After being at SGE for about seven months now, I’ve noticed something about Singapore entrepreneurs: We’re pretty adept at taking a business concept from overseas and applying it locally.
Which is fine by the way — as long as it isn’t blind copying.
The latest to follow in this fine tradition is Singapore-based Connoisseur Club, which is essentially an online restaurant reservation site combined with a group buying site. Think Open Table and Groupon‘s love child. Read more
Chaos Gate will be released in China in April this year.
Developing computer games is risky business. More so, if you’re creating a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Game (MMORPG), which requires a massive investment in capital and time.
But that is the risk Singapore-based Time Voyager‘s founder and CEO Chris Loo is willing to take. By developing their first title — Chaos Gate – for the fast-growing China market, they could potentially reap big rewards. Last year, a report revealed that sales from the China games market reached US$7B last year, a 32.4 percent year-on-year increase.
Time Voyager’s risk-taking spirit is something Canon’s Think Big campaign aims to promote. Think Big encourages entrepreneurs to not just earn a profit, but also to expand their business horizons by doing what was thought to be impossible. Read more
This is the fourth article from the “Mistakes made, lessons learnt” series. Check out all the articles here.
Company & founder: Gina Romero
Biggest mistake made: Failing ask for help from others when confronted with an unexpected big offer
Most memorable setback: Missing out on a potentially big deal – to be the main wireless Internet infrastructure supplier for a housing estate. Read more
As a student, I used to remember visiting places like the Singapore Science Centre where I would be given worksheets to do as part of a learning trail.
Many of us would scarcely bother with the worksheets — since filling in the blanks wasn’t exactly our idea of fun. Read more
In the restaurant-eat-restaurant world of the F&B industry, few local brands have stood out as clearly as Crystal Jade, one of the market leaders in Singapore. Celebrating its 20th anniversary last year with a refreshing of its identity that involves extensive refurbishments at its restaurants, Crystal Jade enjoyed a turnover of S$240M (US$189M) in 2010.
Over the last three years, it has expanded aggressively, investing S$25M (together with partners) to open 39 new outlets across Asia. This year, the F&B group will sink in a further S$17M to open 17 new outlets across eight cities. These efforts helped it to achieve a targeted 10 percent to 15 percent yearly growth in sales.
Beginning from a single outlet in Cairnhill in 1991 — which was closed and reopened with a Kitchen outlet in Shaw Plaza and a Palace outlet in Ngee Ann City – the group now has more than 100 outlets sprawled across 18 cities in nine countries. Half of these are in Singapore while the other 50 are in China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and more. Read more
Echelon, an annual Asia tech startup launchpad, will be back for its third iteration. It is also accepting applications for Startup Marketplace, an exhibition platform for tech entrepreneurs to showcase their startups to potential investors, corporate partners, the media, and members of the startup community.
Deadline for this year’s applications is 31st March 2012. Prior to the main event, shortlisted candidates, selected by a panel of judges, will be invited to participate in satellite events in Singapore, Jakarta, Manila, and Hong Kong, where they will pitch their products to an audience.
Last year, over 1,000 attendees turned up, and the exhibition saw participation from startups from over nine countries. Some of these companies have gone on to secure funding and strategic partnerships.
Following the satellite events, the top 50 selected startups will be given an exhibition space at the main event on 11th to 12th June 2012, which will cost S$400. The top 10 will be given an opportunity to pitch on stage to the main audience.
The Echelon 2012 Startup Marketplace was previously known as the Echelon Launchpad and Startup Exhibition. The platform was revamped following feedback from Echelon alumni, placing more emphasis on startups themselves.
To apply, fill up this form.
With Chinese New Year approaching and families making the rounds visiting relatives, it can be a pickle to decide where to shop and dine, especially with so many options available.
Chalkboard, a Singapore and US-based location-based ad network that has mostly been focused on reaching out to businesses, is now targeting consumers with the recent launch of its new Facebook app that allows people to find out what offers are nearby, all at one glance.
The app (try it out on Facebook) is created by UI designer Serge Baluyot and software engineer Anuj Bheda.
According to Anuj, the app “acts as a one-stop shop for our users to find out what are today’s specials that are around them and what their friends have been viewing.” Read more
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
For an indication of how developed a geek community, just ask if there is a HackerSpace around. That’s an observation made by Zane Kripe, a PhD student at Leiden University in the Netherlands, in an article for the International Institute for Asian Studies newsletter.
“HackerSpace requires substantial dedication and effort, and thus can be considered to indicate the existence of a more developed and substantial geek community,” she wrote, adding that Hackerspaces are gaining momentum in Southeast Asia. These spaces are distinct in that they are independent from the government and large corporations.
Within a year, four new establishments arose in Indonesia, and they are located in the cities of Bandung, Surabaya, Yogyakarta, and Medan. Jakarta is on track to have one too. Read more
Google organized their annual DevFest last month, and it was quite an eye opener to see how they’re placing their bets on HTML5, Chrome, Ice-Cream Sandwich (ICS), and Google+.
Having only attended the first part of the event, I got to sit in at the sessions where Google showed off these new technologies.
Here are some takeaways. Read more
Filed under Entrepreneurs, Innovation & Technology, Mobile, Special Commentary, Technology, WebTags: android@home, Chrome, Flash, Google DevFest, google plus, HTML5, ice cream sandwich
