February 11, 2012 by Terence LEE
Ru-Net, a Russion VC firm focused on funding Internet and IT industries, has plans to invest US$50M in Southeast Asia in the next two or three years, reported Penn Olson.
Successful companies that they’ve already invested in include: OZON.ru, an Amazon-like website, BigLion, a daily deals site, and ivi, an online video site. Read more
February 8, 2012 by Bernard Leong
Malaysia's digital economy is similar to Singapore and Brunei.
Recently, I was invited to speak on entrepreneurship and consumer Internet trends in a private event hosted by Penn Olson during Startups in Asia, which happened from 2nd to 4th February.
In this article, I will highlight additional perspectives to shed greater light on the ideas presented during my talk, which gave the audience a better grasp on the consumer internet space in Southeast Asia. Read more
January 17, 2012 by Terence LEE
Singapore-based Sconce Solutions, which has developed a “shape search technology” for the engineering world, has raised more capital from existing investors Accel Partners India and other strategic angels, it announced last month.
The infusion will fuel its plans to set up an office in the US and expand across various horizontal and vertical sectors that could benefit from its technology. Read more
January 14, 2012 by Terence LEE
The next time you read in the papers about how supermarkets in Singapore are evolving and migrating online, remember that two former investment bankers could very well have played a major role in shaping the landscape.
No, no one’s buying over NTUC Fairprice or Cold Storage.
Meet Roger Egan III and Vikram Rupani, the co-founders of RedMart, a new online supermarket that emerged in the scene last year (see product feature) and received seed funding from Toivo Annus, the co-founder of Skype, in December 2011.
Their mission: To create the “eBay for Consumer Packaged Goods manufacturers” — the makers of of instant noodles and the ever-useful toilet paper. Read more
January 9, 2012 by Terence LEE
With China and India hogging the limelight when it comes to entrepreneurship, it’s easy to forget that something is brewing in Southeast Asia.
Quietly but steadily, geek culture within the region is maturing, creating a suitable environment to nurture the next generation of technology entrepreneurs. A key indicator of this trend is the rise of permanent spaces which provide a comfortable environment for entrepreneurs and geeks to experiment and develop their ideas.
The first of these spaces to emerge is Hackerspace.sg, which was set up as an entirely community funded and supported initiative in 2009.
Photo: Guests interacting with Sheel (center-left) and Abhijeet (center-right) from Bessemer Venture Partners. Read more
January 5, 2012 by Terence LEE
CyberAgent Ventures plans to invest up to US$8M in six to eight Indonesia-based companies in 2012, reported e27.
Following the launch of their office in Indonesia last year, they kickstarted their new fund, CyberAgent Asia Internet Fund I. The fund capital will be increased, possibly up to US$15M, which will be proportionately split between Indonesia and Vietnam.
Should CyberAgent fail to find adequate startups to invest in, they will instead set up an incubation office. Read more
January 3, 2012 by Bernard Leong
If you can't smile after signing a deal, chances are that you've been screwed over. Photo: Candie_N
Here’s a situation which some entrepreneurs would go through. They decide to take in an investor or join an incubator program. In front of them, an investor asks for “x” % of equity. The entrepreneurs then speak to different people in the community to get some advice. The opinions will be diverse. They turn to US tech blogs, which give them a totally different picture. All this adds up to a lot of frustration.
Any entrepreneur has to deal with this potential scenario and negotiate in good faith with investors. To help you, here’s a checklist of things to do before getting an investment deal.
December 31, 2011 by Guest Contributor
Professor Dr. Wong Poh Kam here provides an overview of role of Venture Capital and Angel Investors in teh-startups scene in Singapore. It has been republished here with permission. A more detailed version of this will be published in the Annual SVCA Directory 2011/12
High-technology entrepreneurship has been identified as an important driver of Singapore’s knowledge-based economy, and increased policy attention has been given to encouraging the formation and nurturing of high-tech start-ups, especially those with significant intellectual property (IP). To this end, in 2010 the National Research Foundation (NRF) engaged me, as director of the NUS Entrepreneurship Centre, to conduct a study of high-tech start-ups in Singapore. While the survey covers many aspects of the high tech start-up dynamics, including characteristics of the founders, their sources of technology and funding, growth strategies, performance and challenges, this blog highlights some salient findings on only one aspect of the survey: the performance of start-ups that have received funding from venture capitalists or angel investors versus those that did not. Read more
December 26, 2011 by SGEntrepreneurs
Singapore’s investment sector has seen some buzz lately, with Vickers Capital Group, an early-stage venture firm with offices in Shanghai and Singapore, announcing a new investment in Lotaris, a Swiss-based mobile technology company.
Vickers has led the US$9.5M (S$7.36M) Series A round with co-investors, Credit Suisse and Lausanne-based Eurofin Capital. This strategic partnership will bolster Lotaris in the Asian markets and secure growth in resources for both companies. Read more
December 23, 2011 by Terence LEE
Apps Foundry, an Indonesian mobile development company headquartered in Singapore, announced on 22nd December that they have raised S$1M (US$0.77M) from Gobi Partners and Mitsui Global Investment to further develop SCOOP, their flagship newsstand app.
SCOOP, which was launched in Indonesia last year, has over 800 magazines, tabloids, and books in its stable.
70 percent of Indonesian magazines have their digital editions on the app, which has so far been downloaded over 120,000 times, making it one of the top ten grossing iPad apps in Indonesia. SCOOP is also available for the iPhone. Read more
