The ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) community was flabbergasted and alarmed at talks on labelling weapons as sustainable ESG assets with the backdrop of the Russia-Ukraine war.

Supporters justified this by claiming weapons maintain peace and “are of key importance to uphold and defend democracy, freedom, stability and human rights”. And this may not be the first time ESG investing is dealing with such controversial debate, with industries and companies moving from outcast to hero status in times of crisis.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this, as ESG investing achieves the best results when it evolves according to the dynamic world we live in, considering the changing risks and opportunities at different points in time. Even as ESG investing may look different as it develops across time, it is here to stay.

According to Bloomberg, global ESG assets are on track to exceed US$53 trillion by 2025, representing more than a third of the US$140.5 trillion in projected total assets under management.

In Asia, more than two-thirds of institutional investors indicated increased interest in ESG investments in the post-COVID world, and total ESG assets in Asia have grown from a mere US$801 million in 2019 to US$7.9 billion in 2020.

The shift to Social (S) in ESG

In the venture capital (VC) space, there are observations on rising numbers of thematic funds specific to the environmental (E) aspect (e.g., climate change, decarbonisation, and nature-based assets) and a focus on governance (G) aspect (e.g., internal audit, management commitment to ESG, stakeholder engagement).

This exemplified that ESG investing is gaining steam, but it may seem that the “S” in ESG has taken the role of the forgotten middle child.

But not for any longer, as investors realise that people/ social impact forms the basis of ESG investing. Everything does not matter if it de-risk or benefits the people, as sustainability arising from environmental and governance factors would ultimately translate into the social value created for the people.

Also Read: Why corporates and investors must climb the mountain called sustainability

Just like how weapons are used to be excluded in ESG investing before the Russia-Ukraine war, its social value is now taking the centre stage together with the environmental impact.

The human-centricity of ESG investing will become more apparent, and the social impact investment will take a more proactive form.

Dynamic ESG based on changing landscape to future-proof the firm and portfolio

Drawing back to the Russia-Ukraine war, we observe that the ESG framework is not set in stone and will be evolving based on the changing global or regional landscape. Just like how ESG investors avoided weapons before this war, now there is an ongoing talk about labelling it as a social-positive asset because it has the potential to prevent death and destruction.

From this, the ESG community demonstrates that ESG investing will not be rigid to target outperformance above-market returns. Many investors, including VCs, have acknowledged that ESG does not hamper financial performance but creates long-term value and outsized returns.

More and more started to price in material risks, along with material benefits, effectively de-risking the portfolio while adopting a pro-impact approach. This optimises the future-proofing of the firm and portfolio.

For example, for Quest Ventures’ portfolio companies like Fefifo, food security and sustainable agriculture could materially influence topline sales. For Flex and GajiGesa, financial inclusion can materially convert non-consumers into a new market that is untapped in emerging Asia.

Building back better towards a resilient and sustainable future for the people

Investors, including VCs, invest in sustainable market-creating innovations that shape all nations and regions’ resilient and sustainable futures.

According to Global Sustainable Investment Review 2020 (GSIR), Sustainable investment assets under management make up 35.9 per cent of total assets under management, up from 33.4 per cent in 2018.

The most common sustainable investment strategy is ESG integration (US$25.2 trillion AUM), followed by negative screening (US$15.9 trillion AUM), corporate engagement, and shareholder action (US$10.5 trillion AUM).

Integrating ESG into the investment process will build more sustainable companies early through incorporating ESG during portfolio engagement/ investment stewardship.

However, as Harvard Professor Clayton M. Christensen mentioned in Prosperity Paradox, “all good theories must be used in context. They are only useful in certain circumstances. Every country in the world is different in size, population, culture, leadership, and capabilities. Those circumstances play a role in their destiny.”

Also Read: Why is impact investing suddenly so hot?

We must note the nuances across regions and markets when doing ESG investing and building a resilient and sustainable future. With the Russia-Ukraine war in the backdrop, it compels us to keep ESG supporting flexible while allowing for comparison when measuring its impacts.

Taking a pragmatist approach to ESG investing (investing in companies with moderate unmanageable ESG risk and high ESG unmanaged manageable risk) would be optimal in Southeast Asia, as the emerging market presents vast opportunities to improve ESG financial performance at higher-risk companies vastly.

According to the profiling by Pitchbook, a pragmatist VC may:

• Conduct pre-investment due diligence on the ESG risks derived from broad industry sustainability.
• Conduct slightly less-intensive pre- or post-acquisition identification of manageable risk mitigation gaps and opportunities.
• Evaluate how scale will influence sustainability and ESG.
• Have proactive implementation of ESG-related policies and procedures and quarterly monitoring.

Concluding, the Russia-Ukraine war, amidst its wide-ranging and devastating impacts on people from both nations, had triggered the ESG community and could be changing the conversation on ESG investing through:

• There is a shift to social (S) in ESG, with a social impact no longer isolated from environmental and governance aspects.
• The development of a dynamic ESG based on changing regional and global landscape to future-proof the investment firms and portfolio.
• Building back better towards a resilient and sustainable future by adopting a pragmatist ESG approach.

If you are curious about my position regarding the war: Echoing Singapore’s statement on the Russia-Ukraine war, I too believe that a country’s “sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity must be respected”.

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In this episode we are excited to welcome Jivko Bojinov, Co-Founder of Shipbob, a tech-enabled 3PL (third-party logistics provider) that offers simple, fast and affordable fulfilment for thousands of brands across three continents. Prior, Bojinov worked in China at YESSAT, an education consulting and training company and founder of Ivy League Travels.

In our conversation, Bojinov talks about why international expansion is both easier and also more difficult than you think it is, what characteristics to look for when building out a team in international markets, knowing what can and cannot change when figuring out what to localise and navigating the grey area in between, and the benefits of getting career experience abroad.

This episode is sponsored by our partner, ZEDRA. Learn more about how the ZEDRA team can support you in expanding to new markets here.

Also Read: Patreon Chief People Officer on the importance of fostering curiosity in global expansion journey

Find our entire podcast episode library here and learn more about our forthcoming book on global business growth here.

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The article was first published by Global Class.

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Jio Health, a health-tech company in Vietnam, has closed a US$20 million in Series B investment led by Singapore-based PE firm Heritas Capital.

Fuchsia Ventures, Kasikorn Bank Group, and Monk’s Hills Ventures also joined, the Ho Chi Minh City-based company said in a press note.

The firm will use the money to expand its Smart Clinics and omnichannel ecosystem across Vietnam. It will also extend its clinical service offering to new consumers and employers and hire talent.

Also Read: BuyMed nets US$8.8M to develop a healthtech e-commerce platform, expand beyond Vietnam

Jio Health was founded in 2014 by Raghu Rai and serial entrepreneur Ken Rohl, with offices in Irvine. It provides affordable care wherever consumers shop, work and live. Its technology encompasses telemedicine, e-prescription fulfilment, digital medical records, and machine-learning for clinical decision support.

Beyond virtual care, the offline matrix of Jio Health’s ecosystem consists of Smart Clinics, on-demand home care, and a network of 300+ Jio-branded neighbourhood pharmacies.

The startup’s online and offline care services are integrated with its lab information systems, e-pharmacy, and clinical operating system.

Jio’s multi-speciality portfolio of care services provides consumers with a one-stop shop that spans over 14 specialities, including pediatric care, chronic disease management, mental health, maternity care, and women’s health.

In April 2019, Jio Health raised a US$5 million Series A round led by Monk’s Hill Ventures to scale its care provider team and clinical operations across Vietnam.

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Image Credit: Jio Health

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Cake DeFi, Singapore-based fintech platform that aims to make DeFi services and applications more accessible to the general public, today announced the launch of its venture capital (VC) arm Cake DeFi Ventures with US$100 million in earmarked capital.

The VC arm is led by Cake DeFi co-founders Dr Julian Hosp (CEO) and U-Zyn Chua (CTO) along with newly appointed Investment Partner Nicholas Khoo.

Cake DeFi Ventures is looking to invest in tech startups in Web3, gaming, and fintech, especially those in the metaverse, NFT, blockchain and e-sports industries that “will bring synergistic value to Cake DeFi’s core business.”

Looking to invest in startups from around the world, by the time of the firm’s launch, Cake DeFi Ventures has already invested in tech, media and events startup The Edge Of Company. In a press statement, the firm said that it is currently in talks with a number of startups in Southeast Asia (SEA), the US, and Europe.

“Cake DeFi Ventures is looking for strategic investments that will bring synergies to Cake DeFi’s core business and long-term goals, especially as we enhance and broaden our Web3 offerings. We therefore are in search of startups that possess unique technological and business value propositions (especially in Web3, gaming and fintech) as well as bring us access to a wider Web3 ecosystem. Importantly, the founders have to share our same values and vision for the Web3 space,” explains Chua in an email interview with e27.

The firm plans to “keep the number of investments open for now” depending on the size of respective investments and the number of projects they come across.

Also Read: Demystifying NFTs and DeFi

When asked about the advantages that startups can get by working with Cake DeFi Ventures, Chua said that as a native in Web3 and fintech vertical, the firm has deep insights and immediate visibility to the latest trends, technological innovations and game-changers in this space.

“And because we are entrenched in the Web3 space, we are able to offer more strategic value as investment partners beyond just capital injections. We are able to give them access to resources, proprietary R&D and connections that will aid startups to grow in this space. As a global company with customers in 191 countries, we are able to offer expertise and networks to support these startups in their own global expansion plans,” he said.

About Cake DeFi

As a fintech platform, Cake DeFi described itself as a platform that aims to provide access to decentralised financial services and applications by enabling users to generate returns from their crypto and digital assets. Operated and registered in Singapore, the company said that it is fully compliant with all regulatory requirements of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).

Cake DeFi offers three options to generate cash flow and passive income: Lending, Staking and Liquidity Mining. Its pay out rewards twice a day for Staking and Liquidity Mining.

In 2021, Cake DeFi said that it saw a tenfold growth in its registered customer base, with over US$1 billion customer assets. In the same year, its customers received over US$230 million in rewards.

“Global crypto adoption grew by over 800 per cent in 2021, as estimated by blockchain data platform Chainalysis. We naturally saw a huge growth in Cake DeFi’s customers as we offer an easy, safe and fully-transparent platform for cryptocurrency holders to access decentralized financial services and applications to earn cash flow from their crypto. Last year alone, we were able to tenfold our number of registered users. We also paid out US$230 million to our customers, bringing real value and cash flow to our customers,” Chua explains the reason behind the platform’s rapid growth.

Also Read: To infinity and beyond: Why 2022 will be the year of Web3

“Our Trustpilot score (4.8) is one of the highest in our industry which shows that our customers trust us and we bring real value to them. This has helped to generate strong word of mouth and build credibility with our customers. Today, understanding of cryptocurrency is still at a pretty low level. – and we therefore actively educate all potential and existing customers. We even have a programme called Learn & Earn where new customers can earn crypto while deepening their understanding.”

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Wavemaker Partners today announced that it has closed its fourth fund at US$136 million, anchored by returning investors Pavilion Capital, Temasek Holdings, the International Finance Corporation, and Vulcan Capital.

In a press statement, the firm said that it has also secured commitments from a diverse investor group, comprising institutional investors, university endowment funds, funds of funds, family offices, corporates, and high net worth individuals. It claims to be the largest fund focused on early stage enterprise, deep tech, and sustainability startups in Southeast Asia.

“We are grateful to our limited partners who have believed in us and stayed with us over the past 10 years, and we welcome the new investors who have decided to take the leap with us. We hope to validate their trust as we continue to back high-growth startups that solve meaningful problems in enterprise, deep tech, and sustainability,” said Paul Santos, Managing Partner at Wavemaker.

In addition to the closing of the fourth fund, Wavemaker Partners also announced the appointments of Melissa Ho to Principal and Phuong Tran to VP for
Investments and Country Head for Vietnam.

In this role, Ho will lead the firm’s whole investment team, as well as sit on the boards of portfolio companies, while Tran will lead Vietnam investments for Wavemaker and solidify the VC firm’s efforts in the country, according to the firm.

Also Read: SEA tech founders playbook: A to Z of becoming a fundraising legend (Part 2)

Making waves in the ecosystem

In November 2021, Wavemaker Partners launched a climate tech venture co-builder called Wavemaker Impact. Teaming up with Enterprise SG, they aim to work with at least 12 climate tech companies over the next three years.

The firm puts its focus on enterprise, deep tech and sustainability startups. Out of the 170-plus companies it has invested in since 2012, it said that about 150 (85 per cent) are in enterprise, deep tech and/or sustainability.

Wavemaker Partners said has delivered more than 10 exits so far with an aggregate enterprise value of over US$700 million. These exits include mobile point-of-sale system Moka (acquired by Gojek), cloud communications software company Wavecell (acquired by 8×8), inventory and order management platform TradeGecko (acquired by Intuit), and online payment solutions provider Red Dot Payment (acquired by PayU/Naspers).

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Helping women win in the workplace is not a zero-sum game. Wealth inequality is also a story of gender inequality, and the story is not a happy one. 

Take the gender pay gap, for instance. Data in 2021 showed women were being paid a median hourly rate 10.2 per cent less than their male colleagues, nearly a percentage point higher than the 9.3 per cent gap reported in 2018.

While the gender pay gap is about compensation, the gender wealth gap is the difference in overall net worth between men and women. Worldwide, men own 50 per cent more wealth than women and taken together, the wealth of the richest 22 men in the world equals all of the wealth of the women in Africa. 

The pandemic has further put women in a double bind. More women than men have lost their jobs during this time and, due to a cut in household expenses, have been expected to take on more unpaid care work, 60 per cent more to be exact. 

Besides being paid less at work, women find it more challenging to hang on to their money, much less grow it.

Why has it been so challenging?  

It’s not a helping hand if it doesn’t pull you up

It often feels that initiatives targeting women are useful but ultimately unhelpful when it comes to empowering women and addressing the gaps in gender equality at work.

First, programmes with a mentoring slant presume that there is something inherently lacking in the way women are.

Girls and women outperform boys and men at every level in school, so it’s not because we are undereducated. It’s not our work ethics nor the quality of our work that need to be fixed either.

Hence, suggesting mentoring to address gender gaps looks only at one side of the equation.

Second, the work of measuring up shouldn’t rest solely on the shoulders of women.

Institutional biases should be addressed and eliminated. In this respect, managers and companies have to participate in programmes designed to change their mindset and teach them to develop better, fairer policies around hiring and promotion.  

Also Read: A woman among women: 27 female-led startups in SEA that is going places

Teaching women to kick the ball isn’t going to be enough if no one is taking those who keep moving the goalpost to the task. No amount of mentoring and training will matter if none of them leads to more women getting promoted and recognised at work. 

Not a good look in front of HR

For Agnes Tay*, 42-year-old regional marketing manager, being a woman at the workplace feels like she’s in a game she can never win at. She explains that the discrimination that women face is a lot more insidious.

“As a woman, it’s already a challenge trying to smash through that glass ceiling. Then as you get older, you are made to feel like you’re past your ‘sell-by’ date because younger colleagues call you ‘aunty’ and tease you for being ‘like my mother’,” she says. 

“While the teasing may not be malicious, it sets a tone, and your bosses might then think, ‘Maybe she’s not a go-getter, she’s probably thinking about retiring,’ and off he goes to hire a man for that senior role you’ve been eyeing.

“They don’t say this, but you can tell from how your ideas are only cool enough if your younger colleagues like them, how your concerns are only valid if another man voices it too, how you are never right until another man says you are. Your boss second-guesses your every decision and asks you to back it up with evidence but readily accepts those suggested by younger colleagues or by men.”

While Agnes has thought of bringing it up to HR, she believes it would backfire on her.

“Every boss has the right to ask you to support your work with evidence, but it’s the exceptions that they make for other people that makes you wonder if your suspicions of discrimination are right or you’re just plain jealous, and that’s never a good look in front of HR.” 

When you steal a woman’s future, you steal her wealth

Holding women back at work has financial consequences. When you steal our futures, you steal our wealth.

Women bear a double-discrimination burden in the workplace, with age combined with gender. We are more likely than men to experience age discrimination in the workplace, including being passed over for jobs and promotions.

Women of colour experience this bias at even higher rates. Women suffer occupational segregation, meaning they are underrepresented in higher-wage managerial positions and overrepresented in the lower-wage service sector.

The result is that we are less likely to receive executive benefits like company cars, expense accounts and having the company take care of our rent and children’s private school fees.  

To-do list, not wishlist

First, International Women’s Day is more than just a day where we get everyone to do performative things like posing for a picture and putting a stalk of rose on every woman employee’s desk. Don’t let the gestures trick you into thinking you’ve done right by your female employees. 

Second, we need to unconditionally support a woman’s ambition and advocate for other women until the playing field is levelled.

While some may say, “I don’t want to be hired for a job simply because I tick a diversity box”, it is essential to know that if we don’t push for the change we want, we will never see that change happen.

Also, Read: Women in tech have leaned in enough. This is what we should do instead

Third, companies need to train managers to recognise and remove their unconscious bias regarding hiring, compensation, and promotion.

If your company has a policy where female employees are encouraged to sign up for mentoring sessions to improve their chances of promotion, ask if it does the same to the men. 

Finally, two-thirds of women say they get stressed about money at least once a week, so employers stand to benefit when they prioritise their employees’ financial wellbeing and offer financial literacy and retirement planning as a benefit.

Help your female employees get better control of their money by exposing them to apps like Revolut, where they can build up an investment portfolio using spare change rounded up from their card payments and learn to make better investment decisions through market updates that can be found in-app. 

This is not a zero-sum game where men stand to lose when women benefit. A 2018 McKinsey report on diversity shared that increased gender diversity improves a company’s profitability by 21 per cent. What is good for women is ultimately good for everyone. 

*First name changed to protect privacy 

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Data has become crucial for organisations’ business sustainability. According to the International Data Centre (IDC), the global data sphere is expected to grow to 163 zettabytes by 2025, ten times the amount recorded in 2016.

For organisations, the exponential growth in data can prove a challenge, one in which organisations must learn to navigate if they are to sustain their business.

Today’s largest and most successful organisations like Google, Starbucks, and Amazon know well the impact of data. They have utilised their data to their advantage when making high-impact business decisions.

For businesses, the derivation of insights via data has become no longer a choice but a necessity. In addition, Gartner has also predicted that data fabric, the latest term used to describe data nirvana, will also be one of the top technology trends for 2022.

According to Gartner, data fabrics could reduce data management efforts by up to 70 per cent as organisations get to grips with data literacy and democratisation across multiple departments, platforms, and applications. 

Issues arising from data proliferation

Data has not only exploded in volume but has also been scattered across a myriad of locations, from multiple public cloud environments and data centres to remote offices and the edge, often with minimal global oversight.

At each location, data is isolated in specialised infrastructure or functions, like backup, disaster recovery, and network storage, to name a few, and more often than not, from multiple vendors.

The situation is only made worse by silos within silos, such as a single backup solution that requires various dedicated infrastructure components, like backup software, master and media servers, target storage, deduplication appliances, each of which may hold a copy of a given data source.

In addition, each infrastructure component may come from different vendors, each with its user interface and support contracts. As such, these infrastructure silos have a knock-on impact on operational efficiency.

Also Read: COVID-19, the environment, and the tech ecosystem: what opportunity is available out there for us?

With typically no data sharing between functions, storage tends to be overprovisioned for each silo instead of pooled. Multiple copies of the same data are also propagated between silos, thus taking up unnecessary storage space.

However, despite the issues arising from data proliferation, organisations with self-service data infrastructure in the cloud benefit from the data gathered.

These organisations have been able to gain more insights into their customers’ behaviour compared to before the pandemic, which is enabled by the real-time predictive and prescriptive analytics supported on data lake platforms in the cloud.

These organisations are setting themselves apart from the competition, particularly when implementing communication and customer retention strategies.

For organisations that have yet to implement a self-service data infrastructure, an action plan is needed, built firmly around maximising the use of data if they are to catch up to their competitors. 

The upcoming trends and technologies in data post-pandemic

To stay competitive, organisations need to understand the upcoming trends and technologies in data, given how essential data is to operational and strategic effectiveness.

Some of the top 12 strategic technology trends predicted by Gartner include data fabric, decision intelligence and hyper-automation. According to Gartner, increasing overall data and data diversity will drive organisations towards new compute and storage technologies.

The increase in overall data and data diversity will also drive hyper-automation, which is defined as data-driven automation rather than process-driven, thanks to a combination of AI, ML, and defined as automation that is data-driven rather than process-driven, thanks to a variety of AI, ML, natural language programming and predictive analytics technologies.

Hyper-automation has been regarded as a ‘level-up’ to automation and reflects the concept where organisations have implemented technologies to free employees from the monotony of repetitive tasks, enabling them to concentrate on higher-value tasks, which are more stimulating and rewarding. The technology utilises data obtained from every process and equipment. 

According to Gartner, it is believed that 85 per cent of companies would increase or sustain their hyper-automation investment strategies in 2022, with the technology also having been termed by Deloitte as the next frontier for organisations globally.

However, hyper-automation will be a slow and complex process because it is still early for the technology. To create long-term adoption of the technology, organisations will need to invest significant amounts of time and energy.

Thus, it is crucial that time is taken to understand the necessary steps required before organisations set out on their hyper-automation journey to ensure their success in implementing the technology.

Engaging the right partner is also vital for organisations in this journey. It would allow organisations to gain a better understanding of hyper-automation, which would reduce the time and resources needed to begin their journey and enable them to hyper-automate their organisation that much faster. 

For organisations, aside from hyper-automation, data fabric will be vital in modernising their data management and integration.

Also Read: Understanding GDPR’s impact on event data and helpful security tips

A data fabric consists of multiple systems and data flows, with a data mesh of human roles and processes that must all be coordinated to achieve the goal of an architecture that encompasses all forms of analytical data for any analysis with seamless accessibility and shareability by all those with a need for it.

Data fabric continuously identifies and connects data from disparate applications to discover unique, business-relevant relationships between the data points. The insight then supports re-engineered decision-making, thus providing more value through rapid access and comprehension than traditional data management practices.

To ensure that their data fabric architecture delivers business value, organisations need to start by providing a solid technology base, identifying the required core capabilities and evaluating existing data management tools.

There are four key pillars to data fabric architecture:

• Collect and analyse all forms of metadata
• Convert passive metadata to active metadata
• Create and curate knowledge gaps
• Have a robust integration backbone.

Conclusion

It is crucial for organisations that have already begun their hyper-automation journey to ensure that they continue to work on the technology, given the increased focus and investment on hyper-automation by organisations across the board.

Organisations must resist the temptation to settle for standard automation, which would only provide them with short-term improvements.

For organisations, the successful implementation of hyper-automation will not only enable them to gain an edge over their competitors, but it would also drive more significant benefits for their employees and clients as the technology helps to streamline operations, thus freeing employees up to focus on more stimulating and rewarding tasks, as well as providing exceptional customer service.

Organisations implementing data fabric into their data management must ensure that their data fabric architecture consists of the four key pillars to entirely derive the business value and benefits data fabric can drive for the organisation.

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WebTrace, an IoT platform to monitor vehicle assets, has merged with online heavy equipment rental startup TraktorHub to form Quipster.

An online rental and sales marketplace for the construction, logistics, and mining industries, Quipster will also provide IoT solutions, integrated asset management, and financial/insurance products.

The deal value is undisclosed.

Quipster will act as a holding company for both WebTrace and TraktorHub while each entity will still operate with the integration process ongoing. Both WebTrace and TraktorHub are backed by Prasetia Dwidharma.

“At Quipster, we aim to be able to provide a simplified journey and comprehensive solution for heavy equipment sales, rental, management and monitoring. This will enable equipment owners and users to offload the complexity to Quipster, thus allowing increased productivity on their business,” said Rezka Fonda, Co-Founder of TraktorHub.

Also Read: How the construction industry got “smart” and cleaned up its impact

TraktorHub is an online rental platform for heavy equipment that aims to simplify the process of searching, procuring and logistics for its customers.

Webtrace, on the other hand, is a sustainable IoT solution for the fleet and mobile workforce. It focuses on delivering time and cost-saving solutions, enabling customers to improve their fleet’s and workforces’ utilisation, reduce unnecessary cost, and convert it to more profits. The firm is also backed by Corin Capital and Astra Mitra Ventura.

The construction, logistic, and mining activities in Southeast Asia have increased significantly over the last couple of years. This is due to the rising government spending for upgrading existing infrastructure combined with new projects, especially in countries like Indonesia, which resulted in the growing demand for heavy equipment in the region.

According to the 2021 Mordor Intelligence report, Indonesia will be ranked third among the ASEAN construction equipment rental markets, following Thailand and Vietnam. The archipelago is witnessing significant infrastructure development activities, owing to which the demand for construction, logistic, and mining equipment is increasing.

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Data mesh solution startup Canner

Data mesh solution provider Canner has raised a total of US$3.5 million in a pre-Series A funding round, led by Taiwania Capital. Hive Ventures and SparkLabs Taipei also joined.

Canner will use this funding to accelerate product development, expand local and international marketing efforts, and grow its teams.

Also Read: How companies can manage data privacy in hybrid and multi-cloud work environments

Founded in 2018, Canner aims to empower businesses to convert data into business value by connecting data silos and transforming business-facing datasets into application-ready dataset APIs with a universal data access interface. With Canner’s data mesh technology, users can work with datasets without moving or duplicating data between data sources.

This way, it simplifies building next-generation data applications on top of cloud data warehouses through a universal layer for APIs, access control, data literacy, and optimisation from diverse data silos.

Canner’s data mesh solution can be quickly installed in any cloud – public, private, hybrid and otherwise. It provides multi-format output optimisation for data applications and multi-layer data access control and authorisation.

Conversation management firm Cooby

Cooby, a conversation management tool, has raised US$2.9 million, led by Sequoia India’s Surge and Pear VC.

The Cooby tool helps businesses streamline engagement and individuals to organise their customer conversations and boost inbox productivity.

Cooby is Surge’s first startup founded and based in Taiwan. It is a conversation management solution for WhatsApp and other business messaging channels. The company aims to re-imagines sales management by building team management solutions on top of popular messaging apps like WhatsApp and LINE.

Cooby equips these teams with WhatsApp work number setup, data sync, analytics dashboard, alerts and notifications, and collaboration interface to regulate WhatsApp and enhance sales.

Also Read: How SMBs can use conversational commerce to boost year-end sales

The company also provides visibility to customer conversations and sales activities on a unified platform. Cooby Workspace makes collaboration on WhatsApp possible without all the back-and-forths aggregating all customer contacts. It provides actionable analytics that enables teams to track, improve and grow.

“Since October 2021, we have expanded our customer base to Germany, India, Indonesia, Singapore, and the US. Additionally, in the last three months, we’ve seen the user base of our WhatsApp inbox productivity Chrome extension grow by 350 per cent, and it is now being used in 80+ countries. We look forward to further strengthening our Cooby Workspace product with the funds raised, on top of expanding our team to countries like Singapore and other parts of the world,” said Wen Shaw, CEO and Co-Founder of Cooby.

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Indonesian edutech startup Zenius today announced an undisclosed funding round led by MDI Ventures, the corporate venture arm of state-owned telecommunications company Telkom Indonesia.,

Existing investors Northstar Group, Alpha JWC, Openspace Ventures, and new investor Beacon Venture Capital, a corporate venture arm of Thailand’s Kasikorn Bank, also joined the funding round.

In a press statement, the company said that with this funding round, Zenius has raised over US$40 million in total. Prior to this announcement, it closed a Pre-Series B funding round in January 2021.

The company recently made headlines with the acquisition of Primagama, a local cram school giant with up to 40 years of history.

Zenius CEO Rohan Monga said, “The funding will support the further development and expansion of our learning ecosystem. We will focus on improving our personalised learning experience by enhancing our adaptive learning technology and gamifying our platform to boost students’ motivation. Through our recently acquired network from Primagama, one of the biggest tutoring service providers in Indonesia, we will be able to extend our reach to broaden our impact on education. We strongly believe that hybrid learning model, offline and online, will deliver the highest outcome for the students.”

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In addition to the acquisition, Zenius has recently launched a partnership with Disney for its primary school segment and established ZenPro, a platform for professional or lifelong learning segments.

Founded in 2014, Zenius said that it has helped more than 1.5 million alumni to enter top private and public universities in Indonesia. Last year, seven out of 10 Zenius premium users passed the high-stakes national college entrance exam while Zenius revenue increased by four times.

Monga stressed the role of collaboration in helping the company grows its business.

“Zenius is a collaborative player. We believe that we can realise our mission to shape smarter, brighter, and more fun Indonesia through collaboration, partnership, and synergy with various stakeholders like MDI who share the same vision, which is to improve education in Indonesia,” he said.

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Image Credit: Zenius

The post Following Primagama acquisition, Zenius raises funding led by MDI Ventures appeared first on e27.