S’pore startups find new partnerships to survive competition in China; “We didn’t know that in China there were so many similar products, which have already been launched and commercialised in the market.”

April 8, 2014 Leave a comment

S’pore startups find new partnerships to survive competition in China

By Valarie Tan 
POSTED: 26 Mar 2014 14:39
Singapore startups hoping to expand in China are often faced with stiff competition from local rivals, but some are finding new partnerships to survive in the market.

SHANGHAI: Singapore startups hoping to expand in China are often faced with stiff competition from local rivals, but some are finding new partnerships to survive in the market.

With 500 million people using their phones to go online, China has one of the world’s fastest growing internet mobile markets.

However, with hundreds of thousands of tech companies battling for a share of the market, competition can be stiff.

Singaporean entrepreneur Kong Fern Chiang, 36, found that out the hard way, when he came to China to expand his digital marketing business in 2008.

Mr Kong, CEO of four media, said: “We didn’t know that in China there were so many similar products, which have already been launched and commercialised in the market.

“When I was meeting partners, they would tell us that when it comes to a particular product, they have four to five similar ones in China — and these guys are doing so well, a lot of shops are using them, they have a sales team going out to sell, they have a backend product team and a programming team. And what do we have?”

With help from Singapore’s Infocomm Development Authority (IDA), Kong set up his first office in Chengdu in 2013.

It was during the same year that he found a Chinese partner who wants to expand into Asia and hopes to tap on Singapore’s expertise in that region.

Chen Chunlin, CEO of CloudM Advertising, said: “They have knowledge of the Asian market. Singapore’s best resources are in the service, medical and education sectors.

“Our first aim is to find more users in China. The second is to work together on new products for the markets in Singapore, China and the rest of Asia.

“So we hope to bring many of China’s mobile internet products overseas through the international mindset of Singapore.”

Thirteen Singapore tech startups hoping to get a foot into China have been selected by IDA to take part in a two-week programme in Shanghai where they get to meet with potential Chinese partners, investors and customers.

Vincent Wong, CEO of IDA International, said: “From understanding the Chinese market, we hope they can find a niche market and that can play up the uniqueness of their products.”

IDA said what makes Singapore companies stand out from their Chinese rivals is exposure to both the Eastern and Western markets, with products and services not found in China.

That could possibly give Singapore startups the edge over their Chinese counterparts in one of the biggest and most competitive tech markets of the world.

 

Filed under Macro Trends

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Kee Koon Boon (“KB”) is the co-founder and director of HERO Investment Management which provides specialized fund management and investment advisory services to the ARCHEA Asia HERO Innovators Fund (www.heroinnovator.com), the only Asian SMID-cap tech-focused fund in the industry. KB is an internationally featured investor rooted in the principles of value investing for over a decade as a fund manager and analyst in the Asian capital markets who started his career at a boutique hedge fund in Singapore where he was with the firm since 2002 and was also part of the core investment committee in significantly outperforming the index in the 10-year-plus-old flagship Asian fund. He was also the portfolio manager for Asia-Pacific equities at Korea’s largest mutual fund company. Prior to setting up the H.E.R.O. Innovators Fund, KB was the Chief Investment Officer & CEO of a Singapore Registered Fund Management Company (RFMC) where he is responsible for listed Asian equity investments. KB had taught accounting at the Singapore Management University (SMU) as a faculty member and also pioneered the 15-week course on Accounting Fraud in Asia as an official module at SMU. KB remains grateful and honored to be invited by Singapore’s financial regulator Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to present to their top management team about implementing a world’s first fact-based forward-looking fraud detection framework to bring about benefits for the capital markets in Singapore and for the public and investment community. KB also served the community in sharing his insights in writing articles about value investing and corporate governance in the media that include Business Times, Straits Times, Jakarta Post, Manual of Ideas, Investopedia, TedXWallStreet. He had also presented in top investment, banking and finance conferences in America, Italy, Sydney, Cape Town, HK, China. He has trained CEOs, entrepreneurs, CFOs, management executives in business strategy & business model innovation in Singapore, HK and China.

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