Asean Tech Digest — Issue #32. stimulus packages 💪, livestreams 📺…
By: Victor Tenneroni
Tags: Southeast Asia, VC, Venture Capital, Startup

Confinement, hanami-style

Just funded 💸

🇸🇬 Telehealth startup Doctor Anywhere has raised a US$27m Series B from Square Peg, EDBI, IHH Healthcare, Pavilion Capital, Kamet Capital.

🇸🇬 Waste Management startup Blue Planet has raised a US$25m financing round from Nomura Holdings.

🇸🇬 Cybersecurity startup Horangi has raised a US$20m Series B from Provident Growth, Monk’s Hill Ventures, Right Click Capital, Genesis Alternative Ventures.

🇮🇩 Agritech startup Tanihub has raised a US$17m Series A+ from Openspace Ventures, Intudo Ventures, Golden Gate Ventures, UOB Venture Management, Vertex Ventures, BRI Ventures and Tenaya Capital.

🇮🇩 Social commerce platform startup Chilibeli has raised a US$10m Series A from Lightspeed Ventures, Golden Gate Ventures, Sequoia Surge, Kinesys Group, Alto Partners.

🇵🇭 Logistics startup Inteluck has raised a US$5m Pre-Series B from MindWorks Capital, Lalamove, Infinity Venture Partners.

🇸🇬 IoT startup UNL has raised a US$2m financing round from Here Technologies, Elev8, SGInnovate, SOSV, Venturerock.

🇲🇲 E-commerce startup Kyarlay has raised a US$0.75m financing round from United Managers Japan Inc., EME.

🇮🇩 Edtech startup Pahamify has raised a US$0.15m Seed from Y Combinator. Bio of the founder here.

Startups and downs 🚀

🇸🇬 Streaming service HOOQ, a JV between Singtel, Sony Pictures, and Warner Bros Entertainment, has filed for liquidation.

🌏 Santo Purnama, co-founder of biotech SensingSelf, has developed a rapid self-test kit for Covid-19 — less than 10 minutes and less than US$10, which has already obtained CE certification (EU).

🇸🇬 Banking-as-a-Service platform MatchMove has acquired a strategic stake in e-commerce enabler Shopmatic.

🌏 The Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia are out. Here is a close-up on the 14 Malaysian award winners.

🇸🇬 Grocery delivery startup Honestbee has taken legal action against its ex-CEO and ex-director for breach of fiduciary duties.

🇸🇬 Roboadvisor Smartly has shut down.

🌏 Facebook Accelerator Singapore, in partnership with IMDA, has revealed its new batch of 14 startups, powered by Plug and Play.

🇸🇬 SAP.io Foundry has revealed their industry 4.0 batch.

🇸🇬 F10 FinTech Incubator & Accelerator (Switzerland) has expanded to Singapore and revealed their first local batch.

🇸🇬 Bio of Bryan Koh, CEO of medicine delivery startup WhiteCoat.

🇲🇾 Drone company Aerodyne has divested its participation in wind turbine company in AtSite (Denmark).

🇸🇬 AI company BasisAI has received accreditation from IMDA.

🇲🇾 Machine Learning startup Supahands has appointed Greg Meehan as Chief Revenue Officer.

🇸🇬 Cybersecurity company Right Hand is offering free online cyber training sessions, amidst a raise in scams linked to Covid-19.

Unicorns 🦄

🌏 Grab has appointed Peter Oey as CFO.

🌏 Who are the top 20 shareholders of Gojek?

🌏 Grab has launched GrabMart in Vietnam, allowing on-demand delivery of healthcare & beauty products, dry packaged food, drinks, and books.

Venture Capitalists 🎢

🌏 #SupportStartups aims to aggregate all promotional activities offered by startups — an initiative by Openspace Ventures, 500 Startups and Cocoon Capital.

🌏 www.SEAcosystem.com is a database to find talents & companies still hiring, an initiative carried by Saison Capital, FutureLabs, Jungle Ventures, Alpha JWC, Convergence Ventures, Patamar Capital, Rainmaking, TRIVE Ventures and Tribe Accelerator.

🌏 TNB Aura has launched a Special Situations Fund to invest US$2m in startups impacted by the pandemic.

🌏 Startup builder Antler has announced US$500k funding scheme for startups fighting Covid-19.

🇮🇩 Agaeti Ventures & Convergence Ventures have merged to form AC Ventures.

🇲🇾 1337 Ventures’ & Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation’s Alpha Startups programme’s new batch will be 100% online.

🌏 Softbank is preparing to sell US$15b of Alibaba stock to buy back shares and slash debt. And it won’t buy US$3b worth of WeWork shares after all.

Corporates 👨‍💼

🇸🇬 Carmaker Hyundai (Korea) will establish its 44,000 sqm global innovation hub in Singapore by 2022 with the support of EDB.

🇹🇭 The Toyota Mobility Foundation has provided 10 shuttles powered by on-demand ride-sharing software startup SWAT (Singapore) for the transfer of health workers.

🇹🇭 Siam Commercial Bank will use RippleNet, developed by distributed ledger technology startup Ripple (US), to enable Thais to make low-cost cross-border payments from mobile devices, and QR code payment solutions for tourists.

🇸🇬 Singapore Airlines has cut down flight capacity by 96%.

🇸🇬 Huawei Pay is live in Singapore, in a partnership with ICBC UnionPay.

🇵🇭 Amazon has initiated an investigation on working conditions for its call centers in the Philippines operated by contractor Teleperformance.

Smart Nations 🏛️

🇸🇬 SGUnited, GovTech and the Ministry of Health have rolled out TraceTogether, a Bluetooth-powered app that enables faster infection tracing. Overview of 11 countries using similar tracking solutions.

🇸🇬 US$34b, 11% of GDP — That’s the size of the 2nd relief package unveiled by the Singaporean government, as GDP forecast for this year lies between -4 and -1%. All measures here: co-funding of wages up to 25% — up to 75% for seriously impacted sectors, increased cash payouts to households — S$300–900, 3-month deferment of income tax payments for businesses, property tax rebates and more credit solutions to businesses, notably an increase of the SME Working Capital maximum loan to S$1m.

🇮🇩 Stimulus package I: US$24.2b (in preparation). Measures include: monthly incentives for health workers, corporate tax cut of 30% for 6 months and income tax payment would be deferred by 6 months for 19 selected industries. Unicorn Bukalapak estimates the real scale of infection cases as well as impact on people’s purchasing behavior here.

🇲🇾 Stimulus package II: US$52.8b , 15.5% of GDP. Measures include: one-off cash payments, discount on utility bills, deferments of rental payments for public housing. Here is a list of available online services during the Movement Control Order period.

🇵🇭 Stimulus package I: US$3.9b for low-income households + US$500m to support specific industries — about half for tourism.

🇹🇭 Stimulus package II: US$50.9b, 10% of GDP (to be voted next Tuesday). WFH and schools closing mean free mobile data. The anti-monopoly watchdog has warned food delivery companies, as in some cases service fees to restaurants have increased from 20 up to 40%.

🇻🇳 Stimulus package I (in preparation): US$2.6b. Measures include: 3-month one-off cash payments, employees can borrow at zero interest rate from the Việt Nam Social Policy Bank to pay salaries, and tax breaks are also on the way.

Food for thought 🍜

🌏 The World Bank has issued a report on growth prospects in APAC, considering the impact of Covid-19.

🌏 Livestream is eating the world. Chinese livestreamer Viya has sold a rocket launch service for US$5.6m on Taobao. Another livestreamer, Luo Yonghao, has sold for US$15.5m of goods in just 3 hours. Some additional figures on livestream here.

🇮🇩 The five conglomerates behind Indonesia’s tech & VC scene: who are they?

🌏 Covid-19 apps are the new fashion.

The Fountainhead ⛲

China 🇨🇳

○ The United Nations will use VooV, Tencent’s video-conferencing tool for a global dialogue for its 75th anniversary on June 26th — VooV is available globally since last week.

○ Beverage company Luckin Coffee’s shares went down by 75.6% after it admitted its COO & some of its staff had committed fraud on the company’s financial results in 2019.

○ Transferwise has added Alipay support.

○ Huawei missed US$12b in its 2019 top-line target due to US trade ban, but its YoY growth is unaltered — +19.1% vs. +19.8% from 2018, reaching US$123b.

○ E-commerce platform Pinduoduo has secured US$1.1b in additional financing with a private share placement from long-term investors.

India 🇮🇳

○ VC firms including Matrix Partners, Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners have published a set of best practices for entrepreneurs.

○ Zomato has reportedly reached US$3.25b with the investment from Pacific Horizon Investment Trust, as daily transactions have fallen by 70% to under 1 million.

Also 🤫

○ Stock Jump — Here is a platformer game to ski-slide on stock market downward slopes.

○ Catching Up with Depeche Mode — In the US, short video app Tiktok has experienced +34% WoW revenue growth and +18% increase in downloads, while music streaming app Spotify’s top 200 chart had a 11% WoW decrease in number of plays.

○ Earth has been rebuilt on a 1:1 scale in Minecraft, using Google Maps APIs…and a lot of sweat.

○ Some of us may be confined, but we remain close.

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