Dhaka may be one of the lesser-spoken markets in South Asia but Kishwar Hasheeme believes that there is no better place to launch Bangladesh’s first full-stack cloud kitchen.

While the concept has already existed in Asia and been tested by brands such as Dahmakan and Rebel Foods, considering Dhaka’s status as a “developing market”, cloud kitchen is still in its early days and has massive growth potential.

“Food delivery is in its early stages in many Asian countries such as Vietnam, Bangladesh and Indonesia, and has immense potential to grow over the next five to ten years. Food development and technology value chain that is designed for amazing doorstep experience is often overlooked, as most F&B entrepreneurs are focussed on retail and dine-in,” said the co-founder of Kludio in an interview to e27.

“We wanted to change this imbalance in experience and quality by creating Kludio, so that the underserved middle-income customers have a digital food court to rely on. One app, all your meals, for everyone. Dhaka is the perfect first market for our model because of its dense population, large middle-income demography, who are young and mobile-first. One fun fact is that Dhaka was also Uber’s fastest-growing market in Asia outside of Chinese cities,” Hasheeme added.

Also Read: Go-Jek’s VC arm invests US$5M in India’s cloud kitchen startup Rebel Foods

How it works

Cloud kitchens operate like a WeWork for kitchens where different restaurant brands rent their own kitchen stations, instead of paying for rent at a more expensive locale down the street.

What makes Kludio different from other cloud kitchen models is that it takes control of the entire production, from cooking and lead generation to delivery — ultimately taking ownership of the whole customer relationship. It is like an online food court owned by Kludio. 

“This model can be quite powerful from a differentiation point of view as well as in terms of the unit economics, which is evident from my personal experience at Kludio. However, there are many moving parts and require a diverse set of skills from food development, optimised production, fast logistics, technology development and mobile commerce,” he shared.

“We have built it all. The value chain is quite robust, and if done successfully, there is a layer of defensibility from aggregators, which other models of food preparation (restaurant and kitchens) do not benefit. This is one of the key differentiation for Kludio,”.

Among the food options available on the Kludio’s platform is Dough On The Go (a pizza outlet), Fry Box, and Fish & Chips. The multiple food brands on the app are all created, owned and operated by Kludio.

Also Read: Today’s top tech news: GrabKitchen launches cloud kitchens in Thailand, Vietnam, accelerating regional expansions

To enjoy Kludio’s digital food court experience, users can simply download the app from the iOS or Android store and order anything they like. The delivery hours start at 12 noon until midnight.

“Since its inception, we started to see that our community of customers like the Kludio experience. This attracted more customers, investors and teammates. The model that we built is that of a digital court where you can mix and match brands in one single order much like a physical food court. While at it, we realised we were developing technology that can enable thousands of F&B businesses in terms of efficiency and digitisation,” he said. 

Kludio pre- and post-pandemic

On being asked how the landscape has changed for the startup, pre-and post-pandemic, Hasheeme replied that the challenges keep changing every quarter, every month and sometimes every day.

While that is part of the day-to-day operations, during the pandemic, the entire Kludio team managed to show resilience by participating in the change management process smoothly, he said. The team has developed a special bonding after navigating through the crisis together.

According to him, COVID-19 has turned out to be a blessing for the venture — it launched a consumer-facing app in August this year, which he claims to have crossed more than 20,000 downloads in just two months. The global trends of digitalisation have also boosted the firm.

Bangladesh has only recently been experiencing upward economic growth, thanks to its surging foreign trade which has led to more wealth and employment opportunities.

Although it is still lagging behind Southeast Asia and India in several parameters, Bangladesh has long been an attractive market when it comes to startup investments — evident from the investments made by the likes of Gojek, 500 Startups and Ant Financial into local startups in the recent past.

Kludio has also managed to draw investors and raised a round of funding from several notable investors. “We have raised US$500,000 till date from Grab’s former Chief Economist, Go Jek’s VP of Food Marketplace, Uber’s International Head of Innovation, BOD Tech Ventures (Frontier market tech investor) and Seedstars, to name a few,” he shared. 

The startup most recently pitched at Seedstars International Demo Day, a programme to provide startups with financial funding and global mentors.

Also Read: Yummy Corp bags US$12M Series B to grow its cloud kitchen brand in Indonesia

Although it is young, having started just last year, the firm has revealed plans to expand to other countries in Southeast Asia.

“Kludio’s offering works best in young, mobile-first cities so Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines are suitable for our international expansion plans,” Hasheeme said. 

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Image Credit: Kludio

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Mednefits, a Singapore-based employee medical benefits platform, announced today it has raised S$8 million (US$5.95 million) in a Series A funding round, led by Malaysian firm BLoyalty.

BLoyalty, through its digital engagement platform B Infinite, will work with Mednefits to enhance and automate medical benefits for its clients’ employees across Singapore and Malaysia. These benefits will amount to S$18 million (US$13.38 million) by 2021, as per a press note.

The fresh funds will be used to expand Mednefits’s footprint within these two markets and improve technological offerings on its platform by increasing automation of its services.

Also Read: HealthMetrics raises US$5M Series A to help corporates manage employees’ health, wellness better

Founded in 2014, Mednefits helps businesses take care of their employees with its automated, affordable and accessible employee benefits platform. It has since grown from offering medical benefits to now a full suite of healthcare and wellness essentials in Singapore and Malaysia.

The startup claims its platform has connected over 50,000 employees from 500 companies across Singapore and Malaysia to over 2,000 healthcare providers.

Prior to the latest round, the firm has raised S$12 million (US$7.4 million) in funding.

Employers across Asia-Pacific have long found the rising cost of employee benefits to be a key challenge, with 69 per cent of them citing it as the top challenge faced.

The uptake in costs borne from conventional employer-sponsored health insurance policies that bundle inpatient and outpatient insurance together. Additionally, paper-based claims are still a common practice within the industry, further inflating administrative costs.

Also Read: Startup founders are responsible for their remote employees. Here’s how to fulfil your duty of care

Chris Teo, CEO of Mednefits, said: “Digital technologies can help companies address business and operational challenges. By having businesses of all sizes on Mednefits’s cloud-based platform and an expansive network of panel clinics, we are able to offer competitive and  flexible corporate healthcare plans, while simplifying and automating reimbursements.”

“Mednefits’s vision is to lead the employee benefits transformation in Southeast Asia. We will use this investment to grow faster and further in Singapore and Malaysia, while also improving the product’s self-service capabilities by growing our technological know-how,” he concluded.

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Image Credit: Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash

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Customer acquisition is the life of any business, and different verticals have their own approach to it. When it comes to customer acquisition for B2B companies, there are several myths circulating in the business community. For example, as addressed in this research by Aberdeen Group, B2B companies are believed to have a longer sales cycle.

But how many of these are true?

To get a better understanding of the customer acquisition process for B2B companies, e27 speaks to Brendan O’Shaughnessy, Chief Commercial Officer at ViSenze.

Founded in Singapore, the company provides visual AI services for other companies, particularly those in the retail sector. The services that they offer include visual search engine recommendations and photo tagging; their list of clients include major fashion brands and even five leading smartphone manufacturers Huawei, Samsung, LG, Vivo and Oppo.

“Over the last two to three years, they have integrated our visual search technology into their phones’ operating system,” O’Shaughnessy explains.

With that, after eight years of operations, Visenze processes 350 million product visuals globally every month through its services and manage over 400 million product shoots for a thousand global retailers. It has also partnered with companies such as AWS, which O’Shaughnessy says has enabled them to focus on its core technology development.

In this article, O’Shaughnessy shares the key elements of customer acquisition for B2B companies, based on Visenze’s experience in the field. These learnings are divided into key four points:

• Principles of customer acquisition
• Getting the customers onboard
• Remaining challenges in B2B customer acquisition
• Customer acquisition in a time of crisis

Also Read: Rakuten leads US$10.5M Series B in AI startup ViSenze

Principles of customer acquisition

O’Shaughnessy begins his explanation by stating that in principle, there is certainly a difference in customer acquisition approach for B2B and B2C companies.

To explain how customer acquisition is like for B2C companies, he gives an example of a digital media company. To gain customers, they are likely to introduce a subscription that enables customers to gain access to content for a price, for a particular period of time. There will also be a strong paid marketing approach for these companies to reach their target customers.

“One of the biggest differentiators is the content proposition. It’s really critical for them to get it right because, ultimately, consumers will only pay for those subscriptions if they like the content they carry,” O’Shaughnessy points out.

He adds that while B2C companies tend to have lightweight to zero cost activation, many of these companies also have a minimum subscription term of just one month.

“It’s still a big consideration on the approach you take for reaching and acquiring those users. ‘We spend so much on attracting this amount to one month.’ It will cost you money. So there’s a risk assessment that has to be factored into your strategy at every step of process, acquisition and activation,” O’Shaughnessy concludes.

Meanwhile, with B2B companies, there are factors beyond content that need to be considered: From the different stakeholders involved in the process, the integration with other available services, data security, to even budget approval.

“It could lead to a requirement for trials, competitive evaluation and testing, and ultimately, price negotiation,” O’Shaughnessy says, adding that Visenze’s role in their clients’ business is more like a “component”.

Also Read: Will smartphones become the mall of the future?

“We are the component that supports a function. We are not building an app for them. We’re not creating catalogue or managing interface UX. As components, we have to fit within their strategy. We have to fit within their ecosystem. We have to fit their business priorities. So, you know, part of our customer acquisition strategy, we really have to consider specific messaging,” he continues.

He also adds that for this kind of approach, in addition to having sales and marketing teams, a B2B company might also need to have a pre-sales and customer success support team.

Other principles that B2B companies need to keep in mind is timing and a global mindset.

“If we join a conversation too late, we might miss the boat. If we join too early, we may have a much longer sales cycle and that costs us resources and time,” O’Shaughnessy says, indirectly explaining the “longer sales cycle” myth.

Getting the customers onboard

So now that we have understood the key principles that Visenze is implementing in their customer acquisition approach, how about the practices? How do they onboard a new client into their service?

It starts with content marketing and outreach to specific individuals through various online and offline channels. When they are engaging with a prospective client, Visenze team will try to focus on what these clients need –not only today but also in the upcoming years. At this stage, it is important for them to show successful case studies to convince potential clients that they would not be the first to try this technology, that there are others who have proven its efficacy.

Once they managed to go through that process, Visenze is going to set up a trial account for the potential client –a stage that O’Shaughnessy dubs as “really critical” as it enables them to see how Visenze technology works with their data.

“When we are setting up a trial, we allow them to sort of play in the sandpit. We stay in touch with them throughout the process to make sure that we’re engaged in that. When we get past that point, it’s a question of, ‘Okay, how do we take this forward? What is the strategic fit?’”

Also Read: Moving from an MNC to a startup, what the leap really means

In some cases, some field trials might even be needed.

“Our policy is that field trials can run from one to three months. But we increasingly see one month trial being the preferred option, which is great because we can also demonstrate real business impact in just within that period,” O’Shaughnessy says.

He gives two examples of inbound and outbound leads that the company has pursued. The first company was a US-based major global brand who responded to a white paper published by Visenze’s marketing company. This led to a sales engagement process that lasted for months before they were able to confirm for a paid proof-of-concept.

“We worked very, very closely with them through our market pre-sales team. We also pulled in support from our product and data science team in Singapore. So, after an extended period that included a real-world test in multiple markets and competitive AB testing against one of our prime competitors (who were an incumbent in that account), we were selected … We signed a long term agreement,” O’Shaughnessy elaborated.

Another example involves a Europe-based brand with a local innovation team in Singapore. The company reached out to Visenze, asking to be helped with a “very complex” visual recognition problem for a mass consumer product.

According to O’Shaughnessy, this case was “interesting” as they almost did not win the contract.

“But the project was interesting to us … so we decided to proceed. We ended up conducting a one-month POC for free. We put the contract aside and said, ‘Look, we’ll just do it. Let’s see where we get to.’ We were also against the other two vendors,” he says, adding they eventually secured a partnership with the company.

Remaining challenges in B2B customer acquisition

When asked about that one aspect of B2B customer acquisition that continues to become a challenge, O’Shaughnessy firmly answers lead generation.

“Marketing plays a key role in this … our messaging, positioning, and supporting that outreach effort. [It also helps in] creating that inbound interest to a company like us, identifying target prospects, and researching solutions fit,” he points out.

Visenze’s marketing team will come up with a certain list of target clients in a particular market; a process that requires them to undertake research and analysis to build an understanding on how to best approach the prospects.

Also Read: ViSenze raises US$20M Series C funding round co-led by Gobi Partners, Sonae IM

“What we’re doing on a centralised basis of a sales campaign or marketing positioning [is that] we make sure they got the right messaging collateral that they can tap into and utilise … to support them in terms of best practice, activities that can help them create awareness mark that they can leverage and tap into,” O’Shaughnessy says.

“For any business, keeping that top-funnel out of a very healthy level and keeping that cycling through is really critical, because if you don’t have that, you’re limited in terms of the day-to-day sales activities. You can actually undertake the progress you can make. So, I wouldn’t say we’ve solved it, but we’re continuously evolving ways to deal with it and optimise our lead generation challenge,” he further explains.

Customer acquisition in a challenging time

It is no longer a secret that the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the retail sector widely –a situation that also impacted a visual search platform such as Visenze. When dealing with a crisis of this level, the company believes that there is no option but to refocus.

“We changed our priorities, we changed our approach, and we faced it head-on,” O’Shaughnessy stresses. “So we took three major decisions back in Q2 when it became clear that COVID-19 was going to have a massive impact for an extended period of time.”

There are three steps that Visenze is taking to deal with it:

1. Over-communicate with team members across time-zones

“We were running three daily calls from HQ with our sales teams in different regions. And we felt that was important because sales teams are not used to staying at home … but they’re used to customer contact and team contact. And when you when that’s taken away, it’s it can have a big impact, particularly when you’re disconnected from your sources.”

“It did make a difference in team morale.”

2. Prioritise customer retention

“I’m glad to say that to shift the priority from acquisition –which was just almost impossible– to retention meant that we didn’t lose any major client despite the impact on their businesses.”

3. Take the opportunity to make a change

“[The changes brought by the pandemic] allowed us to reflect and look at our strategy and market offering, and we decided that there were changes we had to make. And we wanted to make it now, as good as any time to make. So we looked at how we could redefine a market offering to better position for a longer term business strategy.”

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Image Credit: Visenze

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Indonesia’s home-grown ride-hailing giant gojek today announced that it has raised US$150 million from Telkomsel, a leading network service provider and subsidiary of Telkom Indonesia and Singtel.

This strategic investment takes place about six months after gojek received a financing round from Facebook and PayPal.

The collaboration marks an expansion of the two tech giants’ multi-year partnership that has offered affordable data packages to gojek driver-partners since 2018.

Also Read: Google, JD.com, Tencent confirm leads in GOJEK Series F fundraising

The joining of forces is also aimed at providing “greater convenience and benefits” such as innovative product offerings and cost savings through joint promotions and product bundles.

The two giants will also collaborate on growing Indonesia’s digital lifestyle sector and increasing the advertising technology solutions available to merchants of all sizes.

In addition, they will work together to implement professional training programmes for Telkomsel employees and share best practices in an effort to boost the country’s technology talent pool.

This agreement is also part of Telkomsel’s journey to strengthen its three digital pillars: digital connectivity, digital platform and digital services.

“By working together, we hope to help Indonesia become a true digital powerhouse in Southeast Asia and bring the benefits of the digital economy to millions more consumers, driver-partners and small businesses,” said gojek co-CEO Andre Soelistyo.

In his view, in a fast-growing, mobile-first market, collaborations like this one are crucial for supercharging the digital economy as great things can only be achieved if the region’s leading technology companies pool their resources and work together to accelerate development.

Also Read: gojek to let go of 430 employees as it shutters GoLife, GoFood Festivals

Telkomsel President Director, Setyanto Hantoro, commented: “We believe that working with gojek and its extensive ecosystem will accelerate Telkomsel’s growth as a digital telco and our efforts to build an inclusive and sustainable digital ecosystem, which is particularly crucial amid the pandemic and beyond. This spirit of collaboration will continue to be our guiding force as we seek to bring the benefits of digital technology in every aspect of life, to all levels of Indonesian society.”

Established in 2010, gojek focussed on courier and motorcycle ride-hailing services in its early years, before launching the app in January 2015 in Indonesia. Since then, it has grown to become a super app in Southeast Asia, providing access to a wide range of services — from transportation and digital payments, to food delivery, logistics and many other on-demand services.

gojek now operates across main cities in five Southeast Asian countries.

As of June 2020, gojek’s app and its ecosystem have been downloaded 190 million times by users across the region.

As per Crunchbase, since inception, gojek has raised US$4.8 billion from 30 investors across 10 rounds. Its other investors include Google, Mitsubishi, Pegasus Tech Ventures, Tencent and Visa.

Over its 10 years of existence, it has also made 10 acquisitions, the latest deal being with WePay in September.

Telkomsel is a digital cellular operator in Indonesia and claims to be serving more than 170 million customers.

Also Read: Group CTO Ajey Gore leaves gojek

Over the last 25 years of serving the nation, Telkomsel has been consistently implementing the latest broadband technology, including being the first to trial 5G services in Indonesia.

Furthermore, Telkomsel continues to develop digital businesses such as mobile gaming, digital entertainment, digital advertising, digital lifestyle, mobile financial services, enterprise solutions, and Internet of Things to enable Indonesian society to continue discovering new ways of living.

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Image Credit: gojek

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StashAway expands to UAE

The story: Singaporean fintech startup StashAway has rolled out its digital wealth management platform in the United Arab Emirates.

Also Read: Digital wealth management startup StashAway raises US$16M Series C led by Square Peg

More about the story: This makes StashAway the first digital wealth manager to get an asset management license from the Dubai Financial Services Authority (DFSA) with retail endorsement.

“When we realised that the gap in wealth management options also exists in MENA, it was an obvious decision to expand our services, starting with earning our license in the DIFC,” commented Michele Ferrario, StashAway Co-founder and CEO.

About StashAway: Founded in 2016, the fintech startup offers investment and cash management portfolios for both retail and professional clients.

It claims it has users from more than 145 countries and of 174 nationalities and has seen its assets under management grow more than 4.3X in the last 12 months. It plans to build on this momentum with continuous product development over the next few months and years.

Safe Space raises US$250K seed round to improve mental health in workplaces

The story: Singapore-based B2B2C digital mental healthcare provider, Safe Space, has closed a seed round through equity crowdfunding platform, FundedHere.

Also Read: COVID-19 is taking a toll on mental wellness, but this startup wants to provide a Safe Space

More about the story: The funds will be used to further Safe Space’s mission in highlighting the importance of mental health in the workplace, and to expand to businesses across the APAC region in 2021.

“Workplace mental well-being will be one of our top priorities going into 2021. Safe Space’s vision is to make digital mental healthcare and education accessible and comprehensive to businesses of all sizes (from startups to MNCs). We’ve built comprehensive tools to cope with the mental health impact of COVID-19 and other challenges ahead,” said, Antoinette Patterson, Founder of Safe Space. 

About SafeSpace: The healthtech startup provides affordable access to quality offline and online mental health therapy care and preventive education. Since its launch in March 2019, Safe Space has grown its user-base by more than 3x and has connected more than 1,500 individuals to psychologists, psychotherapists and counsellors.

Lu International partners Kasikornbank to launch FinVest

The story: Lu International, the Singapore subsidiary of China-based personal financial services platform Lufax Holding, and Thailand-based Kasikornbank, announced the launch of FinVest, an online wealth management platform.

More about the story: The new digital investment platform aims to help retail investors in Thailand gain access to onshore and offshore investment products at a low minimum investment amount.

Kit Wong, CEO of Lu International, commented, “Digital technology is rapidly changing the way investors use financial services. They are increasingly using digital channels to purchase financial products and invest.”

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Image Credit: Photo by M. B. M. on Unsplash

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