6 Key Takeaways from Startup Asia 2013

I visited the Startup Asia 2013 event (organised by TechInAsia) recently in Singapore, which ran from the evening of 3 April (pre-event) to the night of 5 April (after-event dinner). Chock-full of market data from the neighbouring markets, marketplace of big ideas from startups, valuable lessons and advice from successful entrepreneurs, luminary quips (albeit at times with wry humour), it was a jam-packed startup event spread over 3 storeys of panel discussions, interviews, demo booths, startup pitches and countless networking opportunities. Bringing together VCs, incubators, social media marketeers, entrepreneurs, startups and more from all over the region in Southeast Asia and beyond, while everyone recognised that Southeast Asia is evolving to be a hotbed for mobile internet innovation, this wave is not coming without its hosts of challenges like payment, logistics, ecosystem support.

Here are the 6 key takeaways I put together from my experiences in the Startup Asia event 2013.

1. Develop Vertical Communities to build Commerce opportunities

• Lots of Buttons from Hong Kong, won the $10,000 first prize during the startup pitch competition at the Startup Asia event - "Lots of Butttons is a Hong Kong ecommerce that sells craft materials at 50% of retail price. #startupAsia via @xescx"
• Puddding which through its relevant social discovery platform for ladies looking to buy jeans online through recommendations from other similar sized ladies, offers sizing insurance.
• Windphony is a global self-publishing platform which allows composers, of varying professional levels to submit and market their own music (scores) works.
• The trend in the growing number of vertical communities into commerce has been highlighted during the SparxUp Indonesia 2012 event.

2. Enriching Your Communication Experience

• It is little wonder that with social being an essential layer to bring about engagement, community and commerce, the Social Messaging market is hotting up globally and especially now in Southeast Asia.
• In the business to business (B2B) space, Chatwork seeks to simplify business communications amongst employees.
• In the business to consumer (B2C) space - Hoozin tries to bring the real-world experience in face to face group chat conversations into its "round-table user interface".
• Watch out for the evolution of the Social Messaging market in 2013. 

3. Consolidating and Sharing Media Quickly

• Caught in today's hyper-connected mobile world, consumers are constantly being inundated with an avalanche of media, information and tasks to be completed. Startups are constantly sprouting up with solutions to address these perennial pains.
• In the Business to Business or B2B space, mmixr looks to offer professionals a cloud-based solution to better manage, edit and share their rich media presentation materials.
• In the Business to Consumer or B2C space, yet another photo app, Seconds comes forth with a pitch on their 1-2-3 quick to shoot and share to private albums, whilst PixBento is differentiating with their offer to bridge photo sharing amongst buddies by allowing photos to be pooled and shared across the smartphones and PCs of specific buddies.

4. B2B and B2C Loyalty is trending

• From 2012 and into 2013, an increasing number of business to consumer (B2C) loyalty program players who cater to retailer consumer loyalty benefits, and business to employee (B2E) loyalty program players who cater to corporate staff benefits are entering and developing these markets in Southeast Asia.
• Retailers and enterprises alike have been or will be looking into the trend of loyalty programs for their customers (business to consumer, B2C) or for their employees (business to employee or B2E).
• Some examples of B2C loyalty program players include Malaysia based Pofers.com and Gimmie.
• Examples of B2E loyalty program players include Singapore-based Pyrks.com and Malaysia-based PerkPool. And by the way, there is another player in Singapore, Patontheback.org which was not at the event.

5. Utility tools over Cloud as a service to drive SME productivity

• In view of the service labour crunch in Singapore, Kwix is looking to help restaurants relieve their labour shortage in waiting staff by allowing customers to order from their smartphones at their tables, instead of having to wait for the restaurant staff to attend to them.
• Ticktok looks at alleviating the frustrations of consumers who are waiting in line for their table by getting real-time notifications to them when their tables are ready. Restaurant owners are able to better manage their yield in seat allocation and not lose frustrated customers.

6. "Keep the fire in your belly"

• With every new business that one ventures into, there will never be any certainty in the product development, take up and performance. The important thing is that entrepreneurs need to stay bright-eyed in their outlook.
• Chua Kee Lock, Group President and CEO of Vertex Venture Holdings, offered the following golden gems:
• "Are you trying to win, or not to lose?"
• "An entrepreneur needs to be arrogant, but also willing to listen."
• Last but not least, Loo Cheng Chuan from Local L!fe, SingTel Digital Life Group rounded up his presentation about the 9 shocking truths about Silicon Valley with the following quip "Keep the fire in your belly".

Whilst the Startup Asia 2013 event in Singapore was a great platform and meeting of minds for the startup community in the region and beyond, it would only serve as a precursor for more exciting things to come for the business ideas and performances of many of the bright minds I have had seen and had conversations with.

In closing, to all startups and entrepreneurs out there, Keep on going ... Don't lost hope. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

Reading references:

1. Tech and cultural trends from Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia
2. Innovation from the East: takeaways from Startup Asia 2013
3. #startupasia Twitter conversations (chockful of information here! 
4. Startup Management: Tips for Prioritizing and Scaling (with Chua Kee Lock)
5. 9 shocking truths about Silicon Valley - Lessons from 100 Startup Founders
6. Newly added, Startup Asia 2013 as an infographic

6 Reasons WHY Feature Phones need some loving too (Building reach for digital content via feature phones)

"Think about feature phones, they need some loving too ... " I heard this over presentations by Digi and AIS in the 2010 AppXchange Asia event. Granted 3 years have elapsed since the event and all the spotlight these days are given to impressive numbers of smartphones and tablets replacing feature phone users, there are strong reasons for us to think about feature phones and why they need some loving.

(1) Market for feature phones still overwhelm smartphones today

• According to Mary Meeker's Internet Trends 3 Dec 2012 report, whilst there were 1 billion smartphone users globally, that pales in comparison to the 5 billion total mobile phone users worldwide - that's still 4 billion feature phone users worldwide today!
• In emerging markets like Southeast Asia, where the Internet is largely and increasingly experienced via mobile, smartphone penetration is less than 25% on average. 
• Indonesia with its population of 250 million, more than 150 million unique subscribers, has only about 10% smartphone penetration - so, go figure~

(2) Innovation in Mobile Internet Services had existed with feature phones, way before smartphones

• Remember Japan's I-Mode which was a huge success case study in the late 90s to early 2000s?
• In South Korea, even with feature phones then, there were a number of successful case studies and innovation with the likes of mobile loyalty point system OKCashBag, mobile gift voucher system Gifticon from SK Telecom (now SK planet runs this; disclosure: I am now at SK planet).
• It is the developer ecosystems and digital content value chain partners which have been driving the mobile internet service innovation in the era before smartphones, with feature phones (albeit smart as they were already then).

(3) My First Internet, My First Email in emerging markets happened with Nokia (Ovi) feature phones

• Nokia Ovi services which was launched 28 August 2008 (disclosure: I was managing the Nokia Ovi services for Southeast Asia then), provided a number of emerging markets globally with their first Internet, and first email experience.
• A suite of mobile internet services - contents and calendars sync, photo and video sharing, files sync across PC and mobile, maps and navigation, mobile music, mobile social gaming and mobile apps downloads (sound familiar?) were made available already in those earlier years, to users of Nokia feature and Symbian phones (in those days, the N-series (with Maps, Mobile TV services etc), E-series (Push email, mobile device management and PIM sync services) as well as the iconic Nokia Communicator were the smartphones).
• Nokia Life Tools, a sms-based information subscription service for the emerging markets (China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria etc), with more than 95 million users to date, has provided agricultural, educational, healthcare and entertainment service offerings to Nokia feature phone users.

(4) eBooks are thriving and growing with feature phones

• In China, people have already been reading ebooks on their mobile phones and now increasingly on low-cost tablets (more than 75% feature phones - Mary Meeker's Dec 2012 Internet Trends report) with a market size of about $90 million (PwC data). Anecdotally, this figure could well be worth more than $300 million, given China consumers subscribe to ebook stories on sms and mms packages on their mobile - given more than 75% are feature phone users - Mary Meeker's Dec 2012 Internet Trends report).

(5) Social chat messaging is also gaining support and growing via feature phones

• Nimbuzz who has 120 million users today, largely in India and Middle East, is expanding into Singapore, Indonesia and other Southeast Asia markets with its social chat supporting feature phones and smartphones, through partnerships with mobile operators.
• NHN Japan is partnering with Nokia to push their Naver Line social chat service to the next 200 million in 2013, via Nokia's best selling Asha feature phones line-up.

(6) Cloud will enable "smart" feature phones

• biNu is Your Smartphone in the Cloud cloud-based software platform that delivers popular internet services and digital content fast and with low bandwidth for an efficient mobile experience to both feature and smartphones. It is backed by Google Chairman Eric Schmidt's TomorrowVentures.
• In fact, through biNu, romance publisher Harlequin (refer to first demo video below) and Worldreader (refer to second video below) will be offering eBooks through cloud-based eBook reader apps on feature phones who are now made "smart" by the biNu efficient cloud-based service platform. 

Well, 2 more areas to look out at for feature phones are in mobile social gaming with Migg33 (huge in Indonesia, South Africa etc) and mobile advertising (Buzzcity).

Are you convinced yet on the why feature phones today still need some loving attention if businesses are looking to grow and expand their mobile internet business globally?


Let's engage,
Nelson Wee
LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/nelsonwee
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.com/nelsonwee
Twitter: @nelsonwee

Photo credit: vernieman / Foter.com / CC BY

4 Hot Trends to watch in 2013

Looking back 2012, lots have certainly transpassed.  It was incidentally around the same time last year  when I penned "5 Hot Trends to watch in 2012".  In 2012, cloud, social and mobility drove the feverish growth in the ecosystem from startups, incubators, investors, system integrators, enterprises, brands etc, as well as choice and consumption changes in consumer behaviour. 



With 2013, we could see the promise and potential in the following themes:

1. Everything gets smarter, more fun and unstructured.
2. Devices help consumers with recommendations to content and merchandise.
3. Cloud enable content and data transport, storage and backup to different devices everywhere.
4. Consumer loyalty will be driven across multiple experiences.

How would the above factor out in terms of possible trends? Here is part 1 of the view from Nelson Wee :-)

(1) Tablets will rule with Smart Tabs, Mass Tabs, Phablets

• Tablets and its hybrid convertibles phablets (large 5" to 7" screen touchscreen devices) will get smarter, cheaper and made available en-masse.
• In my earlier post "why are there huge opportunities in Connecting People through Mobile Social Messaging", I brought up Mary Meeker's 2012 year end internet trends presentation which pointed out the high internet user adds especially in the emerging markets (i.e. Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam). I also wrote about this in an earlier post "Doorway to the Mobile Internet opens in Southeast Asia, a high growth market in the making".
• Increasingly Asian mobile consumers value larger screens to consume mobile content, in parallel with TV watching.
• In fact, living with the larger screens in with phablets and tablets becomes addictive.
• And one more proof point, iPad mini and Samsung Note tablets have been out of stock in Singapore in the last couple of weeks apparently from the retail stores here I have heard!

(2) Content and merchandise everywhere

• To match the mobility and on-the-go lifestyles of consumers, not only will content need to be availed via multiple screens (feature phones, smartphones, tablets, PCs, Smart TVs etc), physical merchandise will be sold via mobile and bundled with digital content  - this being evident with Amazon.com's foray into the tablet and mobile commerce market.
• Whilst digital rights management (aka DRM) technologies are available today from the likes of companies like Lotaris, the current on-going debate between eBooks and publishers lends caution however to the business issues which need to be resolved along the content value chain.

(3) Apps with niche communities thrive

• In an earlier post "Key themes from Sparxup 2012 in Jakarta", various apps based on niche focused communities (e.g. for backpackers, food recipes) are sprouting up and have the potential to continue to thrive together with the larger social media communities, Facebook.
• Social networks around education and kids via edtech technologies also have an opportunity to grow in particular with the needs of parents and their concerns for their children's future.  Content portals made relevant for kids like WhizTimes are also establishing their foothold to cater to this market.
• Coupled with mobile and social technologies, niche communities can flourish in tandem.

(4) Communication made richer via mobile social

• In my last post "Why are there huge opportunities in Connecting People through Mobile Social Messaging", I highlighted the why and how hot the mobile social messaging market is developing globally, in particular Southeast Asia.
• Additional industry momentum on such Rich Communication Services is also being orchestrated by a global program, marketed as "Joyn", and project led by GSMA, is increasingly deployed to more operators to enable inter-operator instant messaging or chat, video sharing and file transfers.
• Consumers are looking for quick and easy sharing of their media (photos, videos, text etc) with their circles of friends and extended networks, depending on their context.
• Stay tuned to how the various mobile social messaging players evolve their solution platform offerings (e.g. mobile social games, themes, ancillary apps, merchandise) to ensure frequent engagement and viral acquisition.
• Here is Tictocplus - an example of a mobile social messaging platform service for quick and easy sharing of your photos and videos in your chats with your friends (disclosure: Tictocplus is from SK planet, where I am at currently).

Here are my initial take on 4 hot trends I see coming for 2013.

What are your thoughts on 2013 hot trends?

Talk soon,
Nelson Wee
twitter: @nelsonwee
my profile: http://www.linkedin.com/nelsonwee

More reference links for your read:

1. What 5 trends to look out for at CES 2013
2. Most anticipated tech gadgets for 2013
3. 10 Tech Trends to watch for in 2013
4. 10 Marketing Trends to watch for in 2013
5. Arip identifies top 5 trends to watch in 2013
6. 5 predictions for Twitter in 2013
7. Living with a big screen phone

How can Apps help build up your Social Currency?

In my last post "3 Phase Strategy in Digital Commerce", I brought up the potential ways in which:

1. Apps could act as outposts to consumers and build up communities.
2. Social messaging platforms and content marketing could engage with your consumers.
3. Commerce in general is bringing in the social engagement and recommendations to the online and mobile space as consumers are increasingly on-the-go and expect value from differentiated offers.

Wikipedia definition of social currency for your business states that it constitutes the entirety of actual and potential resources which could arise from the presence of your business in social networks and communities - digital or offline.

So how do mobile apps come into the picture in helping to build up social currency for your business? Growth in on-the-go consumers and mobile content consumption are changing the ways in which consumers are putting their attention and mindshare on business and marketing news. In southeast asia markets, whilst largely feature phone driven, smartphone growth are fast outstripping the growth of feature phones in the recent 2 years with the availability of low cost affordable smartphones. Internet access via low cost tablets and wifi enabled cafes are also helping the fuel internet access and content sharing. Have a look at my initial take on the Southeast Asia mobile and internet market (I will be updating this in another post) and you would see the potential reach of apps in Southeast Asia markets. Should you look into getting a piece of this channel? Yes. Is it worth your while? YES!

Southeast Asia Market Sizing for Internet Commerce from Nelson Wee

In developing the app strategy for your business, you would need to understand that in today's world of on-the-go consumers and pervasive mobile internet access, the market landscape for the consumption of business and marketing information is changing. No longer static in nature, there is a shift of information sharing and communication from static documents in your PCs to browsers and now increasingly via apps in smartphones, tablets, feature phones and more upcoming screens.

Here is a slide on how mobile apps: 

• could be used as experimental outposts to reach your consumers 
• to seed and incubate concept messaging, 
• and build up specific vertical communities for businesses. 

Open declaration here: the apps DishPal, StyleTag and StARCALL are from SK Planet where I currently work in.

Apps build communities from Nelson Wee

By nurturing your communities, engaging your users with the all-important relevant content calendar, you start to be able to mine and garner value for your business from your interactions with your consumers through the profiling of your community users.

Referring back to my previous post on the the 3 phases in Digital Commerce, the social messaging platform when coupled with nurtured communities and consumer profiling from apps, will grow richer with more relevant consumer and business context.

Let's discuss further - in subsequent posts or reach me directly.

I look forward to hear from you.

Nelson Wee
LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/nelsonwee
Twitter: @nelsonwee
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.com/nelsonwee