech the next big thing in SEA?; Construction tech startups can improve productivity, diminish delays and secure safety; It is genuinely benefiting the construction sector in areas such as field productivity, collaborations and back-office management. Tech Collective

Singapore, Australia sign digital economy agreement; They have agreed to set new rules to prevent unnecessary restrictions on the transfer and location of data, improved protection for software source code, and ensure compatibility between e-invoicing and e-payment frameworks. Open Gov

After the pandemic, higher education can’t afford to go back to ‘normal’; Simply delivering curricular materials online doesn’t constitute real innovation; Unfortunately, the “sage on the stage’ from before the coronavirus has now become the “sage on the computer screen”. EdSurge

COVID-19 and the rise of live commerce in SEA; By using a combination of live-streamed mini TV shows, competitions and product demonstrations, companies such as Lazada, Shopee and Tokopedia can boost their sales and make the whole shopping experience more interactive. Tech Collective

Singapore’s proptech platform Ohmyhome to set up operations in Philippines; It provides a hybrid model of a DIY platform and full-fledged agency services; The platform has 175K+ active users, 15+ listings of real estate properties to date; Ohmyhome has raised US$2.9M from Golden Equator and K3 Ventures. Malaya Business Insight

How startups can benefit from early investment in tech; Early investment in tech with a strong vision for the future means you are more likely to make the right decisions for the long term; It will also help to avoid mistakes that limit growth and to eliminate wastage. e27

Cybersecurity threats on the rise as companies shift to the WFH model; Those working from home don’t have the bolstered security of an office environment, as most home networks usually have weaker protocols; Google reported that more than 18M phishing emails were sent through in April. e27

Why a pandemic is a good time to experiment and innovate on behalf of your customers; Most people don’t want to buy product A or service B, but rather solve a problem using product A or service B; The sale happens when the customer feels the perceived value of the solution is higher than the price he will have to pay for the product or service. e27

Kay Mok Ku of Gobi Partners thinks VCs will become like influencers in a post-pandemic world; In his view, a new concept or a big market are both important; A new concept for a small market will not attract VC funding; a big market with an existing concept has no defensive moat so VCs will be concerned. e27

Smart pitches ‘real’ 5G network for Filipino businesses; The mobile operator formally announced the activation of its commercial 5G service on July 30, with the initial phase of deployment in key business districts of Metro Manila; The firm claims it has the country’s most extensive fibre network footprint at over 307K kilometers. NewsBytes.ph

China’s WeWork rival Ucommune withdraws US$100M US IPO, eyes backdoor listing; Beijing-based Ucommune is under increased pressure to shore up investors’ confidence in its loss-making biz; There are also growing concerns ignited by WeWork’s IPO fiasco in 2019 and the more recent accounting scandal of Luckin Coffee. DealStreetAsia

How are the co-working spaces doing during the pandemic?; The industry is undergoing a fundamental shift with greater focus on ensuring safety and wellbeing of employees and guests; The WeWork spaces have been modified with staggered seating and buffer zones to help members maintain a healthy physical distance. KrAsia

Renewable energy and the new normal in Indonesia; One of the types of energy that can be cultivated and become the most prospective business fields in the future is solar photovoltaic and wind; The 2 businesses were able to restore the level of confidence in energy investment, which according to the International Energy Agency (IEA) fell 20% in 2020. OpenGov

Vietnam startup Computer Vision Vietnam (CVC) eKYC receives US$500K investment from NextTech Group, Next100.tech fund; CVS eKYC offers AI to recognise face and characters, detecting invalid papers and faces to provide a complete and fully automated eKYC solution. Vietnam News

3 Indonesian startups selected for Google Accelerator; Hacktiv8, Kata.ai, Riliv will undergo the 3-month online programme for high potential seed to series A tech startups; They will join 12 other startups that were chosen from 600 companies proposed from SEA. The Jakarta Post

OVO claims it’s now Indonesia’s largest fintech ecosystem; The Lippo-backed startup first joined the e-money boom in 2017 and later expanded to P2P lending, investment, insurance, multifinance; Lippo has 600,000 merchants, of which 550,000 are MSMEs. Jakarta Globe

How tech can transform your employee experience; In the future, the success of workplace analytics will be determined by its ability to impact the humans running the business and employee productivity, rather than real estate or its footprint. Human Resources Director

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“To provide a platform for the provision of banking services to the unbanked…” – this could be literally an abstract picked by the great majority of 2017 fintech pitch decks, promising to change once and forever the problem of the unbanked population, by adopting blockchain technology. 

Three years later, with the majority of blockchain infrastructure platforms being stable, scalable, secure, and proving their value proposition, the number of projects solving real-world problems in that domain are only very limited and geographically restricted.

Most startups have already wiped out, despite raising big venture rounds, either from institutional capital or retail investors.

It’s worth mentioning, that banking the unbanked by using the blockchain technology, has not been just a push from the blockchain startup community, but also inspired by international organisations such as the World Bank. 

Deloitte’s report Can blockchain accelerate financial inclusion globally? reports, organisations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have launched several initiatives to extend the access to financial services for the unbanked and underbanked, while the United Nations and its member states have indicated financial inclusion as a pivotal enabler for many of the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. 

Also Read: How Blockchain is disrupting the traditional finance industry

The unbanked population by its great majority resides in developing countries. Seven countries have almost half of the world’s unbanked population:

• China: 13 per cent
• India: 11 per cent
• Indonesia: 6 per cent
• Pakistan: 6 per cent
• Nigeria: 4 per cent
• Mexico:  per cent
• Bangladesh: per cent

Nevertheless, programmes and real-world change are far too slow, while blockchain has played only a limited role to ‘bank the unbanked’.

On the other side, we see some geographical areas, that blockchain companies are slowly becoming an integral part of the economy, by replacing the slow and expensive financial ecosystem. 

Startups that have failed to materialise

Humaniq, a blockchain startup, which has raised more than US$5 million from almost 12,000 retail investors with crowdfunding, aiming to offer financial services to eradicate poverty amongst millions of people living in the emerging economies, seems that is has failed to build any traction. The latest published reports date back to 2018, while both online communities and social media look barely active. 

BitSpark, which was founded in 2014 and raised more than US$700,000, has pioneered the first cross border cryptocurrency remittance. The Bitspark web and mobile app platform enabled individuals and businesses to join the Bitspark network as ‘Cash point’ agents facilitating the exchange of cryptocurrencies and cash on behalf of their customers. Bitspark closed its doors as of March 4, failing to prove it’s value to the market. 

PundiX, an Indonesian fintech company that was launched two years ago with a US$34 million ICO and an ambitious plan to equip thousands of retailers with crypto POS terminals, according to Decrypt’s has failed to materialise into real-world traction. It seems that the company has never managed to build the PoS devices. 

The list of failed startups is very long, though we have selected only a few to present, with different backgrounds and stories. 

Also Read: The battle between private and public blockchains

On the other side, there are a handful of projects, which are currently noticing increased adoption, even though this adoption might be geographically limited. Understanding a specific market, and dominating it, before expanding is necessary to grow a product. 

Latin America

Dash, one of the older digital currencies, which was forked from the Bitcoin protocol and is operated by a decentralised autonomous organisation run by a subset of its users, which are called “masternodes”, has slowly re-organised and currently dominating as a scalable digital payments infrastructure.

Their value proposition as outlined in the website is that you can move Dash in a second for less than a cent: any amount, any time, anywhere. 

Dash usage in Venezuela is on the rise, with notable partnerships such as with Burger King. Dash Text also allows people who don’t have smartphones to send and receive the cryptocurrency by SMS. Cell phone penetration is extremely high in Venezuela, with around 85 per cent of the population owning a mobile phone.

According to the Q1 report, commercial payments using Dash grew 104 per cent for Q1, helped by a number of partnerships in the Latin American region. This growth has been spurred by several partnerships in Latin American countries, notably in Venezuela and Brazil.

Southeast Asia

Created by an established payments processing company called Omise, OmiseGo seeks to use the OMG cryptocurrency to streamline how electronic wallets to issue and exchange assets. 

Also Read: XanPool launches platform to enable P2P transactions from local currency to cryptocurrency in SEA

The idea is that digital payments today mostly occur within single payment platforms like Venmo or Alipay, meaning money can’t move easily from one platform to the other. The vision, then, is that payment networks like Omise could leverage OmiseGo to trade assets on behalf of users, sourcing liquidity for trades and facilitating transfers on a blockchain that serves as a real-time market for assets in all participating networks.

Besides McDonald’s, Omise has attracted a host of big-name clients in Thailand, such as  King Power, the duty-free retail monopoly, and True Corp., the country’s second-largest mobile carrier.

India and Indonesia

After Binance US-dollar stable coin BUSD, Harmony has launched a fully audited and fiat-backed stable coin with Indonesia’s Rupiah Token. Rupiah tokens on Harmony will enable real-time settlement for cross-border payments.

Launching an Indonesian fiat-backed stable coin builds upon Harmony’s cross-border payments strategy, allowing local fintech and remittance companies to leverage these stable coins for global payments. These stable coins are fully-regulated and have fiat on/off-ramp support through digital asset exchanges and local partners.

The Rupiah Token stable coin, is part of Harmony’s MoneyHome project, enabling instant low-fee P2P remittances, with a geographical focus on exchange corridors of Indian and Indonesian remittance markets.

The Silicon-valley project has built notable partnerships in the region with Binance, CoinDCX, WazirX, and Tokocrypto to materialise it’s scope. 

Also Read: Roundup: Ryde launches cryptocurrency wallet; Techstars-EG partnership to drive more investment into APAC

Africa

Kamix is a commission-free money transfer application between Europe and Cameroon. The app is multi-purposed to better serve Africans and their diaspora as it features fully integrated mobile money, messaging and marketplace modules designed by Africans, for proud Africans.

With the ambition of its promoters, the Kamix application targets nearly 25 million users and 18% of the money transfer market in Cameroon by 2022.

Summarising what it has worked, and what didn’t, we can see that startups which have achieved small, but important milestones, had a great understanding of the local market, and the geography, while starting with baby steps.

Region-agnostic protocols, or generic products, have failed to structure a product that could be used. There are 100s more startups using crypto to offer banking services, though the market might fail to materialise due to expensive fiat gateways.

Crypto to fiat providers such as MoonPay, SimpleX, and Transak are charging expensive fees (more than 3 per cent) which is not viable for the emerging countries.

Crypto startups, need local partners, which will constitute fiat gateways, and ramp-on/ ramp-off solutions competitive to compete with legacy banking systems.

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The COVID-19 pandemic is driving unprecedented interest into ESG investing, for reasons including business risk preparedness, portfolio diversification, protecting local communities, and more. Companies that can play life-saving roles in natural disasters and directly strengthen the resilience of communities may stand to benefit.

We already see technology being used to track, trace and reduce COVID-19’s impact. In broader natural disasters, companies are coming up with innovative Disaster Tech or “D-Tech” solutions. These can vary from Google’s early flood warning system in India and the Red Cross’s disaster notification and first aid app, to startups such as One Concern, an AI platform for predicting earthquakes and floods, and Field Ready, a manufacturing company that specialises in 3D printing kits of essential medical devices deployed in refugee camps.

Venture capitalists see the opportunity for D-Tech

VCs acknowledge the need for D-Tech, especially in today’s environment.

Puja Bharwani, Director of Antler, commented that “D-Tech is an important vertical and it is one where corporations, governments, technologists and entrepreneurs have to work together to ensure the proposed solution has the desired impact given the scale at which it needs to be implemented.” Antler is a global early-stage venture capital firm with offices in twelve cities across six continents. Founded in Singapore in 2017, Antler aims to fundamentally improve the world by enabling and investing in the world’s most exceptional people.

With growing investor demand for ESG investments — assets have grown 14% annually from 2014 to reach US$31 trillion in 2018 – D-Tech offers opportunities to support profitable, high growth business, while providing sustainable social and environmental benefits.

Dominic Mellor, Senior Investment Specialist at ADB Ventures, added that “D-Tech has a role to play alongside technologies for planning and managing infrastructure, making local economies more diverse and resilient, and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.”

Asia Pacific accounts for almost half of the world’s natural disasters. China, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines, the top four natural disaster-prone countries in Asia, are expected to lose $380 billion each year between 2016 and 2030 as a result of natural disasters. D-Tech provides a way to reduce this impact.

Minette Navarrete, President of Kickstart Ventures (KVI), a corporate venture capital firm with a focus on the Philippines and the greater Southeast Asian region, commented that “KVI has an active focus on emerging markets, which are prone to disasters. A number of invested companies have clear, immediate usefulness in disaster situations.”

Bit Santos, Portfolio Operations Director of KVI, added that developing markets like the Philippines and others in Southeast Asia offer “opportunities for startups to address fundamental problems” such as those posed by natural disasters. Examples include engageSpark, which supports messaging services in areas of poor data reception; and AIAH’s KIRA, a chatbot that shares information and automates health checks.

These are just a few of the many great initiatives spearheaded by startups that can help turn the tide for affected communities in times of disaster, and whom VCs can help support and supplement with necessary resources.

Solving industry problems

Like any venture, D-Tech companies need to pass VC’s business viability tests, while also facing challenges specific to the field of disaster resilience: slow cash flow, lack of patient capital, and the need for community sensitivity.

“D-Tech firms are particularly vulnerable to funding and cash flow problems as a result of their relatively long sales cycles”, Mellor explained. “By their nature, the positive impact of D-Tech firms cannot be immediately felt until after a catastrophe has happened. Clients may therefore feel they are not getting immediate results”. Navarrete added that “firms will also have to contend with the delicate nature of private companies selling services at a time of crisis, which could naturally create a negative impression of profiting from a disaster”.

To help D-Tech start-ups grow, VCs can play a significant role by acting as connective bridges with the government and established institutions. Furthermore, the backing of a reputable VC can provide much-needed credibility to early-stage start-ups.

“For Antler, we work with various stakeholders and entities in the tech ecosystem to ensure startups get all they need — a similar ecosystem approach needs to be taken for D-Tech as well,” said Bharwani.

ADB Ventures, KVI, and Antler noted that startups within their portfolios will gain access to important operational networks across governments, municipalities, large corporates, and even non-governmental organizations. Startups may also gain added advantages specific to their VC’s firms, such as ADB’s reputational advantage, access to Antler’s global alumni and advisory network, or introductions to large corporate networks that Kickstart Ventures is connected to (such as Globe Telecom and Ayala Corporation).

Also read: Disaster Tech innovation is key in mitigating the impact of natural disasters

Prudence Foundation supports D-Tech growth

As the community investment arm of Prudential in Asia and Africa, Prudence Foundation leverages Prudential plc’s long term commitment and geographical scale to make communities safer, more secure and more resilient, by addressing key issues in education, health and safety.

Over the years, Prudence Foundation has worked to improve disaster resilience, most recently through the Safe Steps D-Tech Awards which aims to find, fund and support innovative technology solutions which save lives before, during and after natural disasters.

Donald Kanak, Chairman of Prudence Foundation stated “We wanted to see more focus on applying technology to making disasters less disastrous”.

The D-Tech Awards has partners in both the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors, including e27, Antler, National Geographic, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Asian Venture Philanthropy Network (AVPN), among others.

“It is through partnerships between the private sector, governmental and non-governmental organizations that real impact and inroads can be made,” said Marc Fancy, Prudence Foundation’s Executive Director.

Through the competition, startups are invited to pitch their solutions to a panel of judges — including VCs — for the chance to win grants from a pool of US$150,000. Finalists will also benefit from expert coaching and networking opportunities. Both for-profits and not-for-profits are welcome to apply and will be judged separately. Applications for the next round will open in November 2020.

Prudence Foundation, in partnership with e27, will be hosting two private working sessions on D-Tech on 27th and 28th August and encourages VCs to offer their advice and insight into growing D-Tech startups. If you are interested to participate in the conversation, please kindly answer this survey.

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This article is produced by the e27 team, sponsored by Prudence Foundation.

We can share your story at e27, too. Engage the Southeast Asian tech ecosystem by bringing your story to the world. Visit us at e27.co/advertise to get started.

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Last month, we announced the launching of Perks, a feature of e27 Pro that gives members access to a highly curated basket of services and products across all sectors to help support their company growth. This collection of Perks is made available exclusively through e27 Pro, offered in partnership with different companies that cater to various business needs.

From software solutions to healthcare benefits, our curated basket of services and products are designed strategically to aid startups across the spectrum to achieve their respective business goals.

We recently talked about our initial list of Perks on e27, and trust and believe that we are only getting started! As part of our commitment to empowering the ecosystem as best as we can, the e27 team and its partners are gearing for bigger and more exciting things as the year continues to unfold.

Also read: 5 ways to build startup resilience and avoid failure

Since then, we have added a few more Perks to the list that our members could browse through. These additional Perks will ensure that e27 Pro members get to maximise their membership and optimise their businesses toward larger and further growth.

With these added benefits, we’ve been receiving glowing reviews from Pro members. Alex Tay, Founder of ZeusX Gaming, said “the perks from AWS and Hubspot are fantastic. More than made up the membership cost on their own.”

AWS Activate and Hubspot are only two of our partner companies offering Perks that collectively render over $10,000 worth of savings for member companies who use them. We push this ceiling further by adding more Perks and partner companies to the list.

As such, we’re happy to announce that you can now view the most up-to-date list of Perks on the e27 website. You can do this simply by going to the homepage and clicking the Perks button on the top page navigation bar. Or you can simply click here.

How does the official Perks page work?

All our Perks partners are featured in the Perks page where you can see a snapshot of the exclusive discounts and freebies they are offering to members. Simply click on the card of any Perk to expand its details and to claim it.

You will have to be logged in to your Pro account to claim these Perks. Note that each Perk would have their own terms, which are all indicated in each individual information card. This will ensure that Pro members are fully briefed before they can access the corresponding Perk they are interested in.

Also read: ZeusX to bring mobile gaming to the next level in 2020

Over the next few months, we plan to take e27 Perks beyond just software. Our team is currently hard at work to curate a variety of exciting new Perks categories for Pro members to choose from! With choices ranging from hardware solutions to even travel essentials, the Perks page is gearing up for exciting new things and is sure to spice things up for all e27 Pro members.

Check back soon to find out about other exciting developments!

Join e27 Pro

If you want to enjoy these exclusive Perks available only with Pro, be a part of the Pro community and sign up for an e27 Pro membership today! You may visit here for more details.

Stay tuned to find out what other Perks we have in store!

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