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Twelve years of reporting from the world’s most dynamic ecosystems
Even though Baidu , Alibaba and Tencent were innovate rapidly , they were frequently present as copy of Western troupe ( “ Alibaba , the Amazon of China , ” etc . ) . Despite being home to one - one-sixth of the world ’s population , India was seen as a homogenous flock . People did n’t even bother pay attention to Southeast Asia outside of Singapore .
But I have to take on I also had misperceptions about markets outside of Taiwan , where I dwell , and I was really relieved when other journalists joined TechCrunch ’s Asia squad to supply on - the - land expertise . For this article , I asked my workfellow on TechCrunch ’s Asia squad for their opinions on how outside sensing of tech in each of their countries have evolved . They areRita Liao(China),Manish SinghandJagmeet Singh(India ) andKate Park(South Korea ) , four of the smartest people I eff . ( Note : Ivan Mehtais also a wise writer on this team , but his main remit is actually look much far by than Asia . )
Today is my last solar day at TechCrunch . If there ’s one matter I go for I ’ve accomplished in my decade - plus here , it ’s making it clear-cut why Asia ’s tech ecosystems thing . They do n’t just bear on people within their market . They ’re mold the relief of the worldly concern , through brusk - form video , livestreaming , super apps , fintech , crypto and much more . They ’ve get westerly companies , changed how societal media is used , found attention - take hold of initial public offerings and become crucial manufacturing hub for top smartphone manufacturer . Ignoring them means you end up with a very myopic view of engineering science .
Southeast Asia
I ’m going to start with Southeast Asia , since it ’s my main beat . To say that startups there have evolved at a breathless step over the past decade is an understatement . Despite its growth , however , technical school in Southeast Asia is still underestimated by many mass outside the region . I ’ll give an example of why that ’s incorrect .
In 2013 , I was sent by TechCrunch to the Global Entrepreneur Summit in Kuala Lumpur , Malaysia . I suffer Anthony Tan , who launch Grab the year before . At that point , its focus was to make hail a taxi in Malaysia easier and safer ; its bigger ambitiousness to evolve into a first-rate app and fiscal services provider across eight southeasterly Asian res publica — Cambodia , Indonesia , Malaysia , Myanmar , the Philippines , Singapore , Thailand , and Vietnam — was still nascent .
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I believe that the Uber - Grab deal was the first time many people jump to bear attention to Southeast Asia ’s startup ecosystem , specially out of doors of Singapore . Like other places , SEA is presently impacted by the financing downswing — a barren contrast to the microphone boom of 2021 and 2022 whenfunding take place so quicklymy reportage could scarcely keep up ( and to be honest , sometimes I could n’t ) .
startup in Southeast Asia deserve care , not just because of the region ’s weighing machine — Indonesia alone is the public ’s fourth most populous country — and its diversity , but because they are creating innovative product that can make an shock in many other countries .
One of my favorite account for TechCrunch wasa feature about Islamic law - compliant fintechbuilt for Muslim users . These include funding for small line that do n’t involve interest ( which is veto by shariah law ) , online payment gateways that keep off non - compliant transactions like leverage of alcohol , tobacco and pork , and salvage accounts for pilgrimage to Mecca .
Southeast Asia ’s sharia law - compliant fintech has an chance to break into other marketplace . According toa report by DinarStandard and fintech Ellipses , the securities industry size of Islam fintech in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation ( OIC ) countries is have a bun in the oven to rise at a 17.9 % CAGR by 2026 , compare to traditional fintech ’s 13.5 % CAGR over the same period .
An area I think where Southeast Asian startups are excellent overall is fintech services developed for unbanked or underbanked customers — that is , people who have lilliputian to no entree to traditional financial service like banking bill or loan , often due to issues like a lack of credit bureau infrastructure , a problem that exists in markets around the domain .
One standout is Kredivo , which hasraised about $ 400 million in equityand is developing a extensive stove of products , including instantaneous credit financing for e - commerce and offline purchases , and personal loans . It also lock a neobank called Krom . Since many of its customer do n’t have a credit entry sexual conquest , Kredivo , like many other fintech inauguration targeting underbanked customers , has its own system for valuate creditworthiness , fuse data source like telephone company , e - commercialism accounts and banking company account statement .
The big number of unbanked and underbanked people in Southeast Asia also helped give rise to a thriving crypto and web3 scene . AsRita reported in 2022 , there ’s need for alternate crypto - related finance to grow in the area . DeFi is doing especially well because it gives users a fortune to realize yield and access to capital letter without traditional financial intermediary . Each Southeast Asiatic body politic of web3 adoption has its own flavor of crypto instauration . For instance , Vietnam has “ hard-core applied scientist , ” while Singapore produces SaaS product . One notable startup is Pintu , a crypto trading app thatraised funding at a fast clip between 2021 and 2022 .
China
For China , I asked Rita to give me an overview of the many style she ’s seen evolve over the years , especially ones that have influenced other markets . She ’s the most insightful journalist I can cerebrate of traverse China tech . When I begin at TechCrunch , China was still construe by many Western readers as a tech ecosystem fill up with copycats , especially of American companies . For instance , Baidu was often refer to as “ China ’s Google ” ( and I ’m embarrassed to say I write just that in the headline ofmy first article for TechCrunch ) . That perception has changed dramatically over the past 10 years .
FewerU.S. venture capital business firm are investing in China now , due to geopolitical and other factors , but they have already set style around the world , and stay on to do so .
I ’ll start with TikTok as it is the first social media app from a Chinese tech party to reach its level of success in the United States . originate by ByteDance as the abroad version of Douyin , it launched in 2017 and soon merged with Musically after ByteDance acquired the latter . The short - form picture and livestreaming format that it popularized also finally were copied as core group feature of speech on Facebook , Instagram and YouTube . Its succeeder was not precisely sport innovation , but more execution . Rita notes that livestreaming was around before TikTok launched its hot lineament in 2019 in the U.S. — YouTube had it in position from 2011 — but TikTok ( and Douyin , its Chinese version ) have made it a key feature article of its hugely popular app .
Eight years on , TikTok continues its momentum . A Pew Research Center reportrecentlyfound “ relatively volatile maturation ” over the last two years , withabout a third of citizenry surveyedsaying they had used the platform .
It was also , arguably , a victim of that achiever . In 2020 , just four years after its launch , the U.S. government take its eyes on it as a security threat . It became a political football and anepic saga . The conflict come along eventually to snuff it down — even President Biden ’s reelection team joined it — but it ’s not out . In the last calendar week , theU.S Senate askedBiden ’s team to stop using the app . The app remains ban in several other countries , like India , and it was late included among social metier platformscalled to Congress over kid safety . Beyond all of this , though , its influence on internet refinement is clear , and so is its force as a line of work : It isexpected to overtake Facebook in influencer spending this year .
Another influential app is WeChat , developed by Tencent . The stripped - down version available alfresco of China give it intemperate to see just how crucial it is to the daily lives of Chinese users . WeChat may have started as “ just ” a messaging political platform , but it also was a key innovator of the “ super app ” model , withsocial networking , shopping , game , ride hailing , maps and movie bookingall within the app . It has breed an ecosystem , too , with third - party “ mini programs , ” or mini apps by third - party developer , available . More importantly , it has turn into one of China ’s biggest mobile requital supplier ( somethingJon Russell first covered in 2016 ) , used by service providers like taxicab drivers to accept requital . You could * probably * survive in China without WeChat , but your life would be a lot harder to pilot .
Inplaces like the United States and Europe , companies like Facebook and Telegramhave essay to replicate WeChat ’s achiever as a super app . Traction has been uneven , though . The concept has seen the most success in countries where datum is expensive and download one app with multiple services is more cost - friendly than several apps .
Two other noteworthy examples of how Asia has really draw with the super app concept are Grab and equal Gojek . Both started as ride - hailing apps , but now tender financial avail , like payments , on - demand delivery and logistics .
Another Chinese company having an influence in other markets is PDD , which started as a much smaller e - commerce competition against colossus like Alibaba and JD , before giving ascent to societal Commerce Department . PDD owns Pinduoduo and its babe app Temu . Pinduoduo enables users to make group purchases for lower cost . That might make it tantalising to compare it to Groupon , but it ’s different in two mode . First , team leverage are initiate by buyers , not sellers . Secondly , it ’s focused on apparel , produce and other casual use detail ( in fact , PDD hasinvested intemperately in agriculture , as Rita cover ) . Temuoffers cheap factory - to - consumer commodity .
PDD’sbid to compete with Amazon in the U.S. , set up in 2022 , has give a lot of downloads thanks to generous user subsidy , make Temu the most downloaded app in the U.S. last year . It ’s make an encroachment in other way , too . Last December , my co-worker Alex Wilhelmmade an argumentfor why people should yield attention to the contention between PDD and Alibaba . Alex noted that PDD is now worth more than Alibaba , even though Alibaba is still a lot bigger . This can think good things for China ’s startup ecosystem .
“ Major tech companies in China have long been critical startup investors , and that persona could become even more important in the Chinese tech ecosystem as venture chapiter investing in the country pass up , ” Alex write . “ So if Alibaba and PDD have lots of value and cash , they could help keep domesticated startups afloat if they require to . ”
India
When Rita link TechCrunch , I was so relieved to finally have on - the - footing expertise for such a vast and complex marketplace . I felt the same way when Manish and then Jagmeet come onboard to cover India . I ’m not too proud to say I never feel equipped to cover on India ’s tech scene well . I ’ll give you one example why . In September 2013 Iwrote an articleabout how Microsoft ’s learning of Nokia ’s Devices & Services was a bet on come forth markets and meant it might betray off Nokia ’s feature of speech headphone business to focus on low - monetary value smartphones instead .
But this article emerged only after I had draft one about how Microsoft was planning to replicate down on lineament phones as it dug deep into markets in India . I sent it to my editor program Ingrid Lunden , and she pointed me to search shew ball-shaped sales of smartphones were beginning to overhaul feature phones . I had to rewrite my article because I incorrectly take that consumers in India were still unforced to fall for feature speech sound when smartphones were taking off in the rest of the public .
One of the myth Manish dispelled with his reporting was the misconception that its consumer are willing to give tone and experience for price . In an article from last September , Manish wrote that even though Indian consumers are traditionally realise as price - conscious , they areincreasingly demanding bounty items . Not only do they want luxury smartphones , but they also want opulence hotel , actual acres , railway car and even fans as buyers pay a exchange premium for aesthetic .
“ Amerind consumers ’ willingness to dig deeply into their wallet has major implications for startups operating across nearly every category , allowing firms to ameliorate their gain margin without compromise on quality , ” Manish noted .
Another misconception about India is that the country is a homogenous mass . As Jagmeet told me in our Slack messages , India has complex demographics encompassing different geezerhood , income and language brackets . So Amazon , Facebook and Walmart all go wrong when they took a one - size of it - fits - all attack to India .
Free Basics , a Facebook - owned free app that have people relate to Facebook and other sites like BabyCenter , Wikipedia and Bing , is aninteresting fount study . Created for usance in markets throughout Africa , South and Southeast Asia , and Latin America , it was intend to increase cyberspace espousal among “ the next billion , ” as users in emerging markets were often call . Facebook manifestly also desire to make more users . But in India and many other country , Free Basics like a shot head tobacklashfor undermining net disinterest . As Jagmeet told me , legislators include Rajeev Chandrasekhar , now the deputy IT prime minister and a appendage of India ’s prevail company , led political scandalisation against Free Basics . On a fundamental level , Facebook also underestimate what Indian consumers need — access to the integral cyberspace instead of a pre - selected collection of sites .
Another example of an American technical school giantbungling its India strategywas the launching ofAndroid One smartphonesin 2014 . Designed for affordability , neither its hardware nor software could compete with rivals from Amerindic and Taiwanese manufacturers like Xiaomi .
There are some things in India ’s tech ecosystem that are still developing , like its increasing grandness as a invent hub for companieslike Apple , SamsungandGoogle . Manish evidence me that nobody thought India would become a fundamental hardware manufacturing hub a X ago . But that has change due to factor like a government push and incentive , alongside India ’s originate thriftiness .
Manish also noted that the Native American fund grocery store is open to tech startup . Zomato , which wasamong a crop of technical school companies that listed in 2021 , is do well , and investment depository financial institution like Nomura , Goldman Sachs , Morgan Stanley and Jefferies are pursuing other Indian startups .
South Korea
In 2013 , my then - editor in chieftain ask me to go toSparkLabs ’ first Demo Dayin South Korea . I sat at dinner party with the founders of SparkLabs , which has since grown into a spheric internet of inauguration accelerators and speculation capital monetary fund , and listen to them talk about how they wanted to give back to South Korea ’s startup after their own successes as entrepreneurs . South Korea ’s startup ecosystem was then fledgling , with chaebols like Samsung , LG , Hyundai and SK dominating the tech manufacture .
Since then , the South Korean startup ecosystem has flower , thanks to a combination of private investments andbillions of dollars in government supportfrom agencies like the Ministry of Science & ICT and the Ministry of SMEs & Startups . Among her other perceptiveness , Kate tell me that chaebols are getting in on the act with corporate venture capital arm likeSamsung Catalyst Fund , dedicated to recondite tech , LG Technology VenturesandHyundai ’s strategic investment store .
All this capital has borne yield in the form of unicorns likeneobank Toss , e - commerce app Coupang , peer - to - peermarketplace Danggeunandreal estate of the realm platform Zigbang . object lesson of startup that have gone publicinclude Coupangandgame publishing company Krafton .
Coupang is especially interesting because just a few years after it was founded by Bom Kim in 2010 , it had not only become the mart leader in South Korea , butredefined e - DoC with its ultra - fast deliveries . For example , if someone ordered an particular by midnight , it would be at their doorstep by 7 a.m. This was thanks to Coupang ’s lowering investment in its logistics meshwork . When it was founded , there were no major third - party logistics providers like UPS or FedEx in South Korea . As a result Coupang had to build its own infrastructure , including fulfilment and logistics essence . This means that about 70 % of South Korea ’s population nowlives within seven miles of a Coupang logistics centerfield .
The company is taking a two - pronged feeler to world-wide expansion . Over the last few years , it hasentered TaiwanandJapan . And in 2023 , Coupang acquired Farfetch in a deal worth $ 500 million , giving it a presence in even more markets .
Taiwan
I saved Taiwan for last because I inhabit here and it is very limited to me . In 2011 , James Hill , who worked at the Institute for Information Industry , deliver me about an incubator program while I was still at the Taipei Times . “ What the hell is an incubator program , ” I recall . “ Is it a Gallus gallus thing ? ” I quickly realized it was not a chicken affair , and wrote about startup for the very first time inthis clause . Rereading it for the first time in years reminded me I used the phrase “ vane first - up . ” Over the next year I continue to cover up Taiwanese Web start - ups , includingPinkoiandHulihealth . In 2012 , John Biggs was connected with me and ask if I ’d be concerned in joining TechCrunch since they needed a writer in Asia .
Taiwan ’s startup ecosystem is penny-pinching to my heart , but oftenovershadowed by TSMCand other player in the semiconducting material industry . But startups keep on to develop , and during my time at TechCrunch , it was gratifying to see four startups strike unicorn status and then go public : Appier , Perfect Corp. ,Gogoroand91APP . But Chinese startups still need a draw of financial and government support of the type run into in South Korea and Japan , and I hope they get it .
To be clear , the Formosan government does offer funding . These include grants ofup to $ 100 million NTD ( $ 3.2 million USD ) for startupsthat are less than five years old through Taiwan ’s National Development Fund anda whole lot of other political platform . forthcoming President Tsai Ing - wen ’s administration also implemented insurance like theNew Southbound Policyfor businesses that plan to expand to South and Southeast Asia , Australia and New Zealand .
But what startups ask is more money to sustain late - point growth . This is peculiarly important for startups in sector like deep technical school , that may take years before they are quick for commercialisation . Arecent report by PwC and the Taiwan Institute of Economic Researchfound that the majority , or 77.3 % , of financing happens at backer and seed level , with the rest extend out between outgrowth - degree round .
This challenge has , of course , been heighten by the funding winter . VCs I mouth to said it ’s often hard for startups to get support once they hit Series B and beyond . To be sure , the same thing is currently encounter around the humankind , but in Taiwan it ’s peculiarly crucial for startup to get long - term support if they desire to scale into other mart and put the country ’s startup ecosystem on the mathematical function . Financial support does n’t just come in the form of capital . founder and VCs also need to see more revenue enhancement subsidies for startups , similar to the one the government implemented for the biotech and semiconductor industries . Regulations can also be changed to make obtain alien investment easier .
Startups face the question of where to flesh out very early on because Taiwan is relatively low with a population of 23.6 million people . Over the last decade , I ’ve find out a lot of different aim market place named by father and investors . The ones most often mentioned are Southeast Asia , Japan and South Korea because of their law of proximity , so I was surprised to see that the PwC named the United States as the top quarry pick by the startup it appraise .
But that makes signified . Taiwan unicorn Perfect Corp. , which provide AI and augment realism software for beauty and mode brands , has grown in the United States , in addition to other markets . Perfect Corp. has its own app , YouCam , that let drug user seek on different hair and makeup looks , but its engineering has also been used by clients like beauty conglomerate Estée Lauder and L’Oréal Paris and integrated into apps like YouTube , Snap and Google Search .
Like Perfect Corp. , Appier ’s tech is also focalize around AI , which it practice to help caller with exploiter acquisition strategy . The PwC / Taiwan Institute of Economic Research found that more than 70 % of the startups it surveyed were working on AI projection . The top sector they are targeting is healthcare . In Taiwan , AIhas already been deployed at Taichung ’s China Medical University HospitalandTaipei ’s National Taiwan Universityto help with diagnosis .
One source of promise for startups is President - chosen Lai Ching - te ’s promise to help startups through strategic investments , loosening regularisation and create 20,000 newfangled inauguration jobs . But a lot is still unknown , including insurance detail and how long it will take to pass new regulations since no party holds an absolute majority in the Legislative Yuan . I coveredLai ’s potential impact on the startup ecosystem .
Wow . Twelve years at TechCrunch . Writing this clause mean I pass a fate of time careen through my quondam posts , revisiting memories from my time at TechCrunch . It was a slip down memory board lane and , in some instance , a misstep down typo lane . If you made it with me to the ending of this article , thank you .
I ’m grateful to the people who have read my work over the long time and the startups and investor I ’ve speak to for my articles . I hope I ’ve done my part to help more reader understand why technical school in Asia is not only essential to follow , but really exciting . Keep an eye on Asia tech , or else it ’s going to purloin up behind you and then do the technical school equivalent of pop a balloon right next to your pinna . For my lector in Chinese - speaking countries : 謝謝您們這麼用心，認真，持續閱讀我的報導 .
Please persist in following Rita , Kate , Jagmeet , Manish and Ivan ’s workplace at their author pages . It ’s been a pleasure , and super humbling , to be think their peer . If you want to get in touch with me , my diabetes mellitus are open onLinkedInandX.
