Heaptalk, Jakarta — The 11th edition of Tech in Asia Conference 2022 has returned on September 15th in Jakarta and will be held soon on September 21st – 22nd in Singapore with a hybrid scheme. More than 500 technology founders, investors, executives, and talents in Southeast Asia were entailed in this conference.
Several attractive sessions are presented in this event, spanning the Speed Dating segment, Startup Factory, and Roundtables session, to discuss multiple fruitful topics of the experienced technology practitioners, such as Chief Marketing Officer of Tiket.com, Gaery Undarsa; Chief Executive Officer of Dana Indonesia, Vince Iswara; Partner of East Ventures, Melisa Irene; and Chief Financial Officer of Vidio, William Djumadi.
During the startup conference, prominent keynote speakers delivered their views during today’s global economic uncertainty, one of which is CMO of Tiket.com, Gaery Undarsa. After being hit by the two years of COVID-19 outbreak, numerous startups are demanded to rebuild their business strategies to adjust to the global economic recession. To response to this condition, Gaery suggested that founders should not solely focused on gaining investment.
Seeking new capital, moreover, becomes a dangerous trap if the startup failed to market their products. A good business is basically creating a product value that is aligned with consumers’ requisites. Implementing this strategy will bring huge revenue as the feedback for fulfilling consumers’ needs.
A comparable matter was also explained by the CEO of DANA, Vince Iswara, during the roundtable session at TIA Conference 2022. He affirmed the new early-stage startup founders are required to rationalize the Companies’ most needed matters by returning to their main objective, strengthening its business core to generate sustainable growth, and comprehending their customers’ need to gain huge market potential.
Although investment – the external capital support – is undeniably a critical driving factor for startup development, Vince suggested the new founders should consider investing the capital organically at the very beginning. Based on his point of view, this strategy is appropriate to reinforce the sustainability notions in their business while looking for the right investors who have the same mission to achieve long-term collaboration.
From the investor’s perspective, the Partner of East Ventures, Melisa Irene, revealed that 2022 is the proper momentum for startup founders to seize funds, as the ecosystem in this industry still possesses plenty of opportunities. However, she stated the founders must elevate their networking with other funded startup founders to meet the intended investors. The strategy will assist the founders in discovering a suited ecosystem by observing VC’s portfolios that had been invested. She also prompted the founders to approach the most relevant investors to reach a better closing.
Also, Melisa added, “All funds can still be raised. I think it is not to say that there is no more funding, but investors will be more selective, and it is a splendid reason for them to adjust to these drastic changes about what kind of problems they need to solve. Nevertheless, I also think all good startup founders will survive by emphasizing their business core, customers, and their values,”
As conveyed by Melisa, East Ventures recently completed the fund worth USD550 million. She revealed the firm would tackle the fund to disburse a USD150 million capital injection devoted to the early-stage startups and a USD400 million fund for the growth-stage startups.
