Jungle Ventures leads e-bike startup Dat Bike Series A

Dat Bike, a Vietnamese e-motorbike startup, has announced a US$5.3 million Series A funding led by Jungle Ventures with participation from existing investor Wavemaker Partners.

This brings the total fundraise by Dat Bike since inception to US$10 million.

Dat Bike intends to use the new money to invest in technology, scale production, expand to metro and tier-I cities across north, central and south Vietnam, and hire top talent.

Founded in 2019 by Son Nguyen, Dat Bike aims to drive the mass adoption of green transportation in Vietnam, and, in the near future in Southeast Asia. It wants to convert the 250 million gasoline motorbikes to electric.

Also Read: Dat Bike bags US$2.6M pre-Series A to bring more electric motorbikes to Vietnam

Dat Bike claims it has a competitive advantage in its performance against gasoline bikes. Its first line product Weaver (2019) offered 3x the performance (5kW versus 1.5kW) and 2x the range (100 km versus 50 km) of most e-motorbikes at the same price point.

In November 2021, Dat Bike launched its second model Weaver 200 (2021), which is double the range (200 km) and more powerful (6kW) compared to the Weaver. Further, charging time has been reduced to 1 hour for a 100 km charge and 2.5 hours for a full 200 km charge, compared to 6-8 hours for other electric bikes.

Since the launch of Weaver 200 (November 2021), the company says it has seen strong customer response, with revenue increasing 10x. The company has also opened a new store in Hanoi in April 2022 and will open one more in Danang soon, to meet the growing demand.

Accel Partners injects US$3M Series A into Finbots.ai

Singapore-based Finbots.AI, a company bringing innovation to banks and financial institutions, has raised a Series A funding of US$3 million from Accel Partners.

With this capital, Finbots.AI will look towards accelerating product enhancement, marketing and sales, and customer support. The firm is also looking to recruit senior talent and expand its team across its offices with the fresh funds raised.

Also Read: Ethics and AI: Is the technology only as good as the human behind it?

Finbots.AI was founded in 2017 by Sanjay Uppal (CEO) and Shripad Keni (CTO). Since its inception, the firm identified an opportunity to use AI-powered solutions to aid banks and financial institutions to overcome industry challenges. ZScore is a full-scale AI-driven credit scorecard system for lending institutions that spans the entire credit lifecycle. Equipped with an intuitive user interface and robust scorecard development capabilities, ZScore rapidly develops higher accuracy credit scorecards by using advanced Machine Learning (ML) algorithms that utilise historical traditional and alternate data to automatically build, validate, and deploy real-time, high-performing risk models.

With ZScore, financial institutions have better visibility over potential borrowers’ credit capacity which consequently and indirectly, lead to higher financial inclusion. The World Bank Group considers financial inclusion a key enabler to reduce extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity. According to the latest Global Findex database, 1.7 billion adults worldwide are unbanked, meaning they do not participate in any basic financial products or services.

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Ramadan is a month of celebration and the biggest holiday season for Muslim majority countries around the world. In Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei, Singapore, Southern Thailand, and Mindanao island in the Philippines will celebrate Eid-ul-Fitr (Hari Raya in Singapore, Malaysia and Lebaran in Indonesia) after a month of fasting. 

It is expected some businesses and government offices to be closed for this major holiday, which will be on May third and fourth of 2022 and the number of holidays may extend to a week or sometimes more.

The holidays may be seen as a time for celebration, but families are not the only ones who see these occasions as the most wonderful time of the year. Cyber-threat actors or cybercriminals know exactly that due to low staffing because on vacation, have a higher workload, and get distracted more than usual, the holidays are one of the best times to attack.

As a result, the long holidays such as Hari Raya will put your organisation at a higher risk of cyberattack.

Throwback attack: Shamoon malware on The Saudi Aramco

The attack was started in mid-2012 when one of the IT team at Saudi Aramco, the state-owned Saudi Arabia oil company, opened a scam email and clicked on a bad link containing malware, later called Shamoon.

The hackers were into their system but not immediately attacked. The actual threats began during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan when most Saudi Aramco employees were on holiday. On the morning of Wednesday, August 15, 2012, some employees noticed their computers were acting weird: screens started flickering, files began to disappear, and some computers just shut down, according to CNN Business.

More than 30,000 workstations at the company were affected by the malware. Saudi Aramco’s computer technicians had no choice but to rip cables out of the backs of computer servers at data centres all over the world.

Also Read: How much does cybersecurity cost and how to budget for it?

Every office was physically unplugged from the internet to prevent the virus from spreading further. Everything, from managing supplies, shipping, and contracts with business partners to reporting was done manually with typewriters or fax machines. Not only that, Saudi Aramco bought 50,000 new hard drives to replace the infected ones.

After the attack, a group calling itself “Cutting Sword of Justice” claimed responsibility for the attack, saying they were retaliating against the Al Saud regime for its crimes against humanity. There is no ransom requested by Shamoon and it is an example of weaponised malware that is designed for use in cyber-war. 

Shamoon, known as W32.Distrack, is an aggressive, disk-wiping malware program that can wipe the master boot records and replace them with various images, such as an image of a burning U.S. flag. The Shamoon malware was also used against Qatar’s RasGas oil company.

After the 2012 attack, Shamoon resurfaced in 2016 and in 2018 in a new version that targets energy sector infrastructure in the Middle East.

Other cyberattacks cases during the holidays

Besides Shamoon, several major cyber-threat cases during the holidays in 2021, such as: 

• The largest fuel pipeline operation company, Colonial Pipeline, was forced to pay a ransom of US$4.4 million to the Darkside hacker group after a ransomware attack during the Mother’s Day Weekend on May 9, 2021. The attack successfully disrupted fuel deliveries in the South-East US for several days.  
• JBS, the world’s biggest meat processor, paid US$11 million after a cyber-attack sabotaged its operations, including abattoirs in the US, Australia, and Canada during Memorial Day weekend on May 31, 2021.
• On the July 4 holiday weekend in 2021, when millions of Americans logged out to spend time with friends and family, one of the most significant ransomware attacks of the year began. It was targeted against Kaseya’s software technology which caused national railway systems, schools, broadcasters, etc. to shut operations as file-encrypting malware hit them. 
• Over the Labour Day weekend, Howard University in Washington DC was taken offline and forced to cancel classes for a week as its network was held hostage by cyber-criminals. The cyber-criminals used phishing emails to gain access to credentials from unsuspecting university network users and used the credentials to orchestrate this holiday ransomware attack.

Cybersecurity tips during the holiday season

It is important to prevent cyber threats because security breaches risk financial pain, fines, and endanger your brand, reputation and customer trust in your organisation. Several best practices to reduce the risk and impact of cybersecurity attacks, such as:

• Make an offline backup of your data

Make and maintain offline, encrypted backups of data and regularly test your backups. It is important that backups be maintained offline as many ransomware variants attempt to find and delete or encrypt accessible backups. Review your organisation’s backup schedule to take into account the risk of possible disruption to backup processes during weekends or holidays.

Also Read: Shouldering the responsibility of digital payment security

• Do not click on suspicious links

Minimise the risk of human errors through user training programs and phishing exercises to raise awareness about the risks involved on click or opening malicious websites and attachments.

• Use strong passwords and multi-factor authentication (MFA)

Passwords should not be reused across multiple accounts or stored on the system where an adversary may have access. Require multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all services to the extent possible, particularly for remote access, virtual private networks, and accounts that access critical systems.

• Secure your network(s) by maintaining the highest standards of cyber-hygiene across the organisation

All of your networks, application and devices should meet certain cyber hygiene to protect your most valuable data and information and prevent cyber threats. Automated cyber hygiene and policy enforcement to meet your needs and your industry security compliance.

• Choose a comprehensive security solution

A comprehensive security solution that provides real-time cyber-attack warnings, actionable insights and security analytics to continuously strengthen your security posture and minimise the risks of cyber-attacks during the holidays.

This article has been published on ArmourZero blog on April 21, 2022

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In October 2021, the US and Israeli IT security company Check Point Software Technologies (CPST) identified security flaws in the world’s largest NFT marketplace OpenSea. Later, it also detected similar vulnerabilities in Rarible, an NFT marketplace with over two million active users.

According to Oded Vanunu, Head of Products Vulnerability Research, CPST, if exploited, the vulnerability would have enabled threat actors to steal users’ NFTs and crypto tokens in a single transaction.

“In terms of security, there is still a huge gap between Web2 and Web3 infrastructure. Any small vulnerability opens a backdoor for cybercriminals to hijack crypto wallets behind the scenes,” he said in an interview with e27. “Marketplaces that combine Web3 protocols still lack a sound security practice. The implications following a crypto hack can be extreme. We’ve seen millions of dollars hijacked from marketplace users that combine blockchain technologies.”

Popular metaverse game Axie Infinity, owned by Sky Mavis, also faced a similar attack last month, resulting in the loss of digital assets worth US$625 million from its Ronin Network platform.

Also Read: Sky Mavis raises US$150M led by Binance to reimburse users hit by Axie breach

“In the Axie hacking incident, we have seen the importance of a decentralisation network. In this case, Axie only had nine validators, although you only needed five of them to verify deposits and withdrawals. However, all these five validators were saved in the same place. Decentralisation could have reduced these points of weakness in the systems,” he noted.

While explaining the modus operandi behind the Axie attack, he said that the Ronin network requires five signatures, known as a multi-sig system, to verify deposits and withdrawals. The validators were held by Sky Mavis, the blockchain gaming platform that created the Ronin network. The hacker found all the five multi-sig signatures they needed to sign off on a transaction when they breached the Sky Mavis servers.

“Blockchain bridges are platforms that connect two different networks enabling a cross-chain transfer of assets and information from one blockchain to another. Attackers are targeting bridges because they are the weakest point in the system. All the complex code creates many opportunities for exploitable bugs, and as these bridges usually hold a large amount of money, this makes them even more attractive to attackers,” he further shared.

Vanunu recommends being careful and aware of sign-in requests even within the marketplace itself. Before approving a request, users should carefully review what is requested and consider whether it seems abnormal or suspicious. If there are any doubts, users are advised to reject the request and examine it further before authorising it.

In his view, crypto exchanges and blockchain/metaverse firms face the same security risks as any other company. In addition, crypto exchanges and blockchain/metaverse firms face the new kind of attack vectors related to the smart contract with all the reentrancy, flash loans and other smart contact security bugs and attacks on user wallets.

Also Read: Play-to-earn: Understanding the popularity of Axie Infinity

“The difference between a regular company and a crypto company is that a regular company is well familiar with the cyber-attacks. There is multiple security protection they can add, like Firewall. On the other hand, Crypto companies have to face new kinds of attacks and pioneer new means of protection from such attacks,” he said.

Vanunu, however, doesn’t think that such cyberattacks will discourage users from joining P2E games. “The users are there mainly for the profits, rather than the technology (that sometimes gets hacked). As long as the games are profitable to the players, they will continue to be there. Also, we can see that from every attack, the game developers improve their security, transfer the users to new contracts and try to protect their systems as much as they can.”

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Trusting Social, a credit scoring company headquartered in Singapore, has received US$65 million as part of its Series C round of financing from The Sherpa Company, a subsidiary of Vietnam-based Masan Group.

The strategic collaboration intends to develop an AI-powered consumer tech platform. It aims to provide customised retail and consumer financial products to serve 27 million families in Vietnam, as per a press statement.

In addition, the partnership will enable Masan to drive efficiencies in its core business by leveraging Trusting Social’s AI capabilities in areas such as retail store selection, demand & supply planning, and product assortment & development.

With this collaboration, Trusting Social said it is a step closer to providing one hundred million lines of credit to underserved borrowers across Asia. “Our partnership with Masan is exciting since we broaden our platform from credit access to a total consumer life solution. Masan and Trusting Social believe that Vietnam can create transformation and disruption on par with global peers,” said Trusting Social’s Founder and CEO Nguyen Nguyen.

Also Read: How voice AI is revolutionising the fintech scene

Masan Group CEO Danny Le said, “Walmart has invested heavily to develop an AI and ML platform and has leveraged it to become the leading offline and online daily, consumer life platform. The Trusting Social partnership provides Masan with a similar cutting-edge AI and ML platform but tailored for 100 million Vietnamese consumers. Our job together now is to develop it from a pure credit scoring use case to a holistic Consumer engine.”

Trusting Social is an AI techfin company aspiring to democratise financial services through AI-based consumer insights and embedded finance. It drives financial inclusion by providing credit insights covering over a billion consumers to over 170 financial institutions across Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and the Philippines.

The AI company’s other backers are Sequoia Capital, Beenext, Tanglin Ventures, 500 Global, Kima Ventures and Genesis Alternative Ventures.

Masan Group is a leader in fast-moving consumer goods, branded meat, modern retail, F&B retail, financial services, telecommunications, and value-add chemical processing.

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Zilingo CEO Ankiti Bose weighs options to ‘gain back control’
She is exploring talks with new investors to buy out a majority stake of the fashion company; This comes as the board of Zilingo is set to meet to decide the fate of the company’s leadership changes.

Sea Group offered 10% stake in Indonesian digital bank Bank Mayora
Sea helped state-owned BNI transform Bank Mayora into a digital bank by providing services to develop its tech and business model; BNI recently acquired Bank Mayora by buying 1 billion new shares.

Biofourmis turns unicorn after US$300M Series D led by General Atlantic
To date, the medtech company has raised US$445M in total, counting SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Openspace Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and EDBI as backers; Biofourmis uses AI and ML-based solutions to enable personalised predictive care.

Openspace Ventures’s OSV+ closes growth-stage fund at US$200M
LPs include IDFC and unnamed institutional investors; OSV+ targets SEA-based firms in Series B and above, writing cheque sizes of US$20-25M per company; This means it will invest in 10 companies.

VN fintech firm Trusting Social bags US$65M Series C
The investor is Masan Group’s The Sherpa Company; It seeks to drive financial inclusion by generating credit insights from over a billion consumers; It provides this info to 170+ financial institutions across Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and the Philippines.

Neuron Mobility raises US$43.5M Series B
Investors include GSR Ventures, Square Peg, and EDBI; The capital will be used to manufacture more e-scooters and fuel its global expansion plans; The firm has grown its presence from seven cities in September 2020 to 26 cities today.

Social music creation platform BandLab adds US$12M more to close Series B at US$65M
Prosus Ventures is the new investor; BandLab’s cross-platform creative ecosystem comprises Mix Editor, a royalty-free Sounds library, Mastering, and AI-powered SongStarter; In December, it raised US$53M Series B, led by Vulcan Capital.

E-motorbike startup Dat Bike raises US$5.3M
Investors are Jungle Ventures and Wavemaker Partners; Dat Bike intends to use the new money to invest in technology, scale production, expand to metro and tier-I cities across the north, central and south Vietnam, and hire top talent.

Indonesian D2C eyewear brand Saturdays bags Series A funding
Investors include Altara Ventures and DSG Consumer Partners; Saturdays sells a range of affordable eyewear using an O2O approach; It currently operates a website, a dedicated app, and fifteen brick-and-mortar stores.

TheAsianparent acquires Vietnamese childcare platform Webtretho
Webtretho offers a platform for user-generated content covering parenthood, pregnancy, childcare, beauty, healthcare, and entertainment; It also operates Be Yeu, a social networking community for parents.

Indonesia’s Juragan Material raises US$4M seed led by Go-Ventures
Juragan operates a marketplace for construction materials and accessories and offers various payment methods and delivery options, supporting tax invoice provision.

Accel backs US$3M round of credit-scoring startup Finbots.AI
Finbots’s credit scorecard system ZScore helps banks and financial institutions process loan applications more efficiently and accurately; It has offices in Singapore, India, and the UAE.

Indonesian influencer marketplace BintanGo raises US$2.1M round
Investors include Investible, eWTP Tech Innovation Fund, Farquhar, Plug and Play, Aksara, and Redbadge Pacific; BintanGo’s SaaS-like platform provides productivity and monetisation tools and financial solutions for digital content creators.

Funding Societies enters neobanking space with investment in Indonesia’s Bank Index
Funding Societies allows MSMEs to apply for up to US$1.5M in working capital financing; In Feb, Funding Societies announced a US$294M funding led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2.

3moji aims to transform the way NFTs are used in metaverse with its composable avatars
The 3moji DApp allows users, brands and influencers to change the look of their avatars in the metaverse and across Web2 apps; It recently raised US$750K seed from Collab + Currency, Big Brain Holdings, Definitive Capital, and Gmoney.

Fintech unicorn Revolut gets MAS nod for crypto trading
The Revolut app will now support the buying, selling, and holding of cryptocurrencies, pushing the company a step closer to becoming a super app for financial services.

HK chatbot startup Ominichat bags US$1.8M to enter SEA
Investors’ names aren’t disclosed; Omnichat helps online sellers to centralise their conversations with customers from WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, Line, and WeChat into a single platform.

IFS Capital leads US$1.7M seed round of Malaysian EWA firm Payd
1982 Ventures, The Hive Southeast Asia, Delight Capital and Antler also co-invested; Payd is a B2B platform that allows employees to receive up to 50% of their salaries as they earn; It currently has over 20,000 employee sign-ups.

TikTok’s e-commerce arm sets up shop in Malaysia
Business owners in the country can start signing up to sell goods using their TikTok accounts; TikTok Shop aims to support small businesses that have not yet set up physical stores due to high investment costs.

Teacher upskilling startup Akadasia US$550K funding
Investors are EduSpaze, Spiegels Future Family Fund, and former Meta director Andrew Hwang; Akadasia provides educators with professional development courses, digital tools to design lessons, and access to a network of teachers.

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Cryptocurrencies are seen by many as the future of money. These assets promote financial inclusion and provide a great way for people to send money across borders.

Over the years, digital assets have proven to be more than just a fad. Now, we’re seeing a wave of institutions even jumping into the crypto bandwagon and getting their piece of the crypto pie.

If you’re a beginner in the crypto market, it’s easy to get carried away by the multitude of assets you’re seeing almost on a daily basis. Coins themselves seem to always spring up, and knowing which to invest in can be tough.

One of the most important pieces of advice that anyone can get as a crypto investor is to look for new coins that have massive potential. With the world filled with new assets almost every day, finding one that has upside and investing while it’s in its early days will offer a lot of benefits for you as an investor.

Just imagine if you had bought Bitcoin when it was still worth less than US$100 or if you had invested in Solana or Binance coin by this time last year. With the right amount of capital, you’d be sitting on a goldmine right now.

There’s no point in examining missed opportunities. The truth remains that there will always be opportunities for you to invest in new coins and make money.

But, how do you find these new coins with massive upside? Here are a few things to note:

Functionality rules everything else

Regardless of whether it’s a new or an old coin, one thing you should always look out for when investing in crypto is functionality.

The functionality rule is simple, what does this coin have to offer that can attract investors? Once you can answer this question objectively, you’ve got your answer.

Assets like Solana and Binance coin were able to see surges because of their attraction to investors first. Solana is one of the most popular blockchains right now and a true contender for Ethereum’s title.

Binance coin powers Binance, the world’s largest and most liquid crypto exchange. If they didn’t have those working for them, their prices would be nowhere right now.

Also Read: Bitcoin and Ethereum simplified for a five-year-old

Before an asset can begin to get community approval, it is beyond important for it to start by having functionality and something that will always drive users.

Take Volt Inu for example. The asset was recently launched, and it is gaining massive traction because of its use case. Volt Inu focuses on building a multi-faceted investment strategy that can guarantee yields for investors. The asset’s developers are looking to invest in multiple areas of the market, including but not limited to staking yield farming, and mining nodes.

The point for Volt Inu is simple, by diversifying investment, the protocol can make money for everyone involved. So, for passive income investors, this asset makes the most sense.

A use case like this isn’t just solid, it’s practical. It ensures that even in a market downturn, investors will be able to return.

This is what makes an asset like Volt Inu so attractive. As an investor, remember to always examine the use case of a new coin before plunging funds into it.

Community support remains a major factor

Another thing you should keep in mind is community support. One of the reasons why meme coins are so great is that they get a lot of support from their communities and legions of adoring fans. Dogecoin managed to feed off that hype, and so did Shiba Inu.

Usually, the best way to approach new coins is to first figure out their use cases – and then work on building trust within the community.

Know what people are saying about the coin and the general sentiment surrounding it. From there, you have a relatively strong view of what it could look like when it launches.

Examine the asset’s tokenomics

No one always wants to do dirty research, but it is critical for you to do so. Tokenomics are critical for an asset’s growth prospects because they ensure that the asset will be resilient enough to weather some tough times.

When doing research, examine areas like deflation and token structure. An asset with a deflationary structure will be able to keep supply at manageable levels and maintain its price when a market downturn comes.

Demand will be able to grow, and so will the coin’s price. So, it is always recommended that you look out for the coin’s token structure.

Also Read: Why is there no crypto ETF yet in Singapore?

Examine how the coin’s developers plan to implement a burning strategy and what their roadmap for the asset is. This way, you understand their vision for the coin and can decide whether it’s a vision that you can also support.

Availability and future prospects

Finally, it’s also worth considering the coin’s availability and how easy it will be for you to find it.

These days, most assets that launch tend to do so on decentralised exchanges (DEXs) and wallet platforms. While this is great, there also needs to be a strategy for getting these assets on major exchange platforms.

At the end of the day, these centralised platforms are where the bulk of investors trade. If they can’t gain access to your desired coin from there, it will be difficult for the coin to gain the right traction.

While researching, look into the coin’s roadmap to know how its developers plan to get it on top exchanges and into the consciousness of the mainstream crypto market.

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The era of gaming as we know it is on the cusp of large-scale advancement. In one aspect, that involves Web3 games utilising the strengths of NFTs, ushering in a new dimension of having fun and creative ownership.

In 2021, Web3 gaming attracted over US$4 billion in investments from venture capitalists with over 1.4 million active wallets interacting with Web3-based games. According to DappRadar’s Blockchain Game Report 2021, NFT games accounted for 20 per cent of the total NFT trading volume last year.

One unique factor that has made Web3 gaming attractive to early adopters is the play-to-earn (P2E) gaming model. Users earn in-game items, as well as NFT assets that can translate to real-world value. While in traditional gaming, players have little to no control over their in-game content, the P2E model operates rather differently. Leveraging NFT technology, P2E gaming empowers players with more control over their gaming experience in terms of content ownership. Buying, selling and trading these NFT assets on global marketplaces is now more accessible than ever, as seen in the case of OpenSea’s 1.5 million active users.

As opposed to only playing for fun, Web3 gaming via P2E takes it one step further through game rewards that can be converted into local currency or other real-world value. Although the Web3 ecosystem allows players to earn more as they play, the high entry cost among many P2E platforms are posing major stumbling blocks.

Reducing entry barriers in play-to-earn games

P2E games have been a hit, no doubt. Major industry players have even touted it as the future of the gaming industry. However, for the next leg of mainstream growth, certain challenges must be addressed, one of which is the high upfront cost requirement for new players.

Reflecting on the current state of the P2E ecosystem, Meta Mike, Co-Founder of MetaDerby says, “Play-to-earn gaming has a lot to offer, which is why gamers are strongly inclined to have fun while they earn valuable rewards. However, most P2E games require players to purchase costly NFTs well before they can actually start earning.”

A majority of popular P2E games require users to purchase the game’s related NFTs, costing up to hundreds or even thousands of dollars. For instance, Axie Infinity, a pioneer in the P2E ecosystem, requires new players to purchase its characters known as Axies before getting started. A productive Axie can often be acquired at around US$300, a relatively hefty price tag for the average consumer.

Also Read: These are exciting times for Web3, and we want you to be part of this journey with us

Adding the initial cost component to gaming is not a fun experience. Fundamentally, if the relatively expensive cost factor is removed and players can truly get started for free, Web3 gaming can transition to become a whole lot more attractive.

Merging the best of free-to-play for Web3 gaming

The traditional gaming industry has been around for a while now and has stood the test of time over the years. One of the reasons for this has been the widespread push of free-to-play (F2P) models. Popular mobile games like Candy Crush, Fortnite, GTA V, Call of Duty mobile and countless more have successfully incorporated F2P models. Gamers simply download, get hands-on and spend hours of enjoyable gameplay. No need to risk spending a lot of money from the get-go.

This same model can be applied to Web3 gaming, especially within the fast-growing P2E industry. To attract more gamers, developers need to rethink how to combine familiar F2P elements into the evolving P2E environment.

One example integrating the F2P model for the existing play-to-earn ecosystem is MetaDerby, the first free-to-play horse racing game in the metaverse. New players are only required to complete a beginners task, in which they are then rewarded a free NFT horse to begin gameplay. In contrast with existing P2E games that require initial NFT purchases, MetaDerby takes a friendlier approach by simply eliminating the upfront cost barrier.

“Free-to-play models have consistently proven to attract and retain active gamers. Naturally, it makes sense for the P2E and F2P concepts to merge and encourage millions of new players into the burgeoning P2E ecosystem,” says Meta Mike.

More Web3-based titles such as Splinterlands and Gods Unchained are also enacting the free-to-play incentive in P2E. Better yet, the proven model can be easily infused into a variety of game genres including racing, RPGs, shooter games and the larger Metaverse realm.

Finding the right balance

Gaming is all about having fun, and earning rewards in parallel is even more enticing. Players that seek new revenue streams through P2E earnings are increasingly demanding games that eases the burden on their wallets. Having a blast, earning assets that retain real-world value, while being able to try new games with no upfront cost may perhaps be the right chemistry for the growth of Web3 gaming.

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The article was first published by The Human & Machine.

Image Credit: The Human & Machine

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Singapore-based shared e-scooter and e-bike operator Neuron Mobility has raised US$43.5 million in Series B funding, co-led by GSR Ventures and Square Peg.

Singapore’s EDBI also invested in the round, bringing Neuron Mobility’s total funding raised to date to US$77.7 million.

The fresh capital will fuel Neuron’s international expansion strategy. It will also allow the startup to continue to design and manufacture its own safety-first e-scooters and develop and roll out a range of innovative technology at scale.

Since Neuron’s last funding round 19 months ago, the company claims to have more than tripled its operations, growing from seven cities in September 2020 to 26 cities today.

Also Read: Neuron Mobility extends Series A by US$12M to accelerate e-scooter expansion globally

Neuron Mobility designs and manufactures its own e-scooters for safety and sustainable operations. It launched a battery swappable e-scooter in 2018 for greener operations. In the same year, it rolled out a full suite of geofencing to control where and how e-scooters are ridden.

In early 2020, the startup launched an app-controlled helmet lock which integrates a helmet to every e-scooter.

Neuron Mobility expanded into Canada in May 2021 and has since gained permits to operate in over 30 per cent of all available cities. It has secured permits in five Canadian cities, including Ottawa, Calgary, Red Deer, Lethbridge, and Vernon.

It operates in 18 cities across Australia and New Zealand. The company also increased its global footprint with city launches in the UK and South Korea.

Zachary Wang, Neuron Mobility’s CEO, said: “We think our vertically integrated approach, designing and building our own e-scooters and the systems that run them, gives us a unique advantage. Proprietary technologies, like our ‘e-scooter brain’ and a range of AI innovations, are a real differentiator and help us integrate into cities in the best possible way.”

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According to the World Bank, 1.7 billion adults are still unbanked today in 2022, this is close to one-fourth of the world’s population. In 2014, the figure was two billion, proving that change is happening, but more needs to be done. 

Several countries in Southeast Asia rank high on the list of unbanked populations. In the Philippines, 71 per cent of the adult population is unbanked, and 40 million adults remain unbanked in Myanmar.

Bangladesh, Mexico, Nigeria and Pakistan are high on the list too. By their sheer size, China and India have a vast unbanked population despite having relatively high account ownership. 

But behind these statistical perspectives, there are human stories that reveal everyday sacrifices and struggles faced by populations in the rural areas who would, at times, travel for two days just to reach a bank.

This was the reality that inspired Ragu Senthil Kumar and me to establish on one of our annual road trips.

A road trip that led to a startup genesis

Both Ragu and I have a unique method of ideation. While driving through the countryside of India during the journey, we outlined our strategic plans for the year to follow. 

On one of our annual road trips, this time through the countryside of India, we found ourselves depleted of cash. In search of an ATM between the southern Indian towns of Ooty and Mysore, we finally found one near the small municipality town of Gundlupet, but not until we realised that we had travelled a good 100 kilometres just to withdraw cash. 

Silence followed for the rest of the drive as we imagined what the local community must be going through on a daily basis to access a bank, especially in case of emergencies. We wanted to dive deeper. 

Through our interactions with locals, we understood that lack of documentation became a barrier to opening bank accounts. This also leads to a lack of credit scores, forcing people to take out loans from moneylenders at exorbitant interest rates, which they struggle to repay and face running into massive debt. 

For the banks, profitability and the investments needed for physical branches became huge barriers. They are also bogged down by outdated legacy systems, time-consuming processes, overcrowding in branches and staff-training costs. 

Turning divides into dividends

From then on, we realised the need to revolutionise banking access through digitisation.

Also Read: Deconstructing digital banking – How it can cater to the underserved in Malaysia

Bank-Genie was initially founded to bridge technology to banks and microfinance institutions by offering a comprehensive suite of digital banking features, aimed at banking experiences at a low cost.

This solves one main problem by helping banks break the traditional approaches in banking with technologies that will eventually lead to branchless banking.

Ultimately, our approach would ease the entire customer journey experience in banking and turn pre-digital divides into impactful digital dividends.

In 2019, we launched BanqIn, an instant all-in-one digital core banking platform that provides banks with instant access to field-based data capture, mobile money integration, SMS communication with clients and automated credit check features to change the way they serve customers.   

Not only that, we continuously innovate banking solutions to serve the unbanked who reside in remote areas, including a suite of products that enable the opening of accounts and the processing of transactions through seamless processes. 

When purpose meets passion, success is inevitable

While our startup journey officially began in Africa, we have managed to further our footprint to help even more unbanked populations in the Philippines, Myanmar, Central Asia and India.

And seven years since its inception, we are glad to have partnered with over 30 banks, including banks in the Philippines (BDO, EastWest, Unionbank), Nepal (NMB Bank), Ghana (Calbank, CBG), Sierra Leone (SLCB), and many others, in their transformational journey towards digitisation.

But no transformational journey, especially at this scale, is without challenges. From the onset, we have met with resistance to change that still persists within financial institutions, and this will, unfortunately, continue to be a hurdle.  

Nevertheless, our goal remains intact, with a vision set to change the lives of the unprivileged with access to banking.

Witnessing first-hand how technology and innovation can augment the roles in people’s lives, generating additional income, channelling their savings, turning it into investments and building assets, fostering education, allowing for insurance and help amidst uncertainties.

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Taiwan’s technology industry is a leader in the telecom space as a major manufacturing hub for 5G chipsets, supplying global industry leaders such as Qualcomm, Samsung, and Apple. Added to that, 5G adoption in Taiwan represents over 30 per cent of the market and is gaining stronger momentum. 

With the 5G market maturing fast, there is a need to bridge the gaps and meet the rising industrial demand for innovative solutions. 

2022 is a crucial year for 5G as widespread availability begins to eradicate barriers to access, bandwidth, performance, and latency on connectivity. However, to deliver on its potential to enable revolutionary new applications and business models, the 5G journey will require intelligent solutions at every step. 

With Taiwan actively seeking cooperation with foreign companies through projects like the Asia Pacific Telecom (APT) 5G Challenge Accelerator Programme, there are lots of opportunities for startups to collaborate with Taiwanese telecom hardware suppliers as the 5G solutions market develops.

The Asia Pacific Telecom 5G Accelerator 2022

The Asia Pacific Telecom 5G Accelerator programme (APT 5G) returns this year to expand international recruitment and bring entrepreneurs closer to industry needs. 

The goals of the accelerator are simple: connecting foreign Telecoms to domestic startups and introducing outstanding foreign startups to Taiwan. The programme is expected to attract a strong roster of global startups that can help catalyse the future of 5G in the Asia Pacific region.

Also read: Three leading B2B digital disruptors win 2021 Fast Forward with HPE

Asia Pacific Telecom (APT) is a wireless telecom leader and the first telco to bring 5G services to Taiwan. Organised in partnership with the Philippines’ largest telco, PLDT, and Singapore based venture capital firms, Qualgro and KKFund, the APT 5G Accelerator 2022 aims to promote innovation and international exchange of ideas as well as inject creative talent into the industry. 

The programme will make venture investments and match businesses with the goal of applying new ideas by incubating startup ventures that tap new 5G business opportunities.

A launchpad for startups creating solutions for the 5G era

APT believes that the era of telecom network competition has passed with the advent of 5G technology. The 5G era will be an era of application services competition, which will require cross-industry alliances and collaboration to introduce new services and capabilities across industries. 

In order to facilitate the future development of Taiwan’s 5G infrastructure and associated applications, the APT 5G Accelerator is focused on strengthening startup acceleration and creating successful partnerships with enterprises. 

By introducing venture capital funds and resources to outstanding entrepreneurial teams the accelerator is an ideal launchpad for deeptech startups creating 5G solutions using technologies such as VR, IoT, AI, Cloud and Big data. It also opens up opportunities for the startups to demonstrate their 5G solutions and undertake proof-of-concept testing and verification using infrastructures provided by APT and its foreign telecom partners.

Selected startups will receive guidance in establishing international partnerships and market expansion initiatives. With 5G+AIoT as the central theme, the programme is looking for teams innovating in sectors including but not limited to entertainment, medical care, and transportation. 

Also read: In the age of e-commerce, complete and accurate data analytics is key

Further criteria for participating startups are to incorporate an entity in Taiwan within 2 months upon selection into the programme. Startups are required to meet the criteria as a Taiwan SME and register as a corporate. Startups are recommended to set up base in the new Linkou Venture Park and take advantage of the entrepreneurial environment.

With application registration closing last 25 April, applicants are subjected to the following selection criteria:

• Innovation and market feasibility of 5G products and services [40%]
• Startup company strategy and marketing strategy [20%]
• Professional and executive ability of startups [30%]
• New venture company economics, financial planning, and risk management [10%]

What can participating startups expect?

Selected startups get the chance to showcase their product and pitch their solutions to a panel of judges that include the region’s top telco companies and investor – with the aim of having a minimum of 3 startups winning investment deals from participating partners.

Apart from that, winning startups stand to win as much as NT$250,000 as well as a slew of other benefits that include Taiwan expansion assistance, showcase opportunities at domestic and foreign exhibitions, and access to a 5G lab to further develop their solutions. A special telecommunications award is given to the highest scoring startup selected by foreign telecommunications companies.

APT 5G Accelerator: bringing innovations to the market

In the previous edition of the 5G accelerator, 15 startups were selected from about 300 applicants. Seven local teams and eight overseas startups from countries like Singapore and Indonesia made up the participants.

Minimo Tech, a Smart IoT-powered retail platform that offers brands and companies a merged online and offline solution, won the Special Award from APT.

Participating startups in previous years have brought to market highly innovative products that include: 

Hyper Immersion Technology that provides VR 360 panoramic video production technology with a proprietary VR360 real-time stitching software.

Cheng Jie Technology which has invented the “Witspal Smart Pen” and “Witspal Smart Case” — devices that link up via IoT in helping address nearsightedness among children, by combining computer vision with speech.

InnovArt Design — Its product, CarWink is an interactive internet-on-vehicle (IoV) consumer electronic gadget designed to reduce road rage, improve communication between vehicles, reduce cable mess, and personalise vehicle styles.

Also read: B2B tips: Doing business with large enterprises

OSENSE whose world-leading indoor positioning technology leverages image processing, computer vision, artificial intelligence, and augmented reality to provide indoor positioning and navigation with no GPS signals.

GranDen, which developed the VR music game “I’m ready to Fly”, and AR and location-based services social mobile game, AliGala.

Lichen Ads, a company offering mobile out-of-home digital advertising services leveraging the gig economy.

Ficus Data — an AIoT powered handwashing analysis that aims to help hospitals, clinics, schools, and other medical institutions maintain consistent hygiene standards and decrease the risk of infection.

Fonebud IoT, a mobile sharing assistant that integrates with WiFi hotspots, language translators, power banks, and up-to-date travel information to address usual travellers’ challenges.

Fleetroot which is a platform that enables businesses to rapidly deploy last-mile logistics, mobility, and fleet management solutions at scale.

For more information on programme details, registration criteria, and requirements, visit the APT 5G Challenge website.

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Photo by Timo Volz

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This article is produced by the e27 team, sponsored by Asia IOA

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