Singapore-based investment firm Kollective Ventures (KV) and Turn Capital (the family office of Joseph Phua, Co-founder and Non-Executive Chairman of 17LIVE) have jointly agreed to fully acquire Taiwanese podcast platform SoundOn.

The details of the deal were not disclosed.

As per a press note, SoundOn will continue to operate under its current brand and its services remain unaffected. KV and Turn Capital will look to continue to “accelerate” the growth of the company and the industry in the near future.

Also Read: How 5-year-old live-streaming app 17LIVE acquired 60M users globally

Founded in late 2019 by Likai Gu, SoundOn produces its own content shows featuring Taiwan’s top influencers, besides connecting podcasters to advertisers. The platform also manages its own podcast player app and website, which it claims has been the go-to source for discovering new podcasts in the Taiwanese market.

SoundOn said it has grown to become the largest podcast hosting platform in Taiwan, with over 35 million monthly podcast downloads. This number is projected to grow to over 500 million downloads in 2021.

The Taiwanese podcast industry has grown exponentially since SoundOn’s entry in 2019. The number of podcasts produced for the local audience has grown from less than 50 before 2019 to over 10,000 today. SoundOn claimed its own traffic has grown over 20x in the past year.

“With the growth in market size and SoundOn’s strong product-market fit, the company has achieved over 70 per cent market share and looks to drive further domination in 2021. Kollective Ventures and Turn Capital see massive potential in the podcast and audio space in Taiwan, and this acquisition allows us to further invest and develop the podcast ecosystem,” said Phua.

Also Read: Kollective Ventures acquires Paktor Group from M17 Entertainment

“Recent global success stories in the space, like Clubhouse, have shown the explosive potential of the social audio entertainment space. We look forward to exploring synergies between our audio-related portfolio companies to create an Asian beachhead in this space,” opined Khenglian Ho, Managing Partner at Kollective Ventures.

Last May, KV had acquired Paktor Group, which was founded by Phua, from M17 Entertainment. Paktor is the umbrella that owns a few dating assets, including its namesake app available in Taiwan, Korea and Southeast Asia, and Goodnight, a voice-dating app.

On Monday, Podcast Network Asia, a Philippine-based podcast network agency, announced raising of US$750,000 in seed funding from Foxmont Capital, Venturra Discovery, Kumu and Lisa Gokongwei, President of Summit Media.

Image Credit: SoundOn

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If you’re tired of the buzzwords, you’re not alone. The idea of a “digital transformation” or digitalisation or any other kind of coined version of “change” drives many in business to the brink. The reason is that seasoned professionals know that embracing every buzzword doesn’t guarantee success.

You need more than buzzwords. You need results.

An already popular study from the Harvard Business Review pegs the fail rate at around 70 per cent for most digital initiatives. Seventy per cent. Two-thirds. What’s worse is that McKinsey surveyed several businesses, asking them if they thought their businesses would stay “economically viable” if the trend towards digitalisation continued.

The results? Only eight per cent believed they would…

Only eight per cent of businesses think they could survive the changing tides that technology and innovation bring. That’s shocking.

If your business wants to do more than survive, it needs a different approach to optimise processes in your business. It needs to take control. And doing isn’t as difficult as you may think, provided you make the right choices at the start.

How to successfully transform your business

Before you can understand what works, you need to realise what doesn’t. While there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to transforming your business, there are mindsets you can and should avoid. 

Luckily, the right solutions can help you overcome the common problems that plague scaling your business. This is your roadmap to scale your business successfully.

Problem: Lacking clear expectations

When you ask many executives and department heads what their goals are for their company, you often hear generic responses, “Improve customer service, grow sales, and stay competitive.” 

Also Read: Ecosystem Roundup: Grab considering US IPO this year; Turochas Fuad unveils his new BNPL venture; Tesla scaling its S’pore team

But generic mantras won’t get you far. And tacking on “digital transformation” to every initiative doesn’t constitute change.

Businesses aren’t clear cut, black and white processes with concrete, established boundaries. They’re organic entities with a lot of moving parts. If you shift one area of your company without respect to how it will affect another, you risk doing more harm than good. 

New processes need to flow across all areas of your organisation. Without that, they’ll fall apart before they even get off the ground.

Solution: Clearly defined business goals

The solution is to have clear business strategies. Rather than have generic goals, discuss and create specific, reachable ones. Once you define those goals, you’ll be able to easily backward design a roadmap to get you there. 

During this process, you should listen to input from all departments so that you can have an understanding of how each area of your business evaluate success. You’ll also see the obstacles that stand in the way of that success.

Delegating a single approach will not work. Successful business transformation rests in having a holistic strategy. It should keep in mind the focus of the goals, how to implement them, and how to balance change with growth. It should also be dynamic and run from the top-down, back up again, and throughout the business as a whole. 

Remember, without clearly defined goals, your strategy will lose momentum before it even sets sail.

Problem: Choosing the wrong beginning

There are most likely clear strategies you can put to work right now that would reduce costs and keep your business competitive. But are they the right strategies? And how do you know? And which order should you implement them? 

While it may seem commonsensical to implement quick, simple solutions, that may not be the best approach. Quick fixes can be like patches that take up time and resources but only slow the problem temporarily. To really make a change, you need to think bigger.

Solution: Prioritise strategies for change

While creating the strategy for your company’s future success, begin listing needed changes to workflows and processes in your business. 

Once you know what changes your business could benefit from, see how other processes would be affected by implementing these changes. 

Also, look at what problems remain after putting them into practice. You’ll quickly find that some quick fixes may be unnecessary. Or worse, you may discover that they slow down progress.

Problem: Having a “set-it” and “forget it” mindset

With the ease of access to information these days, it doesn’t take much effort to find out what kind of tactics successful companies used to grow and stay competitive. 

Certain workflows may, again, seem commonsensical at first. And requiring rigorous review and oversight before adding them as solid stepping stones toward progress may seem excessive.

Also Read: How understanding culture can drive digitalisation of payments in Myanmar

Except there’s a problem with that way of thinking. Every business is different. One strategy and roadmap may work well for one company. But it could fail to bring results for your business. Expecting solutions to work because they worked for other organisations is a recipe for disaster. You need to take a different approach.

Solution: Create a custom roadmap for digitalisation

You need a strategy that reflects your company culture, brand, and mission. And more importantly, you need one that caters to your employees’ needs. Any new processes won’t succeed if employees don’t advocate for them. 

Designing a roadmap specifically for your business with company culture in mind is a great way to avoid irritating issues. Looking at the data to back up any decisions while using KPIs to further evaluate performance before augmenting initiatives is key.

It’s better to think of business transformation as a continuous process. One that must be constantly evaluated, adjusted, and tested before its full value is realised. 

And once your new systems take hold and yield results, more employees will aid in championing them on their own. With your company behind new initiatives, successful business transformation is more likely to occur.

Problem: Underestimating the power of disruption

Often, important tasks get pushed aside. Even though executives know the value in successfully digitising your business, they may not fully understand the consequences of putting it off. True. Digital innovation now happens at a far more rapid scale than ever before.

Advancements, data, and analytics mean that more companies are working harder to provide services customers expect. Some changes need to happen quicker than others. And some can be avoided altogether. 

This results in a kind of “analysis paralysis” where companies believe it’s better to hold off and wait because something better is on the horizon.

Solution: Prioritise agility

Rather than waiting for a “better” system, create both a business and company culture that values agility. The key to any successful attempt at digitisation in your company is to have champions behind it. But for that to happen organically, you need a system that clearly improves the experience of those interacting with it.

The best way to do this is to create workflow processes that are easily adaptable. The beauty in business optimisation is that many software solutions are cloud-based. 

They also promote the use of automation and integrations. And as a result, new systems can be far more easily connected to existing ones. These types of workflows reduce processes, handling menial tasks that often bog down employees’ time.

By making digitalisation easier for your company, you’ll greatly reduce pushback from implementing new systems.

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Drivehub, a Thailand-based online car rental platform, announced today it has closed a “USD seven-figure” Series A funding round, co-led by Toyota Tsusho, CAC Capital, and KK Fund.

As per a press note, the fresh funds will be deployed to enhance Drivehub’s software and technological systems, as well as expand to new markets in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

Launched in 2017, Drivehub is an online marketplace where users can “instantly” check vehicle availability, compare prices and quality and transact. The Bangkok-based startup claims it is able to do that through its “real-time” connection to the fleet of rental car companies.

Drivehub shared that it also offers different payment methods for car rentals on its platform. Users can transact through a credit card for international service providers such as Hertz and Dollar, or choose to pay by cash for local service providers.

The ability to pay for rentals with cash is welcomed in Southeast Asia where credit card signups have remained low. Consumers in the region often resort to alternate forms of payments such as cash. In Thailand, 52 per cent of car rentals occur without a credit card.

Also Read: Do you take cash? 3 hurdles to a cashless Singapore

Drivehub claims it has grown by 50 per cent compared to the same period last year, despite sales setbacks by as much as 90 per cent in April 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Drivehub is in the process of using the funding to expand on a regional scale, while also seeking for opportunities to transform the conventional rental car service,” said Thatchai Chuaprapaisilp, CEO and Co-founder of Drivehub.

The company also announced a new partnership with Thai trading company Toyota Tsusho. With the latter’s capabilities in sale-purchase of new or used cars, auto financing and car insurance, Drivehub said it would be able to expand and tailor its solutions to meet the changing demand of consumers.

According to the startup, small local rental car providers will be provided with the opportunity to enhance and expand their business in a sustainable way too.

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Image Credit: Drivehub

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The story is based on my five years of experience working with amazing team members in content marketing at iPrice Group. Here are my 10 key learnings from this journey:

(Really) Teach what you preach

People will directly or indirectly replicate how their leaders behave. If we want people to read, we need to read. If we want people to be creative, show what creative behaviour looks like. If we want people to put their heart into their work, put ours.

“Monkey sees, monkey do”.

Build, develop, and reward a learning behaviour

Learning is one of the biggest factors for people to join or leave a team company. It’s also one of the most crucial skills in any organisation. If it’s done well, the team can be really-really effective and performs really well.

Everyone wants people to learn. But to learn we need to have a supportive environment. We need to build + continuously develop + reward the behaviour of learning.

Give people a chance to learn something new or level up their understanding of a certain topic. And when people learn, reward their behaviour. As simple as saying “good learnings!” or until the extent of asking them to do a sharing session with the rest of the team.

Also Read: Making offline marketing cool again: How this AI startup is changing the future of B2C advertising

Put extremely high standards on the hiring

“People are the foundation of any company’s success”
– Trillion Dollar Coach

• Make an easy to digest + compelling job description in any openings in your team
• Do a passive search and ask for a recommendation from “high performers”
• Provide pre-screening questions in the application form. This is to help you to do an early check of the applicants. Highly recommended as this saves a lot of your time.
• Prepare a set of questions to check all aspects from the candidate: behavioural + technical
• Form a case study to understand more detail about their understanding of the topics and ability to produce something
• Give chance + encourage the candidates to ask you questions
• (If possible) Ask other team members to have a chat with the candidates

The process might be slightly longer, but it’s really worth it.

Genuinely care with your team and invest time to coach them

One of our main responsibility as a manager is to develop our people. Spending time with them so they can learn the most important skills they need to have to be really successful in their role now (technical and behavioural).

To do this effectively, we need to genuinely care about their personal and career growth. Always ask questions and clarify what areas they really interested in + need to learn at their stage now. Never assume.

Whenever you see progress, congratulate them and let them know they are progressing. It’s important because people want to know whether they are progressing or not.

Create a safe environment for people to discuss, debate, and disagree

“High-performing teams need psychological safety”

–  HBR

Be super-super explicit to everyone in the team that it’s totally okay to openly share their opinion (even if it’s different); it’s okay to disagree (as long as they have a strong reason), and it’s okay to debate on a topic (as long they are being respectful to each other).

As a manager, continuously remind people about this. Show an example of how to do it right, and reward people that promoting this value.

Also Read: Epsilo raises US$2M to expand its SaaS e-commerce marketing platform across Asia

Proactively ask for feedback from team members + act on it

Naturally, people hate feedback. But at the same time, we know it’s super valuable.

Make people understand why it’s extremely valuable to have this mentality in the team (Why?). Once they understand the why give them a regular example (day-to-day basis) on how to give good feedback + how to openly receive one.

The top recommendation when it comes to this is the book by Kim Scott, Radical Candor.

Encourage and trust your team to try and do an experiment

Most of you who read it probably works on tech companies, or if not working in a company that wants to be successful. So one of the keys is to continue innovating. Coming up with new ideas + test them out.

Observe any problem or challenges you have in your team and ask people “So do you guys think we can do about it?” Really listen to all the ideas and let them own it and test their solution.

Be very clear and explicit with what we expect from the team

Never ever assume people know what’s in our minds. They are not a mentalist. Want people to be punctual in a meeting? Tell them.

Want people to be respectful with each other? Tell them. Being explicit sometimes is not easy. But it’ll save a lot of time for everyone.

Celebrate wins and learnings

Whenever people learn something new or achieve something (small or big) celebrate in a team. Let people know that their hard work is important and people aware of it. Especially you as their manager.

Also Read: Why team-building exercises won’t make your staff more productive

Few ideas (during this COVID-19 period) 

• Create a chat group to “celebrate wins and achievements”,
• Publicly mention the work + the person on social media (LinkedIn/ Twitter)
• Send small gifts (food)
• Have a dedicated session to thank other people

Learn to tell jokes

The rationale is to bring fun elements into your team. You don’t need to be a stand-up comedian. Just learn to tell few jokes and be fun in the team!

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2020 has finally come to an end. Although the world is still shrouded in the shadow of the Black Swan event of COVID-19, the crisis has reached a turning point. As the pandemic continues to affect all parts of the world, many organisations, companies, and startups have turned to big data and AI to transform and optimise the efficiency of business activities, directly accelerating the overall development of the AI industry.

According to IDC’s report, the global AI market in 2020 will amount to US$156.5 billion, with a growth rate of 12.3 per cent, of which 80 per cent will be attributed to software. IDC also optimistically expects that the market size of the AI industry, considered by some as a blue ocean, will compound at an annual rate of 17 per cent and exceed US$300 billion by 2024.

For various AI initiatives and applications to flourish, data centres must be fully developed to support the storage of data and training models, brain-like IaaS (information-as-a-service), and PaaS (platform-as-a-service) cloud services. After meeting the performance requirements of AI for cloud services, data in various fields such as finance and manufacturing can be used more efficiently to accelerate AI technology.

It should then come as no surprise that leading international cloud players such as Google and Microsoft have recently announced their intentions to deepen their investments in Taiwan’s AI Infrastructure.

Last September, Google unveiled that it would build a third data centre in Yunlin, while Microsoft disclosed at the end of October that it would set up its first Azure data centre in Taiwan.

Also Read: Kollective Ventures and Joseph Phua’s family office acquire SoundOn, a Taiwanese startup with 35M monthly podcast downloads

As Taiwan’s future cloud infrastructure realises, developers will no longer need to build services through overseas data centres, which will accelerate AI innovations and applications by local teams, especially in areas that are more sensitive to data sovereignty, such as finance.

Every six months, AppWorks releases an updated Taiwan AI Ecosystem Map, distilling the latest trends and developments while highlighting various companies leading the charge. In the process of reviewing the overall ecosystem changes, we have observed the following trends in the second half of 2020.

AI in healthtech has attracted investors’ attention

Although the pandemic has negatively impacted economic productivity and overall investor appetite, it has unequivocally accelerated the adoption of AI innovation in healthcare.  Despite the rather barren investment landscape in the first half of 2020, aetherAI, which provides medical imaging AI development services and AI digital pathology systems, managed to close a US$6 million Series A round led by Quanta Computing.

In the second half of 2020, Deep01, which assists medical staff in interpreting computer tomography (CT) and provides an AI image interpretation system for cerebral hemorrhaging, successfully raised NT$80 million (US$2.7 million) in seed funding led by ASUS Capital. In addition, Heroic-Faith, which pioneered innovative medical devices such as an AI stethoscope and a smart respiratory monitoring system, also completed a US$4 million series A round of fundraising in 2020.

Also Read: What is the state of Taiwan’s AI ecosystem?

Moving forward, the next step for Taiwan’s healthtech and AI industry is to go global. As the main markets for medical AI-related products are still focused in developed countries such as the US, Japan, and Europe, Taiwan’s visibility coupled with the impact of the pandemic will have an effect on an international scale. Whether these innovative startups can successfully go overseas to scale will become the focus of attention in the future.

Corporates are accelerating their search for transformation and collaboration opportunities

For many traditional Taiwanese companies, big data and AI have been at the crux of their digital transformation initiatives and overall search for the next growth engines. In 2020, Commonwealth Magazine and Europe’s IMD jointly released the first digital transformation survey between Taiwan and Europe.

It pointed out that up to 52 per cent of Taiwanese companies have not yet been digitally transformed, and only 4 per cent of companies achieved or exceeded their digital transformation goals. Whether it’s in-house big data and AI project teams or looking for partners in the startup world, it has become the newest goal for companies to innovate.

The most direct model is creating corporate venture capital (CVC) arms to invest in new ventures with strategic value. In addition to investment, Taiwan’s major companies are also exploring other collaborative models. For example, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of IoT systems Advantech worked with StarFab to establish an accelerator.

Wistron, on the other hand, not only promotes upgrading the industry through partnerships with startups but also actively lays out future transformations. They collaborated with NCTU to establish embedded AI research centres, and jointly planned Wistron Lab @ Garage+ with Chia Hsin Cultural Foundation and Times Foundation to find growth opportunities in the next decade.

Taiwan’s AI ecosystem is bolstered by the successful prevention of the epidemic

Due to the success of the Taiwan government and all citizens and residents in fighting the pandemic, Taiwan’s AI ecosystem continued to flourish in the second half of 2020. On the startup accelerator side, AppWorks Accelerator has been recruiting specifically for AI startups since August 2018, fostering a total of 84 teams from both inside and outside of Taiwan.

Other community partners such as Microsoft for Startups, SparkLabs Taipei, and Taiwan AI x Robotics Accelerator also recruited a number of AI-related startups to inject new energy into Taiwan’s AI ecosystem. In the second half of 2020, due to the proper control of the coronavirus, it was relatively safe to host physical events in Taiwan. The largest startup event 2020 Meet Taipei showcased many startups using AI and big data to create more value-added services. 

Also Read: How Taiwan’s blockchain industry is powering through the downturn

Taiwan AI Academy, Taiwan AI Labs, and the Artificial Intelligence Foundation are Taiwan’s representative institutions in the field of AI education and research, and continue to inject talent and innovative technologies for the development of AI in Taiwan. With the support from the government, institutions, and overall ecosystem, Taiwan can continue to promote the implementation of AI in various industries and integrate innovation into traditional businesses.

This gives an opportunity for startups to leverage the resources that Taiwan can offer and connect with players in the ecosystem that are upgrading Taiwan’s AI capabilities.

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Hi, I’m Jack. I joined AppWorks as an Analyst in April 2019, not long after I burnt through two startups –one I co-founded in 2017 and the other as a founding team member. My experience taught me that building a successful company is extremely difficult, and if I wanted to improve my odds, I needed to learn from people who have successfully built them.

Now at AppWorks, I get to work alongside 1,300 founders of all stages amongst a variety of startups, 395 active ones to be exact, across the most exciting region that is Greater Southeast Asia, giving me truly a grand scope of founders to learn from.

This year, the coronavirus disrupted the normal world order, taking millions of lives in the process and slowing down economies all around the world. Amongst the chaos, startups from all stages were affected. Besides the select few that prevailed, most startups either saw stagnant growth or worst, shut down their business.

On my journey to become a better founder myself, behind this very unfortunate event was a learning opportunity of a lifetime. This is why I set out to write this piece, to document my learnings and improve my understanding. I got to see just how startups that overcome the pandemic reacted differently to those that didn’t.

Amongst our network of founders, I had the chance to closely observe Ming Ming Chen, the founder and CEO of KKday – a travel platform that provides local experiences and tours across Asia.

I got to witness first hand how he coped with drastic changes that affected his business, how he made quality decisions that pushed KKday to prevail, and how he quickly mobilised the entire company to effectively weather the storm.

Also Read: Ecosystem Roundup: Tech investments in Vietnam drop by 22% in H1; KKday raises US$75M; ShopBack, RedDoorz face data breach

I believe the key lessons distilled here are applicable to early-stage founders all the way up to founders heading into Series B, especially for those that want to learn how to lead a team through uncertainties.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a once-in-a-generation crisis, pushing founders to the test in every single aspect possible, so the lessons observed here should be great additions to your arsenal.

First, plan for the worst to conquer yourself

Back in January when the pandemic first broke out, I hopped on a call with Chen to check in on KKday’s pulse. I remember distinctly that he was very calm and collected. It was hard to tell from his demeanour that 90 per cent of travel in this region was wiped out almost overnight.

I asked him what’s going through his head. Chen mentioned that in his 20+ years of entrepreneurship, a key principle he practised was to always plan for the worst.

By always planning for the worst, KKday has been extremely disciplined in managing their cash flow and balance sheet. The key principle is to not sink short-term assets into long-term investments, optimising for cash flow flexibility in return.

This played a major role in neutralising the initial shock of the outbreak, allowing KKday to protect their brand and refund customers fully, despite a significant drop in revenue.

The other benefit of planning for the worst is better-managed expectations. When bad situations don’t turn out as bad as you had anticipated, then your own morale and energy are left unperturbed.

Also Read: KKday raises US$75M Series C to meet the demand surge for local experiences as Asia’s travel market reopens

This side effect may seem negligible at first, but being the captain of the ship that’s lost at sea, the crew’s attitude is an extension of its captain. Displaying the slightest frustration and anger does not instil confidence in your team, but only serves to discourage them. What seemed like a minuscule change in perspective can actually impact the entire company.

By simply planning for the worst situation possible, Chen and KKday were able to soften the initial blow of the pandemic. But as the travel industry came to a near freeze, how can a founder turn around their startup’s fate from barely managing survival to proactively creating opportunity?

A decision framework against uncertainty

Having led two companies to IPO before starting KKday, Chen draws from a wealth of knowledge and experience to overcome the pandemic. He explains that the result of any decision is amplified during troubled times, either directly adding more uncertainty to your team or reducing it.

Furthermore, the result also impacts the decision maker’s future credits to lead their team. Thus, increasing the decision quality across the company was a key lever to pushing KKday forward.

Chen distilled his decision framework into four steps “seek-digest-strategise-decide” and every decision made within KKday goes through this rigorous process.

The first step is to “seek” information and data that’d accurately represent the reality of the decision. The second step is to “digest” the information and to understand the scope and the stakes.

The third step is to “strategise”, plan and test the hypothesis of your decision; it is important to stress test your thesis and evaluate whether or not it adequately stands up to reality by inviting other stakeholders into the discussion to either validate or invalidate your understanding.

The last step is to “decide”. The founder or the leader of the team needs to make the decision alone, as they need to carry the responsibility for the result. They need to decide on the tradeoffs of making the decision, and whether or not to proceed or revisit the preceding steps.

Also Read: Lessons from a travel tech startup founder on navigating the pandemic-stricken business landscape

Throughout 2020, KKday has transitioned from selling tours for foreigners travelling in a new country to weekend getaways and other domestic excursions for people living in Taiwan, while also branching into products that extend far beyond their typical offering including protective masks and packets of mala hot pot.

In the process of venturing into the unknown, Chen and his team carefully used this framework to test their hypothesis, efficiently and effectively pushing forward their progress without losing precious resources and energy.

And as the year draws to a close, we are seeing all of these initiatives not only making up for the missing revenue but also enabling KKday to strengthen its brand and build goodwill among its customer base, while acquiring a slew of new users in the process.

But making better decisions is only part of the equation, what truly pushed KKday above the line was their execution upon these decisions. So just how did KKday, a company with hundreds of employees, with operations in more than 10 countries adapt to the new normal so swiftly?

Using organisation structure to drive your strategy

Much like a sports team that changes their lineup according to their game plan and the opposing team, a founder needs to structure their organisation and teams relative to the environment and strategy, to maximise the organisation’s output.

Once Chen and his team decided to introduce new products and focus on domestic travel, the way the organisation was previously structured needed to be reshaped, as it no longer yielded optimal efficiency in promoting the new strategy.

Rather than having the Taiwan HQ team approve all products for travellers on their platform, KKday adapted to procuring products locally, authorising local teams to source products for their own markets allowing them to move much faster than before.

Also Read: Taiwan’s travel experience e-commerce platform KKday raises funding from Alibaba to expand to China

The teams also overhauled their KPIs to focus on improving new product sales and domestic travel sales. These new KPIs became the guidelines and instructions that empowered the new teams to directly facilitate the change in strategy, enabling the company to quickly transition from serving outbound travellers to domestic travellers.

COVID-19 hit different countries with varying severity, creating non-linear recovery across all of KKday’s active markets. The organisational restructuring served as an effective way for local teams to rapidly respond to local conditions as needed, helping the travel company to pull off an incredibly successful year by all standard measures—no doubt exemplified by the US$75 million Series C they recently raised in the midst of a pandemic.

There is much more to learn

By always planning for the worst, Chen was able to soften the initial impact for the pandemic, and by improving the decision quality across the board, KKday was able to create opportunities even when the odds were stacked against them.

Most importantly, by efficiently managing the organisation, KKday was able to execute quickly upon the opportunity they identified and improve their chance of survival at every corner and every turn.

These lessons observed here are not commonly found in public domains, and only really shared from one founder to another. As I tried to build my first startup at the age of 25, I mostly did it in isolation without knowing any other founders at all. Looking back, so many mistakes could have been avoided, and so much time could have been saved if I had just learned from founders who were a few years more journeyed than me.

So if you are like me, and you wish to become a better founder and build a successful company in the future, then I encourage you to join a community like AppWorks Accelerator, where you can interact with and learn from over 1,300 founders just like Chen.

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Image Credit: KKday

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Golden Gate Ventures (GGV), one of Singapore’s active VC firms, has promoted Jeffrey Chua as Principal.

Chua has been at the heart of numerous investment-related activities and has helped founders grow ever since he joined the company as an intern five years ago.

In an interview with e27, Chua said that he will continue to focus on processing venture deals. Moving forward, he will also become more active on the portfolio management side.

Being the only junior investment professional at GVV since a long time, Chua brings the experience of being involved in almost all of its major deals. Among them are BukuWarung, Funding Societies, KooBits, and Carro.

In this interview, Chua discusses his personal investment strategy, what he looks for in founders, the GGV’s investment thesis and how deals might change post-COVID-19.

GGV is among one of the most well-renowned early-stage VC firms, globally. How did your journey in this space begin? 

Chua: I ended up in the VC space by accident. It wasn’t something that I had planned.

After studying in the US, I decided to move back to Singapore and was basically helping out my mother with a couple of side investments and everything.

A friend of mine, whom I had known during my time in New York, convinced me to join GGV as an intern, and I decided to give it a shot after staying home for the longest time.

Also Read: Top contributions this week: Golden Gate’s Vinnie Lauria shares pitching from home tips and more

Could you also share a little bit more about the GGV investment thesis and the kind of investments that you largely focus on?

Chua: We are a consumer-focused VC that focuses on software-based tech companies in Southeast Asia, therefore we tend not to play in hardware. The general thesis is the consumer journey within Southeast Asia and the focus is consumer upliftment and improvement. So it could be like payments and logistics companies that make the daily lives of the general population smoother and more efficient.

What are some of the key qualities that you look for in founders?

Chua: For me, I must walk away from the conversation learning something new. If I walk into a meeting and happen to know more about the business model or industry than the founder himself/herself, it’s a red sign. So I like to look for someone who can teach me something new.

Another thing that I look for are people who can change my mind. I might come into a meeting with a certain view or thesis on something. But I’m open to having my mind change if they’re able to change my mind in a very convincing way. That’s usually a very positive sign.

So, the founder has to have some qualities of a good salesman?

Chua: The founder should be able to back up his ideas with sales.

Adding to that, how often do you look at numbers for your early-stage deals? Are you more founder-focused or number-focused?

Chua: It really depends on the stage of the startup that we’re looking at, and what the context of the conversation is. I think, in the VC space, at least in the early stage, I’m probably one of the more numerically-inclined people, where I like going through Excel models and financial plans.

So, if you have data on your current business model, what I’m looking for are things that show me that what you are telling me has been proven or are based on numbers.

At the end of the day, I’m not an accountant. I won’t say ‘hey, your balance sheet doesn’t balance’.

Also Read: Golden Gate Ventures, INSEAD on the state of Southeast Asia’s future exits: trade sales, secondary sales to lead

What are some deals that you passed on that eventually went on to become successful startups? 

Chua: We try not to look back at this because we understand that we’re not going to hit every single unicorn. For us, we like to play in the space where we would like to make the best quality decisions based off of the data available. The outcome, there could be various different factors that play into it.

Speaking more broadly, what signal is the market currently sending post-COVID-19 in terms of investments? Should we expect more deals?

Chua: Overall I think investments will get easier and things will move faster and smoother. Due to the pandemic, a lot of deals that were in the US$10-million range and above were slowed down or stalled since people were not allowed to travel and visit these companies in person. But going forward, when people are able to travel, they’re able to get back to their regular due diligence process.

For GGV, in terms of the number of deals that we’ve seen, things haven’t really changed much since pre-COVID-19. So our pipelines were still pretty full of companies.

We also heard that you beat a couple of investors at the reverse startup competition organised by Slush? What was the winning idea?

Chua: The reverse pitching competition is where investors have to pitch to startups, and I had signed up for it and gone up there and pitched a company called ‘Uber for trains’.

My pitch was that I was raising US$1 trillion to cover Singaporean railroads so that people would be able to hail trains from anywhere. And then I ended up winning because I made everyone laugh the most.

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Image Credit: Golden Gate Ventures

The post ‘Founders should be able to back up their ideas with sales’: Golden Gate’s newly-appointed Principal Jeffrey Chua appeared first on e27.

Meet Frank Oelschlager, who helps companies digitize and automate. Today, he shares how you can get started!

We discuss:
* What is automation + why is it important?
* Examples of automation
* How can you start automating NOW?
* Why Millenials + Gen Z are making companies more honest!

If you don’t see the Apple player above, click on a link below to listen directly!

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This article was first published on We Live To Build.

Image Credit: Michal Czyz on Unsplash

The post Automation should eat your company with Frank Oelschlager appeared first on e27.

Snap yourself using your smartphone camera and have your vital health signs displayed in under a minute? Though it may sound too good to be true, that is exactly what Nervotec promises its users.

All you have to do is to scan your face and the app will measure your oxygen saturation, heart rate, heart rate variability and stress level. After filling up a symptom checker, a health score is generated on the platform.

However, Nervotec had not always set out to serve to provide health tracking solutions for the public. Initially named Flaiight and started in June 2019 by former fighter pilot Jonathan Lau, the Singapore-based healthtech startup had targeted providing health management and workplace wellness tech solutions to ensure pilots were physically healthy before taking to the skies.

“In the beginning, we used wearable technology and gamified traditional psychometric assessments to generate a flight risk score for pilots. It was in this journey that we discovered that predictive analytics could have applications well beyond the flight assessment context,” shared Lau in an interview with e27.

Having faced difficulties in supplying off-the-shelf tracking wearables to corporations due to high costs and challenges in data collection, Lau shared the Nervotec team decided to develop an in-house solution to solve this issue.

Also Read: Singapore startup StretchSkin develops wearable sensors for the healthcare and gaming industries

Technology

The firm’s Awareness platform consists of two core technologies. The first is remote photoplethysmography (rPPg), which analyses the natural light reflected off a user’s face to detect and process signals that measure their vital signs including heart rate, heart rate variability, respiration and oxygen saturation level.

rPPg leverages computer vision and signal processing to generate vital sign readings on any smartphone camera. The app is compatible with older mobile Operating Systems, including Android 8.0 and iOS 10.

The second core technology is an AI predictive algorithm. Leveraging research in deep learning and neural networks, the algorithm is trained with clinical data from research partners to generate insights. This enables the platform to generate risk scores for “influenza-like illnesses”.

Besides enabling individuals to monitor their long-term health, the score also enables companies to track the physical wellbeing of employees.

Lau claims the accuracy of results on Nervotec’s platform is comparable to lifestyle trackers and smartwatches — which are within the four per cent threshold required for theUS Food and Drug Administration (FDA) certification.

The startup has filed a local IP patent and is working towards being FDA- and CE-certified.

When asked how the firm handles the personal health data of users, Lau emphasised that Nervotec adopts “internationally-accredited best practices for information security”.

Also Read: Data will help public-private partnerships build future resilience in SEA. Here’s how

“The entire scanning process is done on the smartphone with no connectivity to a cloud service required. This ensures that no recording of the face takes place and there is no possibility of interception of the measurements taken,” he elaborated.

Assisting firms in tracking employee wellness

He further noted that Nervotec has enabled its client enterprises to overcome health challenges posed by the current pandemic and ensure continued operations of their businesses.

As compared to conventional health tracking devices, Nervotec’s solution has a lower cost of adoption as the platform utilises the personal phone of employees, as compared to purchasing a tracking device outright.

Apart from monitoring vital health signs, the app can also store vaccination and swab tests reports to ensure companies remain compliant to new workplace management measures imposed by authorities.

According to Lau, Nervotec has been well received by firms in the construction industry. Besides signing a proof-of-concept contract with Japan-listed construction conglomerate Kaijima Corporation, it also has other pilot tests with undisclosed companies in the shipping and logistics industry. Lau expects Nervotec’s user base to hit upwards of 20,000 post-pilot.

Also Read: The changing face of healthcare in a post pandemic world

With global personal health and diagnostics technologies sector valued at close to US$90 billion, health tracking looks set to remain a key concern for governments, businesses, and individuals post-pandemic. With a switch to remote working, companies are placing a greater emphasis on employee wellness and there has been an uptake in digital solutions supporting this shift. Nervotec is looking to capitalise on this growing market.

With S$450,000 (US$399,000) in pre-seed raised from angel investors in September 2020, the startup is now looking to raise its seed round next month.

“For the foreseeable future, developing new technologies that improve public access to affordable and convenient healthcare solutions will continue to be our priority,” Lau signed off as he shared about Nervotec’s future plans.

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Image Credit: Nervotec

 

The post Snap yourself using your smartphone, Nervotec app displays all your vital health signs within a minute appeared first on e27.

ELSA, a mobile app that uses Artificial Intelligence and speech recognition technology to help language learners improve their English speaking skills and pronunciation, has secured US$15 million in Series B funding, co-led by Vietnam Investments Group and SIG.

Also participated in the round are returning investors Gradient Ventures (Google’s AI-focused venture fund), SOSV, and Monk’s Hill Ventures. New investors are Endeavor Catalyst and Globant Ventures, which will assist ELSA’s expansion efforts in Latin America.

This new capital will go towards R&D to further develop its voice recognition AI, build a scalable B2B platform and hire new talent.

With this round, the startup’s total financing has touched US$27 million. This includes its Series A round of US$7 million in February 2019.

ELSA (English Language Speech Assistant) was founded in 2015 by Stanford alum Vu Van and Dr. Xavier Anguera.

Also Read: 3 learnings from KKday CEO and Founder on how his travel startup overcame the pandemic

With over 13 million users worldwide, the app claims it helps language learners with an easy way to improve their English speaking ability by listening to how they pronounce words, sentences or conversations to pinpoint exact errors and provide real-time, accurate suggestions on their pronunciation mistakes.

ELSA recently piloted its B2B efforts with schools and companies in Vietnam and India. As a result, the company will now focus on creating a scalable B2B platform that allows cooperation with corporate partners around the world.

With the increase of remote work and investment from companies looking to improve the English speaking skills of their staff, especially in Asia and LatAm regions, ELSA said it has inked many partnerships with corporations and educational institutions worldwide.

Headquartered in the US, ELSA also has offices in Portugal and Vietnam. It claims the app is used by many private schools, public schools and language learning centres.

Also Read: ‘Founders should be able to back up their ideas with sales’: Golden Gate’s newly-appointed Principal Jeffrey Chua

As per the company, in 2020, ELSA nearly doubled its customer base, increased revenue by almost 300 per cent and introduced multiple product enhancements.

The firm’s geographical expansion will focus on the LatAm region where it has experienced exponential growth, plus ongoing investment in Vietnam, India and Japan, where growth was 5x last year with additional demand anticipated in 2021.

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Image Credit: ELSA

The post ELSA to expand its AI English pronunciation assistant globally with a US$15M Series B financing appeared first on e27.