Drivehub, a Thailand-based online car rental platform, announced today it has closed a “USD seven-figure” Series A funding round, co-led by Toyota Tsusho, CAC Capital, and KK Fund.

As per a press note, the fresh funds will be deployed to enhance Drivehub’s software and technological systems, as well as expand to new markets in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

Launched in 2017, Drivehub is an online marketplace where users can “instantly” check vehicle availability, compare prices and quality and transact. The Bangkok-based startup claims it is able to do that through its “real-time” connection to the fleet of rental car companies.

Drivehub shared that it also offers different payment methods for car rentals on its platform. Users can transact through a credit card for international service providers such as Hertz and Dollar, or choose to pay by cash for local service providers.

The ability to pay for rentals with cash is welcomed in Southeast Asia where credit card signups have remained low. Consumers in the region often resort to alternate forms of payments such as cash. In Thailand, 52 per cent of car rentals occur without a credit card.

Also Read: Do you take cash? 3 hurdles to a cashless Singapore

Drivehub claims it has grown by 50 per cent compared to the same period last year, despite sales setbacks by as much as 90 per cent in April 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Drivehub is in the process of using the funding to expand on a regional scale, while also seeking for opportunities to transform the conventional rental car service,” said Thatchai Chuaprapaisilp, CEO and Co-founder of Drivehub.

The company also announced a new partnership with Thai trading company Toyota Tsusho. With the latter’s capabilities in sale-purchase of new or used cars, auto financing and car insurance, Drivehub said it would be able to expand and tailor its solutions to meet the changing demand of consumers.

According to the startup, small local rental car providers will be provided with the opportunity to enhance and expand their business in a sustainable way too.

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Image Credit: Drivehub

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2020 has finally come to an end. Although the world is still shrouded in the shadow of the Black Swan event of COVID-19, the crisis has reached a turning point. As the pandemic continues to affect all parts of the world, many organisations, companies, and startups have turned to big data and AI to transform and optimise the efficiency of business activities, directly accelerating the overall development of the AI industry.

According to IDC’s report, the global AI market in 2020 will amount to US$156.5 billion, with a growth rate of 12.3 per cent, of which 80 per cent will be attributed to software. IDC also optimistically expects that the market size of the AI industry, considered by some as a blue ocean, will compound at an annual rate of 17 per cent and exceed US$300 billion by 2024.

For various AI initiatives and applications to flourish, data centres must be fully developed to support the storage of data and training models, brain-like IaaS (information-as-a-service), and PaaS (platform-as-a-service) cloud services. After meeting the performance requirements of AI for cloud services, data in various fields such as finance and manufacturing can be used more efficiently to accelerate AI technology.

It should then come as no surprise that leading international cloud players such as Google and Microsoft have recently announced their intentions to deepen their investments in Taiwan’s AI Infrastructure.

Last September, Google unveiled that it would build a third data centre in Yunlin, while Microsoft disclosed at the end of October that it would set up its first Azure data centre in Taiwan.

Also Read: Kollective Ventures and Joseph Phua’s family office acquire SoundOn, a Taiwanese startup with 35M monthly podcast downloads

As Taiwan’s future cloud infrastructure realises, developers will no longer need to build services through overseas data centres, which will accelerate AI innovations and applications by local teams, especially in areas that are more sensitive to data sovereignty, such as finance.

Every six months, AppWorks releases an updated Taiwan AI Ecosystem Map, distilling the latest trends and developments while highlighting various companies leading the charge. In the process of reviewing the overall ecosystem changes, we have observed the following trends in the second half of 2020.

AI in healthtech has attracted investors’ attention

Although the pandemic has negatively impacted economic productivity and overall investor appetite, it has unequivocally accelerated the adoption of AI innovation in healthcare.  Despite the rather barren investment landscape in the first half of 2020, aetherAI, which provides medical imaging AI development services and AI digital pathology systems, managed to close a US$6 million Series A round led by Quanta Computing.

In the second half of 2020, Deep01, which assists medical staff in interpreting computer tomography (CT) and provides an AI image interpretation system for cerebral hemorrhaging, successfully raised NT$80 million (US$2.7 million) in seed funding led by ASUS Capital. In addition, Heroic-Faith, which pioneered innovative medical devices such as an AI stethoscope and a smart respiratory monitoring system, also completed a US$4 million series A round of fundraising in 2020.

Also Read: What is the state of Taiwan’s AI ecosystem?

Moving forward, the next step for Taiwan’s healthtech and AI industry is to go global. As the main markets for medical AI-related products are still focused in developed countries such as the US, Japan, and Europe, Taiwan’s visibility coupled with the impact of the pandemic will have an effect on an international scale. Whether these innovative startups can successfully go overseas to scale will become the focus of attention in the future.

Corporates are accelerating their search for transformation and collaboration opportunities

For many traditional Taiwanese companies, big data and AI have been at the crux of their digital transformation initiatives and overall search for the next growth engines. In 2020, Commonwealth Magazine and Europe’s IMD jointly released the first digital transformation survey between Taiwan and Europe.

It pointed out that up to 52 per cent of Taiwanese companies have not yet been digitally transformed, and only 4 per cent of companies achieved or exceeded their digital transformation goals. Whether it’s in-house big data and AI project teams or looking for partners in the startup world, it has become the newest goal for companies to innovate.

The most direct model is creating corporate venture capital (CVC) arms to invest in new ventures with strategic value. In addition to investment, Taiwan’s major companies are also exploring other collaborative models. For example, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of IoT systems Advantech worked with StarFab to establish an accelerator.

Wistron, on the other hand, not only promotes upgrading the industry through partnerships with startups but also actively lays out future transformations. They collaborated with NCTU to establish embedded AI research centres, and jointly planned Wistron Lab @ Garage+ with Chia Hsin Cultural Foundation and Times Foundation to find growth opportunities in the next decade.

Taiwan’s AI ecosystem is bolstered by the successful prevention of the epidemic

Due to the success of the Taiwan government and all citizens and residents in fighting the pandemic, Taiwan’s AI ecosystem continued to flourish in the second half of 2020. On the startup accelerator side, AppWorks Accelerator has been recruiting specifically for AI startups since August 2018, fostering a total of 84 teams from both inside and outside of Taiwan.

Other community partners such as Microsoft for Startups, SparkLabs Taipei, and Taiwan AI x Robotics Accelerator also recruited a number of AI-related startups to inject new energy into Taiwan’s AI ecosystem. In the second half of 2020, due to the proper control of the coronavirus, it was relatively safe to host physical events in Taiwan. The largest startup event 2020 Meet Taipei showcased many startups using AI and big data to create more value-added services. 

Also Read: How Taiwan’s blockchain industry is powering through the downturn

Taiwan AI Academy, Taiwan AI Labs, and the Artificial Intelligence Foundation are Taiwan’s representative institutions in the field of AI education and research, and continue to inject talent and innovative technologies for the development of AI in Taiwan. With the support from the government, institutions, and overall ecosystem, Taiwan can continue to promote the implementation of AI in various industries and integrate innovation into traditional businesses.

This gives an opportunity for startups to leverage the resources that Taiwan can offer and connect with players in the ecosystem that are upgrading Taiwan’s AI capabilities.

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Golden Gate Ventures (GGV), one of Singapore’s active VC firms, has promoted Jeffrey Chua as Principal.

Chua has been at the heart of numerous investment-related activities and has helped founders grow ever since he joined the company as an intern five years ago.

In an interview with e27, Chua said that he will continue to focus on processing venture deals. Moving forward, he will also become more active on the portfolio management side.

Being the only junior investment professional at GVV since a long time, Chua brings the experience of being involved in almost all of its major deals. Among them are BukuWarung, Funding Societies, KooBits, and Carro.

In this interview, Chua discusses his personal investment strategy, what he looks for in founders, the GGV’s investment thesis and how deals might change post-COVID-19.

GGV is among one of the most well-renowned early-stage VC firms, globally. How did your journey in this space begin? 

Chua: I ended up in the VC space by accident. It wasn’t something that I had planned.

After studying in the US, I decided to move back to Singapore and was basically helping out my mother with a couple of side investments and everything.

A friend of mine, whom I had known during my time in New York, convinced me to join GGV as an intern, and I decided to give it a shot after staying home for the longest time.

Also Read: Top contributions this week: Golden Gate’s Vinnie Lauria shares pitching from home tips and more

Could you also share a little bit more about the GGV investment thesis and the kind of investments that you largely focus on?

Chua: We are a consumer-focused VC that focuses on software-based tech companies in Southeast Asia, therefore we tend not to play in hardware. The general thesis is the consumer journey within Southeast Asia and the focus is consumer upliftment and improvement. So it could be like payments and logistics companies that make the daily lives of the general population smoother and more efficient.

What are some of the key qualities that you look for in founders?

Chua: For me, I must walk away from the conversation learning something new. If I walk into a meeting and happen to know more about the business model or industry than the founder himself/herself, it’s a red sign. So I like to look for someone who can teach me something new.

Another thing that I look for are people who can change my mind. I might come into a meeting with a certain view or thesis on something. But I’m open to having my mind change if they’re able to change my mind in a very convincing way. That’s usually a very positive sign.

So, the founder has to have some qualities of a good salesman?

Chua: The founder should be able to back up his ideas with sales.

Adding to that, how often do you look at numbers for your early-stage deals? Are you more founder-focused or number-focused?

Chua: It really depends on the stage of the startup that we’re looking at, and what the context of the conversation is. I think, in the VC space, at least in the early stage, I’m probably one of the more numerically-inclined people, where I like going through Excel models and financial plans.

So, if you have data on your current business model, what I’m looking for are things that show me that what you are telling me has been proven or are based on numbers.

At the end of the day, I’m not an accountant. I won’t say ‘hey, your balance sheet doesn’t balance’.

Also Read: Golden Gate Ventures, INSEAD on the state of Southeast Asia’s future exits: trade sales, secondary sales to lead

What are some deals that you passed on that eventually went on to become successful startups? 

Chua: We try not to look back at this because we understand that we’re not going to hit every single unicorn. For us, we like to play in the space where we would like to make the best quality decisions based off of the data available. The outcome, there could be various different factors that play into it.

Speaking more broadly, what signal is the market currently sending post-COVID-19 in terms of investments? Should we expect more deals?

Chua: Overall I think investments will get easier and things will move faster and smoother. Due to the pandemic, a lot of deals that were in the US$10-million range and above were slowed down or stalled since people were not allowed to travel and visit these companies in person. But going forward, when people are able to travel, they’re able to get back to their regular due diligence process.

For GGV, in terms of the number of deals that we’ve seen, things haven’t really changed much since pre-COVID-19. So our pipelines were still pretty full of companies.

We also heard that you beat a couple of investors at the reverse startup competition organised by Slush? What was the winning idea?

Chua: The reverse pitching competition is where investors have to pitch to startups, and I had signed up for it and gone up there and pitched a company called ‘Uber for trains’.

My pitch was that I was raising US$1 trillion to cover Singaporean railroads so that people would be able to hail trains from anywhere. And then I ended up winning because I made everyone laugh the most.

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Image Credit: Golden Gate Ventures

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Hi, I’m Jack. I joined AppWorks as an Analyst in April 2019, not long after I burnt through two startups –one I co-founded in 2017 and the other as a founding team member. My experience taught me that building a successful company is extremely difficult, and if I wanted to improve my odds, I needed to learn from people who have successfully built them.

Now at AppWorks, I get to work alongside 1,300 founders of all stages amongst a variety of startups, 395 active ones to be exact, across the most exciting region that is Greater Southeast Asia, giving me truly a grand scope of founders to learn from.

This year, the coronavirus disrupted the normal world order, taking millions of lives in the process and slowing down economies all around the world. Amongst the chaos, startups from all stages were affected. Besides the select few that prevailed, most startups either saw stagnant growth or worst, shut down their business.

On my journey to become a better founder myself, behind this very unfortunate event was a learning opportunity of a lifetime. This is why I set out to write this piece, to document my learnings and improve my understanding. I got to see just how startups that overcome the pandemic reacted differently to those that didn’t.

Amongst our network of founders, I had the chance to closely observe Ming Ming Chen, the founder and CEO of KKday – a travel platform that provides local experiences and tours across Asia.

I got to witness first hand how he coped with drastic changes that affected his business, how he made quality decisions that pushed KKday to prevail, and how he quickly mobilised the entire company to effectively weather the storm.

Also Read: Ecosystem Roundup: Tech investments in Vietnam drop by 22% in H1; KKday raises US$75M; ShopBack, RedDoorz face data breach

I believe the key lessons distilled here are applicable to early-stage founders all the way up to founders heading into Series B, especially for those that want to learn how to lead a team through uncertainties.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a once-in-a-generation crisis, pushing founders to the test in every single aspect possible, so the lessons observed here should be great additions to your arsenal.

First, plan for the worst to conquer yourself

Back in January when the pandemic first broke out, I hopped on a call with Chen to check in on KKday’s pulse. I remember distinctly that he was very calm and collected. It was hard to tell from his demeanour that 90 per cent of travel in this region was wiped out almost overnight.

I asked him what’s going through his head. Chen mentioned that in his 20+ years of entrepreneurship, a key principle he practised was to always plan for the worst.

By always planning for the worst, KKday has been extremely disciplined in managing their cash flow and balance sheet. The key principle is to not sink short-term assets into long-term investments, optimising for cash flow flexibility in return.

This played a major role in neutralising the initial shock of the outbreak, allowing KKday to protect their brand and refund customers fully, despite a significant drop in revenue.

The other benefit of planning for the worst is better-managed expectations. When bad situations don’t turn out as bad as you had anticipated, then your own morale and energy are left unperturbed.

Also Read: KKday raises US$75M Series C to meet the demand surge for local experiences as Asia’s travel market reopens

This side effect may seem negligible at first, but being the captain of the ship that’s lost at sea, the crew’s attitude is an extension of its captain. Displaying the slightest frustration and anger does not instil confidence in your team, but only serves to discourage them. What seemed like a minuscule change in perspective can actually impact the entire company.

By simply planning for the worst situation possible, Chen and KKday were able to soften the initial blow of the pandemic. But as the travel industry came to a near freeze, how can a founder turn around their startup’s fate from barely managing survival to proactively creating opportunity?

A decision framework against uncertainty

Having led two companies to IPO before starting KKday, Chen draws from a wealth of knowledge and experience to overcome the pandemic. He explains that the result of any decision is amplified during troubled times, either directly adding more uncertainty to your team or reducing it.

Furthermore, the result also impacts the decision maker’s future credits to lead their team. Thus, increasing the decision quality across the company was a key lever to pushing KKday forward.

Chen distilled his decision framework into four steps “seek-digest-strategise-decide” and every decision made within KKday goes through this rigorous process.

The first step is to “seek” information and data that’d accurately represent the reality of the decision. The second step is to “digest” the information and to understand the scope and the stakes.

The third step is to “strategise”, plan and test the hypothesis of your decision; it is important to stress test your thesis and evaluate whether or not it adequately stands up to reality by inviting other stakeholders into the discussion to either validate or invalidate your understanding.

The last step is to “decide”. The founder or the leader of the team needs to make the decision alone, as they need to carry the responsibility for the result. They need to decide on the tradeoffs of making the decision, and whether or not to proceed or revisit the preceding steps.

Also Read: Lessons from a travel tech startup founder on navigating the pandemic-stricken business landscape

Throughout 2020, KKday has transitioned from selling tours for foreigners travelling in a new country to weekend getaways and other domestic excursions for people living in Taiwan, while also branching into products that extend far beyond their typical offering including protective masks and packets of mala hot pot.

In the process of venturing into the unknown, Chen and his team carefully used this framework to test their hypothesis, efficiently and effectively pushing forward their progress without losing precious resources and energy.

And as the year draws to a close, we are seeing all of these initiatives not only making up for the missing revenue but also enabling KKday to strengthen its brand and build goodwill among its customer base, while acquiring a slew of new users in the process.

But making better decisions is only part of the equation, what truly pushed KKday above the line was their execution upon these decisions. So just how did KKday, a company with hundreds of employees, with operations in more than 10 countries adapt to the new normal so swiftly?

Using organisation structure to drive your strategy

Much like a sports team that changes their lineup according to their game plan and the opposing team, a founder needs to structure their organisation and teams relative to the environment and strategy, to maximise the organisation’s output.

Once Chen and his team decided to introduce new products and focus on domestic travel, the way the organisation was previously structured needed to be reshaped, as it no longer yielded optimal efficiency in promoting the new strategy.

Rather than having the Taiwan HQ team approve all products for travellers on their platform, KKday adapted to procuring products locally, authorising local teams to source products for their own markets allowing them to move much faster than before.

Also Read: Taiwan’s travel experience e-commerce platform KKday raises funding from Alibaba to expand to China

The teams also overhauled their KPIs to focus on improving new product sales and domestic travel sales. These new KPIs became the guidelines and instructions that empowered the new teams to directly facilitate the change in strategy, enabling the company to quickly transition from serving outbound travellers to domestic travellers.

COVID-19 hit different countries with varying severity, creating non-linear recovery across all of KKday’s active markets. The organisational restructuring served as an effective way for local teams to rapidly respond to local conditions as needed, helping the travel company to pull off an incredibly successful year by all standard measures—no doubt exemplified by the US$75 million Series C they recently raised in the midst of a pandemic.

There is much more to learn

By always planning for the worst, Chen was able to soften the initial impact for the pandemic, and by improving the decision quality across the board, KKday was able to create opportunities even when the odds were stacked against them.

Most importantly, by efficiently managing the organisation, KKday was able to execute quickly upon the opportunity they identified and improve their chance of survival at every corner and every turn.

These lessons observed here are not commonly found in public domains, and only really shared from one founder to another. As I tried to build my first startup at the age of 25, I mostly did it in isolation without knowing any other founders at all. Looking back, so many mistakes could have been avoided, and so much time could have been saved if I had just learned from founders who were a few years more journeyed than me.

So if you are like me, and you wish to become a better founder and build a successful company in the future, then I encourage you to join a community like AppWorks Accelerator, where you can interact with and learn from over 1,300 founders just like Chen.

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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.

Join our e27 Telegram group, FB community or like the e27 Facebook page

Image Credit: KKday

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Snap yourself using your smartphone camera and have your vital health signs displayed in under a minute? Though it may sound too good to be true, that is exactly what Nervotec promises its users.

All you have to do is to scan your face and the app will measure your oxygen saturation, heart rate, heart rate variability and stress level. After filling up a symptom checker, a health score is generated on the platform.

However, Nervotec had not always set out to serve to provide health tracking solutions for the public. Initially named Flaiight and started in June 2019 by former fighter pilot Jonathan Lau, the Singapore-based healthtech startup had targeted providing health management and workplace wellness tech solutions to ensure pilots were physically healthy before taking to the skies.

“In the beginning, we used wearable technology and gamified traditional psychometric assessments to generate a flight risk score for pilots. It was in this journey that we discovered that predictive analytics could have applications well beyond the flight assessment context,” shared Lau in an interview with e27.

Having faced difficulties in supplying off-the-shelf tracking wearables to corporations due to high costs and challenges in data collection, Lau shared the Nervotec team decided to develop an in-house solution to solve this issue.

Also Read: Singapore startup StretchSkin develops wearable sensors for the healthcare and gaming industries

Technology

The firm’s Awareness platform consists of two core technologies. The first is remote photoplethysmography (rPPg), which analyses the natural light reflected off a user’s face to detect and process signals that measure their vital signs including heart rate, heart rate variability, respiration and oxygen saturation level.

rPPg leverages computer vision and signal processing to generate vital sign readings on any smartphone camera. The app is compatible with older mobile Operating Systems, including Android 8.0 and iOS 10.

The second core technology is an AI predictive algorithm. Leveraging research in deep learning and neural networks, the algorithm is trained with clinical data from research partners to generate insights. This enables the platform to generate risk scores for “influenza-like illnesses”.

Besides enabling individuals to monitor their long-term health, the score also enables companies to track the physical wellbeing of employees.

Lau claims the accuracy of results on Nervotec’s platform is comparable to lifestyle trackers and smartwatches — which are within the four per cent threshold required for theUS Food and Drug Administration (FDA) certification.

The startup has filed a local IP patent and is working towards being FDA- and CE-certified.

When asked how the firm handles the personal health data of users, Lau emphasised that Nervotec adopts “internationally-accredited best practices for information security”.

Also Read: Data will help public-private partnerships build future resilience in SEA. Here’s how

“The entire scanning process is done on the smartphone with no connectivity to a cloud service required. This ensures that no recording of the face takes place and there is no possibility of interception of the measurements taken,” he elaborated.

Assisting firms in tracking employee wellness

He further noted that Nervotec has enabled its client enterprises to overcome health challenges posed by the current pandemic and ensure continued operations of their businesses.

As compared to conventional health tracking devices, Nervotec’s solution has a lower cost of adoption as the platform utilises the personal phone of employees, as compared to purchasing a tracking device outright.

Apart from monitoring vital health signs, the app can also store vaccination and swab tests reports to ensure companies remain compliant to new workplace management measures imposed by authorities.

According to Lau, Nervotec has been well received by firms in the construction industry. Besides signing a proof-of-concept contract with Japan-listed construction conglomerate Kaijima Corporation, it also has other pilot tests with undisclosed companies in the shipping and logistics industry. Lau expects Nervotec’s user base to hit upwards of 20,000 post-pilot.

Also Read: The changing face of healthcare in a post pandemic world

With global personal health and diagnostics technologies sector valued at close to US$90 billion, health tracking looks set to remain a key concern for governments, businesses, and individuals post-pandemic. With a switch to remote working, companies are placing a greater emphasis on employee wellness and there has been an uptake in digital solutions supporting this shift. Nervotec is looking to capitalise on this growing market.

With S$450,000 (US$399,000) in pre-seed raised from angel investors in September 2020, the startup is now looking to raise its seed round next month.

“For the foreseeable future, developing new technologies that improve public access to affordable and convenient healthcare solutions will continue to be our priority,” Lau signed off as he shared about Nervotec’s future plans.

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Image Credit: Nervotec

 

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Meet Frank Oelschlager, who helps companies digitize and automate. Today, he shares how you can get started!

We discuss:
* What is automation + why is it important?
* Examples of automation
* How can you start automating NOW?
* Why Millenials + Gen Z are making companies more honest!

If you don’t see the Apple player above, click on a link below to listen directly!

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This article was first published on We Live To Build.

Image Credit: Michal Czyz on Unsplash

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ELSA, a mobile app that uses Artificial Intelligence and speech recognition technology to help language learners improve their English speaking skills and pronunciation, has secured US$15 million in Series B funding, co-led by Vietnam Investments Group and SIG.

Also participated in the round are returning investors Gradient Ventures (Google’s AI-focused venture fund), SOSV, and Monk’s Hill Ventures. New investors are Endeavor Catalyst and Globant Ventures, which will assist ELSA’s expansion efforts in Latin America.

This new capital will go towards R&D to further develop its voice recognition AI, build a scalable B2B platform and hire new talent.

With this round, the startup’s total financing has touched US$27 million. This includes its Series A round of US$7 million in February 2019.

ELSA (English Language Speech Assistant) was founded in 2015 by Stanford alum Vu Van and Dr. Xavier Anguera.

Also Read: 3 learnings from KKday CEO and Founder on how his travel startup overcame the pandemic

With over 13 million users worldwide, the app claims it helps language learners with an easy way to improve their English speaking ability by listening to how they pronounce words, sentences or conversations to pinpoint exact errors and provide real-time, accurate suggestions on their pronunciation mistakes.

ELSA recently piloted its B2B efforts with schools and companies in Vietnam and India. As a result, the company will now focus on creating a scalable B2B platform that allows cooperation with corporate partners around the world.

With the increase of remote work and investment from companies looking to improve the English speaking skills of their staff, especially in Asia and LatAm regions, ELSA said it has inked many partnerships with corporations and educational institutions worldwide.

Headquartered in the US, ELSA also has offices in Portugal and Vietnam. It claims the app is used by many private schools, public schools and language learning centres.

Also Read: ‘Founders should be able to back up their ideas with sales’: Golden Gate’s newly-appointed Principal Jeffrey Chua

As per the company, in 2020, ELSA nearly doubled its customer base, increased revenue by almost 300 per cent and introduced multiple product enhancements.

The firm’s geographical expansion will focus on the LatAm region where it has experienced exponential growth, plus ongoing investment in Vietnam, India and Japan, where growth was 5x last year with additional demand anticipated in 2021.

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Image Credit: ELSA

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The banking landscape within Southeast Asia is primed for change with the rise of digital banks. With a high internet penetration within the region, digital banks are offering a valuable alternative to their physical ones, especially in reaching out to the millions of underbanked individuals regionally.

Regulators within Southeast Asia have been receptive to the entry of digital banks. In December 2020, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) shortlisted four candidates for new digital banking licenses. Malaysia and the Philippines finalised their digital banking frameworks, while Thailand announced plans to follow suit.

McKinsey Asia recently released a report detailing the opportunities for both incumbents and new entrants to enter this space and their observations from the Asian digital banking landscape.

Here are the main takeaways:

• Successful digital banks in Asia often operate under a consortia business model that contrasts to the vertical approach seen in Europe and the US

Consortia do present challenges and complexity of their own, particularly in ensuring alignment between partners. However, they also offer a path to scaling relatively quickly.

The majority of applicants in Singapore’s licensing round were consortia and half of the licenses were awarded to consortiums.

Also Read: Grab, Sea and Ant Group amongst 4 selected for Singapore digital banking licenses

Grab and Singtel secured the digital full bank license while a consortium comprising China-based Greenland Financial Holdings Group, Linklogis Hong Kong, and Beijing Co-operative Equity Investment Fund Management obtained the digital wholesale bank license.

On the investment side, investors, particularly venture capital firms, have become more cautious, lending more momentum to consolidation and consortia as funding approaches for digital bank launches.

• On the regulatory front, caution related to economic uncertainty has led some regulators to delay licensing timelines

Singapore’s licensing was delayed by close to five months, while Malaysia’s was delayed for half a year. On the whole, however, the pandemic has not shifted the path for digital banking in Asia.

Virtual banks were launched in Hong Kong and Taiwan in 2020 and the MAS shortlisted four candidates for new digital banking licenses, while Malaysia and the Philippines finalised their digital banking guidelines.

• Digital bank capital requirements are not always lower than those for traditional ones

• Successful and profitable digital banks distinguish themselves well

Thriving digital banks share the following strengths: A truly differentiated customer value proposition, early revenue generation, quick scalability, cost-efficiency

The successful value proposition extends beyond a visually appealing customer interface. Digital banks need to offer seamless onboarding, fast loan approval and disbursement, round-the-clock customer support among others.

Also Read: Treat your customers like humans, not data

These benefits should stem from more granular customer data digital banks can access and the lower marginal cost of loan disbursement.

• An experienced team can go a long way to securing licensing

The report identified 10 success factors to consider during a licensing application. They can be grouped under three broad categories: an experienced team that can implement a plan; the vision and roadmap for a stable and ultimately profitable and differentiated offering; and following the licensing process and engaging with the regulator.

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Image Credit: Photo by Robert Bye on Unsplash

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When it comes to notable hackathons and startup events in the Southeast Asian region, Startup Weekend would be one of the names that come out on top of mind. Major tech companies such as Carousell and Shopback have a history with the event; it has also garnered the support of organisations such as GIC, GovTech and Temasek.

In fact, the event’s latest iteration in September 2020 was graced by Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat and saw the participation of more than 450 innovators.

Its history began in 2012 when founder Durwin Ho returned from his participation in the NUS Overseas Colleges (NOC) programme in Silicon Valley. Seeing an opportunity in the market, two years later, the first Startup Weekend was launched –with the help of volunteers.

Starting off from hosting Startup Weekend events, together with Joyce Tay and Raymond Doraisamy, Ho founded StartupX in 2018, as part of the effort to “drive more impactful innovation on a global scale by bridging the gap between startups and corporations.” Through various partnerships, StartupX curates innovation programmes that range from workshops, seminars and mentorship programmes.

The company also runs HyperX, a sustainability-focused hackathon in partnership with Temasek, and HDB Cool Ideas Hack, a hackathon centred on smart and sustainable living solutions in HDB estates, in collaboration with the Housing Development Board.

“Most people see us as event organisers … we are more of an innovation programme specialists. What we do is that, essentially, we help companies innovate in a variety of different ways. Sometimes, it’s a form of a hackathon. Sometimes, it’s through pre-accelerator,” Ho explains in an interview with e27.

“Events are a very large part of it. But we don’t really see ourselves as event organisers,” he stresses.

Also Read: Photographers, food loss, and mental health: Meet the winners of Startup Weekend Jakarta 2019

But with its past experiences of hosting events, StartupX has plenty of insights and advice to offer to other companies who are exploring better ways to organise their events.

In this edition of deep-dive series, we will learn about:

• Key principles of good event organising
• Why speed and quality control is essential
• Tips for troubleshooting

Let’s start with these two things

Ho begins by stating how the team’s approach in running Startup Weekend changes as time goes by. In its early days, there were more concerns about creating a great participants experience through details such as food and swag, before the team evolved to focus on bringing quality content through speakers, judges, and mentors.

There are two principles that the team learned from this experience that Ho now considers as the essence of StartupX: Managing stakeholders’ expectation and alignment of objective, and a focus on providing a high-quality product.

“Because the worst thing you can do is bring in someone that doesn’t align with your objective, and … half of the battle will be in trying to fight them, trying to convince them of what you’re trying to do,” Ho stresses. “It’s not an easy process … You really don’t want to bring in people who are not very convinced or those who are just there for the money.”

So how exactly can one implement these principles in event organising?

According to Ho, when it comes to dealing with external parties such as clients, first and foremost they have to be clear with what they want –as this is something that goes back to the first principle of aligning objectives.

Also Read: Startup Weekend Jakarta 2019 will help young entrepreneurs and businesses succeed in Indonesia

“The second thing is that you cannot be an event organiser who is just concerned about taking checkboxes. Do I have a virtual platform? Yes. Do I have my speakers ready? Yes. But you also have to consider the kind of platform that you need, and how it suits your needs,” Ho says.

The next points are strongly related to learning from others’ experience –and put the focus on participants’ experience.

“Far too often, I see a lot of event organisers get overly concerned about meeting the expectation of stakeholders, the people who are their sponsors … [that] they forgot about the participant,” he stresses.

” … You have to ensure that the objective of the event is met. If it’s fostering connection … sharing knowledge from participants, or sharing knowledge from founders or whatever, make sure that those are the things that really come up,” he continues.

Quick, let’s do this

When asked about successful events in the past, and how StartupX managed to get it right, Ho gives two examples. The first one would be the COVID-19 edition of Startup Weekend Singapore.

“It’s supposed to be a giga edition. Giga, in our own terms, is 500 people or more; we run a mega before in 2018 with about 200 people. For this year, we initially planned for 500. But then our friend COVID-19 came, so we couldn’t do much about it and we had to scrap the entire plan,” Ho begins.

As expected, the team had to adjust and transform itself into a virtual event. Their effort seems to bear fruit as they managed to score 750 attendees from the expected 150 attendees.

Another success story is related to their pre-accelerator programme with Temasek, HyperX. COVID-19 hit hard just when the programme was about to host its demo day in April, pushing them to go digital as well.

Also Read: 6 lessons learnt from Startup Weekend Singapore final pitches

“The reason why I consider that very tremendous success in our books in StartupX is because of the speed in which we reacted and how we managed to bring together big names,” Ho says.

He stresses that the works that the team is doing are strongly affected by changes and trends in the outside world, be it micro or macro trends. This puts even extra emphasis on the importance of being aware of changes, and be swift in responding to it.

But here’s some tricks of the trade

The most exciting –if not stressful– part of event organising is the adrenaline rush that comes with the flood of activities and movements. There is also the anxious anticipation of things that can possibly go wrong.

When asked about his favourite tip for troubleshooting at events, Ho says that the team always have the role of “station master” ready at their every offline event.

A station master is an individual whose role is to manage the situation on the ground by assigning the right individuals to solve the right issue.

“He will always be free from the day-to-day routine stuff, he’s not the one handling the mic … but he will be the go-to person to handle problems,” Ho explains. “A station master doesn’t solve the problem [himself]. He is there to think about the right person to solve it, then assign the job.”

As the last word, Ho expressed his optimism for the return of offline events in Southeast Asia which has been indicated by the move of top global events such as the World Economic Forum to Singapore and RISE to Malaysia.

“Despite everything, there is still a big dichotomy between the virtual and physical. And I don’t think that’s replaceable, so you have to consider a hybrid model,” he says.

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Image Credit: StartupX

The post Move fast, save things: How StartupX adapts to changes in the events industry during the pandemic appeared first on e27.

As a leading player in the global semiconductor industry, Taiwan is known for its innovation and development. Taiwan has claimed 12th place out of 141 economies in the 2019 Global Competitiveness Report released by the World Economic Forum. In recent years, the country has seen an increase in venture capital investment, government initiatives, and sectoral reforms that encourage innovation and leading to more global entrepreneurs setting up their base in the country.

In order to build a growing and resilient startup ecosystem, creating a stable venture capital market is not only necessary but also creates a strong incentive for startup founders and investors.

Examples of this are the Startup Regulatory Adjustment Platform and the Taiwan Startup Stadium established by the National Development Council (NDC). In December 2019, Taiwan’s National Development Fund announced that it is primed to make investments of at least US$180 million in the next few quarters. Coupled with incentives from the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan is actively attracting international accelerators and venture capitals to open their offices in major innovation hubs.

Attracting international accelerators

International accelerators such as Rainmaking Innovation Taiwan has currently set up four offices in key parts of the country: Taipei, New Taipei City, Tainan and Kaohsiung. The latest Tainan office, Rainmaking Center of Excellence and Expertise (CEE), is located in the Southern Taiwan Science Park (STSP) in which IC, optoelectronics, precision machinery, biotechnology, computer and peripherals, and communications industries are the major industries.

Rainmaking Innovation is dedicated to boosting the potentialities of entrepreneurship and to foster and tailor it best with preeminent enterprises and startups worldwide. “We work with our clients to build a clear view of fast-evolving markets so that we can identify the opportunities they’re best positioned to own,” said Sonia Chuang, the Director of Rainmaking Innovation Taiwan.

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Chuang has witnessed that a good number of startups encounter constant setbacks and have experienced difficulty in breaking that cycle due to their lack of experience. The solution to the issue is to customise different approaches for anticipated encounters.

Rainmaking Innovation supports startups by offering them tremendous tools to solve problems that may emerge during the process of either scale-up or while managing one’s corporation.

Inspiring innovation across many sectors

In addition, the National Health Research Institute (NHRI), known for its excellence in medical research and databases, is accelerating healthcare innovation by working with startups and industry leaders. For instance, the genetic testing company, Taiwan Genome Industry Alliance, founded by the NHRI’s incubation centre with support from industry leaders, is cooperating with the NHRI to develop next-generation sequencing, animal cancer models and other clinical technologies.

The development of startups in Taiwan has been bursting at the seams. Based on results from the World Economic Forum, in the last two years alone, Taiwan achieved first place in the Asia Pacific region and fourth in the world. Moreover, the honour of Super Innovator also went to Taiwan.

Also read: Meet these 10 verified investors that are ready to connect with you

The Taiwan government has been pushing policies and action plans since 2018, embarking on a journey to crack down on problems with funding, human resources, market, and setting up a united system that is capable of coming up with solutions to complex problems surrounding the tech ecosystem.

The National Development Council (NDC) has already held some 10 meetings and workshops with over 100 Taiwan startup communities to build up a brand for recognition. After all the campaigns and consultations, NDC and the Taiwan startup community has come up with the brand Startup Island Taiwan.

Onward to a brighter future

Finally, in May, the Chairman of Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC), Tian-Mu Huang (黃天牧), has given the go signal to start planning the new transaction board for startups, rather than the available over-the-counter market, emerging stock market, listed stocks, or even the Go Incubation Board for Startup and Acceleration Firms (GISA board).

This brand-new idea breaks through the limits of business activities. Compared to the GISA board, established in 2013, which only allows fundraising with the exclusion of insurance that seeks to protect interested parties. Furthermore, the NDC suggested that the FSC should launch a small-medium scale firm friendly project designed specifically to facilitate capital and venture security, while encouraging more potential ventures to fundraise in the capital market.

Also read: Witness Malaysia’s newest digital solutions at the MYHackathon 2020 Finale & Showcase

With almost 1800 startups operating in under five years that are recognised by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, accelerators are helping company founders to scale up their businesses and navigate their target markets.

According to the 2019 Taiwan Startup Ecosystem survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers Taiwan (PwC Taiwan), nearly one-third of respondents are serial entrepreneurs, with almost half that are targeting the Southeast Asia and North America markets. Significantly, over 60 per cent had participated in accelerators in their early phase, and most respondents determined the challenge of funding, market expansion, and talent acquisition after working with quality consultation services.

Startups in Taiwan are rising rapidly amidst past challenges, and the country’s startup ecosystem is working tirelessly to continue attracting venture capital companies while maintaining overall global interest in recent years. Despite many challenges, Taiwan is on the road to becoming a new startup hub in Asia with more government funding and support from innovation-supporting laws.

The post Why Taiwan Matters: local and international initiatives in Taiwan startup ecosystem appeared first on e27.