Commentaries: Dishonestbee 🐝, Visa, Rocket and more

[View this email in your browser]( Weekly Commentaries Dear {NAME} Many of you wrote in to share your feedback. We really appreciate your comments and will try to improve. Keep the comments coming by replying to this newsletter. If you find these weekly commentaries useful, please do us a favor and forward it to your friends. You can catch our commentaries from last week [here](. Enjoy the weekend! – Willis and Terence, Tech in Asia Stories with commentaries Stories that are trending on Tech in Asia. 1. Dishonestbee? ❌ It is one thing to not do well in business – it’s normal – but another to owe so much money to third-parties to the point that it feels… irresponsible? DisHonestbee owed at least US$209m to its largest creditors. 😮 Honestly speaking, if you are in such deep debt, isn’t it only responsible to own up and take measures to prevent any hurt to employees and trusted providers? Sure, people could argue that they were fundraising to save the company and therefore had to keep up a front. But let’s be honest, how can any company with such deep liabilities and poor product focus raise enough to save the company? The decision making at the company has been questionable. It’s the worst possible outcome of putting a CEO with little managerial experience at the helm. Sure, it can work out, but the responsibility lies with the board to pull the plug early if it doesn’t. The rumor is that major shareholder Brian Koo finally had enough of Joel Sng and ousted him at the end. But it’s too little too late. [Read the inside story]( [Read our op-ed]( 2. The return of Rocket Internet in Southeast Asia 🚀 They are back. Rocket Internet is preparing its next wave of ventures across the Asia Pacific, starting in Indonesia. They are “extremely bullish” about the region. We also learned a fun fact that Rocket has been recruiting founders from Facebook ads. Interesting source, but hey they say it works. Say what you want about Rocket, they’ve been successful. Their investment in Lazada counts as a [major win]( and we suppose they made some returns on Zalora as well. [Read More]( 3. Why Visa ❤️ Grab and Gojek Visa missed out on China when WeChat and Alipay dominated the digital payment space. To prevent history from repeating itself and maybe because of FOMO, it injected money into both Gojek and Grab. The super apps provided an angle in the unbanked markets that are dominated by non-credit card users. Given that Visa has data from both Grab and Gojek, it will be interesting to see which company it continues to invest in its follow-up rounds. [Read More]( 4. Alibaba for cars 🚗 US$70 million in revenue and reaching breaking even? That’s a healthy business. CEO and co-founder Aaron Tan wants us to think of Carro as an “Alibaba for cars.” It locks its users into its ecosystem by providing a list of services including car buying-and-selling, financing, insurance, subscription-based rental, workshop services, and roadside assistance. It’s also expanding aggressively, having [acquired]( Indonesian classified site Jualo which claims to have 4M+ users a month and facilitated $1B+ worth of transactions in 2018. Its focus on serving cars owners certainly helped them stay ahead of other general classified/marketplace business. [Read More]( 5. Founders with MBAs = Premium? 🏫 People traditionally think of MBAs as a way to accelerate the climb on the corporate ladder. But now, more and more people are seeing it as a way to kickstart their entrepreneurial careers. The examples are numerous: Grab, Gojek, Traveloka, and more - all founded by MBA holders. We examine whether getting an MBA is worth it. [Read More]( 6. RedDoorz vs OYO in Southeast Asia 🏨 Oyo has [hired]( a dedicated CEO for Southeast Asia and claims to have over 1,260 hotels under management in Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, Singapore-Headquartered RedDoorz [estimates]( that it will have 2,000 hotels by the end of this year and 15,000 hotels by 2022. In terms of funding, OYO has raised more than $1.7B. Out of which, it “has already committed over US$200 million in investment in Southeast Asia.” Meanwhile, RedDoorz has $64M in its war chest or 32% of what OYO has committed in the region. With very limited data, It’s very hard to say who is winning. But if we assume RedDoorz has 1,260 hotels under management in Southeast Asia (which is not a very bad guess) and also assuming each of them has already spent 30% of their war chest, it looks like RedDoorz has a better dollar spent acquiring hotels: - RedDoorz → 65 hotels acquired per $1M invested - OYO → 21 hotels acquired per $1M invested Though interesting, It’s definitely not an accurate measure because there are so many other factors to account for. So, please take it with a pinch of salt. Companies to watch In our humble opinion and/or from what we heard on the streets, these are the startups to look out for. If you have companies to throw our way, please reply to this email. 1. Cariuma – Its CEO, David Python, worked at Arezzo&Co as the Chief Commercial Officer and [sold 12 million pairs]( of footwear annually. If Mr. Python could just do 20% of that at Cariuma, it will translate to about $200M in annual revenue, with its $79 starting price. 2. Qiq – Operating a shared transportation network is a bloodbath. The margins are thin and you’ll run into unhappy regulators. [Qiq is taking a different tack](. It wants to be a technology supplier to these networks, and has been working closely with governments since day one. 3. Edmicro – Vietnamese family spends roughly US$120 per month per child for supplementary education so the opportunity is definitely there. Edmicro says that it is set to be profitable in 2020 and forecasts its revenue to [grow by 300%]( year on year. If what it says is true, then it could be a good catch as it sails with the wind of a growing market. 4. Halodoc – Telemedicine app Halodoc aims to make healthcare available to out of reach population in both urban and rural dwellers. It has so far raised a total of $78M with the [Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation]( as one of its latest backers. “Our mission is to simplify access to healthcare in different ways, for people in the city as well as in the kampung,” Founder and CEO Jonathan Sudharta [says](. 5. Fave – It has a solid team and product. Fave has gone through a few pivots and seems to have found the right product-market fit. Some of us use Fave at Tech in Asia and we are loving it, especially when it gives you extra Grab reward points. The company is in [fundraising mode]( now. It’s around the corner [Tech in Asia Conference 2019]( will be held in Jakarta on October 8 and 9, and it is shaping up very nicely. For speakers, we have William Tanuwijaya (Founder and CEO at Tokopedia), Achmad Zaky (Founder and CEO at Bukalapak), Jason Thompson (CEO at OVO), Rohit Sipahimalani (Joint Head, Investment Group at Temasek) and many more. This year's sponsors include AWS, Zoho, SendBird, Netcore, Sea, ONE, Luno, DBS, and many more. They are champions and supporters of Tech in Asia’s mission and made it possible for us to continue to do what we love doing. If you’d like to work with us, please contact bizdev@techinasia.com. ABOUT TECH IN ASIA Our mission is to build and serve Asia’s tech and startup community. [Join our subscriber community today](. UPCOMING EVENTS [Tech in Asia Conference]( 8 - 9 October [Follow on Twitter]( [Friend on Facebook]( [Follow on Instagram]( Copyright © 2019 Tech in Asia, All rights reserved. You have registered for Tech in Asia. Our mailing address is: Tech in Asia 9 Temasek Boulevard, #04-01 Suntec Tower 2Singapore 038989 Singapore [Add us to your address book]( Want to change how you receive these emails? You can [update your preferences]( or [unsubscribe from this list](.