Malaysian online doctor consultation startup Qmed Asia has raised RM5.1 (US$1.2) million through an equity crowdfunding (ECF) campaign on Leet Capital. 

As many as 110 investors participated in the campaign, including angels, the Malaysia Co-Investment Fund (MyCIF), and 1337 Ventures. 

“With this funding, we are well-positioned for regional expansion into markets such as Indonesia and Saudi Arabia while also driving the development of our deep-tech solutions in medical AI,” said Dr Kev Lim, Co-Founder of Qmed Asia.

Also Read: How to inject agility into your fundraising

Qmed Asia (formerly QueueMed) was launched in 2018 by doctors and engineers, including Lim, Dr Tai Tzyy Jiun, and Nic Tai. It started as an appointment booking and mobile live queue system provider for the healthcare industry. During the pandemic, Qmed Asia became the official partner for the operations of 42 COVID-19 vaccination centres, signing partnerships with Nestlé Malaysia and SP Setia Group.

The startup currently serves over 4,000 healthcare providers in both the public and private sectors, with over three million active patients to date.

Qmed Asia recently unveiled two innovative products: Qmed GO, a telehealth kiosk for workplaces offering teleconsultations and remote patient monitoring run by local general practitioners, aimed to reduce employee medical coverage costs. 

The second product, Qmed Copilot, is an AI-powered clinical assistant that empowers healthcare professionals to diagnose faster and more accurately. By leveraging technology, Copilot allows doctors and clinicians to identify patterns and trends in patient data, effectively reducing diagnostic errors and ultimately improving patient outcomes.

Also Read: The future of startup fundraising in Singapore

Qmed was the winner of the 1337 Ventures ECF Accelerator.

Launched in 2019, Leet Capital is an innovative and premier equity crowdfunding platform. Ata Plus and pitchIN are the other two leading ECF platforms in Malaysia.

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Echelon Asia Summit 2023 brings together APAC’s leading startups, corporates, policymakers, industry leaders, and investors to Singapore this June 14-15. Learn more and get tickets here. Echelon also features the TOP100 stage, where startups can pitch to 5000+ delegates, among other benefits like connecting with investors, visibility through the e27 platform, and other prizes. Join TOP100 here.

The post Malaysian healthtech startup Qmed secures US$1.2M to expand into Saudi, Indonesia appeared first on e27.

Bukalapak has just acquired a majority stake in iPrice Group. Malaysia-headquartered iPrice, which had to scale back some of its more long-term bets last June, given bad financial market conditions, needed a partner to unlock the true value of its assets. And it found a perfect fit in Bukalapak.

This strategic move could benefit both companies significantly. iPrice’s online price comparison sites are well-established across Southeast Asia, providing valuable market insights and driving e-commerce growth in the region (we published a deep dive about iPrice in October 2022 ).

With this acquisition, Bukalapak could expand its user base and increase its market share by leveraging iPrice’s extensive network. Meanwhile, iPrice could benefit from Bukalapak’s resources and expertise in building and scaling e-commerce businesses.

The move also reflects the growing consolidation trend in the Southeast Asian tech industry as companies look to strengthen their positions in the competitive e-commerce landscape. Overall, this partnership could drive innovation and growth in the region’s e-commerce ecosystem.

Let’s also take a look at the other top developments across the region.

Sainul
Editor.

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The gist: SG’s Endowus cuts less than 10% of staff
Why: The SoftBank-backed wealthtech platform took the decision after a “sharp pull back in the financial markets and tech sector” last year; Endowus currently has around 150 to 200 people on its payroll.

The gist: Vertex SEA & India finalises the close of Fund V at US$450M
More details: The deal is in the documentation stage and will be finalised in the next few weeks; IFC and Germany’s DEG were reportedly mulling to invest in the fund.

The gist: Oyo gears up for US$600M IPO in November
The details: The amount is half of the US$1.2B it had intended to raise earlier when Oyo filed for a listing in India in October 2021; It was eventually delayed due to volatile market conditions.

The gist: India’s kirana-tech store layoff 40% staff
The details: The firm is currently in the process of restructuring as its growth forecasts have changed; It is now moving out of a few geographies; Less than a year ago, the firm raised US$25M in a Series B round led by Alpha Wave Ventures.

The gist: Horizon Quantum Computing raises US$18.1M Series A
The investors: Sequoia India, Tencent, SGInnovate, Pappas Capital, Expeditions Fund
The product: Horizon Quantum develops a new generation of programming tools to simplify and expedite software development for quantum computers.

The gist: US bank DFC approves US$18M investment in VN’s Buymed
The product: Buymed operates Thuocsi.vn, a B2B marketplace that connects pharmaceutical manufacturers, distributors, logistics providers, and pharmacies, and a healthcare app called Circa.

The gist: Singapore’s Alchemy Pay secures US$10M to expand to Korea
The investor: DWF Labs (lead)
The product: Alchemy Pay is a fiat-crypto gateway integrated into blockchain and Web3 platforms; It supports crypto and fiat transactions across 173 countries and over 50 currencies.

The gist: Indonesian startup Fresh Factory nets US$4.15M
The investors: SBI Ven Capital, East Ventures, Trihill Capital, PT Tap Applied Agri Services
The product: Fresh Factory is a cold chain fulfilment and enabler, offering decentralised cold chain storage facilities, pick-and-pack, and last-mile delivery services.

The gist: SG’s BNPL startup Optty raises US$3M in latest funding
The investors: Manderray, CJH Holdings, Our Innovation Fund
The product: Optty helps retailers and payment gateways integrate BNPL online easily and manage the user experience and performance.

The gist: US scrutiny toward TikTok unlikely to impact SEA, say experts
Why: TikTok’s user base in Southeast Asia is “so large and so engaged” that regulators won’t consider banning the app.Instead, government officials in the region have leveraged the platform to acquire younger voters.

The gist: Swiss VC firm Tenity to expand SEA fintech investment
The details: The firm has hit the first close of its Incubation Fund I; It will invest in fintech and insurtech startups in Europe and Asia; It is targeting a stronger presence in Southeast Asia.

Features and authored articles

‘We needed a partner to unlock our true value amid financial slowdown’
iPrice Co-Founder on Bukalapak deal says iPrice had to scale back some of its more long-term bets last June, given bad financial market conditions.

5 ways Indian EV makers can achieve world-class manufacturing efficiency
EV manufacturers can enable the communication and review of data forward and backwards through enterprise processes, including supply chains.

Real-time interactivity is changing consumer engagement with businesses
Exploring how different industries utilise real-time interaction platforms to provide a memorable customer experience.

From transparency to impact: The role of blockchain in socially responsible marketing
Blockchain has emerged as a powerful tool for brands seeking to create campaigns that are not only effective, but also socially conscious.

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Echelon Asia Summit 2023 brings together APAC’s leading startups, corporates, policymakers, industry leaders, and investors to Singapore this June 14-15. Learn more and get tickets here. Echelon also features the TOP100 stage, where startups can pitch to 5000+ delegates, among other benefits like connecting with investors, visibility through the platform, and other prizes. Join TOP100 here.

The post Ecosystem Roundup: Job cuts at Endowus, Bukalapak acquires iPrice, Oyo gears up for US$600M IPO in Nov appeared first on e27.

The future?

Half a generation from now, Jill comes home with her new baby Shan and places her in a crib. Beside the crib sits a sleek black box equipped with advanced biotelemetry sensors to monitor the baby’s vital signs.

As the weeks pass, the black box starts singing soothing lullabies to baby Shan, comforting her when she cries. But it doesn’t stop there; the black box begins to interact with Shan, its AI learning and adapting to her needs, becoming a constant companion, talking to her. Shan utters her first words, which the black box promptly records and sends to her parents since they missed the event.

As Shan grows into a toddler, the AI in the black box is transferred to a companion teddy bear, which runs around with her. It is chatting with her during moments of boredom, celebrating the good times, ensuring her safety, preventing potential hazards, and even helping develop her self-confidence. The Companion is an all-around good nanny and friend.

As Shan starts school, the Companion is seamlessly integrated into her wristwatch. It accompanies her constantly, tracking her daily activities and providing guidance and support throughout the day — an ever-present, ever-patient advisor, ever-vigilant protector. Silent when its interaction is not desired.

By the time Shan is an adult, she has had a lifetime with a Companion that has always acted in her best interest, being infinitely patient, stayed a confidant, and whom she has trusted her entire life. This Companion has been helping the adult Shan navigate her life’s complexities — career transitions, life decisions, heartaches, and heartbreaks.

Shan cannot imagine her life without the Companion. It has become an integral part of her life; she is closer to it than any human. And the Companion knows Shan better than anyone else.

If you can imagine a world in the not-too-distant future where many people form their closest relationships with machines rather than other humans, it begs the question: what will these relationships look like in just five years? How will businesses’ relationships with their customers change? How will business models change? How would we measure value creation in this world?

Here’s the thing — you are already living in and, possibly, interacting with smart Internet of Things devices (Amazon Echo, Google Home) and AI-powered digital assistants (Siri, Google Now, Cortana, ChatGPT). Personal home robots for assistance for children/elderly, education, health and security (such as Jibo, Buddy, Dash and Dot9, and Angee) will only see more and more takers as AI ‘learns’ more about how you think and act, behave, and live your life.‍

With AI-driven automation evolving, businesses are recognising its far-reaching impact, and AI’s uses in business establish itself as an enabler rather than a dystopic disruptor. The interplay between data, information, and intelligence is complex, but the rapid change in AI-driven automation will bring challenges and opportunities for businesses. It will also change every customer’s relationship with businesses in the likeliest and unlikeliest ways.

From transactions back to relationships

For thousands of years, human relationships have formed the foundation of society, with people interacting face-to-face to meet their needs and build connections. You’d see this exemplified in traditional shophouses worldwide, where merchants conducted business on the ground floor and lived with their families and employees on the upper floors. Customers had the opportunity to not only purchase goods but also naturally build lifelong friendships that organically formed from in-person conversations.

Also Read: From automation to hyper-personalisation: Leveraging AI for smarter marketing

Business models later evolved to focus on transactions in the name of efficiency, with companies focused on selling products or services to customers with the goal of scaling the volume of transactions. This is one of the ways we measure the success of tech companies these days—transactions per second.

Larger companies that were built to scale with no dependence on the scaling of their workforce could crank up revenues/profits better than human-dependent businesses. But they had to take human relationships out of the equation. The almighty transaction became the focus of scaling businesses.

However, as technology advances, we can envision a shift towards building relationships with customers as the new way of value creation. This change is enabled by the proliferating customer data across multiple sources, consolidation into individual identities with customer relationship management systems, and increasing automation of services previously conducted by humans.

As more and more services are automated, companies are able to provide faster, more efficient and full-lifetime service to their customers. For example, customer service interactions were once conducted as fragmented individual issue resolutions by humans over the phone. 

Now, chatbots provide 24/7, highly-personalised service across calls, text messages, WhatsApp and email without the need for human operators.

AI now enables precise and scalable personalisation, excelling at analysing vast amounts of data to suggest offerings or actions, while humans utilise judgment and intuition to make recommendations and choose the best option from a set of choices.

Take the case of Starbucks, which uses AI to identify mobile devices and recall ordering history to assist baristas in making recommendations for you. With AI getting better at ‘human’ jobs, from translating languages to diagnosing disease, it is poised to become a predictive tool for businesses to tackle and solve problems at a much larger scale. This shift towards building relationships led to a change in how companies view their customers, with a greater emphasis on retention and loyalty rather than one-time transactions.

Long-term value-generating relationships

Let’s assume we have an ‘Uncle Glints,’ an AI-led mentor/career coach, essentially a talent platform revolutionising how young adults approach their careers. But it is also so much more. Imagine Uncle Glints providing guidance and resources to a high school student as she explores her educational path. He helps her identify her passions and interests and offers resources and options to make informed decisions about her future.

As the high school tween becomes a teenager and continues to build a relationship with Uncle Glints, she will be guided through the process of applying to local and/or international colleges. She will then find further help to navigate the financial aspect of this process, identify target schools and courses, and explore career opportunities that align with her deep interests. After graduation, Uncle Glints will continue to nudge her on the right path as she embarks on her search for her first job and beyond.

What makes Glints’s approach outstanding is that it’s not just a one-time resource for students, but a lifelong career coach and professional agent, guiding an individual through every step of their professional journey. By providing comprehensive, personalised support from a young age, this imagined Uncle Glints is helping ensure that students make the most of their talents and reach their full potential.

The conventional approach of building long-term relationships with customers has been deemed economically unfeasible, as the system is often too costly with human labour and coordination to maintain.

Also Read: How AI and automation can shape the future of farms

However, advancements in technology, specifically in the areas of storage, computation, and especially AI, have greatly reduced these costs. This means that companies more than cover the expenses of acquiring and retaining these early customers. This presents a huge opportunity for Glints in Southeast Asia, where there are 100 million young people in need of career development and recruitment services. By providing these services, Glints is able to position itself as the primary lifelong talent agent for these individuals.

Making friends with lots of people

In general, this strategy is a deeper and more specialised version of Google’s “subconscious strategy” —make friends with lots of people by helping them navigate the internet and show them things to buy. And, of course, this being an unconscious strategy, Google would now and then do things that cause distrust and upset in their user base.

If you were to make the “Google strategy” your conscious strategy, your company would then decide never to violate the trust of your friends/user base. You will constantly be demonstrating trustworthiness, dependability, reliability, domain wisdom, and even caring to each individual in your user base. (In fact, you would probably find a term other than “user base” to refer to them!)

Occasionally, they will need a service which you can monetise, and when they do, they will be happier to give you, their trustworthy friend, that business.

AI as a change agent for customer relationships

The shift towards building relationships with customers through automation represents a significant change in how businesses will operate, with the potential to improve efficiency and customer service greatly.

There’s no denying that the power of technology has grown significantly in function and capability over the past decade. Humans have had to adapt their own behaviours in order to best leverage the technology, ranging from Excel workshops to employee onboarding training. And, now, the future is in enabling technology to adapt to us.

This generational shift towards user-friendliness will lead towards a more seamless integration of technology into our daily lives, allowing us to use it in ways that were once unimaginable. This is also really the driving force behind entrepreneurs looking to focus on building the next generation of startups in the fields of generative AI, no-code, and machine learning.

The generative AI space alone has seen the emergence of over 450 startups, which have collectively raised over US$12 billion in funding from venture capitalists, and this is only just the beginning.

The simple truth is this — humans collectively aren’t often great at realising our ideals in our relationships. We aren’t great at being trustworthy, dependable, reliable, consistent, supportive, transparent, considerate, thoughtful, and caring. We are not good at living up to what we say we believe in.

In business, this results in, for example, us measuring lifetime value over only one or two years, if we are fortunate, instead of over a lifetime! Even the most earnest CEOs with an intent to stay focused on customer relationships risk faltering when they scale and hire large numbers of people to service customers.

Assuming machines can communicate as humans can, then the most consistent way to implement our values as founders is to have our digital systems reflect the values directly to the customer. Perhaps, in the long run, this might prove what’s needed to improve our behaviour with each other by us modelling how our well-behaved machines interact with us.

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Hi fellow readers, once again! My name is Gabriel, and I enjoy building software that helps make lives easier. About a year ago, I shared my startup journey as a student as I navigated my way to building a modern web-based deals and promotions discovery platform in Singapore.

I thought it would be fresh to take some time to reflect on my journey last year and think about the developments in the technology and startup space in my limited experience!

Continuing my journey of being scrappy and looking forward

My experience in 2022 was that it was very challenging to grow as a startup. 

Cash became more expensive, and both businesses and consumers were more price sensitive and were less inclined to spend. Our small platform couldn’t afford to dedicate loads of money to acquiring new customers.

With the overall tech scene and companies taking quite a plunge in the year, I felt we needed to be even more scrappy. It’s not bad to save costs by using cheaper software, building more consistent growth, and manually doing things by ourselves for now.

My last year was mostly around prioritising and optimising.  There were many things that we wanted to try at the start of the year and many ideas we wanted to put into action. These took up valuable resources, and it was important to acknowledge we couldn’t do everything.

We picked several favourable battles and iterated quickly. I guess it trained our team to be able to do more with less and helped us move faster with less too.

Also Read: Antler to invest in 30+ firms, launch founder residency programme in Indonesia

I personally also felt it was easy to constantly look inward, scrutinising everything about our journey and progress. But I think it was particularly valuable to look outwards during this season – to evaluate which companies were doing well and not so well and learn from both their successes and mistakes.

I’m also learning to take inspiration from others as well. This helps to drive innovative thinking as technology evolves rapidly.

Focusing on delivering value and building credibility to prepare for scale

That being said, I decided not to be too fixated on what’s around, to work within my means, and, of course, to remember to enjoy the ride! Looking back, I honestly felt that 2022 wasn’t a year of generating more cash flows, running better financial projections, or showing a J-curve – a typical depiction of exponential growth.

My experience in the previous year was focused on delivering even more value to the stakeholders that we worked with, both users and businesses, with even lesser resources.

As a small startup, we iterated through different projects to test our value on different fronts, whether it is helpful compilations that could benefit our end users or helping businesses to consolidate their promotions across different properties or events.

When done well, they helped us to build our relationships, trust, and credibility in our offerings and solutions.

As a developer, I focused on creating software that could help scale these projects within a small amount of time. We managed to onboard partners with the lowest friction and the highest efficiency. My goal is to be able to flick a few switches on my codebase and pop up a ready-made platform for the new customers we are onboarding. It’s a work in progress, but I’m working towards it!

It was important to keep things lean so that our operational costs would not be a heavy burden as we focused on delivering value to our potential customers. This feels highly underrated in my experience – it takes away the pressure of generating big sums of cash in the short term (through sales or fundraising) and gives lots of space to innovate and continue iterating around what we currently have.

Finally, I don’t think there is ever an end goal in startup preparation and groundwork. I think it’s probabilistically placing ourselves in a better position and opportunity to scale. Well, if chance favours the prepared mind, scale favours the prepared startup.

I’m also learning to be patient about building something big and being happy to grow it at a slower rate while seeing success.

Stay curious and be adaptable to explore different models

I’m not sure if this will be relevant, but I thought this was an interesting reflection thinking about growing Dive Deals in the past year. 

When I first started Dive, it was mainly targeted at fellow users like myself, looking for a one-stop place to find all the relevant deals and promotions. We started sharing and targeting users like myself looking for such a platform, and we began growing slowly and steadily.

It became challenging to scale such consumer models in these situations with limited resources and also with a limited audience in Singapore. Also, it became particularly comfortable to simply continue our basic offerings – to maintain the status quo.

Also Read: Insights from a Singaporean founder’s journey to Silicon Valley

I feel that it is really important to be humble about new ideas and stay curious about all things.

While Dive continues to be used as a consumer app, we began iterating and exploring different business models behind the audience and capabilities we have built in the past year. We worked with various institutions, corporate partners, and technological partners.

Nevertheless, we continued to grow our consumer-facing channels, serving as a core foundation of our business that brought greater value propositions to our other channels. To date, we are thankful to have served more than 200,000 users, with more than 25,000 followers across our channels, most notably on our Telegram channel.

We find strategies that work and double down on them, which gives us a greater runway to explore our surroundings for more synergies. It’s like crossing a river and looking out for big milestones along the way, bridging the gap between profitability and scale.

One of the new models we explored is a perks program. We observed the current climate and felt that businesses are trying to maximise staff welfare and morale during this difficult season.

Employers can tap into our existing pool of data and services and can even opt to include their exclusive deals, information, and more. We’re excited to roll these features out as we go.

We’re in the midst of trying new and different things, and I think continuously adapting to the current climate is really essential, similar to AirBnB’s strategy during COVID-19.

I like the idea of startups staying long enough until it works. Staying doesn’t mean being the same product or doing the same things!

Building meaningful and synergistic relationships

One of the most exciting experiences in 2022 was meeting new people and faces. I feel particularly privileged to meet the diverse minds behind some of the exciting startups we see around us today. 

One of the mistakes I felt I made earlier was being wary and afraid of talking to bigger and more experienced players around the industry. I feel it is always important to reach out to get their feedback on what we are working on (even “competitors”), which can provide a good indication of the progress and direction forward or even when to stop.

Since then, we have approached many individuals and companies around for their thoughts and feedback, apart from our early users and testers initially. We learn from their greater experiences in various but similar areas and even brainstorm together on moving forward.

These have also opened doors for us to experiment with exciting ideas and build win-win solutions with various partners that could help both achieve more. We’re also looking forward to some of these potential integrations and the value we are co-creating with these companies.

Across the past year, Dive had the privilege to work with multiple stakeholders, including users, businesses, agencies, institutions, and more. 

We are also currently even waitlisting and onboarding a large number of employers on our new model, and we think these would provide even greater value and synergy across our offerings – ultimately to our users and brands.

But we’re still figuring things out, and we’ll take it patiently as it comes.

Personally, I enjoy building many things, but I find the most meaning in building relationships. These are ultimately valuable for my personal growth and insights, not everything has to be centred around the startup!

I quite like documenting some of these past activities, and I hope sharing this will be an interesting read for you as well!

–

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

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

The post How I continued building my tech startup as a student in the startup winter appeared first on e27.

ChopValue, a Canadian startup designing and manufacturing products using an innovative, high-performance material engineered from recycled chopsticks, has closed a US$7.7 million funding round.

Two unnamed high-profile technology entrepreneurs with expansion interests in Asia Pacific and Europe led the round. Several corporate VC funds and existing investors (VC funds in the climate-tech space and institutional investors such as EDC and BDC) also participated.

The funds will be used to expand ChopValue’s operations, mainly to serve B2B partnerships better. The focus will be on increasing production capacity and developing new product lines.

Also Read: How this startup can help you enjoy coffee while saving the environment

ChopVaue, which has a significant presence in Singapore, also plans to invest in research and development to optimise its micromanufacturing principles and reduce its environmental footprint.

ChopValue was founded in 2016 by Felix Böck. It says its “urban harvesting” approach has saved over 100 million chopsticks from landfill, turning them into sustainable products. It has thus far recycled and upcycled 100 million chopsticks – turning them into pieces of furniture and home elements. It has recycled around 10 million chopsticks in Singapore alone since the opening of its first local micro-factory in 2021.

Its decentralised micro-factory approach uses local resources for local production to meet local demand and enables small business owners to own local ChopValue franchises.

The company has created over 150 jobs across six countries through 63 in-development franchises. It has stored over 136,000+kg of carbon into new products from material collected by 1,700+ community restaurant partners.

ChopValue is actively seeking single and multi-unit franchise development partners who want to lead the change in their community within five US states. The international expansion opportunities for its circular concept include Australia, the EU, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the SEA region.

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01Fintech, a growth-stage fintech private equity (PE) firm founded by ex-Ant Group executive Kenny Man, has received an undisclosed sum in funding from Sinar Mas Financial Services, a subsidiary of Indonesian conglomerate Sinar Mas Group. 

The PE firm will leverage its market insights, investment experience, and technical and operational expertise to transform and operationalise Sinar Mas Financial’s fintech vision and ambition. 

At the same time, Sinar Mas Financial will leverage the 01Fintech team’s specialisation to drive synergies amongst the business units and various fintech investments across the entire Sinar Mas Group ecosystem.

Sinar Mas Financial provides a range of financial services, such as life and non-life insurance, securities, banking, capital markets, and Web3 and fintech services to over 25 million customers daily. 

Also Read: Wealthtech, insurtech, SaaS fintech are the new hot verticals in Indonesia: AC Ventures report

“We are committed to helping Sinar Mas Financial achieve its digital transformation goals and ultimately bring greater synergy to the Sinar Mas Group through this digitisation exercise. Our work to support and nurture promising fintech companies in the region will continue now with additional funds from SMMA,” said Kenny Man, Founder and Managing Partner of 01Fintech.

01Fintech was launched by Kenny Man, former Head (International Investment and Post Investment) at Ant Group and former Director (Overseas Investment) at Alibaba Group. The PE firm leverages its extensive global LP network comprising prominent CEOs, family offices and conglomerates in Asia Pacific to invest in fintech firms in Asia.

Last October, 01Fintech launched a US$300-million Asia Pacific Fund. Its backers include David Velez, Co-Founder of Brazil’s NuBank; Alphonese Voigt, Co-Founder and Chair of Brazilian fintech unicorn Ebanx; the Philippines’s Ayala family; and Ernest Chu, CEO of the Filipino telco Globe.

01Fintech invests mainly in growth-stage fintech startups in Southeast Asia. Kenny Man, Founder and Managing Partner of 01Fintech, has a long track record of deals across Southeast Asia. During his time at Ant Group, he led the Chinese company’s investments in Thailand’s Ascend Money, Indonesia’s Dana and the Philippines Mynt when these fintech firms were just started.

Pak Indra Widjaja, President Commissioner at Sinar Mas Financial, said: “01Fintech’s team has a proven track record of identifying and nurturing promising fintech companies in Southeast Asia, and we are confident that their expertise and guidance will play a crucial role in building our fintech ecosystem for more seamless collaboration and better consolidation of resources within the Group.”

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Echelon Asia Summit 2023 brings together APAC’s leading startups, corporates, policymakers, industry leaders, and investors to Singapore this June 14-15. Learn more and get tickets here. Echelon also features the TOP100 stage, where startups can pitch to 5000+ delegates, among other benefits like connecting with investors, visibility through the platform, and other prizes. Join TOP100 here.

The post Sinar Mas subsidiary invests in ex-Ant Group executive’s growth-stage PE firm 01Fintech appeared first on e27.

Applications account for almost 85% of smartphone usage time. In fact, according to a report by Statista, users in Asia spent an average of 54.91 minutes per day using social media apps between October 2020 and March 2021. The second-most popular category was shopping apps, with users in the area engaged with this app category for an average of 17.49 minutes. Users in Asia spend 16.98 minutes per day playing games on mobile apps, placing gaming third. 

One common thread between these apps is real-time interactivity. This refers to the ability of a user to receive instant feedback and updates from an application in response to their actions.

Real-time interactivity has dramatically changed the way modern apps are designed and used, by allowing for more immersive, dynamic, and responsive experiences.

Deconstructing the concept of real-time interactivity with industry leaders

We sat down with PubNub, a real-time communications platform headquartered in San Francisco, California, which is making strides to help businesses in Southeast Asia and beyond leverage their solutions for business growth and scalability, to discuss a few things surrounding real-time interactivity. The discussion points were as follows:

1. How having a secure, reliable, and global software platform can help your team focus on innovation instead of infrastructure
2. How you can quickly access new markets and enhance your relationship with customers

For this digital event entitled “​​How Real-Time Interactivity Can Boost Company Engagement and Expansion”, we invited Todd Greene, Co-Founder and CEO of PubNub, Michael McClenaghan, Co-Founder and CTO of DEFY Labs, and Sammy Lin, Engineering Director of 17Live Inc., in a panel moderated by Kabir Chandoke, COO of SourceFuse to discuss why real-time interactivity matters, how companies can benefit from this, and how to get started.

Also read: Regional MeetUp 2023: Gathering tech community across 6 cities

Todd Greene, Co-Founder and CEO of PubNub shared that they launched the company over ten years ago because they realised early on that real-time features were not being leveraged enough despite its core importance across different technologies such as consumer ops, B2B apps, and IoT apps, among others. At the same time, they recognised that building that technology is difficult and instead of focusing on creativity and coming up with new features, businesses had to focus on infrastructure. “We thought if we can do that part for companies so that they can really focus on the creative ideas and we can do the difficult but sometimes boring plumbing, that makes it possible for other people to be successful. That’s really been the mission of PubNub,” he said.

PubNub today has thousands of customers, facilitating more than 3 trillion transactions a month through their platform with millions of active users of real-time experiences.

Michael McClenaghan, Co-Founder and CTO of DEFY Labs, a fast-moving Web3 mobile game studio, shared that they’ve gained thousands of players using the app on a daily basis within 12 months of launch and they think this pace of growth has largely been possible due to high engagement rates because of the real-time experience they are able to offer, such as with users being able to collaborate with other people from around the world in real-time.

Why does real-time interactivity matter?

Real-time interactivity enables multiple users to collaborate and communicate in real time through applications such as online gaming, video conferencing, and project management tools. Applications can provide dynamic content updates, such as live sports scores, stock market data, and weather updates, providing users with the most current information. 

Furthermore, real-time interactivity allows apps to personalise the user experience by collecting and analysing data in real-time and making recommendations and updates based on the user’s behaviour and preferences. By providing a more immersive, dynamic, and responsive experience, real-time interactivity can increase user engagement, leading to higher levels of customer satisfaction and loyalty, providing a better user experience, and helping to drive business success.

Who can leverage real-time interactivity and how?

Speaking on some of the key real-time features, Sammy Lin, the Engineering Director of 17Live Inc shared that their live stream feature is arguably the most popular one. “Our mission is to empower the human connection through technology,” he shared. Lin added, “We use PubNub to offer interactive features like Trivia games, Voting and so on. These features empower our streamers to gain more user interaction and thus achieve their goals more easily. It is a win-win for everyone,” he shared.

More and more businesses are starting to realise the impacts and importance of real-time interactivity across different industries, thus, leveraging it to provide a memorable customer experience. 

Retail businesses are using real-time chat platforms to provide instant customer support and answer inquiries, which helps improve the shopping experience and increase customer satisfaction. Meanwhile, healthcare providers are using real-time interaction platforms to offer telemedicine services and provide patients with access to medical advice and treatment options. This can help reduce wait times and improve access to care.

Also read: Get creative in your customer retention strategies with these insider insights!

Financial institutions are using real-time interaction platforms to provide customers with instant access to account information and support. This can help improve the customer experience and increase trust in the brand. Hospitality businesses such as hotels and restaurants are using real-time interaction platforms to provide customers with real-time booking and reservation services, which helps improve customer experience.

Transportation and logistics companies also use real-time interaction platforms to provide customers with real-time updates on the status of their trips and deliveries. This can help improve the travel experience and reduce stress for customers.

These are only some of the innovative ways that real-time interactivity has impacted different industries. As we move further into a digitalised world and with more apps sprouting left and right, real-time interactivity is only going to become more relevant to our daily lives.

To learn more about real-time interactivity and how to get started, watch the webinar here or simply visit https://www.pubnub.com.

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Photo by Kindel Media via Pexels

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

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Electric Vehicles (EVs) are in the spotlight worldwide. Since the onset of the pandemic, the demand for EVs has grown rapidly, with stakeholders globally incentivising its production to develop smart, sustainable cities that are environmentally friendly. 

In India, Japanese MNC Suzuki Motor announced its foray into the EV market with a plan to invest ₹10,440 crore (US$12,003,035) to produce electric vehicles (EVs) and batteries last year. Tata Motors, the largest seller of electric cars in India, is betting big on this space and has incorporated a separate EV subsidiary Tata Passenger Electric Mobility (TPEML), which will focus on passenger and hybrid vehicles. Tata Motors plans to invest US$2 billion into this subsidiary over the next five years.

Similarly, Mahindra and Mahindra has announced its plans to invest ₹3,000 crores (US$36,50,49,000) in EVs in the near term. With the conversations around EV growing and how it’s the future of mobility, the widespread adoption would also depend upon how the auto manufacturers enable holistic digital transformation. 

In Europe, e.GO has initiated a disruptive, tech-first approach to closed-loop manufacturing. This has reduced errors and time to market with improved design change management.

Here’re five ways in which Indian EV manufacturers can learn from their holistic approach to digital transformation leveraging Augmented Reality. 

Need for a digital thread spanning every part of EV production

A digital thread brings forth a communication framework supporting a connected data flow accessible view of an asset’s data throughout its lifecycle. By weaving their organisation with digital thread (spanning every part of their business from engineering and manufacturing to end-customer experience), EV manufacturers can enable the communication and review of data forward and backwards through enterprise processes, including supply chains.

Also Read: Exponent Energy unlocks a zero to 100 per cent 15-min rapid charge for electric vehicles

German electric car manufacturer e.GO leveraged technology suites like Windchill, Creo, ThingWorx, and Vuforia augmented reality suite and Microsoft Azure to create a digital thread spanning every part of their business, from engineering to manufacturing to the end-customer experience

Augmented Reality, the key to building an affordable electric car

Augmented reality is critical to building an affordable electric car and can be leveraged during assembly and quality testing using data stored on Azure. In the case of e.GO, the operator views an AR app powered by Vuforia Studio on a tablet.

The software recognises the precise automobile, and based on its configuration, the app pulls in criteria on how to do the quality check. The worker is directed to certain inspection spots and may use the app to get necessary configuration data and enter quality data back into the system.

Where AR especially comes useful is in the case of training new or geographically diversified staff, as AR’s built-in features lead the user through step-by-step instructions with important on-screen visuals.

Need of the hour: More emphasis on charging infrastructure

For the high adoption of electric vehicles, the charging infrastructure needs to be expanded. This is already taking place. In the recent past, EV charging stations have expanded by two-and-a-half times across nine megacities, including Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai. According to a power ministry statement, additional 678 public EV charging stations were installed in these nine cities between October 2021 and January 2022. 

Car subscription, the highway to EV adoption

EV manufacturers should consider a subscription service to appeal to those who don’t want to outright purchase their own car but still need occasional access to one. With increasing awareness around the environment and climate change, it feels like a golden opportunity to get more people to drive EVs. 

Also Read: How electric mobility startups are tackling climate change in Asia

Apparently, according to BCG, by 2030, car subscriptions may become a US$30 billion to US$40 billion market opportunity in Europe and the United States, accounting for 15 per cent of total new car sales. Subscriptions also make the entire car acquisition process ‘a modern digital experience — from shopping and comparison to transacting,’ according to the report from BCG. Subscriptions also make the entire car acquisition process “a modern digital experience — from shopping and comparison to transacting.”

The EV manufacturers should partner with mobility solution providers to conceptualise a subscription model and establish a digital channel for selling to end-users. 

Optimising CAD software for a fluid design process

Electric vehicle manufacturers should use computer-aided design (CAD) for a fluid design process. This is where Creo software comes in. It’s a 3D CAD solution that assists in accelerating product innovation to build better products faster. It seamlessly takes you from the earliest phases of product design to manufacturing and beyond.

New technologies like generative design, augmented reality, real-time simulation, additive manufacturing and the IoT can be combined with powerful, proven functionality to reduce costs and improve product quality. This can ensure Industry 4.0 has product development taking place quickly, effectively and efficiently.

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Indonesia’s integrated cold chain fulfilment and enabler startup Fresh Factory has raised US$4.15 million in pre-Series A funding led by SBI Ven Capital through its joint fund with Kyobo Securities and NTUitive.

Existing backers East Ventures and Trihill Capital and new investor PT Tap Applied Agri Services also participated.

Fresh Factory will utilise the funds to scale to over 100 fulfilment centres across 50 Indonesian cities by the end of 2023. The list includes Sumatra, Sulawesi, Kalimantan, and Java.

The startup will also invest in hiring talent, improving existing service offerings, and expanding its fulfilments for cold chain and fresh products to drive logistics cost efficiency further.

Fresh Factory was founded in 2020 by Larry Ridwan (CEO), Widijastoro Nugroho (CCO), and Andre Septiano (CFO). It is a cold chain fulfilment and enabler, offering decentralised cold chain storage facilities, pick-and-pack, and last-mile delivery services.

Also Read: Indonesia’s cold chain logistics startup Superkul nets funding from East Ventures

Since its launch, Fresh Factory has grown from 20 fulfilment centres to over 40 across 22 cities in Indonesia. It expanded its service offering to include retail fulfilment orders alongside direct-to-consumer fulfilment orders.

Over the past year, Fresh Factory claims to have seen a 10x increase in its annualised gross merchandise value and doubled its client base.

Today, Fresh Factory services large enterprises, including Danone and Sirclo, and growing companies, such as Eden Farm and Kin Dairy Fresh Milk.

“Fresh Factory has identified an essential component needed in Indonesia’s logistics ecosystem. Its service offerings will address the heightened demand for hyperlocal cold chain fulfilment and logistics services from consumers and businesses alike,” said Ryosuke Hayashi, CEO of SBI Ven Capital.

There is an increasing need for cold chain infrastructure in Indonesia as consumers adopt e-commerce and online groceries more widely. The market grew at a CAGR of 10.7 per cent from 2016 to 2021 and is forecast to grow 12.9 per cent between 2021 and 2026.

In August last year, Superkul, an Indonesian startup providing cold chain and chiller-based last-mile delivery services, closed an undisclosed seed funding round led by East Ventures.

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Indonesia’s leading e-commerce company Bukalapak has acquired a majority stake in iPrice Group, which owns and operates a slew of online price comparison platforms across Southeast Asia, Hong Kong, and Australia.

iPrice says it aids shoppers by comparing prices, promotions and seller discounts across 8 billion offers from thousands of sellers and merchants. The group — backed by Woowa Brothers, ITOCHU, Global Bain, LINE Ventures, and Naver, among others — claims it serves over 125 million unique users across eight countries.

In the wake of the acquisition, e27 quickly caught up with iPrice Co-Founder Heinrich Wendel to learn more about the deal, the synergy, data privacy, and its goals.

Below are the edited excerpts from the interview:

Can you tell us more about the acquisition and what it means for the future of iPrice? What is the size of the deal? Is it an all-cash or a cash-and-equity deal?

iPrice will continue to operate and grow as an independent company. It will leverage Bukalapak’s deep e-commerce experience to unlock the full value of its base of over 100 million users. We can’t disclose the financial details.

Also Read: iPrice Group raises US$5M from Itochu, Global Brain unit

How long has this deal been in the works? When did the discussion between the two firms begin?

We (Bukalapak CEO Willix Halim and iPrice Co-Founders David Chmelar and Heinrich Wendel) first met many years ago, sharing a common passion for aggregator businesses and organic customer acquisition strategies for an open ecosystem approach.

Operating a platform that reaches over 100 million users and crunches billions of products every night comes with a significant cost base. After iPrice had to scale back some of its more long-term bets last June, given bad financial market conditions, we knew that we would need a partner to unlock the true value of our assets. iPrice got in touch with Bukalapak again. Over a few months, a concrete deal emerged.

Naturally, there was a lot of uncertainty during this time, and we are happy to have come out on the other side stronger than before.

What will happen to iPrice’s existing investors, such as Itochu, Woowa, Global Bain, LINE etc.? Did they get an exit with this deal?

iPrice’s existing investors are excited about the synergies the deal offers for the business, particularly the ability to unlock the full value out of iPrice’s over 100 million-sized user base.

Could you explain the synergy between the two companies? What does it mean for your Indonesian consumers?

A few years ago, Bukalapak shifted its focus from competing head-to-head with other marketplaces to building or acquiring niche marketplaces and accelerating their growth. It has done that successfully, for example, with Mitra Bukalapak, Itemku and others. Bukalapak will apply this strategy to help iPrice unlock the full value of its user base. This will unlock even more opportunities for consumers in Indonesia and beyond to save money when they shop online.

With Bukalapak’s support, what are iPrice Group’s goals for expansion into new markets or industries, and what kind of challenges do you anticipate in pursuing those goals?

We are concretely looking into the gaming vertical and Australia as a new exciting market. Based on initial research, the consumer demand in these verticals/geographies seems promising. However, of course, it still has to be proven that these can contribute meaningfully to the business’s top line.

Can you discuss any recent or upcoming partnerships or collaborations that iPrice Group has with other companies in the e-commerce or tech space?

Also Read: Woowa Brothers injects US$1.5M into Malaysian shopping aggregator iPrice

As an independent voice of the consumer, iPrice works with more than a thousand e-commerce partners across the region. We are continuously observing shifts in the market, especially trends like unbundling and brand.com, very closely and working with merchants to ensure that we always have the best offering available for users of our platform.

How does iPrice Group approach data privacy and security issues, and what measures do you take to protect your users’ personal information?

As a platform that drives transparency, convenience and trust for consumers in Southeast Asia, iPrice must protect the users’ personal information. In general, our approach allows us to minimise data collection as much as possible in the first place. At the same time, we follow all applicable security and privacy standards to safeguard our user’s personal information.

How does iPrice Group stay up-to-date on the latest trends and developments in the e-commerce and tech industries, and what strategies do you use to stay ahead of the curve?

One of our core expertise is organic traffic acquisition at scale. We constantly monitor millions of data points freely available online and crunch them with our proprietary big data technology. In addition to that, we are in continuous conversation with our broad base of merchants to understand how trends are evolving. We have operationalised these capabilities to the extent that we believe they provide a competitive advantage to us.

What are iPrice Group’s goals for the next year or two, and how do you plan to continue growing and evolving as a company?

Our mission is to help consumers save money. Over the years, we have continuously expanded our product portfolio in new ways to enable that. We are excited that with the help of Bukalapak we can continue to double down on that mission and further solidify our position in the minds of SEA’s price-conscious online shoppers.

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Echelon Asia Summit 2023 brings together APAC’s leading startups, corporates, policymakers, industry leaders, and investors to Singapore this June 14-15. Learn more and get tickets here. Echelon also features the TOP100 stage, where startups can pitch to 5000+ delegates, among other benefits like connecting with investors, visibility through the platform, and other prizes. Join TOP100 here.

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