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Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) continues bringing finance and technology closer together, making sure that Singapore’s financial industry doesn’t miss the fintech train.

One in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users.

Today’s announcements at the second annual Fintech Festival aim to show it’s still keeping up just fine: a US$20 million grant for artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics projects, a dedicated fintech hub in the middle of Singapore’s business district, new cyber security and cross-border payments initiatives are some of the ways MAS is making Singapore’s finance industry tech-ready.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon took the stage on Tuesday to reflect on the state of fintech. Financial technology services are on the cusp of mainstream adoption, he said, with one in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users, according to Ernst & Young.

In Singapore, more than 400 fintech startups have set up shop. And finance execs can now “carry on an intelligent conversation about blockchains without looking at their notes – this is a big change from just two years ago,” Menon said.

Among the initiatives MAS is setting up to take advantage of this tailwind are:

• A new US$20 million grant for AI and data analytics projects. Part of the US$165 million Financial Sector Technology and Innovation Scheme, the grant is meant to support the adoption and integration of AI and data analytics systems in financial institutions as well as training personnel in these areas. The scheme has already funded fintech startups like SoCash.

• A cross-border platform for trade finance based on distributed ledger technology (otherwise known as the blockchain). MAS hopes to have the project, called Global Trade Connectivity Network, up and running by early 2019. It’s being jointly developed by MAS and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to allow snappy transfer of digital documents and data between the two territories.

• Boosting cyber security initiatives. This includes the establishment of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which will do what it says on the tin: help financial institutions share cyber threat data and coordinate on defense and response. MAS is also partnering with the Association of Banks in Singapore to lay down risk management guidelines including for red-teaming – a sneak invasion test on a financial institution’s live online system.

• Making it easy to send money from Singapore to Thailand and vice versa through mobile payments. MAS and the Bank of Thailand have linked Singapore’s PayNow mobile payments system with Thai counterpart PromptPay. This allows for fast and safe cross-border payments between the two countries using just a mobile phone number.

• A fintech innovation hub at Singapore’s business district. The building at 80 Robinson Road is currently home to fintech hub Lattice80, which occupies two floors. MAS announced the entire building will be devoted to fintech startups, giving them 100,000 square feet of space. The building will be rebranded to 80RR to reflect its new hip fintech identity.

• For cross-border payments, MAS will also partner with the Bank of Canada to collaborate on Project Ubin, the central bank’s initiative to enable money transfers using blockchain tech. MAS announced a successful first trial of the project early this year. More recently, the authority successfully produced three software prototypes for decentralized payments, and plans to release the source code to developers. MAS produced a report on this second phase of the project, available here (PDF link).

• MAS is also streamlining the way it’s collecting data from financial institutions, aiming to make all its data requests machine readable; working with banks in Singapore and abroad to come up with a unified know-your-customer application; and partnering with the World Bank to create the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, where fintech startups can focus on financial inclusion for unbanked people in Southeast Asia.

See: Here’s how Singapore’s central bank is bringing fintech to the real world

This post Singapore’s central bank to pour $20m into AI and data as it pushes fintech growth appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) continues bringing finance and technology closer together, making sure that Singapore’s financial industry doesn’t miss the fintech train.

One in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users.

Today’s announcements at the second annual Fintech Festival aim to show it’s still keeping up just fine: a US$20 million grant for artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics projects, a dedicated fintech hub in the middle of Singapore’s business district, new cyber security and cross-border payments initiatives are some of the ways MAS is making Singapore’s finance industry tech-ready.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon took the stage on Tuesday to reflect on the state of fintech. Financial technology services are on the cusp of mainstream adoption, he said, with one in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users, according to Ernst & Young.

In Singapore, more than 400 fintech startups have set up shop. And finance execs can now “carry on an intelligent conversation about blockchains without looking at their notes – this is a big change from just two years ago,” Menon said.

Among the initiatives MAS is setting up to take advantage of this tailwind are:

• A new US$20 million grant for AI and data analytics projects. Part of the US$165 million Financial Sector Technology and Innovation Scheme, the grant is meant to support the adoption and integration of AI and data analytics systems in financial institutions as well as training personnel in these areas. The scheme has already funded fintech startups like SoCash.

• A cross-border platform for trade finance based on distributed ledger technology (otherwise known as the blockchain). MAS hopes to have the project, called Global Trade Connectivity Network, up and running by early 2019. It’s being jointly developed by MAS and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to allow snappy transfer of digital documents and data between the two territories.

• Boosting cyber security initiatives. This includes the establishment of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which will do what it says on the tin: help financial institutions share cyber threat data and coordinate on defense and response. MAS is also partnering with the Association of Banks in Singapore to lay down risk management guidelines including for red-teaming – a sneak invasion test on a financial institution’s live online system.

• Making it easy to send money from Singapore to Thailand and vice versa through mobile payments. MAS and the Bank of Thailand have linked Singapore’s PayNow mobile payments system with Thai counterpart PromptPay. This allows for fast and safe cross-border payments between the two countries using just a mobile phone number.

• A fintech innovation hub at Singapore’s business district. The building at 80 Robinson Road is currently home to fintech hub Lattice80, which occupies two floors. MAS announced the entire building will be devoted to fintech startups, giving them 100,000 square feet of space. The building will be rebranded to 80RR to reflect its new hip fintech identity.

• For cross-border payments, MAS will also partner with the Bank of Canada to collaborate on Project Ubin, the central bank’s initiative to enable money transfers using blockchain tech. MAS announced a successful first trial of the project early this year. More recently, the authority successfully produced three software prototypes for decentralized payments, and plans to release the source code to developers. MAS produced a report on this second phase of the project, available here (PDF link).

• MAS is also streamlining the way it’s collecting data from financial institutions, aiming to make all its data requests machine readable; working with banks in Singapore and abroad to come up with a unified know-your-customer application; and partnering with the World Bank to create the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, where fintech startups can focus on financial inclusion for unbanked people in Southeast Asia.

See: Here’s how Singapore’s central bank is bringing fintech to the real world

This post Singapore’s central bank to pour $20m into AI and data as it pushes fintech growth appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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//

Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) continues bringing finance and technology closer together, making sure that Singapore’s financial industry doesn’t miss the fintech train.

One in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users.

Today’s announcements at the second annual Fintech Festival aim to show it’s still keeping up just fine: a US$20 million grant for artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics projects, a dedicated fintech hub in the middle of Singapore’s business district, new cyber security and cross-border payments initiatives are some of the ways MAS is making Singapore’s finance industry tech-ready.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon took the stage on Tuesday to reflect on the state of fintech. Financial technology services are on the cusp of mainstream adoption, he said, with one in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users, according to Ernst & Young.

In Singapore, more than 400 fintech startups have set up shop. And finance execs can now “carry on an intelligent conversation about blockchains without looking at their notes – this is a big change from just two years ago,” Menon said.

Among the initiatives MAS is setting up to take advantage of this tailwind are:

• A new US$20 million grant for AI and data analytics projects. Part of the US$165 million Financial Sector Technology and Innovation Scheme, the grant is meant to support the adoption and integration of AI and data analytics systems in financial institutions as well as training personnel in these areas. The scheme has already funded fintech startups like SoCash.

• A cross-border platform for trade finance based on distributed ledger technology (otherwise known as the blockchain). MAS hopes to have the project, called Global Trade Connectivity Network, up and running by early 2019. It’s being jointly developed by MAS and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to allow snappy transfer of digital documents and data between the two territories.

• Boosting cyber security initiatives. This includes the establishment of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which will do what it says on the tin: help financial institutions share cyber threat data and coordinate on defense and response. MAS is also partnering with the Association of Banks in Singapore to lay down risk management guidelines including for red-teaming – a sneak invasion test on a financial institution’s live online system.

• Making it easy to send money from Singapore to Thailand and vice versa through mobile payments. MAS and the Bank of Thailand have linked Singapore’s PayNow mobile payments system with Thai counterpart PromptPay. This allows for fast and safe cross-border payments between the two countries using just a mobile phone number.

• A fintech innovation hub at Singapore’s business district. The building at 80 Robinson Road is currently home to fintech hub Lattice80, which occupies two floors. MAS announced the entire building will be devoted to fintech startups, giving them 100,000 square feet of space. The building will be rebranded to 80RR to reflect its new hip fintech identity.

• For cross-border payments, MAS will also partner with the Bank of Canada to collaborate on Project Ubin, the central bank’s initiative to enable money transfers using blockchain tech. MAS announced a successful first trial of the project early this year. More recently, the authority successfully produced three software prototypes for decentralized payments, and plans to release the source code to developers. MAS produced a report on this second phase of the project, available here (PDF link).

• MAS is also streamlining the way it’s collecting data from financial institutions, aiming to make all its data requests machine readable; working with banks in Singapore and abroad to come up with a unified know-your-customer application; and partnering with the World Bank to create the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, where fintech startups can focus on financial inclusion for unbanked people in Southeast Asia.

See: Here’s how Singapore’s central bank is bringing fintech to the real world

This post Singapore’s central bank to pour $20m into AI and data as it pushes fintech growth appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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//

Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) continues bringing finance and technology closer together, making sure that Singapore’s financial industry doesn’t miss the fintech train.

One in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users.

Today’s announcements at the second annual Fintech Festival aim to show it’s still keeping up just fine: a US$20 million grant for artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics projects, a dedicated fintech hub in the middle of Singapore’s business district, new cyber security and cross-border payments initiatives are some of the ways MAS is making Singapore’s finance industry tech-ready.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon took the stage on Tuesday to reflect on the state of fintech. Financial technology services are on the cusp of mainstream adoption, he said, with one in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users, according to Ernst & Young.

In Singapore, more than 400 fintech startups have set up shop. And finance execs can now “carry on an intelligent conversation about blockchains without looking at their notes – this is a big change from just two years ago,” Menon said.

Among the initiatives MAS is setting up to take advantage of this tailwind are:

• A new US$20 million grant for AI and data analytics projects. Part of the US$165 million Financial Sector Technology and Innovation Scheme, the grant is meant to support the adoption and integration of AI and data analytics systems in financial institutions as well as training personnel in these areas. The scheme has already funded fintech startups like SoCash.

• A cross-border platform for trade finance based on distributed ledger technology (otherwise known as the blockchain). MAS hopes to have the project, called Global Trade Connectivity Network, up and running by early 2019. It’s being jointly developed by MAS and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to allow snappy transfer of digital documents and data between the two territories.

• Boosting cyber security initiatives. This includes the establishment of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which will do what it says on the tin: help financial institutions share cyber threat data and coordinate on defense and response. MAS is also partnering with the Association of Banks in Singapore to lay down risk management guidelines including for red-teaming – a sneak invasion test on a financial institution’s live online system.

• Making it easy to send money from Singapore to Thailand and vice versa through mobile payments. MAS and the Bank of Thailand have linked Singapore’s PayNow mobile payments system with Thai counterpart PromptPay. This allows for fast and safe cross-border payments between the two countries using just a mobile phone number.

• A fintech innovation hub at Singapore’s business district. The building at 80 Robinson Road is currently home to fintech hub Lattice80, which occupies two floors. MAS announced the entire building will be devoted to fintech startups, giving them 100,000 square feet of space. The building will be rebranded to 80RR to reflect its new hip fintech identity.

• For cross-border payments, MAS will also partner with the Bank of Canada to collaborate on Project Ubin, the central bank’s initiative to enable money transfers using blockchain tech. MAS announced a successful first trial of the project early this year. More recently, the authority successfully produced three software prototypes for decentralized payments, and plans to release the source code to developers. MAS produced a report on this second phase of the project, available here (PDF link).

• MAS is also streamlining the way it’s collecting data from financial institutions, aiming to make all its data requests machine readable; working with banks in Singapore and abroad to come up with a unified know-your-customer application; and partnering with the World Bank to create the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, where fintech startups can focus on financial inclusion for unbanked people in Southeast Asia.

See: Here’s how Singapore’s central bank is bringing fintech to the real world

This post Singapore’s central bank to pour $20m into AI and data as it pushes fintech growth appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) continues bringing finance and technology closer together, making sure that Singapore’s financial industry doesn’t miss the fintech train.

One in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users.

Today’s announcements at the second annual Fintech Festival aim to show it’s still keeping up just fine: a US$20 million grant for artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics projects, a dedicated fintech hub in the middle of Singapore’s business district, new cyber security and cross-border payments initiatives are some of the ways MAS is making Singapore’s finance industry tech-ready.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon took the stage on Tuesday to reflect on the state of fintech. Financial technology services are on the cusp of mainstream adoption, he said, with one in three digitally active people considering themselves regular fintech users, according to Ernst & Young.

In Singapore, more than 400 fintech startups have set up shop. And finance execs can now “carry on an intelligent conversation about blockchains without looking at their notes – this is a big change from just two years ago,” Menon said.

Among the initiatives MAS is setting up to take advantage of this tailwind are:

• A new US$20 million grant for AI and data analytics projects. Part of the US$165 million Financial Sector Technology and Innovation Scheme, the grant is meant to support the adoption and integration of AI and data analytics systems in financial institutions as well as training personnel in these areas. The scheme has already funded fintech startups like SoCash.

• A cross-border platform for trade finance based on distributed ledger technology (otherwise known as the blockchain). MAS hopes to have the project, called Global Trade Connectivity Network, up and running by early 2019. It’s being jointly developed by MAS and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority to allow snappy transfer of digital documents and data between the two territories.

• Boosting cyber security initiatives. This includes the establishment of the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center, which will do what it says on the tin: help financial institutions share cyber threat data and coordinate on defense and response. MAS is also partnering with the Association of Banks in Singapore to lay down risk management guidelines including for red-teaming – a sneak invasion test on a financial institution’s live online system.

• Making it easy to send money from Singapore to Thailand and vice versa through mobile payments. MAS and the Bank of Thailand have linked Singapore’s PayNow mobile payments system with Thai counterpart PromptPay. This allows for fast and safe cross-border payments between the two countries using just a mobile phone number.

• A fintech innovation hub at Singapore’s business district. The building at 80 Robinson Road is currently home to fintech hub Lattice80, which occupies two floors. MAS announced the entire building will be devoted to fintech startups, giving them 100,000 square feet of space. The building will be rebranded to 80RR to reflect its new hip fintech identity.

• For cross-border payments, MAS will also partner with the Bank of Canada to collaborate on Project Ubin, the central bank’s initiative to enable money transfers using blockchain tech. MAS announced a successful first trial of the project early this year. More recently, the authority successfully produced three software prototypes for decentralized payments, and plans to release the source code to developers. MAS produced a report on this second phase of the project, available here (PDF link).

• MAS is also streamlining the way it’s collecting data from financial institutions, aiming to make all its data requests machine readable; working with banks in Singapore and abroad to come up with a unified know-your-customer application; and partnering with the World Bank to create the ASEAN Financial Innovation Network, where fintech startups can focus on financial inclusion for unbanked people in Southeast Asia.

See: Here’s how Singapore’s central bank is bringing fintech to the real world

This post Singapore’s central bank to pour $20m into AI and data as it pushes fintech growth appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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The summer 2017 cohort of Microsoft’s India accelerator in Bengaluru. Photo credit: Microsoft Accelerator.

Active.ai has raised US$8.25 million in a series A round co-led by Vertex Ventures, Creditease Holdings, and Dream Incubator, it announced today.

Existing investors IDG Ventures India and Kalaari Capital also participated in the funding.

Vani Kola, managing director at Kalaari Capital and a board member at Active.ai, said in a statement that the capital will fuel the startup’s continued R&D efforts, as well as its plans for expansion to other countries.

Active.ai co-founder and CEO Ravi Shankar added that the investment will also be used to grow the company’s technical team.

Headquartered in Singapore with an R&D base in Bengaluru, Active.ai is one of a large number of startups in the region that has developed a customer service chatbot.

In its case, the focus is on serving banks and financial institutions. Active.ai’s chatbots are powered by its artificial intelligence (AI) engine named Triniti, which is capable of natural language processing and generation.

The platform allows banks to respond to queries or complaints sent by customers through messaging apps such as Facebook Messenger and Line. A Triniti-powered chatbot can then engage in a conversation with those customers to try to solve their queries – saving the bank time, money, and manpower, and allowing it deploy its human employees to higher-level tasks.

Beyond chatbots, the startup is also aiming to apply its AI engine to channels such as voice calls, text messaging, and virtual reality, so that banks can automate more of their customer-facing operations.

Active.ai’s last funding round was a US$3 million investment from Kalaari and IDG about a year ago. The startup was selected to join Microsoft’s India accelerator program earlier this year.

This post Chatbot for banks developer Active.ai raises over $8m in series A round appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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Photo credit: racorn / 123RF.

Singaporean startup iPaymy has raised US$1 million in a seed round led by Beenext and Digital Garage’s investment arm, DG Incubation.

Starting out as a consumer-focused platform, iPaymy has since pivoted towards serving small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), providing a platform for them to use their credit cards rather than cash to pay for expenses like invoices, salaries, and taxes.

The startup’s first product was a payments platform that allowed individuals to pay monthly expenses using their credit card.

It’s just like if you go to a restaurant and charge the meal to your credit card.

“We launched a consumer business to help consumers earn lots of air miles by paying their rent with their credit card,” iPaymy co-founder and CEO Ethan Dobson tells Tech in Asia. “Organically, after a few months, we started hearing feedback from some of those consumer customers who said they run a small business, and it would be great if they could use the same solution there.”

That’s when the startup began working on its new offering, named iPaymy for Business. This platform allows SMEs to add payees and make both one-time and recurring payments using a credit card – even to payees that don’t typically accept such payments.

More than air miles

Small businesses can struggle to access traditional financing products, such as bank loans, that they typically rely on to cover operating expenses. They might not meet the lender’s criteria, or they might have an unsatisfactory or non-existent credit record. Even if they have a decent credit score, they likely face a motherload of paperwork, the need to put up other assets as collateral, and a weeks-long approval process if they apply for a loan.

Something that most Singaporean SMEs do have access to, though, is a credit card. If they have the ability to pay everyday outgoings on credit card, they can free up working capital for spending or investing elsewhere.

The problem is that plenty of payees – in a broad sense, including employees and landlords – don’t accept credit cards. Realizing this, iPaymy co-founders Dobson and Chrystie Dao-Szabo set out to find a solution.

Within the rails

Explaining how the model works, Dobson says that he considers iPaymy to be a tech-driven payments platform, rather than a financial intermediary.  

“We don’t actually touch the cash, by design,” he explains. “We want to work within the existing rails, so we work with various acquisition partners – Stripe being one of them.”

Chief business development officer Chrystie Dao-Szabo and chief executive officer Ethan Dobson, iPaymy’s co-founders. Photo credit: iPaymy.

The startup charges an SME’s credit card with funds settled to an iPaymy trust account. Recipients are then paid directly via a bank transfer from the trust account within four business days, after iPaymy has claimed its one-time, per-transaction fee and completed know-your-customer checks. The SME pays its credit card provider back as normal when its statement arrives at the end of the month.

“We don’t lend, we don’t take on risk in that way,” says Dobson. “It’s just like if you go to a restaurant and charge the meal to your credit card.”

SMEs think that going to the banks is the only way to get capital.

For more complicated payments, such as monthly salaries for a number of employees, business owners can upload a CSV file containing tabulated employee data to the iPaymy platform. The credit card is then charged and the KYC process takes place before iPaymy transfers the funds to the employees’ bank accounts.

There are a few other startups around offering similar solutions to iPaymy, such as fellow Singaporean company CardUp. However, Dobson thinks the biggest challenge facing iPaymy is awareness.

“We’re partners with a number of banks, but other banks are in a way our competitors, because SMEs think that going to the banks is the only way to get capital,” he says. “One of our main goals is to educate SMEs, and that task varies along a pretty big spectrum, from the mom-and-pop shop which is lower on financial sophistication scale, to folks all the way up at the top.”

Pivot, grow

Dobson says that the startup still maintains an extensive portfolio of individual customers for its original consumer solution. However, it is now dedicating all of its development and R&D resources to iPaymy for Business, which it sees as having more growth and scale potential.

In terms of the US$1 million seed funding it has just raised, iPaymy will be spending in three areas – product development, its go-to-market strategy, and potential regional expansion beyond Singapore.

For Dobson, having the expertise and experience of VC firms Beenext and DG Incubation on board is at least as valuable as the capital they’ve injected into iPaymy.

“They are the premier payments VCs in the region,” he says. “These guys know payments – Digital Garage has [payments provider] VeriTrans. Teru [Sato, founder] of Beenext built Beenos in Japan. Their network here is amazing, and in terms of series A and beyond, we’re very aligned on what our goals are. That’s such an enormous tailwind for the company.”

Dobson says that iPaymy is aiming to lock up a series A round by the middle of next year, with the next fundraise already attracting interest from “recognizable names.”

This post Singaporean payments startup shifts to business clients with $1m fundraise appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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The Inside series is a column where the Tech in Asia Jobs team gives an insider’s glimpse into interesting companies and professions. Looking for a job? Search thousands of jobs for free on Tech in Asia Jobs.

I immediately recognized the Skyscanner office upon stepping out from the elevator. Decked in its familiar blue, pink, green and grey theme, it looked exactly like every other Skyscanner office I’d seen online.

Photo credit: Skyscanner.

But unlike the others, Skyscanner’s Singapore office is their regional headquarters, and is where a lot of the magic happens to bring the UK brand to its Asia-Pacific counterparts. In Singapore alone, the team reports solid revenue growth and a 40 percent visitor growth year on year.

I spoke to Paul Whiteway, senior director and head of growth for Asia, to find out more about Skyscanner’s development in the region.

Skyscanner’s expansion to APAC

Members of the Skyscanner APAC team at an annual team bonding event this year. Whiteway is first from the right. Photo credit: Skyscanner.

Skyscanner landed on Singapore’s shores in 2011, when its business was picking up in Asia.

Since then, its Singapore office has flourished into a 100-strong team, including the Growth, Commercials, and Product teams — the three pillars that unlock growth in their markets.

“As the regional HQ, we have a very diverse team based in Singapore,” said Whiteway. “We have teams from the local countries who are responsible for growth in their markets. My job is to help them be successful. This involves managing and working with teams to help them define and execute the strategy for growth in our markets.”

“I act like a chef by finding the right recipe and mix for a market, coordinating the resources, timing the execution, getting the resources and ingredients, and removing blockers,” he added.

Organisational structure

Unlike traditional corporations, Skyscanner is organized into cross-functional teams or squads.

Image credit: Joshua Lim.

To put it simply, the APAC team in Singapore is called a tribe, with Whiteway as the tribe leader.

Within the APAC tribe, there are different kinds of squads, like the growth and engineering squads. Squads have between five to eight members.

Growth squads are typically organized by the countries belonging to the region they handle. For example, the Singapore office has the Korea squad, the India squad, the South Asia squad (in charge of Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand), the Oceania squad (in charge of Australia and New Zealand), and the VIP squad (in charge of Vietnam, Indonesia and Philippines).

In general, this is what a country squad looks like.

Image credit: Skyscanner.

This structure allows squads to work towards achieving the same key performance indicators together. As a result, teams are lean and agile, with complete autonomy to enable rapid iteration and have maximum impact.

Entering new markets

According to Whiteway, Skyscanner sets out “to build a sustainable foundation for growth,” beginning by “understanding the level of product-market fit for that market and some key critical growth levers.”

They then conduct some limited marketing activity to provide initial stimulus. This could be anything from running advertisements, improving search engine optimization, public relations activities, and blogger outreach.

Next would be finding ways to get to product-market fit.

“To determine product-market fit,” he said, “we use a set of key metrics, such as acquisition, activation, retention, referral and revenue [or AARRR] to consider whether the market has the potential to support growth.”

“Product-market fit is always a moving target for us,” he said. “Take Korea for example. At the initial stages, it was crucial to get local partners and airlines into Skyscanner. Once that was in place, Skyscanner Korea was able to offer local currency options and local support. As it progressed, it was learning how travellers book and make choices, and then adjusting the product to match that.”

Once they get to product-market fit, Skyscanner then applies certain growth levers, such as increasing the number of local partners, app store optimization, and running advertisements and email marketing campaigns.

“We are also always tweaking our product to make sure product-market fit remains,” he said.

Challenges of localisation

“The fact that APAC isn’t as homogenous a region like Europe is both an opportunity and challenge for us,” said Whiteway. “We needed to make sure we are adapting our offering to individual Asian markets while making our business more nimble and responsive to customer needs.”

He also cited the allocation of resources as a constant challenge.

“In some markets, we need to take a leap of faith in order to kickstart growth,” he said. “In others, the small experiments and iterations will prove more successful and effective. Our teams are constantly looking into the data, speaking to users, and working across different squads and tribes, in order to determine what the right approach is.”

Case study: Korea

The Korea squad. Photo credit: Skyscanner.

Whiteway held up Skyscanner’s Korea squad as a huge success.

“The team has managed to grow more than double year-on-year and has hit its first revenue milestone in January of this year,” he said.

He pointed out several elements that have worked in their favor.

“At the beginning, the squad focused on building supply by speaking to airlines and educating them about Skyscanner. With the help of engineers, we were able to integrate partners such as Korean Air and Asiana Airlines within a year. Having local partners on Skyscanner provided users with locally available prices, familiar brands, and local customer services,” he said.

However, technical problems occurred when the airlines’ systems proved incompatible with Skyscanner’s, affecting the accuracy of prices presented on Skyscanner.

“This affected the user experience and was a challenge for us to move forward,” he said. “Our engineers worked closely with the product, commercial, and growth teams to help stabilize the system and improve price inaccuracies. That helped our brand earn the trust of the Korean travelers.”

Once the issue was resolved and they found product-market fit, the growth teams were able to execute and optimize marketing activities to acquire and retain users.

“Our squads and tribe structure helped see collaboration among the product, commercial, and growth teams to overcome such challenges. And it has proven successful for us,” he said.

Areas for improvement

Despite its successes, Whiteway still sees areas where Skyscanner can do better.

“APAC consumers have different purchasing behaviours, and they access the internet from their mobile devices more so than on their desktops,” said Whiteway.

“Our app usage is climbing towards 50 percent, but we are not there yet,” he continued. “We are now working towards that direction and want to be able to move our app usage to 80 percent, like our parent company, Ctrip.”

Hiring

The Skyscanner Oceania squad. Photo credit: Skyscanner.

Whiteway said Skyscanner is looking for people who are not only collaborative and independent, but are also active learners and self-starters. “Because of the way we are structured as a growth organisation, we are looking for talent with T-shaped skillsets — those who are willing to explore and learn skills beyond their own specialization,” he said.

He also shares some helpful advice for potential candidates.

“Be data-driven and experimental. Build, measure and learn. Design like you’re right, and test like you’re wrong,” he said.

This post How Skyscanner enters new markets appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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Uber is on the verge of its biggest ever funding round after approving SoftBank’s bid to buy a sizeable stake. The deal looks set to allow Softbank and an array of other investors to buy a US$10 billion stake in the ride-hailing firm, reports Bloomberg this morning.

Here’s how Uber, Softbank, and its rivals stack up after this game-changing investment:

This post Uber and the ride-hail funding war appeared first on Tech in Asia.

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Photo credit: Alice Moore / Unsplash.

Musical.ly, the app described by Teen Vogue as a mixture of Vine, Snapchat, and Dubsmash, has been acquired in a surprise deal.

Based in Shanghai, China, but predominantly used by teens in North America and Europe, Musical.ly has grown to 200 million users making and watching a mishmash of homemade music and comic videos. This year it also rolled out Live.ly for live streaming.

The acquirer is Bytedance, the ambitious Chinese media startup behind the smash-hit news app Toutiao, which has 120 million readers each day across China. The terms of the deal are not disclosed, but an overnight rumor snagged by The Wall Street Journal says it’s US$800 million to US$1 billion. A Bytedance representative declined to disclose the amount to Tech in Asia.

Bytedance is said to be worth US$20 billion as it raises more funding.

See: China’s $20 billion news app

More eyeballs

In a statement this morning, Bytedance vowed to boost Musical.ly with its content-driven AI and help expand the social network’s “reach in China and around Asia.”

Bytedance already has a growing media empire around the world that includes Flipagram, Topbuzz, and Tik Tok.

Alex Zhu, Musical.ly co-founder and co-CEO, today described Bytedance, with its AI know-how, as the “ideal partner.”

“Musical.ly’s vision is to make entertainment more personal, participatory and interactive, by enabling anyone to be a content creator. To achieve this, we need to constantly innovate to provide new and exciting video creation tools to our users, and we see AI as a critical factor in augmenting human creativity,” added Zhu.

If you’ve not heard of Musical.ly, your kids would prefer it stays that way. In a survey, one-sixth of youngsters aged 13 to 19 said Musical.ly is the app “they were most excited about and doubted adults would know about,” reported Business Insider.

See: How a Chinese startup won the hearts of American teens

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