The term sheet, sometimes referred to as the letter of intent or memorandum of understanding, is a preliminary document containing a summary of key terms agreed between parties to be used as a basis for preparing definitive agreements.

In the context of equity financing, the unassuming yet impactful term sheet can either make or break negotiations in a funding round.

In this article, we shed some light on the term sheet for Singapore startups looking to secure equity financing from external investors.

The big picture

Here is how the term sheet fits into the big picture and why it matters.

While the term sheet is usually drawn up at the start of talks with investors and is intended to be only preliminary to kickstart the funding process, it records the parties’ starting positions on key terms, which sets the tone for negotiations on the definitive agreements.

This is the case even if the term sheet is not legally binding as it is meant to signify the parties’ good faith in seeing the transaction through, much like a gentlemen’s agreement. In the course of the funding process, the term sheet will often be cited as a reference point, and a sharp deviation from its terms may risk rocking the boat.

Also Read: While traditional funding penalises a biz at its worst time, Jenfi gives them more leeway

As such, the term sheet should not be taken lightly, especially if it is legally binding, as it may end up being the only contract that parties can rely on if they fail to reach a consensus on the definitive agreements.

The use of the term sheet does not usually come into the picture until the company is ready to raise significant funds from external investors, where each funding round is typically demarked as series A, B, C and so forth.

This is because venture capitalists and other sophisticated investors coming in at such rounds with higher stakes often demand a greater level of assurance upfront through the term sheet compared to earlier investors at pre-series funding rounds.

It is common for the lead investor in a series funding round to dictate the form of the term sheet based on the lead investor’s preferred template or the previous term sheet used by the company in its last funding round (which goes to show the lasting effect of a term sheet in setting precedent for future funding rounds).

The life of the term sheet is intended to be a short one, surviving until such time the definitive agreements are executed to supersede and replace the term sheet. The main definitive agreements based on the term sheet for a series funding round will usually be the share subscription agreement and the shareholders’ agreement, from which other transaction documents may follow.

Binding or non-binding?

The term sheet can be legally binding or non-binding on the parties, the company and the incoming investors. While a legally binding term sheet may seem attractive to the company to secure the investors’ financial commitment as early as possible, the company should be wary of agreeing too soon to terms that it has yet to discuss with its key shareholders, especially if such terms adversely affect their rights.

The company ultimately needs to perform a balancing act to negotiate the terms with the investors whilst ensuring that such shareholders will be on board with such terms. If a longer runway is required for this, a non-binding term sheet may be more appropriate to give the company the flexibility it needs to adjust the terms down the line.

It should be noted that a non-binding term sheet can still contain certain binding terms, such as confidentiality provisions to keep the details of the proposed investment confidential (including any information disclosed for the purposes of the investors’ due diligence on the company) and exclusivity provisions often requested by investors to restrict the company from concurrently entertaining third-party offers for a limited period of time.

The key terms

The key terms in the term sheet typically revolve around three areas:

Also Read: With a looming recession, is office space really a wise investment?

• the deal economics (e.g. the investment amount, the class and number of shares to be issued and the ownership percentage they represent, and the valuation of the company used to calculate the share price);
• the rights attached to the class of shares to be issued (e.g. any dividend preference, liquidation preference, conversion right, redemption right, or anti-dilution protection); and
• specific investor rights and requirements (e.g. any board seat, inclusion in the quorum for meetings, reserved matters, information rights, pre-emption rights, right of first refusal, right of the first offer, tag-along right, drag-along right, founder liability, or founder restrictions).

Below are general tips on how start-ups and their founders can navigate some of the more contentious key terms. The information in this article is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice which should be sought on a case-by-case basis.

Valuation

Ensure parties are negotiating with the same valuation metrics in mind (whether pre-money, post-money, or on a fully diluted basis) and look out for provisions which allow investors to adjust the share price in their favour or otherwise be compensated for any changes to the pre-agreed valuation of the company.

Dividend preference

Investors may ask for an annual dividend rate, a percentage of the share price, on a cumulative / non-cumulative basis and a compounding / non-compounding basis in priority to any earlier class of shares.

Also Read: Term sheet negotiation: 3 ways you can win investors

Consider negotiating for a non-cumulative basis (whereby dividends are declared and paid for any profitable year and do not accrue for non-profitable years) and a non-compounding basis (whereby the dividend rate will only apply to the share price and not together with any accrued dividends) in favour of the company.

Liquidation preference

The liquidation preference determines how the investors will cash out of the company upon the occurrence of a liquidity event, which the investors may try to define as broadly as possible to include not only the winding up of the company but also a trade sale or even a change in control of the company.

The liquidation preference is usually set to a multiplier (e.g. 1x or 2x) of each investor’s initial investment amount in priority to any earlier class of shares and can be participating (giving the investor upside benefits via a double dip to receive the multiplier amount and participate in remaining proceeds of the liquidity event in proportion to its ownership percentage on an as-converted basis) or non-participating (giving the investor downside protection via a single dip to receive either the multiplier amount or convert its preference shares to ordinary shares to receive its pro-rata share in the total proceeds of the liquidity event).

As the liquidation preference can set a precedent for future series funding rounds and eventually affect the exit strategy of the founders, who are usually at the bottom of the liquidation waterfall, consider keeping the liquidation preference minimal at a 1x multiplier on a non-participating basis.

Anti-dilution protection

Where the company issues preference shares to investors with a right to convert such preference shares to ordinary shares (whether at the investors’ option or upon the occurrence of certain events such as an initial public offering of the company), the investors may ask for anti-dilution protection so as to be compensated in a down-round where the company subsequently issues new shares at a price lower than the conversion price offered to the investors.

This is achieved by adjusting such conversion price downward based on any of the following formulae (ranked from least to most company-friendly):

• full ratchet (where such conversion price is adjusted to the lower price in the down-round);
• narrow-based weighted average (where such conversion price is adjusted by considering only outstanding ordinary shares in issue and/or issuable upon conversion of the investors’ preference shares); or
• broad-based weighted average (where such conversion price is adjusted by considering all outstanding ordinary shares calculated on a fully diluted basis).

The broad-based weighted average formula is most commonly used by companies as it results in fewer ordinary shares being issued to the investors upon conversion of their preference shares and consequently less dilution of ownership percentage of the founders and other shareholders with no anti-dilution protection.

Consider introducing exceptions to the anti-dilution protection, such as share issuances pursuant to the company’s employee share option scheme or the exercise of any options, warrants or convertible securities.

Reserved matters

Investors receiving only a minority stake in the company will often request reserved matters to allow them to veto and hence control certain matters relating to the company (whether at the board or shareholder level) despite having no general voting power over such matters as a minority shareholder.

Ensure the reserved matters are not likely to impede the founders’ ability to operate the company’s business. In particular, consider setting less rigid reserved matter consent thresholds by tying them to shareholding percentages rather than particular investors and qualifying any reserved matters to exclude low-risk recurring activities of the company.

If the founders lose board or shareholding control over time (which is inevitable the more investors the company onboards), reserved matters can similarly be used by the founders to retain some control over the company by adjusting the reserved matter consent thresholds in their favour.

Drag-along right

A drag-along right benefit specifies majority shareholders looking to sell their shares to a third-party buyer by compelling the remaining shareholders to participate in such a sale on the same terms, thus increasing the marketability of the company’s business for a trade sale.

Consider aligning the triggering conditions for the drag-along right with the founders’ exit strategy to allow the founders to cash out on such conditions, e.g. by prescribing a minimum sale price or determining whether the drag-along sale should cover all and not only some shares or extending to an asset sale.

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At e27, we have kickstarted a new articles series called work-life balance to learn more about tech enablers and executives and their lives beyond working hours.

As the Marketing and Content Manager, Sheryl Chen leads marketing, content strategy, partnerships, and community programmes at at Qualgro. Previously, she was a Programme Manager at Google Cloud for Startups, covering events, programmes and partnerships across JAPAC.

Chen holds a Bachelor’s in Sociology and a Minor in Entrepreneurship from Nanyang Technological University.

She is a regular contributor of articles for e27 (you can read her thought leadership articles here). 

In this candid interview, Chen talks about her personal and professional life.

How would you explain what you do to a 5-year-old?

This is tough! I still struggle to tell my relatives what I do during Lunar New Year gatherings, but I recently had a crash course on Baby Shark, so let me try.

Baby Shark wants to create a company that solves some of the world’s most significant problems, from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean. His solution knows no bounds. Baby Shark needs seashells to start his company to expand from his Sea Hometown to the Global Oceans.

Baby Shark seeks help from a V.Sea, a school of fish, which gives him seashells, dishes out advice, and helps him meet other sea creatures to help him in his quest.

The V.Sea, a school of fish, has many different roles, all of which are important. Some of them give out seashells, some advise the other sea creatures on where to look for the best food, and some make sure that the school of fishes are in the best shape to perform their roles.

My role at the V.Sea is to help Baby Shark look good when he is ready to put his best fin forward, so the world will know of the fantastic work that he has done! Baby Shark also has friends who have big dreams to change the world, and I hope to help them.

PS: Pinkfong, please hit me up if you want to do a series on popular but unconventional careers (e.g., data scientists, project managers) so we can tell the wee ones that there is more to life than being a doctor or lawyer.

What has been the biggest highlight/challenge of your career so far?

My biggest challenge was to pick myself up after being displaced thrice.

My heart is in pain with the current spate of layoffs. I am not a stranger to them. I’ve experienced my restructuring and was made redundant three consecutive times. This is something that I wish nobody had ever experienced, and each time I see news of mass layoffs, my heart breaks for the affected individuals.

I hold no grudge against the organisations I worked for and still keep them in high regard. They were all business decisions, and I tried my best in each role.

I spent a lot of time grieving each role and the future I thought I had, and each time felt like a kick in the gut. I didn’t know who I was outside of work and struggled to find meaning and value in life. I had days where I was unable to pull myself out of bed. I regret not reaching out to industry friends to ask for help or introductions earlier.

Also Read: Blockchain promises to be as foundational and indispensable as the internet: Amit Ghosh of R3

I started going to therapy, and we worked on building a sense of self outside of work and reframing my self-talk to be kinder to myself. Most importantly, how I shouldn’t let these setbacks define my career.

It took me a few years to be ready to share what happened to me, and only when I started sharing my vulnerabilities did I learn that it was more common than I thought and LinkedIn feeds (primarily) only show the glitzy side of peoples’ lives.

To anyone who is struggling and needs a listening ear, I’m here if you want to talk. Take all the time you need to grieve and heal. When you’re ready, pick yourself up, knowing that you have people around to support you. Know that what happened to you didn’t come from lack but was a factor of market conditions and business decisions.

How do you envision the next five years of your career?

I still see myself connecting people to people, people to ideas, and people to resources. It’s what sparks joy in me.

What are some of your favourite work tools?

Notion, EverNote, Trello, and Notability for iPad for time boxing (or old-school pen and paper work too).

What’s something about you or your job that would surprise us?

I unintentionally went viral twice.

The first time was because I stood up to a racist commuter on the bus. The second time was on TikTok when I filmed two cats at the right place at the right time.

Do you prefer WFH, WFO, or hybrid?

Hybrid. I still appreciate WFO because of the productivity, sharing, and cross-pollination of ideas. However, WFH is still better for me when I need to be creative and ideate.

What would you tell her if you could reach out to your younger self?

Your identity shouldn’t just be limited to what you do at work.

A friend once sent me this HBR article: What Happens When Your Career Becomes Your Whole Identity.

The article asks the reader five questions:

• How much do you think about your job outside of the office? Is your mind frequently consumed with work-related thoughts? Is it challenging to participate in conversations with others that are not about your work?
• How do you describe yourself? How much is this description tied to your job, title, or company? Are there any other ways you would describe yourself? How quickly do you tell people you’ve just met about your job?
• Where do you spend most of your time? Has anyone ever complained that you are in the office too much?
• Do you have hobbies outside work that do not directly involve your work-related skills and abilities? Are you able to consistently spend your time exercising other parts of your brain?
• How would you feel if you could no longer continue in your profession? How distressing would this be to you?

If we take a step back, we should also see that having a job is one of the many roles you play in your life. You can be a manager at work, but you are a daughter, wife, girlfriend, or mother.

I want to challenge you not to limit your identity to your roles. Sure, these are essential aspects, but what’s more important is the traits that make you who you are.

Also Read: Try to look at the world through a beginner’s eyes: Joey Alarilla of Playfix.io

So instead of How is Sheryl like? She’s a super hard worker, and she tries her best in everything she does. She’s executed xx conferences, worked with xx speakers, and put together xx minutes of stage content which achieved xx NPS score and xx audience turnout.

I would reframe it to Sheryl is exceptionally empathic, and I know she will always have my back. She’s also super compassionate, and she even gave herself a crash course on caring for neonatal kittens so that she could foster a two-day-old kitten. She’s also a great cook, and her memes are impeccable.

Can you describe yourself in three words?

Empathic, compassionate, resilient.

What are you most likely to be doing if not working?

Find me where the animals are!

After my third layoff, I started volunteering at a local no-kill shelter. They are home to over 100 dogs, 300 cats, and a couple of terrapins.

I upkeep my animal TikTok account, taking advantage of the following I gained from my one-hit wonder to educate the public to adopt and not shop. But content creators know how tiring churning out content is hence the word ‘try.’

What are you currently reading/listening to/ watching?

Unfortunately, I have a very short attention span for non-fiction books, so I toggle between a few books.

During a recent event we hosted, my portfolio company founders recommended a few books they keep returning to. I immediately carted the books out. 

They are: 

• High Output Management by Andrew S. Grove
• The Great CEO Within by Matt Mochary

I’m reading ‘You’re About to Make a Terrible Mistake’ by Olivier Sibony, a Senior Advisor at Qualgro. He talks about why organisations make terrible mistakes due to cognitive biases and how to create processes and environments to make better decisions.

I read fiction books like candy, and my all-time favourite author is Jeanette Winterson because she makes me feel all my emotions.

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Join the e27 contributor community of thought leaders and share your opinion by submitting an article, video, podcast, or infographic.

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Singapore-headquartered insurtech startup Igloo announced an additional US$27 million to close its Series B round at US$46 million.

The InsuResilience Investment Fund II, initiated by German development bank KfW and managed by impact investor BlueOrchard Finance led the capital extension, along with WAM, Finnfund, La Maison, and Series B lead investor Cathay Innovation.

The Series B raise was started with US$19 million in funding in March this year.

The additional funds will provide Igloo with a comfortable multi-year runway. With 50 per cent of Igloo’s team committed to R&D, the company plans to double down on attracting the best engineering, product, design and data talent across all geographies.

Igloo is also in the process of identifying and closing on various M&A opportunities.

Also Read: ‘Microinsurance will play a pivotal role in accelerating financial inclusion in SEA’: Raunak Mehta of Igloo

Incorporated in 2016 by Wei Zhu (ex-CTO of Grab), Igloo leverages big data, real-time risk assessment, and end-to-end automated claims management to create B2B2C insurance solutions for platforms and insurance companies.

It primarily targets the gig economy segment by providing “comprehensive and competitively-priced” insurance for delivery riders, through its Foodpanda partnerships in Thailand, Singapore, and the Philippines, as well as Lozi and Ahamove in Vietnam.

Recently, Igloo launched a Weather Index Insurance product in Vietnam – one of the top five rice-exporting countries. The product utilises blockchain-based smart contracts to automate claims payouts calculated using pre-assigned values for losses due to weather events or natural calamities.

In 2020, Igloo raised an undisclosed Series A-plus funding round, led by InVent. It also counts ACA and Openspace Ventures among its investors.

“Women are a major contributor to the economic activity in SE Asia and Igloo’s technology-led impactful model plays a critical role in securing their financial resilience by making insurance accessible to the most vulnerable and underserved segments,” said Rajat Arora, Head of Asia at WWB Asset Management.

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Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings has written off its entire investment in cryptocurrency exchange FTX irrespective of the outcome of the US-based company’s bankruptcy protection filing.

Temasek invested US$275 million in FTX International and FTX US across two funding rounds from October 2021 to January 2022. This comprises US$210 million for 1 per cent in FTX International and US$65 million for 1.5 per cent in FTX US. 

In an updated statement issued on November 26, the VC firm said the write-down would not impact its overall performance as it is just 0.09 per cent of its net portfolio value of SG$403 (US$293) billion as of March 31 2022.

“Similar to all investments, we conducted an extensive due diligence process on FTX, which took approximately 8 months from February to October 2021. During this time, we reviewed FTX’s audited financial statement, which showed it to be profitable,” it said. 

Also Read: Our main competition in SG is the idle cash lying in banks: Kristal.AI CEO Asheesh Chanda

The due diligence efforts focused on the associated regulatory risk with crypto financial market service providers, particularly licensing and regulatory compliance — i.e. financial regulations, licensing, anti-money laundering/know your customer, sanctions, and cybersecurity.

“Reports have since surfaced that customer assets were mishandled and misused in FTX. If these statements are true, then this amounts to serious misconduct or fraud at FTX. All of this is currently being investigated by the regulators,” Temsek said.

Temasek also clarified that its investment in FTX was not an investment in cryptocurrencies and currently has no direct exposure to cryptocurrencies.

“The thesis for our investment in FTX was to invest in a leading digital asset exchange providing us with protocol agnostic and market neutral exposure to crypto markets with a fee income model and no trading or balance sheet risk,” it said.

Temasek’s announcement comes a few days after Sequoia Capital decided to write down the full value of its US$214 million bet on FTX. SoftBank, another high-profile FTX backer, said it anticipates an investment loss of around US$100 million. FTX’s other investors include BlackRock, Tiger Global, Insight Partners and Paradigm.

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Work-life has drastically changed since the pandemic began, and while the hybrid workforce has become the ‘new normal’, there is increasing conversation globally on how organisations can potentially adopt a four-day work week.

In fact, some countries such as Australia and the UK have already implemented trials of this new working style. Although Australia had only started running the trials recently, a spokesperson has already mentioned that the study looks “very encouraging”, and additionally, the UK trials saw no loss in productivity.

However, it was noted by the chief executive at 4 Day Week Global, a non-profit organisation in New Zealand, that there were some “understandable hurdles” for businesses whose cultures “date back well into the last century” during their trial.

Also Read: How to tackle cybersecurity threats during the holidays

Closer to home, a survey conducted by Indeed found that 88 per cent of Singaporean employees advocated for a four-day workweek with the same pay.

In spite of the findings, Singapore would need a nationwide shift in mindset from its dominant work culture; the country has been ranked the most overworked country in APAC by The Instant Group.

As interest in flexible working grows, there is still a large swathe of people within organisations who hold roles that cannot be “switched off”.  In particular, we are talking about cybersecurity professionals responsible for managing the explosion of endpoints as remote workforces expand and the frequency of cyberattacks increases.

Staying safe has no holiday

Between July and September alone, BlackBerry’s Threat researchers reported that they had prevented 1,129 cyber-attacks within its customer base in Singapore. These days, there are rarely any days off and uninterrupted holidays for cybersecurity professionals.

In fact, the REvil ransomware gang took advantage of the US’s largest holiday, the fourth of July, as a distraction while they commenced their attacks.

Additionally, the pandemic has put underlying pressure on cyber skills and resources. When organisations expanded their roster of connected services and devices to adapt to the challenges posed by remote working, more security vulnerabilities arose for attackers to gain entry and cripple businesses.

That said, it is not impossible for cybersecurity professionals to adopt a four-day workweek. Modern cybersecurity tools such as artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) make it possible to keep up with modern threats, such as malware and ransomware.

For example, a leading express delivery service provider in Malaysia and other markets in Southeast Asia wanted to put intelligent cybersecurity at the forefront of its digital transformation. Hence, they adopted BlackBerry’s automated AI/ML cybersecurity software to prevent malware infections and potential data breaches.

Benefits of AI and ML

The use of AI and ML solutions offers several benefits to organisations. Firstly, AI-driven security reduces human error and can ensure security policies are promptly updated to prevent hackers from worming their way into workers’ devices and networks to steal their identities and passwords.

Also Read: Best cybersecurity practices for startups to stay ahead of the curve

These ‘smart’ tools are also proactive, helping workers locate and solve problems that may appear as network systems are updated, modified, or replaced.

Secondly, AL and ML help to reduce threat alert fatigue and stress on cybersecurity professionals. Eliminating manual processing of security alerts is not only practical, given the volume and velocity of daily threats, but gives cybersecurity teams the bandwidth to determine what more urgently needs their attention.

Smarter security, powered by AI, allows IT teams to manage these threats in a practical and manageable way with automated labelling, even as the machine learning algorithm solves some threats on its own.

Lastly, AI and ML-based cybersecurity solutions can significantly reduce threat response time, which is one of the most pivotal metrics for measuring a cybersecurity team’s efficiency. While human responses may lag, AI/ML-assisted security never does, as these solutions can pull data from an attack to be immediately regrouped and prepared for analysis.

Taking it one step further, automated security also provides reports with recommendations and insights to prevent future attacks.

Final thoughts

Although a hybrid workplace has existed in some form for several years, it is now clearly here to stay. Whether cybersecurity professionals adopt a four-day workweek, they would have to continue evolving their solutions to fit this new configuration of work.

Ultimately, organisations need to consider implementing AI/ML in their cybersecurity models to aid their employees in the fight against the barrage of cyber threats they must deal with on a daily basis. Not only will this reduce burnout among cybersecurity professionals, but it also keeps the organisation safe from cyber threats 24×7.

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Editor’s note: e27 aims to foster thought leadership by publishing views from the community. Share your opinion by submitting an article, video, podcast, or infographic

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Food sustainability has long been a hot-button topic for Singapore, and there has been a greater push for Singapore to inch toward self-sustainability.

As a Farm Manager in Archisen, a local urban agritech farm, we’ve seen the changes in Singapore’s agriculture landscape firsthand. We’ve had to experiment with many new ideas and concepts, build teams, optimise yield productivity, and implement new innovations – all to keep up with the increasing importance of food security in Singapore.

The current agricultural landscape

Agriculture has been a crucible of evolutionary change over the years. Despite being ranked the most food-secure country in the world, The Singapore Food Agency reports that the country imports over 90 per cent of its domestic food consumption.

Also Read: Can agritech solve the world’s growing food security problem?

As a result, this leaves the bulk of our food supply dependent on unpredictable factors such as climate change, political unrest or economic shifts.

In the current agriculture landscape in Singapore, I feel that urban farms have their own set of unique challenges, and we do have a fair share of implications from these price hikes, such as rising costs of raw materials and energy.

The confluence of technology, engineering, design, and farming has set the stage for a transformation in urban farming. Amidst growing realisation that food security is an existential issue to contend with, SFA unveiled their ‘30 by 30 vision’ in early 2020, which aims to locally produce 30 per cent of the country’s nutritional needs by 2030.

Leading the Farm Operations at Archisen, it is my responsibility to ensure that Archisen is actively developing new technologies and solutions to optimise how Urban Farms are operating and to change people’s perceptions towards them.

The Singapore government has enhanced the Agriculture Productivity Fund and pushed out the 30×30 Express Grant to support producers looking to use technology to grow more with less. These recently introduced policies reflect the government’s interest in moving Singapore towards becoming a more self-reliant and food-secure society.

With support from the government, Archisen is playing its part in spearheading the Singapore Green Plan 2030 along with all other local farms.

Despite the government’s efforts to move towards self-sustenance, the lack of popular demand for local products presents a pressing issue today. Without sufficient consumers ‘buying local’, there could be a surplus in production and, subsequently, more food wastage.

Consumers do not tend to actively source locally produced food, especially if it is not certified as ‘locally grown’ or ‘organic’ and placed at eye level on supermarket shelves. Local producers not knowing the right kinds of vegetables consumed by the bulk of the people might also be a contributing factor to the issue of low demand.

Apart from that, one major problem we face in this industry is the lack of manpower. This industry requires a passion for farming which often demands a lot of hard work, and this sometimes demotivates potential applicants.

Also Read: From working on a family farm to driving growth for the world’s fastest growing foodtech company

On the whole, it is technically difficult to grow popular local varieties at competitive rates, and many farms may choose to specialise in less popular leafy greens. Hence, it is crucial that we balance local vegetable supply with an array of different options which can help to reduce waste.

What the future of Singapore’s agricultural landscape looks like

There are still areas that we do not know well enough in the field. In many situations, ready solutions are unavailable, and we must attempt to innovate to solve our problems. However, this also provides many opportunities for development and collaboration.

In 2021, a US$60 million Agricultural Food Transformation Fund was announced, aimed at increasing production efficiency, boosting yield, enhancing productivity and sustainability, and improving circularity of resource use while reducing the reliance on manpower. Such initiatives could help propel the industry towards integrated growth systems, automation and robotics to solve some of their growing problems.

I can envision the continuous development of CEA to efficiently produce more crops that are difficult to flourish in harsh external environments and provide more varieties and cheaper prices for consumers in Singapore.

Apart from greater varieties, There would also be 10 to 15 times more vegetables and fish produced, growing up to half a million kilograms of fresh vegetables each year, mitigating the problem of food insecurity.

To date, there are 238 local urban farms selling produce in supermarkets around Singapore. And this number will grow in the years to come. With a growing supply, an exponential increase in demand for local produce should be expected.

Fortunately, with Singaporeans becoming more environmentally conscious, this shift in mindset will hopefully spur Singaporeans to put sustainability needs over their money-mindedness and support local agriculture.

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Editor’s note: e27 aims to foster thought leadership by publishing views from the community. Share your opinion by submitting an article, video, podcast, or infographic

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Ruangguru lays off hundreds of employees
The company cites the drastically worsening global market situation for the job cuts; Ruangguru has raised a total of US$205M in funding to date; In July, it acquired education startups Schoters and Kalananti.

Startups in HK and Singapore sidestep local bourses for US SPACs
Info from financial data provider Refinitiv shows that at least nine SG and HK firm this year have announced plans to go public with SPACs listed in the US, despite the cities offering many shell companies since Q1.

GoTo’s Q3 losses drop a tad, revenues triple on cost-cutting efforts
The losses in the quarter came in lower at US$432M compared with US$483M in Q3 2021; The firm reported US$286M in net revenue in the July-Sept quarter, a significant rise from US$91.5M last year.

Binance was soliciting SG users without license, MAS says
In a letter, the MAS said that while both crypto exchanges were not licensed to operate in Singapore, only Binance had been soliciting users in the city-state; Binance also supported listings in SGD and payment methods specific to the city-state.

PropertyGuru’s Q3 revenue soars 47%, net loss narrows
Net revenue rose to US$25M for the quarter on the back of strong marketplace revenues, especially in Singapore and Malaysia; The net loss dropped to US$5.4M in the quarter from US$7M in the same period last year.

Recession Run: Australia’s Mandalay Venture to invest 20% of new fund in SEA
Partner Philippe Ceulen says the VC firm is raising a US$25M fund, meant for startups in the agritech and food technology space; The check sizes are likely to be between US$100K and US$804K.

Lightspeed eyes investments in climate tech startups in SEA, India
Electric mobility is one of the biggest areas to invest in; SaaS-based carbon accounting and offsetting solutions is the other areas of interest; Both SEA and India are poised for innovation in the EV and other climate tech space.

Better Bite rolls out new fund for idea-stage alt-protein firms
‘First Bite’ will select “several new alt protein founders in APAC” and invest US$50K into each; Founders working on new ideas in plant-based, fermentation, molecular farming, and cultivated meat spaces qualify for funding.

Indonesia’s Hangry posts 2.5x revenue jump in 2022
According to the culinary startup’s filing with ACRA, it generated US$12.2M in revenue in 2021; With that figure, its total revenue for the first 10 months of 2022 would be around US$30M.

Ayurveda tech startup NirogStreet raises US$12M to strengthen supply chain
The investors include Jungle Ventures, Spiral Ventures, and ICMG Co-Creation Fund; NirogStreet offers integrated doctor-led prescription e-commerce enablement, P2P learning for Ayurvedic doctors, and health record management.

Singapore’s wealth-tech firm Kristal.AI banks US$10M
The investors include Chiratae Ventures, Stride Ventures, and the Desai Family Office; The company has 50K+ individuals across over 20 countries on its platform, handling upwards of US$1B in AUM.

Sorabel, Magpie founders join Monk’s Hill as venture partners
Lingga Madu and Huong Tran will be in charge of sourcing and executing deals in Indonesia and Vietnam, respectively, and working closely with the VC firm’s portfolio companies.

FTX crypto exchange owes biggest creditors US$3.1B
The embattled firm, which filed for bankruptcy in the US last week, says it owes about US$1.45B to its top 10 creditors; Filings revealed more than 1M people and businesses could be owed money following its collapse.

World’s largest crypto fund swept into FTX storm
The shares of the theUS$10.5B Grayscale Bitcoin Trust, which owns 3.5% of the world’s bitcoin, has plummeted to a 39% discount to the value of its underlying assets as investors have embarked on an increasingly desperately scramble to exit.

HK’s Genesis Block to shut down following FTX crash
Genesis Block operates a portal that lets users trade cryptocurrencies by opening up an account and getting support from an account manager; December 10 will be the last day of the OTC platform.

Korea, SG, Japan suffered most from FTX’s collapse: study
SimilarWeb data from Jan-Oct 2022 shows that Korea had the highest traffic share of 6.1%, representing 297,229 monthly users; Singapore made up 5% of global traffic with 241,675 monthly users.

Will digital banks take off in the Philippines?
Millions in the Philippines live in remote areas with no access to a branch and, therefore, no way to open a traditional account, presenting a huge pool of untapped opportunities for digital banks to expand into.

Why defining work-life harmony is key to navigating uncertain waters in 2023
Our ways of working have changed forever over the last two and a half years, and it’s important to maintain a work-life harmony for success.

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Fundraising or preparing your startup for fundraising? Build your investor network, search from 400+ SEA investors on e27, and get connected or get insights regarding fundraising. Try e27 Pro for free today.

The post Ecosystem Roundup: Layoffs at Ruangguru, GoTo’s Q3 revenues triple, Better Bite forms new idea-stage alt-protein fund appeared first on e27.

Early stage venture capital firm Saison Capital today announced that it has teamed up with global data analytics platform Mixpanel to introduce a practitioner-led programme for product managers in Southeast Asia.

The first cohort of the analytics programme in January 2023 will connect Saison Capital’s 2to3 Product Manager Community directly with Mixpanel leaders across product management and engineering. This will allow the PMs to tap into specific and actionable insights during group learning sessions.

In this programme, the Mixpanel team will study insights from more than 7,000 tech companies and answers more than 70 million product questions every month, with some of these insights to be shared with the programme’s cohort.

In an email to e27, Looi Qin En, Principal at Saison Capital, explains the programme and its long-term benefits in further detail.

Also Read: Singapore faces talent crunch for engineering and product manager roles: Report

“During the programme, participants will have a direct touch point at Mixpanel who will partner with them as they make sense of how to implement the knowledge and skills they’ve picked up. Once they’ve completed the programme, they’ll have further support from the 2to3 Community for peer-level learning and networking,” he wrote.

“Ultimately, we launched this with Mixpanel in response to a gap we noticed in the tech ecosystem – a need for a PM community to support the role they play in driving the delivery of solutions in the market. Doing so benefits the industry at large by ensuring we’re lifting the talent level out there.”

The programme is ideal for PMs with at least one year of experience.

“That way, participants can bring their industry perspectives on product building, management and challenges to the table to make for a more engaging way to brainstorm and troubleshoot with fellow PMs,” said Looi.

The 2to3 Product Manager Community, which will be involved in this programme, is a ground-up initiative organised by Saison Capital to invite product managers working in both Web2 and Web3 roles who are curious about the impact
blockchain, crypto, and decentralisation could have on future products and solutions.

Also Read: Lockdown learnings: How I became a half-decent product manager in 2020

Saison Capital said that the community had grown organically to more than 300 PMs within the first month of its launch.

“The 2to3 Community is a ready pool of almost 400 PMs growing based on word-of-mouth referrals. These are all executives who came together because of an organic interest in peer-level learning, so developing this fresh programme was very much in response to the positive feedback from our past 1-on-1 matching sessions and breakfasts,” said Looi.

Fresh intakes of product managers are constantly invited to join the community.

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Fundraising or preparing your startup for fundraising? Build your investor network, search from 400+ SEA investors on e27, and get connected or get insights regarding fundraising. Try e27 Pro for free today.

Image Credit: Saison Capital

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I have been a VC for over 12 years, and while it’s not too long a tenure, it also isn’t a short one.

But if you can change your mind in a few minutes, imagine how much you can change in a decade. During this time, I have definitely grown in my experience, thoughts and approaches.

The journey hasn’t been a linear one, but I thought maybe this is a good time where I reflect and share my learnings for the benefit of others.

Many of these values (and lessons) that I have learned may not be new to you, but as values go, they are unique to everyone, and everyone applies them differently. But I do hope it provides you with a different perspective through my lens.

(Re)building trust

If building a business is tough, the next hardest thing to build is trust, especially one that has been broken before.

Also Read: 5 lessons from 5 years in venture capital

Building trust is a long-term game, and speaking in investment terms, it starts from the early stage, and you need to keep investing time and effort to make sure it gets stronger. For trust to get to the stage of being unconditional and truly mutually cherished is akin to getting to the unicorn stage- not easily done and not as common.

Trust is the most important currency we speak of in the VC world (or at least within AJWC). The value it brings is almost immeasurable. When we have mutual trust between us and our stakeholders (investors, founders, and also especially between partners), conversations become more honest and impactful, deals close quicker, and we are seen as a partner of success rather than just as an investor.

For me, I have also learned that trust needs to be equally strong between co-workers and co-partners. Having my trust broken once before in a business partnership, I became more resolved that in my new partnerships and ventures, it is vital for me to work with people who are not only trustworthy but also value it as much as I do.

Lastly, trust in yourself is often forgotten too. You will learn that there will always be naysayers or detractors who will try to bring you down. But you need to trust in your own abilities, actions, and conscience to rise above all the negativity.

We talk about trust between people, but trust is also about believing in yourself to be able to achieve your goals and be the best version of yourself.

Integrity

So how do you command trust? What kind of person do you trust? To me, it would be someone with a strong sense of integrity.

Having worked in the corporate world (in Credit Suisse and Citibank) for over 10 years, the importance of possessing strong integrity (in myself and the people I work with) played an inherently critical role in further shaping my professional career and how I approach my relationships with my co-workers and clients.

Having worked with different people and faced different challenges and opportunities, I also got to witness (and learned the hard way) how a person’s sense of integrity can be tested in different situations and sometimes that integrity is compromised over short-term gains, thus ruining relationships that took years to build.

I value a friend, a partner, and a colleague who has an unwavering sense of integrity. That is the number one quality I look for in a founder too, because that is the kind of founder that commands respect from his team and who will do the right thing for his team and company.

Being authentic

Trust and integrity then bring about authenticity in the way you present yourself, run the company, and work with founders and investors.

When we were raising fund 1, the best thing we had was our trust in our network. We hustled and went out hunting and farming investors, and it took us over a year to close our first fund. A lot of hard work and time was put in to raise that first round.

What we told ourselves was that there is no shortcut to this, and whatever it is, we have to be authentic and be real about what we can do and achieve and not overpromise to get investments.

I believe that being authentic helped us gain not only the trust of our investors to raise our first fund and showed them who we truly are, what we are capable of, and how we will run our firm.

Also Read: What lessons can crypto investors draw from the Luna, UST episode?

Authenticity in our relationships with our founders is equally important. We knew the kind of partnerships and roles we wanted to play in our portfolio investments, and we were always upfront with would-be founders on our approach to active involvement and open communication. This ensures a right fit between the founders we invest in and us.

Onwards

I have learned many lessons from my professional and personal journey, and I know those lessons will continue to come my way. But as I was once told, if you learn and grow from them, they become valuable lessons. If you don’t, they will remain regrettable mistakes.

In our industry, where failures are costly and challenges can rife, I am very glad that we are able to build a great team at Alpha JWC who uphold those values and work very closely like a family to make things happen for all our stakeholders and most of all our portfolio founders.

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The post 12 years as a VC: Life’s valuable lessons turned values appeared first on e27.

Garnering corporate partnerships is often a coveted goal for many startup founders. Still, it may not always be perceived as an immediate strategic priority, given the relative differences in scale of business operations, thereby giving a perception that possible intersecting priorities are thin to nil. However, in a conversation among Southeast Asian startup founders at Echelon, along with e27 and SAP, key insights about emerging use cases where corporate-startup partnerships in the region have served to be a compelling avenue to drive more significant business value were shared.

Tackling the topic of how startups can scale sustainably and enter new markets through corporate partnerships, the panel speakers were Raunak Mehta, co-founder and CEO of Igloo, Junkai Ng, co-Founder of Janio Asia, Shamir Rahim, founder and Group CEO of Versafleet, and Aaron Ang, SAP head of Southeast Asia mid-markets. The conversation was moderated by Justin Chin, head of business development at e27.

The conversation focused on what they did to prepare and secure corporate partnerships, how they navigated associated challenges and overcame them, as well as insights on how to effectively forge long-term collaborations with corporates.

Corporate-startup collaboration

Touching on the mindset needed when deciding to work with corporates, Shamir, who runs a transport management software that digitalises business execution and last-mile route optimisation, shared that it was a challenging journey at the start.

Initially starting out with SMEs as their primary client pipeline, their team eventually faced pains associated with inconsistent sales cycles, not to mention encountering partners with misalignments in innovative mindsets. From their seventh year of operations, they gathered the courage to target corporates. While they had to grapple with going through long contracts and questionnaires, they persevered. Getting their first corporate client gave them the confidence and experience in their playbook to win more corporate partners. These now include Resorts World Sentosa, Watsons, and Indofood.

Expanding on the massive potential of corporate-startup collaboration, Aaron elaborated SAP’s strategy to build value and sell to, through, and with startups, “You can no longer ignore the proliferation of tech moving the market and changing trends. Rather than solving everything, partnering is always the way to go”.

Aaron is excited about partnering with startups, citing Versafleet as a successful case study wherein they have developed APIs and intellectual property through the SAP Innovation Platform and have since reaped substantial business value through catering to more corporate clients via this avenue. Providing the leading enterprise software in the market at its core, SAP also serves as a platform for startups to be connected to other enterprise clients globally and access this as a compelling business development channel.

Also read: Optimising business solutions through customer-centricity

Overcoming challenges and building strategies

On the challenges involved in forging corporate partnerships and overcoming them, Raunak, who runs a regional insurtech company spanning Southeast Asia with a vision of insurance for all, emphasises the importance of having clarity in the fundamental aspects of every deal and being deliberate on your ability to deliver promises. This may entail saying no to fluid sets of requirements, in order to commit to things that your startup can deliver on and deliver well. 

Junkai reiterated this insight and urged other founders to consider the costs of client acquisition versus the costs of losing them. He emphasised the importance of focusing on what you do really well, staying true to the fundamentals, and treating the rest as noise. As most things are already digitalised, it is not hard to find direct and indirect competitors for your solutions in the market. Therefore it is important to focus on solving the core pain point well. They embodied this case recently and have had to cut 500 clients and instead focused on delivering compelling value to their over 60 clients while retaining 90% of revenues.

Also read: Supercharging B2B startups with SAP’s enterprise collaborations

Helping startups navigate the market

As for advice to startups on driving growth for their companies as they navigate through more VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous) environments, Shamir shared, “Think of distribution. Partnering with corporates is important for new markets.” Versafleet has adopted this themselves as they leveraged SAP’s collaborative programmes where they got to work with SAP executives across continents, learned how to integrate out of the box with SAP, and eventually accessed wider networks and strategic partnerships. Due to this, Versafleet now enjoys having a larger corporate business development pipeline within the ecosystem. 

Raunak emphasised this and shared, “find platforms that have enough captive audience, requisite network effects, and piggyback on what they offer”. It is practical to identify platforms that give you substantial access to your target customers, rather than having to work on the distribution piece first-hand. He also urged startups to focus on strong business fundamentals, looking at the business financial statements as guidance to weather through macroenvironmental changes. He encourages leaders to build 12-18 months of runway, and look beyond P&L to focus on ensuring that margins are liquid, and power through by having a good spread on working capital.

Junkai reiterated the advice to focus on what is controllable versus what is not. Ultimately, the economic climate is a business cycle, and the focus is to survive this slump. Therefore it is important to get rid of the noise, focus on the business, build value for customers and meet payroll.

He shared, “the market doesn’t care if it’s startups or corporates offering, but the value you bring. There are two main principles of focus: cost and speed of distribution. Once put in place, the rest will follow.” They have the same perspective when it comes to their clients as well as to their suppliers and partners. Ultimately, it’s about providing value at scale, speed and efficiency.

Harnessing the power of SAP

Aaron encouraged startups to never stop innovating and to always share solutions that can help startup founders to manage various situations, including the good, bad, and ugly. SAP has supported startups in their growth in various ways, by either being a technical partner or a consumer of their tech solutions.

Rather than being stage-specific, SAP focuses on the value that startups bring, and how they disrupt markets and differentiate themselves through their products and innovations. “Startups can develop their IP, integrate with SAP solutions, making their IP sellable”, Aaron shared. With this, startups that become tech partners of SAP can tap 440,000 customers across 180 countries.

SAP looks forward to bolstering its provision of value through strategic partnerships with leading startups in the Southeast Asian region. Apart from Versafleet, they have collaborated with other innovative businesses in SEA such as Opsis which offers emotion and facial-recognition based AI business applications, F&B businesses like Jumbo Group, and e-commerce businesses like Love Bonito.

For more information, visit https://www.sap.com/sea/index.html and https://sap.io/startup-programs/.

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This article is produced by the e27 team, sponsored by SAP

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