The startup paradox: Altruism juxtaposed with toxicity; You want to help every startup founder in the same boat and they want to help you back; It would be great if we could somehow bottle this altruism and provide the same level of support to our own teams. e27
Delivery app Line Man merges with Thai restaurant review platform Wongnai; The new entity has received US$110M from BRV Capital Management; The move is expected to help Line Man as it tussles with other regional players like Grab, gojek and foodpanda in the food delivery war. Bangkok Post
Meet the VC: In conversation with East Ventures’ first female partner, Melisa Irene; With over 170 investments in companies across SEA and Japan, it recently launched its new sector-agnostic fund worth US$88M; According to her, VCs are becoming more careful, and the growth-stage investment might return back in 2021 as the market is still predicting a recovery post-vaccine. e27
Startup funding rounds in July: Survival was the name of this game; One of the most notable was Traveloka’s US$250M fundraise amidst COVID-19; New protein sector was a popular sector in July, with companies like Burgreens and Karana announcing their funding rounds. e27
Rachel Lau of RHL Ventures on the kind of thinking that allows innovation; She says the tech industry has changed tremendously over the last 3 years; Now, there’s a lot of emphasis on sustainability and margins; There’s a lot of maturity coming from investors and they are more involved in the ecosystem and building it, instead of just being invested in a company. e27
This Singapore startup turns jackfruit into plant-based pork; Karana’s whole-plant pork is available shredded or minced, and it’s also catered for Asian recipes; Recently, plant-based products have come under fire for being unhealthy, highly-processed products from food industry executives and health experts. Vulcan Post
Visa joins Thailand Tourism Authority to expand ‘new normal’ digital payments; Visa will be working with financial institutions to support businesses partners in upgrading their payment acceptance service to card payments; According to a recent study, 3 in 5 Thais are forming cashless habits, preferring to pay with cards or through mobile applications over cash. Pattaya Mail
The roadblocks on the smartphone commerce journey; Security concerns and limited usability can be obstacles to buying via smartphones; But consumers use their phones to get an overview of available products; If the smartphone develops into a universal digital wallet, synergy and network effects will emerge that could accelerate the change. Digital Commerce 360
Why we need to stop glamourising startups with fancy labels and focus on real metrics; The unicorn status has reached such ubiquity that it’s hard to kill; The other labels seem to be either a response to global situations or a response to the shortcomings of unicorns; Whether you’re a startup unicorn or camel, your business is still being fuelled by the man-hours and ingenuity you put into the company. e27
HashStacs, Bursa Malaysia to develop blockchain platform for tracking investor holdings; This will also enable investors to automate the movement of funds and securities — increasing liquidity and asset servicing for the market; This is done by enabling the participant banks and the exchange to securely share a single data source that can be trusted.
Startups get insights into overcoming challenges; The world is undergoing a great transformation with four ‘bigs’ playing a leading role — Big Tech, Big Media, Big State and Big Health; Businesses need to abandon traditional, pre-COVID ways of doing things and adapt to the VUCA normal — volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. HRM Asia Media
Being geek and gay in SEA: What startup ecosystem can do to foster diversity and inclusion; If you ask an LGBTQ individual in SEA about how they are being treated by society, the answer will vary depending on where they reside; While countries such as Thailand are perceived as more accepting, other countries leave a lot to be desired. e27
The unstoppable rise of fintech in SEA; A collaborative approach is endemic to the fintech industry; It is not a ‘winner takes all situation’ — the market is huge enough to accommodate partnerships, collaborations, to innovate with customer-centric products and carve out new areas of niche services. Tech Collective
The road to recurring revenue for hardware startups; Hardware has one advantage over software: customers understand there is a cost to your product; This allows hardware startups to generate revenue with their first iteration, but it’s unsustainable as the company grows and needs to innovate. TechCrunch
HR-tech firm Globalization Partners (GP) bares full-scale expansion into APAC; This expansion comes on the back of its US$150M funding round; The new APAC ops will support companies based in Asia that are looking to expand both within and outside the region; GP’ claims its solution enables any company to hire anyone, anywhere, in as little as 12 hours into every market around the globe. NewsBytes.ph
Filipino edutech startup touts AI-powered school management system; Its software analyses data that schools from K-12 to colleges can use in their planning and operations; It utilises smart algorithms and AI; The firm claims it has achieved its target to help over 25K students across 10 schools. NewsBytes.ph
Filipino fintech firm Bayad Center to push for more branches, online platforms; To date, it has set up 39K payment touchpoints around the country, with daily transactions of over 10K; Aside from bills payments, it also services domestic and international remittances, insurance sales, medical reimbursement, ferry and airline ticketing, ATM withdrawal, and loan disbursement. Newsbytes.ph
6 leading investors assess the remote-work startup landscape; VCs do not believe that the remote-work services and tooling world is solved; It would be simple to presume that a growing library of apps and services would lead to SaaS fatigue, but the VC group isn’t too worried about the concept. TechCrunch
How brands in Asia are paving the way for a post-pandemic recovery; As the world navigates the unchartered territories, it is a time for learning, experimenting and adapting; Some brands have shown that when the status quo does not work, new approaches and strategies cannot only help them survive and recover, but also pay rich dividends in the future. Appier blog
Is Cambodia’s startup ecosystem ripe for a new era of growth?; 47% of its population is aged under 25; Combined with a mobile and internet penetration rate of 120% and 84% respectively, it is safe to say tech-savviness resides among the top traits of the population. e27
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