India heads the pack as an artificial intelligence leader, with 70 per cent of companies having AI projects up and running or in motion, according to a new report.

This is in stark contrast with the global average of 49 per cent. Additionally, the report found that 91 per cent of India-based companies will use half or more of their data to train AI models in 2024, finds the second annual Cloud Complexity Report released by NetApp.

“The world today is driven by AI, and data plays a critical role in enhancing AI capabilities,” said Puneet Gupta, Vice President and Managing Director at NetApp India/SAARC. “India is a country of humungous data sets. No surprise then, that India leads the world, and corporations are embracing the technology to further their IT agenda.”

Also Read: FPT, NVIDIA to build US$200M AI factory in Vietnam

The Cloud Complexity Report analyses the experiences of global technology decision-makers deploying AI at scale.

The report found a clear divide between artificial intelligence leaders and laggards across several areas, such as regions, industries, and company sizes. While 60 per cent of AI-leading countries such as India, Singapore, the UK, and the US have AI projects up and running or in the pilot, only 36 per cent are doing it in lagging countries (Spain, Australia/New Zealand, Germany, and Japan).

Technology leads with 70 per cent of AI projects up and running or in the pilot, while banking & financial services and manufacturing follow with 55 per cent and 50 per cent, respectively. However, healthcare (38 per cent) and media & entertainment (25 per cent) are trailing.

In terms of sizes, larger companies (with more than 250 employees) are more likely to have AI projects in motion, with 62 per cent reporting projects up and running or in the pilot, compared to 36 per cent of smaller companies (with fewer than 250 employees).

Globally, 67 per cent of companies in AI-leading countries report having hybrid IT environments, with India leading (70 per cent) and Japan lagging (24 per cent).

As much as 87 per cent of Indian companies have optimised IT environments for AI, and some lagging countries also have AI-ready IT environments: Germany (67 per cent) and Spain (59 per cent).

AI leaders are also more likely to report benefits from the technology, including a 50 per cent increase in production rates, 46 per cent in the automation of routine activities, and a 45 per cent improvement in customer experience.

The study further noted that despite the divide, there is notable progress among the laggards in preparing their IT environments for AI, but the window to catch up is closing rapidly.

A significant number of companies in AI-lagging countries (42 per cent) have optimised their IT environments for AI, including Germany (67 per cent) and Spain (59 per cent).

Also Read: Exploring the boundaries of AI: What AI can or cannot do?

Rising IT costs and ensuring data security are the two biggest challenges in the AI era, but they will not block AI progress. Instead, AI leaders will scale back, cut other IT operations, or reallocate costs from other parts of the business to fund AI initiatives. About 53 per cent of India-based companies reported being more likely to scale back or cut other parts of IT operations to make room for AI projects.

The study further revealed that 71 per cent of Indian enterprises feel cybersecurity is the biggest challenge for managing the increasing complexity of data across cloud or multi-cloud environments. This is followed by 52 per cent of tech leaders reporting increased scepticism over the cloud and 37 per cent worrying about going over budget.

The study, conducted by Savanta on behalf of NetApp, fielded 1,300 IT executives from key markets, including the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, Australia/New Zealand, Japan, Singapore, and India.

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X marks Echelon. Join us at Singapore EXPO on May 15-16 for the 10th edition of Asia’s leading tech and startup conference. Enjoy 2 days of building connections with potential investors, partners, and customers, exploring innovation, and sharing insights with 8,000+ key decision-makers of Asia’s tech ecosystem. Get your tickets here.

Want more from your Echelon experience? Be an Echelon X sponsor or exhibitor. Send enquiry here.

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The world of work is undergoing a seismic shift. The rise of hybrid work models is a prime example. A recent survey by the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans found that close to three-fourths (74 per cent) of employers now offer hybrid work arrangements.

This aligns perfectly with employee preferences, with a strong majority (68 per cent) preferring a hybrid model, versus 28 per cent wanting to work full-time from home and eight per cent preferring full-time on-site work, according to a World Economic Forum survey. This shift, coupled with globalisation and a growing emphasis on talent experience, is forcing companies to rethink their HR strategies.

Enter the vanguard of HR transformation companies — innovative players disrupting the traditional landscape and empowering businesses to thrive in the new era. From streamlined global hiring to AI-powered talent insights, these companies are equipping businesses with the tools they need to build winning teams and navigate the future of work.

A 2023 study by Gartner revealed that forty-six per cent of HR leaders cited HR technology as their top investment priority. This surge in investment highlights the growing importance of technology in streamlining HR processes, improving talent acquisition, and fostering a positive employee experience.

Next month, at Echelon X, there will be four major conference themes that the attendees will get to dive deep into: Agile Business Practices, Sustainability & Responsibility, Collaborative Ecosystems, and Fostering Creativity. HR transformation will also be one of the things that ecosystems are looking at. How are we going to make that difference? What best practices are out there? Most importantly, who are the people set to make a difference?

To prepare ourselves for the event, check out this list of nine transformative companies offering innovative HR solutions shaping the current talent management landscape.

Deel

Founded in 2019 by Alex Bouaziz and Shuo Wang, Deel is a comprehensive Global People Platform that simplifies international workforce management, covering culture, onboarding, payroll, and compliance. With industry-leading HR tools and compliance expertise, Deel enables companies to scale globally efficiently.

By offering a single platform for teams, Deel eliminates hiring and management barriers, facilitating seamless collaboration and access to new opportunities. Additionally, Deel is developing Deel AI, an in-house tool akin to a global employment assistant, offering insights on regulations in 150+ countries and providing company-specific data.

It raised US$50 million in a venture round at a US$12 billion valuation in May 2022, bringing its total funding to US$679 million.

Globalization Partner

Founded in 2012 with the goal of streamlining global business operations, Globalization Partners (G-P) became the first company to offer Employer of Record (EOR) services and defined the category with its industry-leading SaaS-based Global Growth Platform.

Led by CEO and Founder Nicole Sahin, the platform pairs the industry’s most compliant EOR solutions with best-in-class Payroll and HCM solutions, making it easy to hire and manage teams in 180+ countries without setting up entities.

In 2022, G-P secured a US$200 million investment, valuing the company at US$4.2 billion.

Also Read: Addressing real-world challenges: 8 AI companies transforming lives with innovative solutions

Jobstreet

Jobstreet, Singapore’s leading online job marketplace owned by SEEK, leverages Artificial Intelligence to connect job seekers and employers more efficiently. It offers access to over 100,000 tech jobs across various APAC markets.

To further enhance regional connectivity, SEEK recently unified its online marketplaces — SEEK, Jobstreet, and JobsDB — under one AI-powered platform. The platform employs AI to assess talent and provide personalised recommendations, analysing data from resumes, job ad descriptions, and employers’ past behaviours. This enables fast and accurate hiring decisions, with employers able to expedite the talent shortlisting process by incorporating AI-recommended screening questions in their job ads.

Peter Bithos, CEO of SEEK Asia said, “One unified platform means we can now offer our product to millions of people across Asia in an entirely new way so that our customers can find jobs and talent more easily.”

Employment Hero

Founded in 2014 by Ben Thompson and Dave Tong, Employment Hero has developed an all-in-one platform for seamless and compliant talent recruitment, onboarding, payment, and management. This empowers business owners and managers, allowing them to focus on business growth while ensuring peace of mind.

The Employment Hero super-app, ‘Swag’, serves as a real-time control centre for employees, offering efficient and intelligent management of their work and financial activities.  The company claims that over 300,000 businesses and 2 million employees are now using its products.

In October 2023, the company secured US$168 million in funding, bringing its total fundraising to over US$650 million to date.

Multiplier

Founded in 2020 by Sagar Khatri, Amritpal Singh and Vamsi Krishna, Multiplier is driven by the mission of connecting individuals with their ideal jobs, regardless of location.

With a presence across 150 countries, Multiplier empowers its clients to tap into global talent pools using its EOR technology and infrastructure so that clients can instead focus on scaling their businesses. The company’s proprietary technology simplifies the employment process by managing the complexities of local compliance, labour contracts, payroll, benefits and taxes.

Multiplier has secured US$60 million in Series B funding in March 2022.

Remote

Founded in 2019 by Job van der Voort (CEO) and Marcelo Lebre (President), Remote is a global HR platform designed to empower companies to build geographically distributed teams.

Their suite of solutions simplifies hiring, managing, and paying international teams. This includes services like HRIS, payroll, international employment, and contractor management, enabling companies to compete more effectively in the global economy. The company claims that as of November 2023, it offers contractor management services in over 160 countries and acts as an Employer of Record (EOR) in over 80 countries.

In April 2022, Remote secured US$300 million in Series C funding, reaching a valuation exceeding US$3 billion.

Bossjob

Founded in 2023 by Kiat How Quak and Anthony Garcia, Bossjob is a hiring platform designed to streamline communication between job seekers and employers. This chat-first, AI-powered platform aims to expedite the hiring process by enabling direct chat communication between candidates and potential employers.

Following early success in the Philippines market and securing US$5 million in venture funding, Bossjob expanded its operations in Q3 of 2023 with launches in Singapore and Malaysia, marking the beginning of its global expansion strategy.

Also Read: A horse of another: Here’s the complete list of Southeast Asia’s 30 unicorns

NodeFlair

Founded in 2018 by Adrian Goh and Ethan Ang, NodeFlair is a Singapore-based platform focused on career transparency for tech professionals. It provides verified career data, including salaries, company culture, and benefits, with the mission of empowering tech talent to make informed career decisions.

NodeFlair’s verified career data, including salary information corroborated by payslips, has positioned it as a valuable resource for tech professionals in Singapore, with over 20 per cent actively utilising the platform to inform their career decisions.

Darwinbox

Founded in 2015 by Chaitanya Peddi, Jayant Paleti, and Rohit Chennamaneni, Darwinbox is a cloud-based Human Capital Management (HCM) platform designed to automate HR processes, deliver data-driven insights, and improve the employee experience. Its AI and ML-powered suite offers a user-friendly, mobile-first experience for employees.

Darwinbox currently serves over 850 organisations and 2.2 million employees across 116+ countries. The company secured US$5 million in Series D funding in January 2023 at a valuation of US$1.42 billion.

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BillEase, a consumer finance and buy-now-pay-later app in the Philippines, has received US$5 million in credit facility from Saison Investment Management, the offshore lending arm of Japan’s Saison International.

This round expands BillEase’s existing Helicap-led credit facility to US$40 million, which already included participation from various investors, such as the Helicap Income Opportunities Fund, several institutional credit investors, and high-net-worth individuals.

Also Read: Helicap joins Filipino consumer lender BillEase’s cap table with US$20M debt facility

The funding will allow BillEase to grow its loan portfolio and launch credit products tailored to the needs of its over one million users.

“Coming off a year where we achieved profitability and doubled our revenues, we are extremely well-positioned to scale our consumer loan offerings and expand access to affordable financial services across the Philippines,” said Garret Go, CFO of BillEase.

BillEase leverages machine learning and AI to offer personal loans, e-wallet top-ups, prepaid load, gaming credits, bill payment, and a buy now, pay later (BNPL) service in partnership with over 10,000 merchants.

The fintech firm claims it achieved profitability in 2023, revenue doubled year-over-year and served over 800,000 customers.

“The Philippines is emerging as one of the fastest growing countries in Asia post-COVID, with a huge population that is rapidly digitising. With this as a backdrop, we hope to build our presence in the market, and play a catalytic role in enlarging Philippine’s digital financing ecosystem, to unlock greater economic opportunities for individuals and households,” said Kosuke Mori, CEO of Saison International.

“With 65 per cent of the population unbanked and more than 80 per cent of the country’s transactions still paid with cash, our partnership with BillEase through Helicap is driving financial inclusion by building a credit history for a large share of their customers and creating meaningful impact for a broader segment of the population in the Philippines,” said Claudia Rojas, Head of SIMPL.

Also Read: This e-credit card allows Filipinos to buy big-ticket items online with easy instalments

“We are thrilled to have SIMPL as an investor in BillEase,” said David Z Wang, Co-founder of Helicap, a Singapore-based fintech company. “Their investment underscores the immense potential of BillEase to drive financial inclusion and uplift underserved communities in the Philippines. With this additional capital, BillEase can accelerate its growth and bring affordable financial services to even more customers across the country. This partnership exemplifies our shared vision of leveraging technology to create economic opportunities.”

In September 2022, BillEase completed an up to US$20 million debt facility from Helicap Securities, bringing its total raised to US$55 million in debt and equity. This included the US$11-million Series B round led by BurdaPrincipal Investments earlier that year.

Previously, it raised US$20 million in secured debt from UK-based Lendable.

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X marks Echelon. Join us at Singapore EXPO on May 15-16 for the 10th edition of Asia’s leading tech and startup conference. Enjoy 2 days of building connections with potential investors, partners, and customers, exploring innovation, and sharing insights with 8,000+ key decision-makers of Asia’s tech ecosystem. Get your tickets here.

Want more from your Echelon experience? Be an Echelon X sponsor or exhibitor. Send enquiry here.

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East Ventures, a venture capital (VC) firm operating in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, recently unveiled its East Ventures Sustainability Report 2024. The report showcases the firm’s ongoing commitment to integrating Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) frameworks throughout its operations and ecosystem. It highlights the firm’s strides in generating positive societal impacts while ensuring responsible business practices.

East Ventures has crafted policies that underpin its investment decisions, emphasising sustainable investments. It integrates ESG and impact management principles, serving as a guiding principle in fostering responsible investing practices and enhancing corporate governance within its portfolio companies.

In an email interview with e27, East Ventures Partner Melisa Irene explains the firm’s approach to ESG and how it is promoting it to its portfolio companies.

East Ventures’ investment strategy fosters positive impacts and mitigates ESG risks. Through its ‘Doing Good’ approach, the firm evaluates its investments’ potential positive environmental and societal outcomes using a Theory of Change framework. Simultaneously, the ‘Avoiding Harm’ aspect focuses on risk mitigation, incorporating ESG standards into the selection process and ensuring ongoing compliance with regulations and best practices.

Also Read: Former MD of Temasek Lifesciences Accelerator Sang Han joins East Ventures Korea

To understand the process, check out an edited excerpt of the conversation.

What particular challenges do you face in promoting ESG in your work? How do you tackle them?

ESG risks and opportunities cover broad topics, including greenhouse gas emissions, diversity and inclusion, and business ethics. Each topic adheres to various standards and frameworks that outline the highest level of ESG performance for companies. Aligning to all these standards and frameworks requires extensive effort and resources; hence, prioritisation is essential.

Our approach is tailored to the unique characteristics of our business and portfolio companies. We utilise a materiality-driven strategy, which means that by engaging collaboratively with our portfolio companies, we define the priority of ESG topics most relevant to respective companies’ verticals. This allows us to focus on the most critical ESG risks and opportunities rather than addressing them all indifferently.

Moreover, we also consider the maturity level of our portfolio companies when implementing ESG. We do not demand that our portfolio meet the full criteria of ESG immediately while disregarding the companies’ financial sustainability. The bottom line is that the company needs to comply with all relevant ESG regulations. Beyond compliance, we collaboratively develop an ESG and impact action plan with our portfolio companies, laying out immediate and long-term improvements. Consequently, ESG becomes not just a compliance exercise but a value-adding initiative that fosters company growth.

What steps do you take to promote sustainability in your portfolio companies?

Our investment team and ESG Specialists actively work with our portfolio companies to map out their ESG integration and maximise opportunities for sustainable growth and impact creation.

For example, we work with our portfolio company in the agriculture sector to identify their detailed ESG risks and opportunities for improvement. The project’s outputs include recommendations on aligning with sustainability best practices to minimize biodiversity risk and improvements in Environmental and social management practices.

Also Read: East Ventures launches US$30M fund to back Indonesian startups

Following the project, we worked with the company to develop a strategy to improve internal processes and address respective ESG risks better.

Let us get back to the basics: How is implementing sustainability good for businesses?

Sustainability is a long-term goal that can be achieved through ESG implementation. ESG elements are becoming more crucial in influencing global business and investment choices. This trend stems from the realisation that sustainability and responsibility are vital for mitigating risks and fostering opportunities, leading to enduring value creation.

As a venture capital firm, our role in shaping the future involves supporting innovative firms that drive positive change. By incorporating ESG criteria in our investment strategies, we aim to generate value for our investors, portfolio companies, and the broader society.

We proactively look for investment prospects in companies aligned with our ESG commitments. Our investment emphasises enterprises tackling local challenges, enhancing efficiency and effectiveness, and making a significant positive impact. Our sustainable investment approach is designed to build a portfolio with meaningful impact, contributing to long-term value.

What aspects do you wish to improve on in your sustainability journey?

We have been launching our annual Sustainability Report for the last three years. It helps us better understand our efforts and serves as an assessment of our operation and initiatives for long-term sustainability/ESG goals.

We have gained some insightful insights/findings that help us strategise our operation better, and they have been implemented in our operation recently. We believe that if we do well, we want to do good, too. So, we are looking to create more initiatives and collaborate more with the relevant stakeholders to further create impacts and promote sustainability.

Also Read: East Ventures, SV Investment launch US$100M fund to bridge SEA, Korea startup ecosystems

What is your big agenda regarding sustainability this year?

We are dedicated to continuously enhancing our sustainability initiatives and upholding our principles and pledges. From an investment perspective, we will continue making investments that align with our ESG commitments.

Moreover, we remain committed to creating and supporting this space’s initiatives; for instance, we have again launched the Climate Impact Innovations Challenge with Temasek Foundation to empower climate-tech solutions in Indonesia and Southeast Asia.

We also launched a free web-based emission calculator for companies in Southeast Asia called ECOVISEA.

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Image Credit: East Ventures

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Not till long ago, ‘growth at any cost’ was the mantra in the startup world. Investors pushed their portfolio companies to acquire customers and grow the business at any cost. This prompted startups to splurge money with no clear goal to build a profitable and sustainable business. This strategy worked well when funding was a glut. 

However, a slowing global economy and the ongoing funding winter turned things around. Investors have now become more cautious and have realised that growth at any cost is unsustainable, making fundraising more challenging for startups. Investing in scalable and sustainable businesses has become the new buzzword.

Growth and scalability: similar but not the same

Although ‘growth’ and ‘scalability’ are two business jargon used to refer to an organisation’s overall development, few understand the differences. 

Scalability refers to the ability of a system, process, or organisation to handle increasing amounts of work or expansion without sacrificing performance, quality, or efficiency. It typically involves designing for flexibility, redundancy, and efficiency to ensure that resources can be added or adjusted as needed without significant disruption.

Growth, on the other hand, refers to the increase in size, revenue, market share, or any other metric of a business, product, or organisation over time. Growth can be organic, where it occurs naturally through increased demand or market penetration, or it can be stimulated through strategies such as marketing, acquisitions, or partnerships.

Let me give you an example- one of our portfolio companies, Goofy Tails, sells pet food. When we first invested in this firm, dog food formed the bulk of its sales (90 per cent). In one of our mentoring sessions with the founders, we learnt that the cat food market is big in a market like India, and we helped the company scale into this category with the right marketing strategy. 

This led to Goofy Tails’s cat food sales growth, leading to an increase in the startup’s total revenue, and currently, this category accounts for 30 per cent of the sales. This is an example of scaling.  Goofy Tails also plans to enter a new geography with the new products. This is growth. 

Also Read: Critical considerations: Address these 5 questions before scaling your tech startup

Another example is Healthfab, a firm that provides innovative and affordable health and hygiene solutions. They achieved scale by increasing production efficiency and using economies of scale to reduce cost. They scaled revenue six times in a short period and set up their own factory in Bangalore, India to reduce the costs further.

There are quite a few tools in the market to help with business scaling, but sadly, most founders don’t leverage them to their advantage. Using tools like chatbots to engage customers on your platform can be one simple way. This technique could nudge customers to return or buy more.

Risks associated with scaling, correcting bias with mentorship

A common mistake many founders make is investing a lot of money to scale and grow the business, assuming they can raise money to sustain it shortly. This stems from the belief that unit economic and profitability metrics are not crucial in the early stages and that priority should be given to scale and grow fast.

We believe this may not be an optimum strategy. We must understand that scaling and growing should be sustainable. Founders need to tread a fine line by spending wisely and controlling the cash burn. Of course, this results in slower scaling, but it is definitely sustainable. As the business scales, it is hard for founders to stay focused on innovation. ‘Sharing the experiences’ can be one way to tackle this challenge. This keeps founders motivated and stay focused on the core things.

Sometimes, founders fall into a confirmation bias trap and believe whatever they do is right and good for the business. This narrow mindset often hinders the ability to scale intelligently. Here is where an experienced mentor comes in handy. A mentor with a different and objective mindset could offer alternative and out-of-the-box solutions to their problems and help them scale faster and with less cash burn. 

A classic example is Unirec, one of India’s pioneering sustainable fashion brands. It partnered with Netflix to obtain the official rights to produce merchandise for the recently released Bollywood movie ‘The Archies’. They benefited from mentor support, which was instrumental in helping structure this collaboration.

Also Read: Powering startups: 10 cutting-edge digital marketing strategies for rapid growth

We understand that scaling a startup can be a daunting task, requiring expertise and experience that founders may lack. We believe there are five growth engines to help startups accelerate business growth while aiding them in overcoming any strategic or operational challenges that they may face. These Growth Engines, led by industry experts, comprise five pillars, including BeyondMarketing, BeyondDistribution, BeyondServices, BeyondCapital and BeyondPeople.

Collaboration is crucial

Bringing together two or more companies with complementary products is also another great way to scale faster for both. 

An example is a recent collaboration between multiple startups in the pet-care space. Companies like Urban Animal and GoofyTails partnered with Dog-O-Bow to offer their products on the Dog-O-Bow platform. Simultaneously, MyPetzOPD, a mobile veterinary care startup, established a satellite centre at DogNation. Such opportunities to collaborate often come in places where we would least expect them. 

In a nutshell, collaboration helps companies to scale quickly and easily. However, collaborations occur only when founders know each other well and work together productively. 

No more blind expansion

With the free flow of capital becoming a thing of the past, venture capitalists and other types of startup investors have started prioritising sustainability and scalability. Companies that can handle increased demand without compromising quality or burning through cash are the new targets for them.  

Having said that, sustainable scaling requires prudent financial management and ongoing innovation. Collaboration, mentorship, and leveraging tools for engagement are vital in navigating the complex journey of startup scaling. Sharing best practices within ecosystems and having experienced mentors can help founders navigate challenges and achieve sustainable growth. By focusing on scalability, startups can navigate the current economic climate and position themselves for long-term success.

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