Boleh!: Operating a Start-up in Southeast Asia
Operating a company across different countries in SEA is difficult for many reasons -from language and cultural barriers to varied political and business climates. We'll hear from savvy business leaders across SEA on how they've adapted to these challenges to do good business across the region, overcoming it all with a can-do spirit.
Mr. Gupta: Running a start-up is about your mentality; there are no previous processes that you can refer to.
Mr. Tandon: Finding out the “pain points” and problems of your target consumer market is most important; solutions will follow but understanding the consumer problem is what catalyses growth.
Running a start-up is about targeting the root problems that consumers face through flexible, innovative and targeted processes.
Mr. Sheji: Contrarian thinking is key; need to go against the crowd and focus on long term strategy, but this does not mean that you reject every contrary viewpoint.
Mr. Tandon: Don’t be afraid to talk to people or get rejected; what matters is what you do with your idea––getting feedback, attracting potential customers all come from real interactions.
An entrepreneur is confident enough to break into a market and work hard; they balance self-conviction in their strategy and different stakeholders’ interests.
Mr. Sheji: Different “buckets” of healthcare models in SEA
Mr. Gupta: How Gojek competed with Grab successfully but saw its market share in Vietnam decline with the entrance of Korean competitor, Baemin.
Given the diversity of the SEA market, there is an underlying need to localise an understanding of different SEA markets and who your product appeals to/how to appeal to locals.
Panelists
Mr. Sheji Ho
aCommerce (early movers in SEA ecommerce back in 2013, raised $65m in BKK / healthcare equity startup that leverages eCommerce tech
Sanuk Tandon
Co-Founder and CEO of Kalibrr, a HR SaaS start-up in Indonesia and the Philippines that has worked with thousands of SMEs and Fortune 500s (Apple, Google, Unilever etc). Backed by Y Combinator.
Mr. Vaibhav Gupta
Former Head of International Growth at Go-Jek. Also worked at Uber. Currently an MBA student at Tuck (Dartmouth SB) / was based in Vietnam
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