State of Southeast Asia 2017 Part 1 with Arnaud Bonzom

Arnaud Bonzom from 500 Startups joined us in a conversation to review the state of Southeast Asia in a two part conversation before the closing of 2017. In this episode, we discussed the three major events that rocked Southeast Asia starting with SoftBank and Didi’s investment into Grab with US$2 billion, followed by the two IPOs from Sea (formerly Garena) and Razer, followed by how the startups and venture capital firms are starting their series B journey, and the change of fundraising landscape with initial coin offerings (ICOs) dominating the region.

Here are the interesting show notes and links to the discussion (with time-stamps included):

• Arnaud Bonzom (@arnaudbonzom, LinkedIn, Slideshare),Venture Partner @ 500 Startups and Co-founder @ Map of the Money [0:38]
  • Re-Introduction and what have you been up to? [1:58]
• State of South East Asia in 2017 Review Part 1 [2:27]
  • Event 1: SoftBank & Didi’s major investment in Grab with US$2B
    • Will Go-Jek still able to take on Grab in Indonesia given that it’s the largest market there? [3:47]
    • Will Didi eventually acquire Grab? [5:18]
    • Does Uber even stand a chance within Southeast Asia? [7:48]
    • Reference: China Tech Talk Episode 13
  • Event 2:  Southeast Asia companies go IPO with Sea (aka former Garena) and Razer [9:57]
    • Given the lack of knowledge from US investors, will Sea able to break out in their next stage of growth in the company? [11:04]
    • Razer is entering China as they are listed in Hong Kong Stock Exchange, what will be their trajectory be? [12:47]
    • A conversation on Hong Kong Stock Exchange vs New York Stock Exchange. [13:11]
  • Event 3a: Series B & C funding across startups in Southeast Asia for Carousell, CXA Group, SmartKarma and Shopback [17:06]
    • Will the war on talent in Southeast Asia start to shift? [17:49]
    • How are these companies going to prove their valuations for the next stage of funding in series C? [23:11]
    • Brief mention of Naspers and their significance as investors in Southeast Asia and they are early investors of Tencent as well. [24:30]
  • Event 3b: VCs in Southeast Asia have successfully raised their second round funds: NSI, Golden Gate, Wavemaker, Jungle Ventures and etc… [25:06]
    • Are the seed and series A deals getting smaller given that we don’t see new entrants? [25:54]
    • Are the ICO successes a new form of fundraising in Southeast Asia with Omise and TenX? [29:13]

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The show is hosted by Bernard Leong (@bernardleong & weibo) and are sponsored by Ideal Workspace (Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn) with their new Altizen Desk on Indiegogo (Twitter, Facebook, Medium). Also check out Ideal Workspace’s new standing desk, Altizen and sign up for their mailing list. Sound credits for the intro music: Taro Iwashiro, “The Beginning” from Red Cliff Soundtrack.