On this episode of the RISE Offstage podcast, host Casey Lau welcomes Akshay Bhushan, a Partner at Lightspeed who is leading the firm’s Southeast Asia investments, focusing on consumer tech investing across both Southeast Asia and India and in companies like Sharechat, Chilibeli, Grab and more. 

Akshay talks about how the pandemic has helped them to deploy more capital, which are the big Asian markets Lightspeed is looking at and the next group of exciting verticals they are looking into like The Passion Economy and empowering SME’s in Asia to more efficiently run their businesses using technology.

This is a fascinating chat discovering what Lightspeed is looking at in terms of startup investments across Asia and their big bets on India, Indonesia and Vietnam.

To get a warm intro to Akshay please reach out to Casey on Twitter.


SHOW NOTES

Akshay Bhushan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/akshaybhushan/

Lightspeed Venture Partners: https://lsvp.com/portfolio/

Sharechat: https://sharechat.com/

Chilibeli: https://www.chilibeli.com/

Grab: https://www.grab.com/

The Passion Economy: https://www.passioneconomy.xyz/

SME Market in Southeast Asia via EY 2019: https://assets.ey.com/content/dam/ey-sites/ey-com/en_sg/topics/growth/ey-smes-in-southeast-asia-redesigning-for-the-digital-economy.pdf

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WE ARE HIRING IN JAPAN: https://www.websummit.com/careers

Collision https://www.collisionconf.com/

RISE https://www.riseconf.com

Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo

Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau

Casey Lau on Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/@casey_lau

On this episode of RISE offstage, I welcome the new regional director of 500 Startups APAC Ee Ling Lim to the podcast.

Ee Ling’s main role is to work with governments and corporates to build innovation programs using the 500 Startups network and has run programs in the city of Kobe Japan and with corporates like Malaysia’s Petronas with their FutureTech accelerator.

We talk about how engaging with corporates and governments can accelerate not only startups but the ecosystem itself and Ee Ling gives us lots of information on how these goals are measured and obtained in the ongoing battle in Asia, where each country is fighting to become the digital hub of the region and the benefits that brings to startups all over the world.

SHOW NOTES



Ee Ling Lim
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ee-ling-lim/
Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/@linglim

500 Startups Ecosystems https://500.co/ecosystems
500 Startups Demo Day 2020: https://youtu.be/YOy4LsFJU4Q
500 Kobe: http://500kobe.com/
Petronas x 500 Futuretech Accelerator: https://www.petronas.com/media/press-release/petronas-teams-silicon-valleys-500-startups
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NOW HIRING FOR JAPAN: https://www.websummit.com/careers
===
Collision https://www.collisionconf.com/
RISE https://www.riseconf.com
Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo
Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau
Casey Lau on Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/@casey_lau

On this episode of RISE Offstage, host Casey Lau speaks with Animoca Brands founder and chairman Yat Siu about the current NFT craze and how it goes beyond the art and collectibles world and into games and pop culture. Based in Hong Kong, Yat has invested in Opensea, Dapper Labs and more and helps decipher the world of NFTs and explore the market opportunities in Asia that are coming up over the next year on this episode.


Show Notes:

Animoca Brands
https://www.animocabrands.com/
===
Yat Siu on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ysiu
Yat Siu on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yatsiu/
===
Opensea: https://opensea.io/
The Sandbox: https://www.sandbox.game/en/
F1 Delta Time: https://f1deltatime.com/
Cryptokitties: https://www.cryptokitties.co/
Dapper Labs: https://www.dapperlabs.com/
NBA Top Shot: https://nbatopshot.com/
Quidd: https://market.onquidd.com/
Foundation: https://foundation.app/
NiftyGateway: https://niftygateway.com/
The Metaverse: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaverse
Snow Crash: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_Crash
Ready Player One: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ready_Player_One
===
Collision https://www.collisionconf.com/
RISE https://www.riseconf.com
Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo
Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau
Casey Lau on Clubhouse: https://www.joinclubhouse.com/@casey_lau

The RISE Offstage podcast with Casey Lau highlights chats with community leaders, startup founders and investors across Asia about their startup ecosystems and how they are facing new challenges and new opportunities.

On this episode I welcome Koichi Saito and Kuan Hsu the co-founders and general partners of KK Fund. These two investors have worked in Japanese venture capital and now through their own fund are investing in startups in various verticals from e-Sports to AutoTech to InsurTech and more across South East Asia, Taiwan and Hong Kong .

This is a truly pan-asian conversation as we talk about the Japanese, South East Asian and Singaporean startup scenes and what KK Fund look to invest in, and what they see happening post-pandemic in this exciting market they have been helping to build.

KK Fund
http://kkfund.co/

Koichi Saito
https://www.linkedin.com/in/koichisaito/

Kuan Hsu
https://www.linkedin.com/in/alankhsu/

RoomMe
https://roomme.id/

Meet Your Match
https://medium.com/@kk_info/meet-your-match-sea-fd95926d9856

Smart Nation Singapore
https://www.smartnation.gov.sg/

Razer
https://www.razer.com/

Secret Lab
https://secretlab.co/

Family offices in Singapore, lured by the city-state's ample incentives and low taxes
https://www.businessinsider.com/singapore-attracts-ray-dalio-sergey-brin-family-offices-2021-2

===

Collision 2021 https://www.collisionconf.com

RISE 2022 https://www.riseconf.com

Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo

Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau

The South Korea startup ecosystem has been booming - some of the most exciting new companies are coming out of Seoul.

On this episode of the RISE Offstage podcast I welcome Jimmy Kim and Bernard Moon the co-founders of SparkLabs one of South Korea’s most successful startup accelerators.

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SHOW NOTES:

Jimmy Kim LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimmykim1/
Bernard Moon LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bernardmoon/

SparkLabs Korea http://www.sparklabs.co.kr/lb/index.php
SparkLabs Group: http://www.sparklabsgroup.com/
SparkLabs Demo Day http://www.sparklabsdemoday.com/en/index.php
SparkLabs Ventures http://www.sparklabsventures.com/v/index.php
SparkLabs Taipei: https://www.sparklabstaipei.com/
Bespin Global: https://en.bespinglobal.com/

===

RISE https://www.riseconf.com
Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo
Collision https://collisionconf.com/
Web Summit Lisbon https://websummit.com/

Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau
Casey Lau on Clubhouse: https://www.bit.ly/caseyonclubhouse
Startup Yumcha on Clubhouse every Tuesday 10am Hong Kong time.

Amarit “Aim” Charoenphan is best known as the Co-founder and Former CEO of HUBBA, Thailand’s first coworking space and community that is the only Google for Startups Partner Hub in Thailand. He is also Chief International Officer and Cofounder of Techsauce, one of Southeast Asia's leading technology media and events company. His passion for the startup community and to help entrepreneurs grow has led him to angel invest in many of the top Thai startups and actively coaches over 1000+ different startups founders over the past decade.

Show Notes:

Aim on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AimAmarit
Aim on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amaritcharoenphan/

Hubba: https://www.hubbathailand.com/
Techsauce: https://techsauce.co/
Unfold Ventures: https://www.facebook.com/unfold.ventures
Impact Collective: https://impactcollective.earth
Almond Digital Group: https://www.almond.group/

===

RISE https://www.riseconf.com

Web Summit Tokyo https://www.websummit.com/tokyo

Collision https://collisionconf.com/

Web Summit Lisbon https://websummit.com/

Casey Lau on Twitter: https://twitter.com/casey_lau

Casey Lau on Clubhouse: https://www.bit.ly/caseyonclubhouse

At Web Summit 2020, we announced that RISE will move from Hong Kong to its new home of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in 2022.

Malaysia is fast becoming the digital hub of the ASEAN region and I thought it would be great to talk to some people who live and breathe the Malaysia startups ecosystem and give us some insight into what is happening there right now, the challenges and successes and the massive opportunity, so I welcome two amazing women on the podcast to talk about the startup ecosystem in Malaysia:

Lalitha Wemel is the regional director of community for Techstars and while she travels Asia to build ecosystems for Techstars she calls KL her home. She works with corporate and government partners in the region to build out hundreds of startup programs annually in APAC.

Lennise Ng, the co-founder and CEO of Dropee.com a B2b e-commerce startup redefining the business sourcing experience across South East Asia . Lennise was also the second Malaysian startup to be accepted into Y Combinator and is also a Forbes 30 under 30.


SO here we go - an introduction to the Malaysia startup ecosystem on this episode of the RISE Offstage podcast.



SHOW NOTES:


Lalitha Wemel LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lalswemel/
Techstars: https://www.techstars.com/
Happy Messy Humans podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/happy-messy-humans/id1516074368

Lennise Ng LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lenniseng/
Dropee: https://www.dropee.com
Y Combinator W2020 batch: https://blog.ycombinator.com/yc-winter-2020-batch-stats/
Forbes 30 Under 30: https://www.forbes.com/30-under-30/2020/asia/retail-ecommerce/


===

Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation: https://mdec.my/

Malaysia Startups are Booming via Mashable: https://sea.mashable.com/tech/8956/malaysian-startups-are-booming-heres-the-reason-why-theyll-get-even-bigger

Why the Malaysian startup ecosystem will survive this pandemic via e27: https://e27.co/out-of-the-woods-why-the-malaysian-startup-ecosystem-will-survive-this-pandemic-20200827/


===

RISE moves to Kuala Lumpur in 2022 via Techcrunch: https://techcrunch.com/2020/12/02/web-summit-will-hold-rise-2022-in-kuala-lumpur-launch-a-new-event-in-tokyo/

With RISE tech conference, Malaysia aims for place on global digital map via SCMP: https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/economics/article/3113085/rise-tech-conference-malaysia-aims-place-global-digital-map

Hong Kong just lost a splashy tech conference to Kuala Lumpur via CNN: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/03/tech/rise-hong-kong-moves-hnk-intl/index.html

On this episode of RISE Offstage our guests are Mark Wang, Head of East Asia for Shopify who heads up the e-commerce platforms growth in Japan and he invited one his e-commerce success stories Kaz from kiko & gg to provide insight from a local Japanese entrepreneurs perspective and how her e-commerce business is operating, and not only during a pandemic, but more importantly internationally and with Japanese retail culture intact.

SHOW NOTES

Shopify: https://www.shopify.com
Shopify Japan https://www.shopify.jp
Selling in Japan https://help.shopify.com/en/manual/intro-to-shopify/initial-setup/sell-in-japan
===
kiko & gg
English website https://www.kikoandgg.com
Japanese website https://www.kukkia.jp
English Instagram https://www.instagram.com/kikoandgg/
Japanese Instagram https://www.instagram.com/kikoandgg_jp/
===
Stores.jp https://www.stores.jp
Commerce Cloud https://www.salesforce.com/ca/products/commerce-cloud/overview/
Rakuten https://www.rakuten.co.jp
Amazon Japan https://www.amazon.co.jp
Yahoo Japan https://shopping.yahoo.co.jp/
Don Quixote https://www.donki.com/en/
Tokyu Hands https://www.tokyu-hands.co.jp/en/
Mercari https://www.mercari.com/jp/
===
Japan E-commerce Stats https://ecommercedb.com/en/markets/jp/all
===
What is Kodawari? https://exploringkodawari.blog/what-is-kodawari/
===
RISE https://www.riseconf.com
Web Summit https://www.websummit.com
Casey Lau on Twitter https://twitter.com/casey_lau
===
RISE Offstage on Apple Podcasts
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/rise-offstage-with-casey-lau/id1532312429
===
RISE Offstage on Spotify Podcasts
https://open.spotify.com/show/0zniLKC4MapdE7VmhZUDC2?si=77ubUkw7RPKpTNW_Kcew7A

On this episode of RISE Offstage, Casey Lau sits down with Roland Yau of CoCoon Ignite Ventures and Ben Wong of Eureka Nova to talk about the recent challenges facing the Hong Kong startup ecosystem and how it will thrive as part of China's Greater Bay Area and amidst the enactment of the National Security Law.

RISE returns in March 2021.

Show Notes:

Roland Yau on LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/roland-yau-0228611/

Ben Wong on LInkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/thebenwong/

Eureka Nova
https://www.eurekanova.com/

New World Group
https://www.nwd.com.hk/

CoCoon Ignite Ventures
http://www.cocoonigniteventures.com/

CoCoon Hong Kong
https://www.hkcocoon.com/

NWD x Mizuho Bank Accelerator
https://www.eurekanova.com/mizuho-crowd-brain

Hong Kong protests news via South China Morning Post
https://www.scmp.com/topics/hong-kong-protests

National Security Law via CNN
https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/25/asia/hong-kong-national-security-law-explainer-intl-hnk-scli/index.html

Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent, known as the BATs via CNBC
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/10/china-tech-outlook-2020-baidu-bidu-alibaba-baba-and-tencent.html

Greater Bay Area via South China Morning Post
https://www.scmp.com/topics/greater-bay-area

======

RISE
Https://www.riseconf.com

RISE on Twitter
Https://www.twitter.com/riseconfhq

RISE on LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/company/riseconf/

RISE on Facebook
Https://www.facebook.com/riseconfhq

RISE on Instagram
Https://www.instagram.com/riseconfHQ

Casey Lau on Twitter
Https://www.twitter.com/casey_lau

On this episode of RISE Offstage I welcome co-founder and president of AirWallex Lucy Liu to the podcast - Airwallex is one of the fastest growing fintech startups in Asia having raised a new $160mm Series D round in April with investors like Tencent, Sequoia China and Horizon Ventures.

On this episode (which was shot in person back in January 2020 as a pilot to a video version of this podcast) Lucy and I start at Airwallex’s super cool offices in Quarry Bay, Hong Kong….and then we walk over to one of Lucy’s favorite coffee shops nearby and I get a chance to learn more about her startup journey as a female founder in fintech, being a young mother managing a unicorn-level startup and starting a new tech company in Australia and then growing internationally from their Hong Kong headquarters.

Please welcome co-founder and CEO of Airwallex Lucy Liu to RISE Offstage.

Airwallex
https://www.airwallex.com

Airwallex - Your Passport to Global Business
https://youtu.be/Wg0NZhD5HH4

Airwallex gets $160 million Series D to launch more cross-border financial products
https://techcrunch.com/2020/04/15/airwallex-raises-160-million-series-d-to-launch-more-cross-border-financial-products/

What is 996?
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/29/technology/china-996-jack-ma.html

Web Summit returns December 2-4, 2020
https://www.websummit.com

RISE returns March 2021
https://www.riseconf.com

Follow me on Twitter
https://www.twitter.com/casey_lau