radical candour from a deep generalist
I am gonna check this out…
FOR: LEVEL3 FOUNDERS
An exclusive forum where startup founders can be inspired, share ideas and
knowledge, learn about opportunities, and make vital connections within the
startup ecosystem. We have Michael Smith Jr., Partner at SeedPlus to lead
the session.
This should be fun to watch.
12 Startups in 12 Months – Jon Yongfook:
Things are very different now. Today, years since my last product launch and having given the last 2.5 years of my career to the corporate world, I am embarrassed to say my product shipping muscle has atrophied. So I’m spending the next year exercising that muscle back, by building and shipping a new product every month for a year. 12 startups in 12 months. This concept is not new. Well-known digital nomad Pieter Levels was the first to attempt this challenge back in 2014. One or two others have also attempted it.
Awesome read. I need to pick up The Economist this week.
I think this one comment sums up what no other ecosystem in the world has.
The density. And he even misses of few of the players in the density – the VC’s, the lawyers and even the companies (many used to be startups) that buy the startups – all are in one big area.
Maybe this shouldn’t be what makes an ecosystem thrive since we all talk about the power of tech in decentralisation and distribution but it seems in this case – density really does matter.
Silicon Valley has always had one important advantage over other regions when it comes to the tech sector. There is a much higher density of talent, capital, employment opportunity, and basic research in Silicon Valley versus other locations. When I say density, I mean physical density. If you walked a mile, how many tech companies would you pass along the way? That metric in Silicon Valley has always been higher than elsewhere and still is. So even though the return on capital (human and invested) has significant headwinds in today’s Silicon Valley, it is still a lot easier to deploy that capital there. And I think that will continue to be the case for a long time to come.
Long but good read.
Obviously opinions and some controversial ones at that.
😉
What we learned from Chinese Companies & Consumers — A week of Fynding inspiration in China
Haven’t caught this newsletter before.
There is a lot of travel stuff going on out there.
The Travel Monthly- August | LinkedIn:
Singaporean start-up, Travelstop, raised $1.2m in seed funding. Team is led by founders of Travelmob which Expedia’s HomeAway acquired in 2015. Travelstop aims to simplify business travel.
This one is a bit longer with some good interview questions:
Prashant Kirtane has launched his new startup, Travelstop, to become the “Slack of unmanaged corporate travel” for SMEs in Asia.
CRA CRA
Looks like there are, or will be, some more Crazy Rich Asians in Singapore. Terra has raised $32 million to fuel its vision of creating Project Terra, the next generation of digital money, based on blockchain and cryptocurrency technology.
— Read on venturebeat.com/2018/08/29/terra-raises-32-million-to-build-the-future-of-money-with-blockchain/
Super cool! Travelstop on the radio!
Simplifying Business Travel in Asia – MONEY FM 89.3 – Omny.fm
Long PDF read analysing or pontificating Softbanks chance of success as a VC fund.
Very interesting.
On October 14, 2016, SoftBank shocked the world with the announcement of its $100 billion Vision Fund, which would focus on investing in late-stage technology companies. Within 7 months of the announcement, SoftBank had already cemented $93 billion in commitments. To put the unprecedented scale and speed of the Vision Fund into perspective—it took all US-based venture funds 4 years to raise $143 billion from 2014 to 2017.
In its short history, the Vision Fund has already led enormous financing rounds across the globe, from billion dollar plus investments in ride-sharing services like Uber to a $300 million investment in Silicon Valley’s dog-walking and dog-sitting app, Wag. In comparison, the median global VC deal size for late-stage companies was only around $11 million in 2017. The sheer amount of capital deployed has left the venture capital world stunned, with many questioning if competitive returns are possible at this massive funding scale.
At EquityZen, we decided to take a step back and analyze what it would take for the Vision Fund to deliver competitive returns.
Peng is always honest and to the point, I like the last line in the part I highlighted.
This is not a fly-in game.
For this VC, being an investor wasn’t an obvious career choice:
If I’m a VC who wants to come into Southeast Asia, what trends should I look out for? I think more important than the trends is what you need to do. If you’re an existing VC in some other geography, you would want to look for people who understand the local scene and know entrepreneurship.
Southeast Asia has several countries. One advantage of the region is that most of its cities are used to international businesses. So, it’s not as difficult as it was in China 10 or 15 years ago. VCs would be flying in from Hong Kong and, especially, from The Valley, and that worked for maybe a year or two. But then it stopped working because you were not there when the contacts were being made.
It’s the same thing with Southeast Asia. There are a lot of local nuances that you probably don’t understand, and that’s why you need a local person for each country. This is not a fly-in game.
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