Central and Southern Asia and Oceania (CSAO) is the third largest cryptocurrency market in our index this year, with citizens of CSAO countries receiving US$932 billion in cryptocurrency value from July 2021 to June 2022.

CSAO is also home to seven of the top twenty countries in this year’s index: Vietnam (1), the Philippines (2), India (4), Pakistan (6), Thailand (8), Nepal (16), and Indonesia (20).

Let’s analyse the main drivers of and barriers to grassroots cryptocurrency adoption in these countries. But first, let’s look at CSAO in aggregate.

India continues to lead CSAO in the unweighted crypto activity, receiving US$172 billion in cryptocurrency value from July 2021 through June of this year. Thailand, Vietnam, Australia and Singapore follow close behind, with each receiving more than US$100 billion. Less engaged with cryptocurrencies, however, are Central Asian countries like Uzbekistan and Oceanian island nations like the Maldives.

NFTs are perhaps the biggest on-ramp to cryptocurrency in CSAO today. 58 per cent of web traffic from CSAO IP addresses to cryptocurrency services in Q2 2022 was NFT related; another 21 per cent was to the websites of play-to-earn blockchain games.

Play-to-earn games and non-fungible tokens are intimately related. In most blockchain games today, the in-game items are NFTs, like Axie pets in Axie Infinity and Sneakers in STEPN, which can be resold on many different NFT marketplaces, like MagicEden and OpenSea. For countries with high web traffic to NFT marketplaces, especially Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines, a large portion of that NFT-related traffic may therefore come from players of blockchain games.

As the heatmap above shows, NFT-related websites account for a majority share of web traffic in almost every CSAO country, but most of these same countries have their second-highest share going to blockchain games and entertainment.

This is not necessarily surprising. CSAO is a hub for innovation in blockchain-based entertainment. Game-centric blockchain developers Polygon and Immutable X are headquartered in India and Australia, for example, and Axie Infinity and STEPN, the two largest play-to-earn games, are operated in Vietnam and Australia, respectively.

Also Read: A look into the Chainalysis 2022 geography of cryptocurrency report

Traffic to websites related to subjects like decentralised exchange contracts, however, has declined in recent quarters. This is likely connected to the bear market overall. Manan Vora, Senior Vice President of Operations and Strategy at Liminal, a Singapore-based wallet infrastructure provider, found this to be the case. “The UST crash played a big role in shaking the confidence of the crypto market. When a top ten coin goes to zero, it becomes very difficult to get people who have just entered the market to stay in the market. These are the users that you may lose forever.”

Now that we’ve looked at CSAO’s crypto markets at large let’s zoom in on the most active countries within the region.

Rapid adoption in Vietnam and the Philippines

For the second consecutive year, Vietnam ranked the highest in our cryptocurrency adoption index. The Philippines, meanwhile, made a giant leap, jumping from 15th to second. Both of these countries have similar growth drivers: play-to-earn (P2E) games and remittances.

The first of these, P2E games, we’ve already addressed in part above, but it’s worth noting the sheer scale of P2E penetration in these two countries in particular. An estimated 25 per cent of Filipinos and 23 per cent of Vietnamese citizens have played a play-to-earn game. At one point, players based in the Philippines made up 40 per cent of Axie Infinity’s player base. Meanwhile, Axie Infinity’s developer, Sky Mavis, is based in Vietnam.

Vietnam and the Philippines are also massive remittance markets, with remittance inflows accounting for five per cent and 9.6 per cent of their respective country-wide gross domestic products. In Manan Vora’s view, cryptocurrencies, especially stablecoins, help bridge the gap in cases where parents don’t have access to traditional banking channels and money transfer services like Western Union charge high fees. “It makes a lot of sense. Why pay three per cent to a banking intermediary and wait two days for the funds to reach them when USDT/USDC can reach them within one minute, with almost zero fees?”

The same remittance thesis resonates for other CSAO countries as well. Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh each have US$20+ billion in remittance markets, and blockchain-based payment providers are beginning to disrupt traditional intermediaries. Some of these payment rails are even being built in coordination with government agencies, such as the Pakistani central bank’s work with Alipay. These transfers are generally made via stablecoins, so that the value being transferred is preserved in transit.

As the graph above shows, stablecoins and ETH/WETH are the top two most actively traded asset types in many CSAO countries, consistent with the remittance and NFT-centric adoption model.

Indian and Pakistani crypto regulations likely dampen activity, but not the pace of innovation

In our 2021 crypto adoption index, we found that Indian and Pakistani citizens were the second and third highest cryptocurrency adopters globally, respectively. In 2022, they’ve fallen to fourth and sixth. Recent regulatory developments may help explain why.

India

On April 1st, 2022, the Indian government implemented a 30 per cent tax on all crypto gains, with no ability for users to offset their losses. Then, on July 1st, the government also implemented a one per cent transaction deduction at source (TDS), meaning that crypto users must pay an additional one per cent fee on every transaction. “This led to a lot of brain drain,” said Vora, “first to Singapore, and now to Dubai because even if your business is market-making, it is now effectively being treated as a lottery business.”

Also Read: A new type of digital arts are on the rise. How is Web3 redefining content ownership?

Vikram Rangala, the Director of ZebPay, an Indian crypto exchange, helped us understand the government’s perspective on these new rules. For them, he explained, it’s about consumer protection.

“From the conversations I and my colleagues have had, people in the Indian government, including members of parliament, aren’t anti-crypto per se. Some are very pro-crypto. But they’re worried about their constituents trading a volatile asset without adequate information. A 25-year-old saving to get married or provide for his family might trade some meme coin and get wiped out. No public servant can be seen backing something so risky for most people. Rich people can survive such losses, but a house cleaner, farmer, or rickshaw driver cannot.”

And in Rangala’s view, crypto innovation in India has continued unabated.

“India has dozens of [crypto] projects working on establishing property rights, accessing tickets and membership passes, helping rural artisans monetise, even giving token holders a chance to go skydiving with a movie star in Dubai, and more.”

Pakistan

In January this year, Pakistan’s central bank and government recommended a ban on cryptocurrencies. Since then, the federal government has formed three subcommittees to deliberate the matter further and eventually propose their own crypto policies. It remains to be seen whether or not the policies implemented will be as restrictive as the proposed ban.

Other issues further complicate Pakistani crypto adoption. The country has been on the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) grey list since 2018, hurting its ability to get international financial aid and hardening the government’s negative attitude towards cryptocurrencies.

State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Governor Reza Baqir stated in February that the potential risks associated with cryptocurrencies “far outweigh the benefits” and named the “widening grey economy” and “capital flight” as key worries.

Given Pakistan’s current civil unrest, its former prime minister was recently charged under the country’s antiterrorism act yet remains one of Pakistan’s most popular leaders, Baqir’s concerns about crypto-based capital flight may prove prescient. Vikram Rangala suspects as much, “After watching Venezuela and Argentina, I think that anybody who’s in a country where things are not that stable, they’re starting to see cryptocurrency as a possibility.”

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Mycotech develops a new scientific process to grow mushroom mycelium-based products. It uses mushroom mycelium, the vegetative part of mushrooms, as a natural adhesive. It employs mycelium as a binding agent to create biomaterial composite (Biobo) and cultivate it to create strong, leather-like material (Mylea).

CEO Adi Reza Nugroho co-founded Mycotech with the mission to create the highest quality materials made from mycelium that meet the highest standard of the biotech industry. He also wants to make a real impact by reducing the use of animals in the fashion industry and delivering sustainable material that meets the uncompromising standards of the fashion industry.

Mycotech has shipped Mylea material samples to 16 countries following its original Kickstarter campaign. In collaboration with LVMH prize-winning designer Masayuki Ino from Japan, its products were showcased at Paris Fashion Week S/S 2021 and F/W 2022.

In March and April 2022, Mycotech brought one collaboration product with Hijack Sandals in Indonesia to the overseas market to launch the first mycelium leather sandals called “Mimic Mylea” exclusively in Japan. The launch marks its first step to start penetrating the East Asian market.

Also Read: This startup by an Indonesian farmer produces ‘leather’ used in shoes and wallets without killing a single animal

Currently, Mycotech operates a production facility with a capacity of 10,000 sq ft per year in Indonesia. Besides that, Mycotech brought six global brands, with one of the brands coming from Fashion for Good, for piloting to create prototypes, bring the products to the market, and make capsule collections.

In addition to focusing on Mylea, the company will also develop research and penetration for two other products made from mycelium for the long term. Biobo for creating remarkable structural patterns that rejuvenate residential, industrial, and public spaces, as well as composite research that allows exploring more about the many possibilities of mushrooms as the key to the future.

“Biomaterial innovations, such as mycelium leather, are instrumental to the industry’s transition towards more sustainably sourced materials and better practices. There has been an observable increase in demand for mycelium-based materials over the last decade. Fashion for Good believes Mycotech is rightly positioned to be a commercially viable solution in this space,” said Priyanka Khanna, Head of Global Expansion at Fashion for Good.

Peter Chia, CEO at Temasek Life Sciences Accelerator and Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory, added, “Mycotech is at an inflexion point where transdisciplinary bioengineering research is poised for significant contributions toward sustainability.”

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27 will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon.

The 2022 Echelon edition will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. Learn more here. 

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As an alternative fundraising tool, venture debt has gained traction in Southeast Asia. Singapore-based Genesis Alternative Ventures, which launched its second fund with a target of US$150 million in August, is one of the leading companies in this space. Japan’s Aozora Bank is one of Genesis’s investors.

Genesis was co-founded by Martin Tang, who has strong business development professional skills in corporate finance, working capital, venture debt, private equity, and financial modelling. Before founding Genesis in 2018, Tang was Vice President at DBS Bank and previously held the Associate role at Standard Chartered Bank. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Commerce from Curtin University.

Tang speaks at Echelon Asia 2022, to be held in Singapore from October 27-28.

In this conversation, Tang shares why offline events like Echelon are crucial for the region’s startup ecosystem.

Excerpts:

Offline events are making a comeback. Do you think they are relevant in the new post-COVID era? Why?

Offline events are coming because they are relevant and fill our innate need to connect with each other. We have all missed the spark of inspiration from seemingly causal conversations over lunch, waiting at lift lobbies or the water cooler.

How startup events like Echelon are important when the world is going through a tough investment climate. What do you expect from Echelon?

Events like these are even more important during tough times because there is strength in unity. There is an African proverb: “‘if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together’. When people get together, we can encourage each other to keep going and provide support.

I look forward to many meaningful conversations leading to collaborations during the event.

How does Genesis help its portfolio companies tackle the current crisis? Have you become more prudent and cautious when it comes to investing?

In addition to deploying capital to our portfolio companies, we constantly value add by making strategic introductions to expert networks, other founders and investors.

Also Read: ‘Economic crises become less important when investing with a longer-term mindset’: Qin En Looi

We are laser-focused on ensuring that companies have sustainable businesses with strong unit economics. Some CFOs are grateful to us for helping them enforce financial discipline. We continue to seek potential portfolio companies to add to our stable actively.

Many Japanese investors are now turning their focus on Southeast Asia. Is it because Japan’s potential has already been tapped, or does SEA present better opportunities?

Japanese investors have always been focused on Southeast Asia — in construction, infrastructure, automotive, etc. The potential in Southeast Asia is huge, and investing in the startup ecosystem here is an extension of their thesis.

How do Japan’s startups tide over the current crisis compared with their counterparts in Southeast Asia?

I believe it would be the same as any other startup in SEA: Cut costs, raise capital, preserve cash flow, and ensure strong unit economics to tide over this turbulent period.

Why sustainability and climate tech are important in Southeast Asia?

It is not just important for Southeast Asia but for everyone in general. While making a return is important for all businesses, doing it sustainably is equally important.

Also Read: Nothing can truly replace the offline element of community building: Yinglan Tan

The opportunity for climate tech in Southeast Asia is a large one, given our vulnerability to the effects of climate change. Most major cities here are coastal ones and, therefore, vulnerable to rising sea levels and climate change. So it has gone from merely being a buzzword to something in urgent need of action.

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27 will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon. The event will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. 

We are looking for top-notch speakers for the 2022 edition to join our line-up of speakers, such as Steve Melhuish (Co-Founder, PropertyGuru), Yinglan Tan (Insignia Ventures Partners), Looi Qin En (Saison Capital), Aaron Tan (Carro), Aaron Sharma (Scaleup Malaysia), Carmen Yuen (Vertex Ventures), Shao-Ning Huang (AngelCentral), and Grace Sai (Unravel Carbon).

Learn more here. 

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Malaysia’s global drone services company Aerodyne Group has raised US$30 million as part of its latest bridging round led by Petronas Ventures, the corporate VC arm of energy major Petronas.

The round also included a follow-on investment by KWAP, initially invested in Aerodyne in 2020.

Also Read: Malaysia’s Petronas sets up US$350M VC fund to invest in tech startups around the world

Petronas is Aerodyne’s long-time client. A memorandum of collaboration (MoC) was signed on April 21, 2022, between Aerodyne Oil & Gas, a subsidiary of Aerodyne Group and Petronas’s technology commercialisation arm Petronas Technology Ventures. It explores opportunities for deployment and commercialisation of drone-based solutions, as well as enabling remote and autonomous operations through the expansion of robotics and digitalisation.

The drone company will use the capital to support its expansion into Europe, Africa, Latin America and South Asia. A portion of the funds will also be utilised to support its agriculture scaling efforts and bring the solution to Indonesia and India.

It will also invest strategically in technology acquisition and enter the advanced air mobility space. A large-scale commercialisation plan for the air mobility solution is underway. This solution includes using heavy lifter drones, which can replace the more costly traditional methods and is well-suited for oil & gas operations such as shore-to-platform and platform-to-platform deliveries. This also accelerates extensive logistic operations, such as delivering medical supplies in rural areas and potentially in urban air mobility, where it can provide fast and cost-effective transportation shortly.

According to Kamarul A Muhamed, Founder and Group CEO of Aerodyne, the firm has plans to raise US$100-200 million shortly to bring Aerodyne to the next stage of its growth.

Established in 2014, Aerodyne is a DT3 (drone-tech, data-tech and digital transformation) company. It uses Artificial Intelligence as an enabler for large-scale data operations, analytics and process optimisation. Its flagship precision agriculture solution is powered by in-house developed AI capabilities, with more than 300,000 secured effective hectarages for major industry players in Malaysia.

Also Read: Malaysian drones services firm Aerodyne adds Japanese investors to its cap table

The group employs over 1,000 drone professionals in the UAS (unmanned aerial vehicle) services sector. It claims to have managed more than 560,000 infrastructure assets with 458,058 flight operations and surveyed over 380,000 km of power infrastructure across 35 countries.

Early this year, the group acquired a principal stake in Malaysia-based AI and data analytics company Synapse Innovation for an undisclosed amount. Last year, it announced a strategic investment from a consortium of Japanese investors, comprising Real Tech Fund, Kobashi Holdings and ACSL.

Two years earlier, the group secured US$30 million in a Series B investment round, led by InterVest/Kejora Ventures, with participation from VentureTECH, Gobi Partners and 500 Global. This round was extended with an investment from North Summit Capital, Arc Ventures, and Leave a Nest in February 2020.

In December 2019, Aerodyne acquired a controlling stake in the services business of Measure UAS, an aerial intelligence company in the US.

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon.

The 2022 Echelon edition will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. Learn more here. 

The post Petronas leads US$30M financing round of Malaysian industrial drone firm Aerodyne appeared first on e27.

Manila-headquartered CloudEats, which operates cloud kitchens across the Philippines and Vietnam, announced today it has raised US$7 million in a fresh funding round led by London-based VC firm Nordstar.

The ghost kitchen startup will use the new funds for regional expansion and the development of its brands Burger Beast, 24/7 Eats, and Sulit Chicken.

Resources will also be allocated to developing stronger content and expanding marketing efforts for CloudEats’s celebrity brands, such as Pia’s Kitchen with Pia Wurtzbach and Healthy Appetite with Rhian Ramos.

CloudEats is also doubling down on its smart kitchen technology, expanding its development team’s capabilities and onboarding crucial talent in brand and marketing.

CloudEats has become a major player in the region with its portfolio of persona-driven, innovative cloud restaurants and technology-powered cloud kitchens. It claims to have served over 2.5 million orders so far.

On the back of its successful Vietnam launch, the company is looking to open a third market in H1 2023.

Also Read: CloudEats raises US$5M in Series A for SEA expansion

“The massive growth of our Vietnam business over the last two quarters is highly encouraging. We are taking the best practices and key learnings to our next market launch,” said CloudEats Co-Founder Kimberly Yao.

His Co-Founder Iacopo Rovere said the firm has identified key focus areas in the next twelve months. They include a suite of integrated SaaS solutions for food service as well as intensifying brand building and marketing efforts for its hero and celebrity brands in the form of deeper partnerships with the food delivery platforms, creative offline executions, advanced product innovation, and exploration of new channels.

“As a global investor in the cloud kitchen space, we are capturing the white space in Southeast Asia’s food delivery market through our investment in CloudEats,” said Kimberley Ong, principal at Nordstar. “CloudEats generates the best brand and kitchen-level economics in the market. This is all due to the company’s sophisticated technology and operations backbone and the team’s unique data and partnership-driven approach to brand building.”

The firm has raised US$14 million since launching. In November last year, it announced a US$5 million Series A round led by Vulpes Investment Management of Singapore and Gobi Partners.

The US$15-billion food delivery market continues to explode in Southeast Asia and is expected to reach US$50 billion by 2030, according to a recent report by Frost & Sullivan. Euromonitor also projects the industry to be a US$1-trillion global opportunity by 2030.

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27 will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon.

The 2022 Echelon edition will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. Learn more here. 

The post Cloud kitchen startup CloudEats raises US$7M to expand to more SEA markets, develop its brands appeared first on e27.

X-PITCH is one of the largest startup contests in Asia. Organised by Taiwan Accelerator (TA), the pitch competition is known as the X Games for Startups. Contestants go through 15-second, 60-second, and 3-minute pitches all the way to win awards and investments. In the past three events, the 60-second pitch has been held in TAIPEI 101 high-speed elevator and autonomous vehicle. This year, X-PITCH is the first in the world to use MRT train and Metaverse as the competition carrier.

This year’s theme is Tech for Good which highlights the challenges in the post-pandemic world and innovations that will make meaningful social impacts for the public good and sustainable development. Participating startups focus on applications and services that enable digital transformation around five categories, backed by AI, 5G, edge computing, VR/AR/XR, Web3, and next-gen technologies.

Also read: 18 X-PITCH startups raised crossborder funding

Semi-finalists represent diverse next-generation tech industries

Compared to 2021, the proportion of non-Asian teams has increased by five per cent, while the number of pre-seed startups decreased by five per cent. AI startups still account for half of the share, but next-generation tech rose sharply to 33 per cent from seven per cent last year. 

It is exciting to see more new technologies emerge and enter the market. The percentage of Web3 startups is twice that of 2021, proving the rapid development of this field. On the application side, Banking/Commerce saw a notable increase of 14 per cent, while Consumer Lifestyle declined by nine per cent. These data provide some insight into current trends in innovation and entrepreneurship.

More than just a pitch competition

In the following weeks, semi-finalists will go through a series of activities to help the startups progress in their X-PITCH journey. Together with its partners, the startups will go through fundraising workshops, investor matching programs, country access webinars, corporate access programs, and online exhibitions.

To kick off the activities, a fundraising workshop will be held on October 29, 2022, to help prepare the startups for the investor matching program that will be facilitated by e27 through its Pro Connect. 

The fundraising workshop on the 29th will cover the following topics:

• How to value your startup? This discussion will be led by Equidam, the official valuation partner for the competition.
• How to effectively reach out to investors?  For this topic, e27 will lead the discussion to provide not just insights but a technical demonstration for the investor matching that will happen on e27.

Investor Matching on e27’s Pro Connect

As the official investor relations partner, e27 will be facilitating the investor matching program through Pro Connect. Pro Connect is one of the e27 Pro membership plans that gives its members access to 400+ active and verified investors and tools to assist startups in discovering and connecting with the right investors for their fundraising goals.

For X-PITCH Investor Matching Program (XIMP), the startups will be given complimentary access to Pro Connect to access a list of X-PITCH’s investment partners. They will be able to connect directly with the investors, schedule meetings, and manage the deal status for each investor. 

After the investor matching program, the TOP150 startups will be able to continue their fundraising journey on their own and connect with more investors from e27’s 400+ active and verified investors in the region. 

The grand finale

Ten awards will be presented at the Grand Finale on 10 November. The top three teams will win up to US$1 million in investments in total. 

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At e27, we are kickstarting a new articles series to know startup professionals and their lives beyond working hours.

With an immense experience as a corporate venture specialist, ST Chua recently joined Ikano Insight as its Regional Business Director of SEA. His primary task is to lead the company’s growth in Southeast Asia, helping both corporates to grow startups on any customised advanced analytics needs.

Before this role, he was heading PETRONAS Dagangan’s digital transformation “SWAT team” TipTop. His achievements included streamlining maintenance processes to significantly reduce equipment downtime at retail fuel stations nationwide and introducing an internal super app for dealers across 1060 stations.

Chua has developed a multi-million-dollar international e-commerce business and is a co-founder of an FMCG distribution firm, a predictive analytics company and a fintech startup.

He enjoys mentoring startups and frequently speaks at technology-related events. He holds an MBA from INSEAD, France.

In this candid interview, Chua talks about his personal and professional life.

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

To 5-year-olds who like chocolates, I will say that I manage a team to help the company selling those chocolates, and I want to determine what type of chocolates he/she likes. I will also ask the kid how much to price those chocolates, what else to bundle with, and how to ensure a sufficient supply of chocolates, optimising the retail location where he or she is most likely to buy those chocolates. This is to ensure you are one happy kid eating those healthy chocolates.

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

There have been many challenges throughout my career. I would go with the most recent when I was the General Manager and Head of TipTop at PETRONAS Dagangan Bhd, where I led a special “SWAT team” to look into digital transformation and automation.

The business has been running for 40+ years, with strongly defined processes, multiple stakeholders, and people staying there for a long time. Naturally, someone new coming to do the transformation with no prior background in the industry will be questioned and challenged. Trying to execute transformation at pace and scale in that environment is challenging. My team and I had to put tremendous focus on change management.

The second part of the challenge was introducing innovation or new technologies to a company with the largest retail network in the country with over 1000 sites. For example, to introduce IoTs or smart cameras, the business model needs to accommodate the additional cost of three zeros behind, which is a challenge when business margins are thin.

As a leader in PETRONAS, we are also responsible for upholding the trust put on us to manage the country’s resources (we call it Amanah in Malay) and ensuring that our investments create substantial value. So there’s always a trade-off between cool technologies vs practically, long-term investment vs short-term gains to balance.

Also Read: What Pierluigi Cau loves most about working at GitHub

Besides delivering our plan, the highlight was building a high-performing team with strong startup culture — always steadfast, agile and standing together despite the pressure and challenges.

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

I hope to continue pushing my career’s boundaries, busy solving complex problems or pain points. What excites me about Ikano Insight is that data and technology adoption is growing exponentially. This company is an expert in helping others be it large corporates, to scale-ups to make sense of data, transforming them into useful insights.

The other exciting thing about Ikano Insight is its ability to help companies meet upcoming ESG compliance since we have the know-how to track and monitor ESG using global standards that we utilise ourselves across the group. How many analytics companies in Southeast Asia can say they have a sustainability practice? There is so much to learn about ESG and sustainability, which is exciting.

Sometime down the road, I wouldn’t discount the possibility of setting up my own VC fund to help startups since I have experience setting funds up from scratch, scaling and exiting companies.

What are some of your favourite work tools?

I use Trello a lot as a Kanban board for myself (Trello should give me an award for being their biggest evangelist since 2012 when no one at that time knew about it in this part of the world). I also use Slack for communication with different teams and projects, Jira for product development, Miro for brainstorming, Google Calendar, Microsoft suite of products (Sharepoint, Word, Powerpoint and Excel), and last but not least, sticky notes.

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

Ever since I joined Ikano Insight, I found five points that seem to surprise people about my job and the company:

• Ikano is not a Japanese company despite sounding like one. It is owned by the late IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad’s family from Sweden.
• Being the youngest entity in the Ikano Group, we are more like a startup than a corporate.
• We are not merely an internal data arm to serve the Ikano and IKEA companies but a standalone insight and advanced analytics company providing services internally and to external clients, be it corporates or scale-ups. So you will see my team and me out and about for business development.
• We are technology agnostic. We use what clients are comfortable with and perfectly fine to work on their existing technology stack.
• One of our largest focuses is sustainability. We use data and technology to monitor sustainability efforts and automate ESG reporting.

Do you prefer WFH or WFO, or hybrid?

As someone from the startup and venture capital world, I am used to working from anywhere with a laptop, so it does not make a difference to me. So instead of WFH, I would call it WFA (work from anywhere).

Also Read: What Samar Sen’s life looks like while heading Talos in APAC

To me, the world has progressed so much in adopting digital tools that enabled us to work entirely online for two years. Why revert? One has to be practical about it and think about how to maximise productive time, and if there is a need to have a face-to-face meeting, then do that to not lose the personal touch.

What would you tell your younger self?

Experience as much as possible, try new things, go to new places, and study different languages. It’s increasingly becoming a globalised world without borders, especially in the digital space and the ability to relate to surroundings, have empathy and communicate across cultures is crucial.

Can you describe yourself in three words?

Curious, simple, trustworthy.

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

I have lots of dogs, so I would probably be walking them, bringing them hiking or socialising with other dogs to drain their energy, or else they would be up to mischief at home. Otherwise, you would find me in some café mentoring startups or brainstorming the next business idea with people of similar interest.

What are you currently reading/listening to/ watching?

I finished reading the book Touching the Void. It’s a real-life account of two climbers and their perilous journey up the west face of Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes when disaster struck. It is a story of extraordinary resilience and willpower to survive. A brilliant book that I would recommend reading.

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Astra pours US$259M into WeLab-backed digibank Bank Jasa Jakarta
The deal was done through Astra subsidiary SMI; SMI currently has 1.1M shares, or a 49.56% stake, in the local bank; At the same time, WeLab also increased its ownership in Bank Jasa Jakarta to 49.56%.

Shopee lays off hundreds of employees in 3 markets
The e-commerce firm is slashing jobs in Singapore, China, and Indonesia, where 180 employees (3% of the workforce) will be dismissed; In a statement, Shopee Indonesia attributed the decision to efficiency issues and adjustments to changes in business policies.

IDG Ventures Vietnam sues VCCorp for alleged governance lapses
It alleges signs of wrongdoings in VCCorp’s corporate governance process and signs of violating the investment contract with shareholders, causing serious harm to shareholders’ rights and legitimate interests.

Indonesia’s Dana joins unicorn club
This follows investments from local conglomerate Sinar Mas Group and Lazada; The funding puts Dana’s post-money valuation at over US$1.2 billion, said one of the sources.

LinkAja-owned agri P2P lender iGrow faces irate lenders, repayment delays
Retail lenders on its platform complain that they are not earning the investment returns and debt repayment promised; One of the lenders, Rizki, says the company doesn’t pay the margin on time or provide regular updates on the projects.

Singapore’s home appliance startup Prism+ bags US$32M from TNB Aura
The online-focused firm will use the capital to further expand in SEA, especially in the Philippines; Prism+ offers a wide range of electronic appliances, from smart TV to air conditioners.

Singapore’s agritech firm Nutrition completes US$20M round
The investors include Thai oil major PTT, Sumitomo, and ING Sustainable Investments; Nutrition manufactures protein from black soldier fly larvae as a sustainable alternative to fishmeal.

Q-commerce firm Dropezy may have closed all its 20 dark stores in Jakarta
This is part of its strategy to shift to an asset-light model; In an earlier statement to DealStreetAsia, its CEO Nitish Chellaram said the company is keen on becoming asset-light.

Ant Group may see IPO comeback after Shanghai land purchase
Ant said that after the purchase is completed, it will acquire roughly 60K square meters of office space to bolster its presence in the city’s fintech and blockchain landscape.

Indonesia’s B2B marketplace Ralali raises US$2M in Series D+
The investor is Singapore-based ACA Investments; Six months ago, the marketplace raised US$7.95M in equity funding backed by Beenext, SBI Ventures, ICMG Partners, and Arbor Ventures.

Singapore, India fintech regulators sign cross-border sandbox agreement
After the agreement, Singapore startups that have already joined MAS’ regulatory sandbox may be referred to IFSCA’s sandbox to test their use cases in India; Likewise, Indian startups will be able to test their services in Singapore.

Indonesian agritech firm Agridesa raises US$200K pre-seed
The investors are Multifield and Triputra Agro Persada; Agridesa connects land owners and farmers; It uses agricultural loans from banks to kickstart farming projects and divides the profit among all stakeholders when the crops are harvested.

Spin co-founder Derrick Ko announces new football venture
Derrick Ko’s new venture Matchday will focus on European football; While there isn’t a lot known about Matchday right now, it said it aims to deliver “football at its most authentic and personal”.

AirAsia to launch car-hailing in Indonesia
According to AirAsia Super App Indonesia, the service will focus on four-wheeled transportation at its launch, with Bali as its first location; AirAsia Ride has already rolled out in Malaysia, where drivers can be full-time employees.

‘Economic crises become less important when investing with a longer-term mindset’: Qin En Looi
Qin En Looi, Principal at Saison Capital, also says what worked in a capital-rich, low-interest environment (as we were a year ago) does not work in today’s climate.

Animoca Brands to acquire MotoGP developer WePlay Media
The acquisition will allow Animoca Brands to expand on its existing relationship with Dorna Sports as a sponsor, NFT licensor, collectible cards provider, and blockchain game developer and publisher.

Indonesian Web3 brand-retailer enabler SerMorpheus raises US$2.5M
The investors are Intudo Ventures, 500 Global, Febe Ventures, AlphaLab Capital, and BRI Ventures; SerMorpheus empowers brands and creators to develop NFTs and manage utilities, allowing them to engage directly with customers and communities.

Terra co-founder says he is not on the run
Do Kwon has clarified that he is not in hiding following reports that South Korean prosecutors issued arrest warrants for the co-founder and a few others; A recent Reuters article said that the Singapore Police Force has confirmed Kwon is not in the country.

Thailand SEC bars crypto firms from offering lending, staking services
SEC said it made the decision to protect traders and the general public from risks associated with related transactions, such as crypto staking and lending.

While traditional funding penalises a biz at its worst time, Jenfi gives them more leeway
Jenfi offers fast and efficient funding (as quickly as the same day) vs six-nine months, which is typical for VC/PE funding.

Indonesia may have a bright future in Web3 space, but some homework remains
The archipelago has all the elements of a supportive Web3 ecosystem with a close-knit community to forward-looking initiatives.

What the entrepreneur community says about King Charles III’s visit to WORQ
Stephanie Ping, CEO and Co-Founder of WORQ was surprised to see the King portraying that personality, which is rarely captured in the media.

Say no to working in silos
Silos can become a problem for workplace cohesion and employee engagement, don’t dismiss yourself and bring in what you’re good at.

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon.

The 2022 Echelon edition will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. Learn more here. 

The post Ecosystem Roundup: Astra invests US$259M in digibank Bank Jasa, Shopee lays off hundreds of staff, IDG Ventures VN sues VCCorp appeared first on e27.

Singapore-based insect protein company Nutrition Technologies has announced the completion of a US$20 million equity funding round led by PTT Ventures, the venture arm of Thai oil major PTT.

Sumitomo Corporation, ING Sustainable Investments, Mandala Capital, and existing investors Openspace Ventures, SEEDs Capital and Hera Capital also participated.

Nutrition Technologies will use these funds to further expand production capacity at its current operating plant in Malaysia and through a new joint-venture project in a soon-to-be-announced second country in Southeast Asia. It also intends to expand its R&D capabilities in Singapore; commence commercial activities in the UK and the EU, and add several new patents to its existing IP portfolio.

Founded in 2015 by two British entrepreneurs Nick Piggott and Tom Berry, Nutrition Technologies manufactures sustainable animal feed ingredients and biofertilisers, using a unique combination of biotechnology and black soldier fly larvae to recycle nutrients from agricultural and food processing byproducts.

Also Read: This Vietnam startup seeks a place in the crowded alternative protein market for its cricket-made food products

Its two-hectare production facility in Johor, Malaysia, bioconverts several hundreds of tonnes of organic waste weekly. The facility produces functional proteins and oils with bioactive compounds that efficiently improve animal growth performance and health outcomes.

Nutrition Technologies plans to build several similar size facilities across Southeast Asia in the next five years.

Nutrition Technologies’s proprietary technologies and vertical insect production system are designed to capitalise on a tropical climate’s low-energy benefits and suitability.

Over the past few years, Nutrition Technologies has conducted multiple trials of their products on fish, shrimp, poultry, piglets and pets, with significant results. Its biofertiliser products improve soil health while naturally increasing plant resistance to disease, reducing the need for chemical pesticides.

“We are increasing production to meet market demand and providing essential ingredients to the domestic agricultural sector as well as boosting exports through shipping our products to Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Chile. We will also commence shipments to the UK and the EU very soon,” said Nick Piggott, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Nutrition Technologies.

“Commercial insect protein production is one of the most important innovations of the past few years, with the potential to disrupt the animal feed and fertiliser sectors and solve multiple issues the world is currently facing,” said Dr Buranin Rattanasombat, Senior Executive Vice President, Innovation and New Ventures, PTT Public Company.

“We believe insect protein is one of the most important recent solutions to protein production, contributing to solving various environmental issues and addressing several Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” said Masahito Uno, GM Life Science Division, Sumitomo Corporation.

The insect sector has gathered increasing attention over the past few years. The global insect protein market is estimated to be worth US$343 million in 2021 and is expected to grow with a CAGR of 26.49 per cent to reach US$1.3 billion by 2027.

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Echelon 2022 aims to provide intimate and focused discussions on key topics and business matching services to facilitate business-driven connections during the two-day event. e27will curate and invite key stakeholders of startups, investors, corporates, and ecosystem enablers to drive towards fruitful business outcomes at Echelon.

The 2022 Echelon edition will be co-located with SWITCH at Resorts World Sentosa from 27 to 28 October 2022. Learn more here. 

The post PTT arm leads insect protein firm Nutrition Technologies’s US$20M round appeared first on e27.