The first time I heard about Open Banking was in 2015 when the EU rolled out guidelines for the Second Payment Services Directive (PSD2). Many years have passed since, but Open Banking has just recently been implemented in certain parts of Southeast Asia.

This article is meant to shed light on developments in Open Banking in Southeast Asia from the point-of-view of regulators, banks, and startups.

The lists are by no means exhaustive so please feel free to give me a shout if there are new pieces of information that I should incorporate. If you’re already familiar with Open Banking, please feel free to skip the first section.

Open Banking refers to when banks allow third parties to access their customer data in order to read the data and provide additional financial services using that data or to perform transactions on the customer’s behalf. The underlying idea of Open Banking is that customers are the owner of transaction data, not banks, thus, data should be shared if the customers wish to do so.

The data access and exchange take place through Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), software links that allow secure, rapid, and dependable communication directly between two firms. If this sounds alien to you, think about a restaurant reservation application that has Google Maps embedded into it. APIs allow external applications to read data from Google and portray the data on their own applications.

Also Read: Why banks will benefit from open API

While there’s consensus that Open Banking should bring about innovation in financial services which – in theory – should benefit end consumers, determining how ‘open’ banks should be is a contentious issue. Banks have been reluctant to share customer data as they view such data to be their source of competitive advantage, enabling them to provide customised services to customers and prevent competitors from stealing the customers.

To put things into perspective, if two competing banks have the same set of customer’s financial data, they could compete for loans by offering more competitive interest rates. Therefore, allowing other entities to access customer data means banks will face heightened competition and risk losing the customer.

This is where regulations come in. Open Banking has been pushed forward by regulators of leading financial systems, including the EU, the UK, and Australia, because regulators view that the sharing of data will level the playing field for fintech players, increase customers’ access to financial services, and enhance financial innovation.

Approaches to Open Banking vary across countries, and so does the scope of implementation. Australia, the EU, and the UK have chosen a regulatory-driven approach, while others have chosen a market-driven approach.

Southeast Asia’s open banking landscape

In Southeast Asia, Open Banking is still in a nascent stage with regulators opting for a ‘market-driven’ approach. Banks are free to pursue Open Banking as they wish. By letting banks take a lead role in designing and implementing Open Banking, different banks opt to use different technical standards for their APIs.

Also Read: Temasek, Tencent inject US$35M into open-banking software company TrueLayer

This means that third parties that want to connect with banks would need to slowly integrate with one bank at a time and follow different standards or protocols, resulting in a lot of inefficiencies for both banks and third parties.

Some central banks, such as Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia, foresee this problem and have proactively launched ‘soft guidelines’ or ‘API standards’ for banks to follow if they wish to open up.

Other central banks, such as Thailand, the Philippines, and Vietnam, have not launched any guidelines or reveal their strategies on Open Banking.

Nonetheless, these central banks have rolled out payment transformation initiatives, which means that Open Banking could be next on the policy agenda.

While regulators have done an incredible job at setting implementation guidelines, more can be done. Because Open Banking is, in essence, the sharing of customer’s sensitive data, regulators have a crucial role in screening third parties who can connect with banks and access such data.

For example, the UK and the EU stipulate that third- party providers (TPP) must be registered and approved by the regulators. This has a few benefits. First, it ensures that customer data will be treated properly.

Second, this would free up banks from having to screen TPP, streamline the partner onboarding process, and reduce the bank’s liability since banks are no longer liable if they engage with inappropriate TPP or if TPP mishandles customer data. By regulating TPP, regulators can reap the benefits of Open Banking, while ensuring customer protection and bank adoption.

Also Read: Survey: Filipinos are more open to creating bank accounts via smartphones compared to foreigners

Although regulators are not stepping in to push Open Banking adoption, banks across the region have launched a public API portal, allowing third parties to connect with them and make use of customer data. However, the extent of openness varies widely.

Some of the popular APIs available among banks in Southeast Asia are bank product data, account status, payments, and cards. On the other hand, transaction data, loan origination, account opening/closing, customer reference, and authentication are harder to find.

More importantly, the process of on-boarding API partners vastly differs from bank to bank with a majority still require lengthy paperwork and manual on-boarding process. Say, a payment provider wants to connect with three banks in Thailand, it would have to approach each bank individually and file different sets of paperwork, a process which could take months.

This opens up an opportunity for API startups, such as Brankas, to serve as a middleman and handle local complexity so that any companies can make payments, transfers, and access customer account information without having to directly engage with banks.

Also Read: 4 ways the banking sector can respond to the digital transformation

It aims to be an API infrastructure that helps banks turn their legacy systems into APIs, and in turn, serve as a unified platform for third parties to connect with banks.

So far, Brankas has worked with leading banks, such as UnionBank in the Philippines and the top three banks in Indonesia, to create API portals and onboard payment partners.

Open Banking APIs from Banks

Startups in Open Banking

Few startups are operating in the Open Banking space in Southeast Asia with a majority being payment providers (PISP) because there is clear regulatory or licensing requirement for payment providers, however, other types of services are lacking. Part of the reason might be due to the inconsistency in Open Banking adoption among banks.

For example, startups that want to become an Account Aggregator (AISP) would need to be able to access and display customer data from all banks. However, to date, only nine banks – out of hundreds of banks in the region – allow third parties to access customer data.

Here is the list of Southeast Asia-based companies working on Open Banking:

Open Banking might be a hard pill to swallow, but it can bring about many benefits that are met with today’s financial system, including improving customers’ financial health by allowing them to view their financials in one place, to gain insights on their spending habits, to make payments efficiently from one place, etcetera.

Also Read: Is Japan ready for the digital banking revolution?

To realise this vision, participation from regulators, banks, and startups is a requirement rather than a nice-to-have.

This post first appeared on www.nattariya.com.

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A major crisis can either incapacitate your company’s ability to market itself, or present opportunities for your brand to thrive.

At the time of writing, several global brands have already declared bankruptcy or significantly downsized their business, including Hertz, Singapore-based oil trading company Hin Leong and WeWork, with more companies expected to follow suit, even as countries are looking to re-boot financial activities after months of lockdowns or social restrictions.

With so much uncertainty and a gloomy outlook that’s likely to last over the next few quarters of 2020, should you continue with your marketing activities, and how do you keep your audience engaged during these difficult times?

The marketing paradox: Damned if you do, damned if you don’t

Marketing is necessary for any business to flourish, yet we all know that marketing budgets are also among the hardest to justify, and especially during the current business climate, many business owners would tend to see marketing activities as luxuries as they actively seek out ways to reduce spending.

Companies are not only cutting back on marketing – in some cases, they are actually laying off their marketing teams.

Also Read: Customer is not always the king, says Tokopedia’s customer engagement expert

On the other hand, as business owners, we all know we can’t stay “quiet” for long, especially in today’s content-rich and social media-driven marketplace where your brand is likely to be forgotten when you adopt conservative strategies.

According to a recent study in May 2020 by the American Association of Advertising Agencies, 43 per cent of consumers found it reassuring to hear from their favourite brands, while 56 per cent said they like to learn how brands are helping their communities during the pandemic.

Only 15 per cent of respondents said they would not want to hear from companies at all.

What this means is that, contrary to what many of us would imagine, it actually makes more sense to increase – not decrease – marketing spend during this period if you do not want to lag behind your competition when business activities pick up again.

So how then should you approach your marketing and branding during and in the aftermath of COVID-19?

Focus on interaction with customers, not pushing products

Even as the economy reopens, remember that months of stringent social and movement restrictions coupled with gloomy economic and employment outlooks have left their mark on the psyche of your customers. The next few months or even years ahead are going to be difficult for many people, especially with the prospect of more job losses looming in the horizon.

Also Read: Is virtual reality the next big marketing channel?

It is, therefore, necessary to understand that while we are anxious to restart our business activities, we need to balance off our marketing and sales efforts with exercising empathy for customers.

Empathy is the ability to understand and feel another person’s emotions, and it becomes even more critical as we interact with customers during such difficult times. Being overly pushy with trying to get people to notice your products immediately in the aftermath of a particularly trying period is very often not the best approach in building trust.

In a post-coronavirus business environment, having an omnichannel strategy becomes even more important when interacting with customers. While multichannel marketing only looks at creating as many channels as possible to connect with customers, omnichannel adds a dimension of ensuring the user experience regardless of the chosen channel is consistent so as to truly personalise interactions with customers.

Reassure customers with your brand

Every brand seeks to add value to its target market; the most successful brands are those that connect on so many emotive points with their customers that they remain assured (and hence loyal) to the brand even in challenging times. Such was the case for recently-bankrupted Gold’s Gym – the long-standing delivery of its brand promise to keep members fit and healthy allows it to still retain a loyal following even as the brand’s future remains uncertain.

It is important for companies and businesses to try to provide an assurance to both existing and potential customers that they will still deliver on their brand promise and value proposition even during difficult times.

While it’s true that consumers are more conservative in their spending during this time, it would be a mistake to think you have to keep talking about cost-savings for those who use your product or service. Highlight the strength and unique characteristics of your brand instead of just trying to justify your pricing or how much of a “good value for money” you are.

Work your CRM

If you are looking at using multiple channels to reach out to the market, you might consider switching to a more robust Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platform. CRM allows you to gather useful data and analytics that provide you information like where your customers are coming from, who is likely to purchase your products and services, customer lifecycle, and help you keep track of your marketing campaigns.

In a post-coronavirus era, a credible CRM system is like a marketing multi-tool for you to gain massive outreach: you can segment your client base into distinct categories and take advantage of built-in features like emails, customised messages, send out event invites and a whole lot more to deliver the omnichannel-optimised user experience.

Don’t promote fear

The last thing anyone needs right now are brands taking advantage of fear and panic to promote their products and services. Fear is never a good motivator, and while you want greater brand visibility, you do not want to create negative associations with your brand name.

Also Read: The only customer engagement strategy businesses need during a crisis

What you really should be focused on is telling your audience why they should take proactive positive measures to cope better with the tough times, not tell them about the dire consequences of not using your product. We talked about empathy early on, and you will miss out on opportunities to build genuine connections with your customers when the focus is on using fear to motivate people to make a purchase.

Review your product offering

With a gloomy economic outlook ahead, consumers are likely to focus on purchasing essentials rather than spend money on luxury goods and services. You have to, therefore, target the essential product segment and come up with a brand narrative that fits that picture.

For instance, you may have a brand that deals exclusively with high-performance one-on-one coaching with clients. This may be a good time to consider introducing a range of functional fitness training programmes that can cater to the needs of a wider audience. Doing so does not necessarily dilute your brand identity – it just makes your brand more accessible to a larger audience with a different goal or need.

Focus on the longevity of your branding

Brand longevity is really about ensuring how you can remain relevant to the market in different circumstances. The current chatter is focused on dealing with health- and economic-related issues – any brand that talks about these issues will, therefore, gain visibility quickly; yet to skew your entire marketing and branding angle to what’s relevant now would be short-sighted.

You need to look at angles that allow you to build new narratives and pivot quickly to remain relevant to your audience when circumstances change.

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Severan Rault, whose past experiences as an engineer include leadership roles at Amazon and Microsoft, has been appointed as new CTO for Southeast Asian tech unicorn gojek.

Rault will oversee all of the technology behind gojek’s ecosystem -which provides access to a wide range of services from transportation and payments to food delivery, logistics and several other on-demand services- and manage the company’s engineering teams across Southeast Asia and India.

gojek’s official statement notes that Rault brings to over 20 years of experience in software engineering, with roles that included leading a team that founded Amazon Prime Air, the company’s drone delivery service; leading architect of Microsoft’s web search engine, Bing; as well as a stint as Principal Development Manager for Microsoft OneApp, a software application that enables feature phones.

Rault himself is also a serial entrepreneur who was credited for the founding of wireless solutions firm Kikker Interactive, which was acquired by Microsoft in 2008. He was also the brain behind the establishment of virtual reality company Betawave, at which he worked before moving to gojek.

Also Read: (Exclusive) Group CTO Ajey Gore leaves gojek

Earlier this year, Rault joined gojek as Head of Engineering for the company’s marketplace platform, before assuming Group CTO responsibilities from Ajey Gore, who left the company recently.

He will report to gojek co-CEO, Kevin Aluwi.

“It is a time like no other at gojek. The company is entering a critical phase as it moves from startup to maturation and it’s special to be a part of that. Building systems and processes for a business of gojek’s scale and complexity is a challenge one rarely enjoys in their career and I’m grateful for the opportunity,” said Rault.

Last month, e27 reported that Gore has announced his departure after serving the tech giant for about six years.

Gore joined the on-demand multi-service company in mid-2015 as Head of Engineering in its Bangalore office before being promoted to the position of CTO in January 2016. Gore stated personal break to focus on family time and health as the reason behind his decision to leave the unicorn company.

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Image Credit: gojek

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Insider, a multichannel growth management platform, announced today it has secured US$32 million in Series C funding round, led by US-based VC firm Riverwood Capital.

Sequoia India, MENA-focused investment firm Wamda, and US-based Endeavor Catalyst also joined the round, bringing the Singaporean firm’s total financing raised to date to US$47 million.

The company will use the additional capital to improve its platform, expand its R&D team, and also for global sales and marketing efforts.

Founded in 2012, Insider’s AI-powered platform enables enterprise marketers to connect customer data across channels and systems, predict their future behaviour with an AI-powered intent engine, and orchestrate and deliver individualised experiences to customers.

Also Read: gojek names Severan Rault as new CTO

The platform claims to be offering a wide set of product features in the market while coordinating all offline and online data across the unified platform and its various engagement channels.

The company says its AI intent engine consists of 15-plus algorithms that enable marketers to make precise predictions, such as which customer segments are likely to convert, buy and churn — and then design optimised experiences accordingly.

Ultimately, Insider enables digital marketers to drive growth across channels, and throughout the funnel from acquisition to activation, revenue and retention — thereby impacting ROI metrics such as conversion rate, CAC, LTV, and average order value.

Insider currently serves 800 global enterprise brands, including UNIQLO, Singapore Airlines, Marks & Spencer, Estée Lauder, Virgin, Samsung, Carrefour, Dominos, Toyota, Newsweek, Avon, MediaMarkt, AVIS, Allianz, BBVA, IKEA and CNN.

CEO and Co-founder Hande Cilingir said: “So far, we’ve focused on leading in high-potential markets in the Eastern part of the world. We plan to grow substantially in our existing 24 countries and we are now ready to enter the US market and believe that our fresh solutions to marketers’ biggest pain points will be a major differentiator.”

Also Read: Can SEA’s proptech come back to its pre-COVID-19 glory? Experts speak

Insider is a heavily women-led organisation with 50 per cent of top executives in the company, including the CEO, CMO, CFO, and CPO being women. It has offices in London, Paris, Singapore, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Seoul, Sydney, Helsinki, Barcelona, Dubai, Moscow, Warsaw, Taipei, Jakarta, Manila, Wellington, Istanbul, Kiev, Ho Chi Minh City, Bangkok, Brussels, Amsterdam, Luxemburg, Ankara, and Kuala Lumpur.

Currently, Insider employs more than 550 people across 24 countries worldwide.

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Circles.Life launches eSIM

The story: Singapore’s digital telco Circles.Life has launched eSIM. Anyone can sign up for an eSIM online without needing to wait for a physical SIM or offline verification by a third party.

What is eSIM?: The new product allows users to toggle between their physical and eSIM accounts, giving them the option of a secondary line for either work or personal use, along with the best data plan.

Circles.Life eSIMs are compatible with any existing physical SIM or can be used to activate a phone line on a new device that does not already have an existing physical SIM.

The product offers virtual activation via facial recognition and MyInfo integration.

eBay launches e-commerce accelerator

The story: eBay has launched Global 24/7, an e-commerce accelerator programme specifically designed to help Singapore’s SMEs leverage the e-commerce major’s platform for global export.

What is it?: The programme provides startup incentives, necessary tools, trainings, and assistance for business owners to tap into eBay’s global marketplace of over 174 million active buyers.

It is extended to markets across the Southeast Asia region which includes Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, and Malaysia.

When?: The programme will run from 1 July to 31 December 2020.

Who are eligible?: SMEs that have an existing business but do not have an eBay store are eligible to apply for this programme. This includes large and small businesses across the value chain — from manufacturers to dealers to retailers.

Tezos Combinator demo day to showcase 8 projects

The story: Tezos Combinator, an early-stage blockchain incubator from Korea’s TZ Ventures, will hold its hybrid demo day on July 22.

Through this initiative, TZV believes that “real use cases of blockchain will emerge at a large scale”.

Who are the programme’s partners?: Du capital, KK Fund and Broadone Capital.

Which are the SEA startups attending the programme?

GIZTIX (Thailand): A platform for trucks that enables real-time tracking of shipments

Med247 (Vietnam): A healthcare app that uses blockchain to give patients access to their entire medical history and securely stores its data

Olim Planet (Korea/Vietnam): A VR/AR immersive content company for real estate, shopping and exhibitions which utilises blockchain to make transactions more efficient and transparent

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Image Credit: Circles.Life

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Dropee funding

The story: Malaysian B2B e-procurement platform Dropee, has raised US$1.3 million in funding right after its graduation from Y Combinator’s Winter 2020 batch.

Investors: Y Combinator, Ondine Capital, Vynn Capital, Brama One Ventures, John Devor (COO of Touchpoint Games), Jason Tsai (Machine Learning Lead of GooglePay), and a number of other angel investors.

Plans with the money: Lennise Ng, CEO and Co-founder of Dropee, said: “With the newly injected capital, we plan to fully assist and automate the on-boarding process for these wholesale businesses.”

What does Dropee do?: Started in 2017, Dropee is a SaaS-enabled marketplace that connects brands with local retailers in Southeast Asia. It is on a mission to help wholesale buyers find the best product and suppliers for their business.

The platform allows retailers to discover, purchase and manage inventories for their store all on a single marketplace platform — and its software tool for suppliers helps businesses to deal with all the pain points of a growing customer database, from ordering to payments. This saves retailers and suppliers time and money, allowing them to focus on what’s most important: building and growing their business.

What are its products?: The company offers two products — 1) Dropee Marketplace: a platform where retailers and business buyers can search and source from new and existing suppliers via a single platform; 2) Dropee Direct: a B2B e-commerce SaaS for wholesalers and brands to bring their offline trading processes online.

As of today, Dropee has helped companies such as British American Tobacco, Petronas, and many others to move their B2B procurement and trading processes online.

SFA’s launches Grants and Jobs Portal

The story: The Singapore FinTech Association (SFA) has launched a comprehensive Grants and Jobs Portal.

What is it for?: The portal currently has over 500 job postings and will enable job seekers to access the latest job vacancies, available grants, relevant training opportunities and latest news within the fintech sector.

SFA has also collaborated with organisations, including the Institutes of Higher Learning, to generate content to the portal.

In addition, the Grants and Jobs portal will be highlighting various schemes available under the SGUnited Traineeship and Skills programmes.

SFA’s other initiatives: Since the onset of COVID-19 and after a survey conducted with its members in March 2020, SFA has pivoted quickly and worked closely with key stakeholders within the sector to progressively introduce a range of timely and purposeful initiatives. These initiatives come in the form of monetary and non-monetary assistance to help FinTech companies retain jobs and facilitate business growth despite disruption to normal business activities.

aCommerce gets new COO

The story: Thai e-commerce enabler aCommerce has appointed Luca Altomare as the Group Chief Operating Officer. In this role, he will be responsible for managing country heads and driving operational excellence.

He previously served as SVP of distribution for Southeast Asia at Li & Fung Group and worked at specialist consulting firm Value Partners. Luca will report to Paul Srivorakul.

Other appointments: The firm has also named Peter Kopitz (Co-founder and former COO) as Group Chief Commercial Officer, Phensiri Sathianvongnusar as Chief Business Officer, and Graeme Kingshott as Group Finance Director.

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Image Credit: Dropee

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Black Friday is a phenomenon like no other. It’s where our hard-earned money finds salvation. Marking the official commencement of the festive season, Black Friday is when our year-long wait to finally purchase that one electronic gadget at the cheapest rates possible comes to an end.

Be it an iPhone upgrade, a smart television, a gaming console, or a microwave oven, most of us wait until this day to purchase as this is the time our wallets don’t take an official beating.

The fanfare is so interesting that you could call Black Friday the Freddie Mercury of shopping. People flocking in lines hours or even a day before the d-day and getting all excited about finally getting hands-on with their gadgets or product are sights to behold.

The major characteristic –or let’s call it an attribute of Black Friday– is the way people gather outside stores. The lines are pretty huge and everyone is crammed up to make their way into stores. Malls are usually full and there’s always a group gathered everywhere.

Black Friday has always been like this. But this year, it certainly seems questionable and uncertain.

The COVID-19 effect

Scott Rankin, KPMG US’ principal and national consumer and retail strategy leader, shared that he doesn’t envision any of these happening this year.

Also Read: Is COVID-19 the catalyst B2B e-commerce companies needed?

With the world crippling with the COVID-19 situation, things have changed drastically. A dystopian scenario has already kicked in with people staying inside unwilling to step outside. And even those who do are seen wearing a mask.

This is not how the world used to be. There would be crowds everywhere. From restaurants and cinema halls to malls and retail stores, you would always see people. But with the onset of coronavirus, the gathering has become something distant.

With the contagion numbers showing no signs of curtailment and with the development of a vaccine seeming a time-consuming affair, people wouldn’t want to step out to get anything unless and until they are groceries and essentials that need to be procured.

When there is no crowd at the store, there would be no purchases as well. And storekeepers are definitely anticipating this. Stores wouldn’t dare to stock in their inventory hoping people would miraculously storm in. That’s very risky.

So, what about Black Friday this year?

Is it officially dead?

The answer is e-commerce

E-commerce and its ally – the on-demand economy – have been a boon for mankind. During this global pandemic, they have turned out to be the only reliable entities in the world. They prevent us from stepping out and at the same time, deliver what we want, where we want.

Thanks to these, this year’s Black Friday still seems promising and hopeful and all that storekeepers and offline businesses have to do is take their stores online.

Also Read: Is COVID-19 the catalyst B2B e-commerce companies needed?

And this is not a wild theory or a statement under the assumption to lure businesses into e-commerce app development. Studies and statistics have clearly shown the impact of e-commerce on Black Friday.

• According to Adobe Holiday Shopping Report, the Black Friday online sales in 2019 numbered to US$7.4 billion. This number is US$1.2 billion more than its previous year.
• Last year, around 58 per cent of the online traffic during Black Friday came from smartphones. Tablets accounted for just five per cent and desktops accounted for 37 per cent.
• Out of this, close to 36 per cent of the sales were completed on mobiles and 59 per cent of the sales were completed on desktops. This further pushes the need for e-commerce app development or e-commerce website development.
• The same report also shares that traffic redirected from social media have increased from four per cent in the year 2016 to 11 per cent in the year 2019.
• Not just that. With the rise of Instagram, what has equally grown is the concept of influencers. With a steady following, Instagram celebrities today significantly influence our shopping and purchasing behaviour.
• According to Adobe Holiday Shopping Report, over 20 per cent of the overall consumers have made a purchase after being recommended by an online celebrity or an influencer.

If the above-shared numbers matter, imagine that this is from an era before COVID-19, where people still had the option to step outside and shop their hearts (and wallets) out.

In the US, e-commerce sales grew by 49 per cent during the month of April when the pandemic started to become more serious. While the sales of electronics grew by 58 per cent, the sales of groceries increased by 110 per cent.

The new normal

With people getting a taste of the on-demand economy, e-commerce is finally attaining the new normal status. At the same time, one should also acknowledge the steps and initiatives taken by e-commerce companies in ensuring a safe and hygienic delivery mechanism.

• Delivery agents are being checked for temperatures and symptoms
• they are perpetually masked during their shift hours
• They have their vehicles sanitised
• And they even follow a contactless delivery process.

Also read: 10 ways to get a customer to buy from your e-commerce site

Is your business e-commerce ready?

If these numbers don’t entice you to take your business online, understand that e-commerce offers more convenience in terms of wholesome shopping experience.

With an e-commerce website or an app, you can –

• Understand the behaviour of your individual users and personalise selling and sales
• Offer personalised discounts and deals when they abandon carts or don’t purchase anything in a while
• Consistently engage and interact with them
• Announce new products and availability of them
• Run giveaways and build a brand around your niche
• Optimise customer retention and do more

When you have an e-commerce platform (desktop or mobile), you could run your own Black Tuesday or Black Sunday. The point is, e-commerce platforms are revolutionising industries and they give you authority over your business and sales.

With the unfortunate onset of the pandemic, an optimistic side is the alternatives we have in our hands thanks to technology. One wise move today can reshape our future.

We have given you the facts, statistics, and opinions and it is up to you to decide how you would want the remaining year for your business to be.

Good luck and here’s to a safer and healthier year!

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Editor’s note: e27 aims to foster thought leadership by publishing contributions from the community. Become a thought leader in the community and share your opinions or ideas and earn a byline by submitting a post.

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Singapore-based surgical robotic company, NDR Medical Technology, announced today it has raised SGD$8 million (US$5.8 million) in a Series A round of investment, led by Chinese medical devices maker Microport Scientific Corporation.

This is MicroPort’s maiden equity investment in Singapore.

Kava Ventures, a partnership founded by the owners of Transmedic (an advanced medical technology distributor in Southeast Asia), and existing SGInnovate, also participated in the round.

NDR will use the capital to prepare for the expansion into the US, regulatory submission across other major markets, as well as to further enhance the team’s technical capabilities and explore other clinical applications for the product.

Additionally, NDR will be establishing a joint venture in China with MicroPort Urocare, a subsidiary of MicroPort. This will advance the Singaporean company’s entry into the China market, tapping on existing networks and engineering resources that the partnership brings.

Also Read: Ecosystem Roundup: Grab reportedly in talks for US$500M bank loan; SCB to launch food delivery service in Thailand

“With MicroPort as our strategic investor alongside Kava Ventures that has rich commercial experience in distributing surgical robotic systems, NDR will be able to accelerate our growth plans in Asia with greater assurance, fulfilling our vision of ensuring safer surgical procedures with better clinical outcome,” said Alan Goh, Co-founder and CEO of NDR.

Founded in 2014, NDR has developed an Automated Needle Targeting (ANT) system for robotic-guided access to obtain precise targeting. The system uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) and medical image processing to identify the targeted lesion and perform insertion trajectory planning, with the robot executing a range of motion to assist surgeons in obtaining accurate access.

The solution can be applied to biopsy, ablations and other surgical procedures that require precision.

NDR has an ongoing clinical trial in Japan and is continuing its development of ANT for other imaging modalities and medical applications.

Lung cancer has the highest incidence among all tumors worldwide, especially in China. The incidence of lung cancer is also increasing every year and affecting more and more young adults.

The increase in the survival rates of lung cancer patients depends not only on improvements in treatments but also on the availability of precise early diagnosis.

Clinical results have shown that the 5-year survival rates of early-stage lung cancer patients who have timely diagnoses and treatment far exceed those of advanced-stage patients. Percutaneous biopsy is one of the most popular methods in the diagnosis of lung cancer.

Also Read: Malaysia’s Dropee raises US$1.3M from Y Combinator, others

The ANT-C robotics system can assist physicians to perform CT-guided operations more precisely, which further boosts the accuracy of needle biopsy, reduces complications and widens the access of precise diagnosis of early-stage lung cancer. In addition, the low-profile robot could be applied in multiple disciplines, which expands the use of the CT-guided procedure.

The ANT-X robotics system is indicated for percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL) procedures. The precise needle positioning is the most critical step in PCNL. Compared to conventional manual needle positioning, the application of the ANT-X robotics system could reduce the complexity, shorten physicians’ learning curve, increase procedure accuracy and minimise complications, which will benefit the patients with kidney stone and ureteral stone.

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Image Credit: NDR Medical Technology

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During a chat back in 2014, John Rasjid, Christopher Madiam, and Chrisanti Indiana, three friends with backgrounds in finance, IT, and design and communication, respectively, agreed that beauty and personal care products required a dedicated place. Back then, there didn’t exist any online platform that catered to this specific market in Indonesia.

“Chrisanti was the beauty aficionado. She tossed the idea about beauty, and upon further learning the industry, we jumped right into it bringing our interests and skills to the table,” Rasjid said in a virtual interview with e27.

The beginning

The beginning of the startup was not a coincidence, says Rasjid. “There were many reasons for the trio to start Social Bella, including the need for authenticity and trust in the platforms.

We looked at what examples there were in the market, and Dollar Shave Club came to our mind. Its premise when it was launched in 2011 was pretty straightforward; it wanted to deliver razors and other personal grooming products to customers by mail. And it worked,” Rasjid explained.

The American company that inspired Rasjid today delivers razor blades on a monthly basis and offers additional grooming products for home delivery. The convenience of having one’s personal care products delivered to the customers’ doorstep should be and could be the norm, and it’s proven so today.

“Social Bella started out as a B2C e-commerce platform focussed on a single category, walking side by side with larger horizontal/marketplace e-commerce with much larger resources. The challenges have been there since day one; they just evolve from year to year,” remarked Rasjid.

He further added that identifying the right people to join the company was hard since the founders needed to look for the right team members from the same scarce talent pool and with industry interests. “Starting in mid-2018, when our ecosystem was finally formed, the execution wheel started to spin faster and we were able to serve a much larger customer base.”

Also Read: Indonesian beauty platform Social Bella embraces O2O with the launch of physical store

Social Bella’s commitment has always been centred around the needs of its customers. “Customers have always been our top priority and we want to continue to stay relevant for our dynamic customers, and that’s how we ran Social Bella with its three business channels, and now, with a new one in the equation,” according to him.

Building beauty ecosystem

Talking about the approach the Social Bella team is striving to provide, he said that the team continues to innovate to meet their needs and to support companies that provide holistic beauty services in Indonesia.

“Having said that, we conclude how we should aim to build a complete ecosystem to serve the growth of the beauty industry. Our focus now is to ensure that the innovations that we do continue to focus on the customer experience and seamless shopping experience,” he added.

The company has three business units:

• SOCO, an online consumer review platform for beauty and personal care products
• Beauty Journal, an online beauty and lifestyle media with O2O marketing service
• Sociolla, a beauty and personal care e-commerce which also has an offline store with the omni-channel concept
• Lilla by Sociolla, a beauty and personal care e-commerce service specifically designed for mothers
• Brand Development, the business unit that offers end-to-end distributor service for beauty and personal care brands.

A few days ago, the company announced a US$58 million funding round from Temasek, Pavilion Capital and Jungle Ventures. Along with this, Social Bella also announced the establishment of Lilla by Sociolla (lilla.id).

“Lilla is specifically built for young and sophisticated mothers who are looking for the best-curated products for children and themselves. There are growing needs for good quality products by mothers in Indonesia and we strive to deliver our best to serve their needs. We will focus on growing those existing business lines and strengthen our tech capability,” he explained.

Offline expansion

With the current business units, Social Bella is estimated to serve around 30 million users in 2020, Rasjid claimed.

Last year, Social Bella completed its ecosystem as an integrated beauty-tech and end-to-end brand distributor in Indonesia by launching a flagship omnichannel store in Lippo Mall Puri. At present, Social Bella owns six physical stores across the country.

“We started with e-commerce with Sociolla.com, yet we understand that when it comes to beauty products, physical shopping experience remains relevant. Customers want to feel, touch, smell and try the products. The offline experience provides that experience and serves our customers in a more interesting, personalised, and enjoyable way made possible by our tailored technology for beauty and personal care,” Rasjid said explaining the rationale behind the decision to go offline.

“At the same time, it creates a platform for new aspiring brands that we curate to get closer to customers. However, I don’t believe that an offline store is a one-size-fits-all solution for all e-commerce and even if one decides to have an offline presence, she certainly needs to be mindful of the degree of prevalence of their offline store versus digital,” Rasjid emphasised.

The beauty tech in hindsight

The Internet has enabled new brands since the early days when Dollar Shave Club hit the US market in 2011. It was a tectonic change in the consumer brand world and the beauty market has particularly witnessed a number of global-hit brands in the past five to six years.

The beauty industry in Asia, especially Indonesia, is growing very rapidly, especially thanks to the development of infrastructure and technology. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, the rising lifestyles and a growing middle class are driving growth in demand for beauty products.

Together with the strong influence of social media, this creates the new generation of consumers, who are more sophisticated and also more demanding of having the beauty and personal care products that are suitable for their skin type, skin tone, facial features, and more.

Also Read: Indonesia’s beauty-tech startup Social Bella raises US$58M Series E from Temasek, Pavilion, Jungle Ventures

“Looking at this huge opportunity, constant innovations supported by creative, highly-skilled and experienced talents are needed to grow our business and capture the market potential. Technology development is also important to identify consumer behaviour, thus we can stay relevant to the market needs,” Rasjid added.

Coming up next

Looking at retailers around the world today, the digitisation trend is stealing news headlines, especially during the COVID-19 outbreak. “No one knows and everyone is guessing how the post-COVID-19 era will alter customers’ behaviours and hence, the responses by industry players. Microsoft, for one, decided to permanently close all their physical stores,” said Rasjid.

New trends have been coming from new brands born out of the digital realm. This will continue to shape up the beauty and personal care industry. Going forward, the tech will continue to play big roles in marketing efforts.

“Now, armed with the latest funding from investors, we will focus on building our technology infrastructure and digital assets to meet users’ need for a more optimal, relevant, and personalised shopping experience. This allows us to expand into broader market segments, accelerate our business even further and provide more comprehensive beauty services,” he went on.

Social Bella’s new plans are to provide beauty products that are of high quality and affordable for beauty enthusiasts in Indonesia in a more personal and fun way. In addition, Sociolla Store also connects consumers with various brands.

“This affirms Social Bella’s vision to position itself as an incubator for beauty and self-care. We’ll also focus on SOCO. By focussing on improving the quality of user experience, this platform integrates Sociolla and the Beauty Journal to answer the needs of Indonesian women for safe personal care and personal care products,” said Rasjid.

The Social Bella innovation in technology is highly relevant in response to the challenges in the beauty industry, especially when facing business turbulence amid COVID-19 pandemic.

McKinsey in its report entitled “How COVID-19 is Changing the World of Beauty” states that there are several things players must keep in their radar in the beauty industry to be able to survive amid COVID-19, one of which is shoring up digital aspects and speed of innovation.

Also Read: Sociolla’s parent secures US$40M to develop its community platform SOCO

The report said fortifying the digital aspects is necessary to accommodate the needs of consumers who have now turned to online shopping activities. On the operations side, the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for contactless production and personalisation must also be expedited to accommodate consumers’ attention to product hygiene, especially if it involves direct contact.

“Answering the challenges that have emerged since the onslaught of the COVID-19 pandemic, where activities are centred at home, we are strengthening Sociolla by introducing a new feature, namely live chat with beauty consultants. We understand, however, that shopping for beauty products cannot be compared to shopping for other needs,” said John.

Before the latest round of funding, Social Bella had secured a Series D investment of US$40 million in September 2019. The investment was led by East Venture Growth, Temasek, Pavilion Capital, and Jungle Ventures.
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Picture Credit: Social Bella

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Property technology (proptech) was riding high on the strong demand in the real estate industry in Southeast Asia until the onset of the novel coronavirus towards the end of 2019.

The pandemic created a panic in the real estate market, prompting customers to defer their property purchase decisions. This, in turn, dealt a huge blow to the overall proptech sector in the region.

As the contagion spread rapidly, businesses suffered. While a few proptech startups were pushed to the brink some were forced to change their business model for survival.

Industry experts believe that the full picture of the effects of the crisis will become more visible in the coming months, although they hope for a rebound.

But will it come back to the pre-pandemic glory?

“If we look at the past long-term property trends in Asia, it has always come back after demand shocks. This might be a a testament to the fact that Asia is still urbanising and the long-term demand for property and the related proptech sector is still trending upwards,” says Kay Mok Ku, Managing Partner of Gobi Partners, a leading ASEAN-focused VC firm.

Also Read: How Indonesian beauty e-commerce startup Social Bella finds balance between commerce, content, community

“It is likely that the real estate industry in Asia will return to its previous glory. What is unknown, however, is how long the recovery will take, given that we do not know when a vaccine will be available. It should revert to the previous normal as long as a vaccine removes the need for social distancing,” Mok Ku predicts.

Still in the early stages

As Mok Ku points out, Asia’s — particularly Southeast Asia’s — proptech industry is small and still in its infancy. The market still largely remains untapped.

The pandemic hasn’t had much impact on the VC investments into the region’s proptech. As per the data collated by startup research platform Tracxn, in FY2019-20, more than US$202 million venture capital was invested in the industry across 25 deals. During April 2020 to June 2020 (when the pandemic was at its peak), upwards of US$25 million was invested across six deals.

Across all the markets, companies based in Singapore (12) and Vietnam (seven) bagged the most number of deals during the April-June 2020 period. These numbers are expected to rise, thanks to the growing middle-class and salaries, growing urbanisation and younger population, and massive smartphone penetration.

“Property is one of the least disrupted industries in Southeast Asia; the market is still gigantic despite the fact that economic recession is imminent. Hence the opportunity is still great,” remarks Wong Whei Meng, Founder-CEO of SPEEDHOME.

For SPEEDHOME, a home rental platform in Malaysia, the first signs of a recovery are already showing; its May sales rebounded to the pre-COVID19 level, claims Wong. “The numbers looked great in June and we expect it to grow more than 20 percent (in the coming months),” Wong said.

“The effects of the pandemic are still working their way through the Southeast Asian economies and it’s too early to get a clear view of how this pandemic will unfold in the proptech sector,” said Ali Fancy, Principal at Cento Ventures, which is focused on the emerging markets in Southeast Asia.

“Perhaps the first set of early data points we’ll see will be towards the end of July/early August,” he added.

Having said that, consumers have been cautious about investing in the sector. They are no longer going out to public spaces, with social distancing becoming part of the routine. As a result, the co-working space has lost business.

But it has a positive side to it; the demand for affordable private spaces, such as enclosed offices, rather than hot desks in co-working spaces has risen. Consumers are also more comfortable with virtual viewing — so proptech platforms tapping this have an opportunity to grow.

“Proptech firms use technology to manage supply and demand for properties in innovative ways; for example, co-working/short-term residential rental. This means most of them are not saddled with huge fixed costs of the assets,” adds Mok Ku. This augurs well for the overall industry.

The other key outcome is that the pandemic has accelerated digitisation across industries: digital property platforms now have new opportunities to offer easier and smoother journey and experience for customers looking to purchase or rent a house.

Also Read: Propzy secures US$25M in Series A funding led by Gaw Capital, SoftBank Ventures Asia

“Digital acceleration may spur demand for housing in city outskirts as people are warming up to working from home. We will start to see this happen in the next two to three years as companies adapt to the advanced communication/collaborative tools to support the work-from-home policy,” Wong says.

What is lacking?

Southeast Asia is not a single homogeneous market, which means the real estate market conditions vary widely across the countries. There are many local brands that are still developing and not ready for regional consolidation. While there are the likes of heavily-funded PropertyGuru (both Singapore), Propzy (Vietnam), and iMyanmarHouse — which have been leaders in their respective real estate markets — there is no single player that has monopolised the Southeast Asian market yet. In the next three to five years, the region will see new giants emerge, predicts Meng.

Experts agree that only the surface has been scratched as of now and the Southeast Asian market is yet to see major innovation. A lot of things are on-demand now; the sales journey is still very tedious. “There should be strong proptech in the scene where it can offer to buy a house within a day, like Unmortgage in the UK,” he opined.

“In general, direct transactions between owners and renters, especially on a short-term basis, still suffer from trust issues, e.g. properties often differ from online description or cleanliness is not up to standard. This has affected the take-off of P2P marketplaces such as Airbnb. Instead, B2C models, similar to Tujia in China, seem more appropriate for Southeast Asia,” Mok Ku explained.

Conclusion

While the real estate market has been bearing the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic, all is not lost yet if experts are to be believed. The sector will come back as it is still in its nascent stage, and there is massive potential. The pandemic will trigger more innovations, which will help the consumers as well as the industry in the long-term.

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Image Credit: 123rf.com

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