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And in April, during the Easter week holiday rush—a peak business period—Honestbee’s business in Catholic-majority Philippines paused indefinitely. The situation has only worsened since. Restoring investor confidence Honestbee is said to have just 10 remaining employees in its Singapore headquarters, 177 employees at its Habitat supermarket, and another 54 spread across the rest of the … Read more
However, the Vietnamese market is expected to contribute 29-33% of the group’s revenue in 2019 and 2020. With the considerable capital from KKR, PropertyGuru bought out its Vietnamese counterpart, Batdongsan.com.vn, giving it a 69% market share and the market leader position. The acquisition is a saving grace, as out of all the other markets in … Read more
And lastly, perhaps causing the biggest dent of all, PropertyGuru’s rivals recently announced a merger. In a move to defend its shareholder base, the ASX-listed property classified company REA Group merged its Indonesia and Singapore businesses with a smaller Singapore-based startup 99.co. The combined market share for both will post a strong challenge to PropertyGuru’s … Read more
Unlike Carousell’s new-age beginnings, 701Search has a far more orthodox origin story. It was born out of the digitisation of the listing business in SPH’s traditional print business. Since then, things have become a lot more complicated. Its acquisition by Telenor in 2017, for example, isn’t exactly what it may seem on the outside. Telenor … Read more
The keenness to plug gaps and support companies during the growth stage funding is seen as well-intentioned, but it is countered by the view that opportunism is a motivating factor. Two partners at global VC firms who spoke to us speculated that a major reason why regional VC firms are raising larger funds is to … Read more
This “growth stage funding gap” is something that Southeast Asia’s VCs in are looking to tap into by raising larger funding vehicles—sometimes in the hundreds of millions. Jungle Ventures raised its October 2019 $240 million fund with this in mind, as did Singapore’s Vertex Ventures ($290 million). “This is why we cannot do it ourselves … Read more
“The level of support was incredible. In particular, it was very hands-on during demo week,” one investor whose portfolio company took part in the programme remarked. “No other programme has the access and reach to connect young entrepreneurs with industry stalwarts from across the world,” said another investor. “They get to meet some of the … Read more
Similarly, Pune-headquartered online tutoring company InterviewBit Academy is reported to be raising $20 million at a post-money valuation of $100 million, according to a Times of India report. Sequoia, Tiger Global and EDBI—the corporate investment arm of Singapore’s Economic Development Board—are said to be leading the deal. Even in Southeast Asia, where dealmaking has been … Read more
The best accelerator programmes are known for their ability to help companies grow. Consequently, the go-to metric to assess the effectiveness of an accelerator is follow-on funding. A look at the classic model of Y Combinator in the US—perhaps the most famous accelerator; it graduated 197 companies in its most recent batch this past summer—shows … Read more
Zilingo took that early momentum and, perhaps, in part thanks to Sequoia’s connections, went on to raise significant money from Singapore sovereign fund Temasek, Myntra investor Sofina and Germany’s Burda among others. Once those larger Series C and D rounds were announced, it quickly went from existing under-the-radar to being one of Southeast Asia’s deepest-pocketed … Read more