Portfolio
Yangon Broom
Office & Home Cleaning Service
Yangon Broom was founded in 2016 in order to give impoverished, under-educated and disadvantaged women in Myanmar a chance for fair and safe employment. Our Founder, Kayson Yang, understands the lack of opportunities for women in this country and aims to end the poverty cycle by empowering our cleaners with the training and skills that they need to succeed and eventually become financially independent.
Apart from the training we provide, our cleaners have received comprehensive housekeeping and ironing training from a five-star hotel in The Accor Group of hotels and we are continuously providing our cleaners with regular training they need.
We provide day-to-day Office & Home cleaning services for janitorial & personal needs.
Well-Trained cleaners are one-call away from you to meet your needs & we combine that with the greatest customer service team and the best standard of operation to deliver you the greatest value.
Kayson Yang - CEO
Vishnu Sivasami - COO
Founders
Vishnu Sivasami
Milestones
Founded – 2017
Nest Tech invested – 2019
Kalpha
EdTech
Kalpha is a peer to peer mobile platform where individuals can connect and meetup to learn and share any skills, knowledge and experiences on a 1-to-1 basis.
Welcome to Kalpha, a community platform where everyone is empowered to teach and learn skills, knowledge and real-life experiences. We’ve built a mobile application network where people can connect and learn anything on a 1-to-1 and face-to-face basis from one another. Sharing sessions can be arranged anywhere and anytime between learners and sharers.
The most important aspect that we bring to you is the quality of the sharing sessions, not the sharer’s qualifications. Furthermore, we ensure that it’s budget-friendly by capping sharing session prices and encourage people to share their knowledge and skills for free if possible. Learners have the option to reward their sharers based on their own discretion after every successful sharing session concludes.
JACK SOH and JADEN TEO - Founders of Kalpha
Joosk
Animation Studio
Studio Joosk (also known simply as Joosk) is Myanmar’s leading animation studio based in Yangon. Joosk began in 2015 with young talented Myanmar digital artists releasing Panzagar (anti-hate speech) stickers on the Facebook sticker store. As the very first Myanmar stickers on Facebook, this was a phenomenal success and the stickers were downloaded by over 2.8 million people.
The young, talented artists of Joosk are also behind Myanmar’s very first web animation series (Gwen University) produced in June 2016 and amassing 124K followers. Joosk is best known for the Bebee and Friends weekly comics also known as Sassy Bound , which was produced in 2017. It won the prestigious Myanmar Influencer Award in the category of Art and Design 2019. In June 2019, thanks to thousands of fan requests and hundreds of thousands of followers, we launched the Bebee and Friends weekly animation series, which receives some of the highest organic engagement among Myanmar’s digital content, rivaling the country’s top Facebook pages in organic metrics.
The Joosk team is unparalleled in Myanmar for creating characters, developing stories and engaging with diverse audience groups to deliver difficult messages with the magic of creativity. The team is young, fun and happy!
Zayar Win Htet and Thet Paing Kha – Founders of Joosk
Joosk Studio has received a six-digit sum investment from Vietnam’s venture capital firm Nest Tech VN and Yangon-based EME Myanmar
Founders
Milestones
Founded – 2015
Nest Tech invested – 2019
About Us
Our Vision
Our goal is to create value and be recognized as a leading catalyst in South East Asia in the backing of entrepreneurial talent and to maximize their potential, as they build the next generation of disruptive technology companies. We build trust and mentor start-ups to evolve their strategy and vision and help them to expand and compete at the regional and global level.
Our Investment Focus
Nest Tech invests in internet and mobile start-ups across many sectors, that leverages the rapidly increasing consumer economies of South East Asia with high smartphone and internet penetration rates.
Our Vision
We have premises in Ho Chi Minh City with a café and office space to develop creative ideas, network and collaborate - and further build onto our mix of innovative entrepreneurial and development opportunities.
News
The virtual event was successful. Congratulations Top 5 of Startup Wheel International Track on amazing performance today.
November 6, 2020Final Round - International Track of Startup Wheel 2020
The virtual event was successful. Congratulations Top 5 of Startup Wheel International Track on amazing performance today. Let’s look forward to the winner announcement on 13th November 2020 in the Ceremony Awards Event of Startup Wheel 2020.
Final Round – International Track of Startup Wheel 2020
Top 5 International Track – Startup Wheel 2020 is selected from nearly 200 international startups from 20 countries on 5 continents.
1. TradingView Inc
- Country: US
- Sector: FinTech
- Achievement: a total of more than 40 million USD raising fund in series B round; Best Analysis Platform at Benzinga Fintech Awards 2017 in New York’s; Top 200 Global Website in February 2020; one of the 300 largest websites in the world in April 2020 with more than 10 million traders and investors.
2. Saathi
- Country: India
- Sector: Healthcare
- Achievement: TIME’s Magazine’s 100 Best Innovations; Not Impossible Award 2019 in LA, US; 3rd Most Innovative Company in India; 2019 St Andrews Prize for the Environment; 2020 XTC Award in Health Category….
3. Interbrid Inc
- Country: Korea
- Sector: AdTech
- Achievement: a total of more than 1,5 million USD raising fund; more than 74 locations in Korea and 10 international partners: America, Canada, Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam…
4. Verily Vision
- Country: Thailand
- Sector: Logitech
- Achievement: Thailand Best SME/Startup Award 2019; 2nd Runner Up GSB Best Startup Award 2019; 2nd Runner Up ASEAN Hackathon 2019; 3rd Runner Up SAMART Young Technoprenuer Award 2019.
5. Reziena
- Country: Korea
- Sector: MedTech
- Achievement: Top 10 Hottest Korean Beauty Startup to Watch; Industrial Grand Award From Money Today News; 5th Korea Industry Awards in ICT Divison.
Board of Judges
Started in 2013, Startup Wheel is designed as a 6-month accelerator program running from March to August annually. The competition is also the biggest and longest run competition for startups in Vietnam. Since 2018, we have opened the International Track for international startups who are eager to explore and expand their business to the Vietnam market.
- 7 years organized successfully
- 7.797 startups participated
- 20 countries on 5 continents have been reached out
Source: startupwheel.vn
Startup Wheel - One of the largest and most intensive startup competitions in Southeast Asia is going to its final stage.
November 3, 2020Mr. Soe Moe Kyaw Oo - One of the Judges in The Final Round of Startup Wheel
STARTUP WHEEL – One of the largest and most intensive startup competitions in Southeast Asia is going to its final stage.
Started in 2013, Startup Wheel is designed as a 6-month accelerated program running from March to August annually. The competition is also the biggest and longest-running competition for startups in Vietnam. Since 2018, Startup Wheel has opened the International Track for international startups who are eager to explore and expand their business to the Vietnam market.
The final round – Top 5 online pitch battle (Source: startupwheel.vn)
- The place where gathers Vietnam, and International Startup Ecosystems: connecting more than 500 investors, venture capital funds, businessmen of leading corporations, leaders of startup supporting organizations in Vietnam and overseas with more than 100 outstanding Vietnamese and International Startups
- The place where boost more than 100 pitchings of TOP 60 outstanding Vietnam startups and TOP 50 excellent international startups from 19 countries on 5 continents to call out investment from Investors, the Venture Capital Fund
- The place where witness the fierce competition in the Final Round of Startup Wheel 2020: TOP 10 Vietnam startups and TOP 5 International startups with a total prize valued up to 10 billion VND
- The place where take the roundtable discussions between Investors, Businessmen about mindset “Back to Basics” to flexibly respond the difficult times of global startups: finding “silent moment” to contemplate the business model, to evaluate the efficiency of business activities; find the “low notes” to focus on the core values of the business, to optimize resources for learn operations; to consolidate internal strengths, to increase the resources, to be ready catching up the opportunities when the economy recovers
- The place where honor Vietnam, and International startups has demonstrated a strong resilience in the volatile economic situation between the Covid-19 pandemic
Selected out of 176 startups from 19 countries on 5 continents, after the 6-month process, the most 5 outstanding International startups will have an online pitch battle in front of the Board of judges for the prizes.
Let’s take a look at the Top 5 and see how potential they are!
The details of the final round:
- Date: 9:15 to 11:30 in Vietnam Timezone on Friday, 6.11.2020
- Format: YouTube Livestream
Source: startupwheel.vn
Platforms help learners reduce risk, not spend a lot of money and time experimenting with the learning environment.
October 8, 2020Edu2review: Education quality evaluation system
Vietnamese parents are spending 47% of their income on their children’s education, according to TTC Edu’s statistics, while according to the Institute of Educational Research, 75% of parents admit that they are sending their children tutoring. The general education sector is also forecast to grow impressively, reaching $ 89 billion by 2026.
These figures show that the demand for investment in education in Vietnam is huge. But not all training units are qualified and suitable to the needs of learners. Most parents have to spend time and money trying to bring their children to 1-2 tutoring centers and many parents encounter poor quality centers.
In order to provide accurate and transparent information about teaching centers, Mr. Ho Duc Hoan has decided to start a business with the first educational quality assessment platform in Vietnam – Edu2Review. Mr. Ho Duc Hoan, founder and CEO of Edu2Review, shared: “On the side of the centers, those with money and expertise can run ads. Because the advertising content lacks control, it more or less creates a presence in the tutoring market, while the good, reputable, small-scale teaching units have few advertising operations. Realizing the supply and demand in the market, I decided to create Edu2Review, a professional evaluation platform for the first educational centers in Vietnam ”.
Photo by: Edu2Review
Mr. Hoan shared: “In developed countries, the supply-demand connection model has a foundation to play the role of assessment and booking, thereby helping users to reduce risks and not spend a lot of money. Vietnam, time for self-testing. However, in Vietnam in 2015, there was no foundation for educational evaluation. That is an opportunity for Edu2Review “.
Those who want Edu2Review to be certified will be trained by experts, collect students’ assessments, attend classes to check the quality. The startup is also committed to representing the student’s interests at the center, taking responsibility if the student is dissatisfied and making sure to find another suitable course for that person.
Edu2Review also features video assessment, pictures of schools and centers, helping users to have more information to make better learning options. Users only need to register by email to write reviews including strengths, weaknesses and experiences at the training unit learned. Edu2Review system will evaluate and verify the content before publishing.
Another convenient point is that Edu2Review also has an online course booking service that helps users not have to come to the center to register. The courses and centers range from kindergarten to university, so Edu2Review can meet the majority of the needs of parents and students in Vietnam.
Photo by: Edu2Review
“The current average growth of Edu2Review is always 2-3 times per year and Edu2Review is also leading in terms of brand awareness among students, students and employees in Vietnam”, Mr. Hoan said. know.
Only after 2 years of establishment, Edu2Review has successfully raised capital with a total capital of 1 million USD. Edu2Review also won many awards in the startup community: First Prize of Startup Wheel 2016, Second Prize of Hatch Fair 2016, Top 5 startups competing at APEC 2017. Singapore’s valuation of $ 4.5 million. This startup also appeared on the program Shark Tank Vietnam, invested by Shark Nguyen Hoa Binh and Shark Nguyen Manh Dung.
After 5 years of development, Edu2Review has achieved certain successes. Currently, 70% of tutoring and training centers in two big cities Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi are partners of this startup. According to Mr. Ho Duc Hoan, Edu2Review has more than 2,500 partners, 1.5 million visits from users and 7,500 students book each month.
Mr. Hoan also said that Edu2Review has reached breakeven point so far and is about to make a profit. Therefore, in mid-2021, Edu2Review will continue to raise capital to expand the system nationwide, aiming to serve 3 million students per month.
In August, Edu2Review also launched the online learning system StudyNow.vn. This system will help connect students with teachers in a one-to-one form, consistent with the current world learning trend, whether or not the COVID-19 translation occurs.
Source from: nhipcaudautu
Despite Topica’s setbacks, Vietnam edtech is on the radar of some regional investors.
October 8, 2020After Topica, Vietnam seeks its next edtech breakthrough
Despite Topica’s setbacks, Vietnam edtech is on the radar of some regional investors.
Topica, Vietnam’s leading education tech startup, has been a hard act to follow, even for itself.
In a 2018 interview with Tech in Asia, the founder and then-CEO Tuan Pham was riding high. At the time, Topica was fresh off its announcement of a US$50 million series D funding from Singapore-based private equity firm Northstar Group.
Topica’s founder and former CEO Tuan Pham at an edtech conference / Photo credit: Topica
Two years later, Topica’s series D is still one of the largest funding rounds ever closed by a Vietnamese tech startup. Established in 2007, the company focuses on three core areas: Topica Native, an online English-speech tutoring service for adults; Edumall, a marketplace that features short courses; and Topica Uni, which partners with universities to offer online bachelor’s degree programs.
But in January this year, Tuan stepped down as CEO and was replaced by Nguyen Huy Duc, Topica’s chief financial officer. According to local media reports, Duc said that he would “streamline” operations and invest aggressively in AI-driven products for children and young students.
A report on DealStreetAsia suggested that Topica had laid off the majority of its staff due to pressure from investors and to better manage its operational costs.
Several sources also told Tech in Asia that Topica rushed its expansion, both in terms of products and geographic markets. In response to an email from Tech in Asia, Topica’s new CEO Duc said the company would discuss its current priorities at a later time.
Topica’s troubles show that it’s not easy for startups to crack the sector despite the obvious potential. Vietnam’s edtech market is expected to be worth about US$3 billion by 2023, according to estimates from Ken Research.
The addressable market is quite significant. Vietnam has about 16 million students in primary and secondary levels as well as another 1.7 million studying at universities. Frustration with the current education system prompts Vietnamese families to splurge billions of US dollars each year to send their children abroad.
Parents and students rush to classes in Hanoi / Photo credit: 123rf
“In the past few years, most edtech companies have pursued a similar business model as that of Topica, without any remarkable feature that can differentiate themselves from other big players,” says Vy Le, co-founder of Do Ventures, a Vietnam-focused fund that was launched in September. “There are some innovative edtech [companies] in the markets that receive seed investments, and their sizes are still small.”
With Covid-19 expected to accelerate the growth of edtech, can smaller Vietnamese startups in this sector ride the wave and potentially become the next Topica, Ruangguru, or even Byju’s?
Weathering Covid-19
Austin Carter co-founded Ho Chi Minh City-based startup Edu2Review in 2017 with two others. The startup wants to make it easier for parents and students to get credible information about universities, colleges, language schools, and other education providers in Vietnam and overseas.
The Edu2Review team / Photo credit: Edu2Review
While users can do their own research via Google and Facebook, Edu2Review let them compare course prices, check verified reviews from past learners, get discounts, and receive refunds after a one-week trial, says Carter. For some courses offered locally, students can even book directly on the platform.
Carter, who also serves as chief financial officer, describes the company’s business model as similar to Booking.com, which means Edu2Review charges a commission on each transaction.
But relying on offline centers meant that when Covid-19 struck Vietnam in February, Edu2Review was hit.
He claims that the startup has about 1.5 million monthly active users and around 10,000 education providers listed on its site. In August 2018, Edu2Review announced that it had raised an undisclosed amount from Nest Tech, a Singapore-based venture capital fund.
But relying on offline centers meant that when Covid-19 struck Vietnam in February, Edu2Review was hit. Registration for classes went down by about 25% to 30%, according to Carter, while offline education centers had to burn through their cash reserves and cut down on marketing.
To make up for the drop in course registration, the startup began working with universities for advertising and supporting their student recruitment amid the pandemic. Edu2Review also expanded its offerings for online courses.
For Tony Ngo, chairman and co-CEO of Everest Education, a startup with brick-and-mortar learning centers in Ho Chi Minh City, its decision to develop live interactive online classes paid off.
Everest Education co-CEOs Don Le (left) and Tony Ngo / Photo credit: Everest Education
In August 2019, Everest announced that it had bagged US$4 million in a series B round. The startup operates in the after-school segment, meaning it caters to students who take extra classes in Math and English and do test preparation at its offline facilities.
To reach students in the suburban districts and other provinces, Ngo says that Everest started developing online classes in December 2019. “We were able to move all of our offline classes to online one week into the national shutdown [in February] while other big incumbent offline centers looked relatively sleepy,” he tells Tech in Asia.
Everest doesn’t have an app. Instead, it focuses on the live component of online learning, allowing students to interact and practice with classmates and their teachers. Getting students online allowed the startup to avoid letting any staff go, Ngo observes. “It’s hard to send great teachers everywhere in the country, but you can do that through technology at a much lower cost.”
Long-term obstacles
Nguyen Tri Hien, who runs Hanoi-based edtech consulting firm GetJSC, estimates that there are about 600 e-learning and edtech companies in the country. He points out that about half of them operate in the K-12 segment, offering products and services with little differentiation.
Maria Spies, co-founder and CEO of education market intelligence platform HolonIQ, says that about 20% of edtech firms in Vietnam covers language learning, followed by workforce upskilling, STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) and coding as well as international education and study.
Besides Topica, no other company has really dominated any market segment. And with Topica having to restructure and slow down, smaller edtech startups must overcome long-existing barriers before they can think about pulling ahead of the pack, according to experts interviewed by Tech in Asia.
Students in Ho Chi Minh City / Photo credit: 123rf
They note that Vietnam’s education system in general takes a passive approach. As such, it doesn’t really encourage independent or online learning. With the boom of ecommerce and financial tech, paying for online services has taken off in the country. Opening wallets for online courses, however, is still fairly new. Most Vietnamese parents remain traditional and prefer keeping children at schools and offline centers.
Giang Le, a mother of a 12-year-old, says she prefers Khan Academy, a US-based nonprofit edtech organization, because the English content is top-notch, interactive, and totally free. She also uses VietJack.com, a homegrown platform that digitalizes all official learning content as required by public schools.
It also doesn’t help that investments in Vietnam’s edtech sector have been fairly limited, with only US$3 million record for the first half of 2020.
As Covid-19 forced Vietnam to shut down schools nationwide from February to May, Giang says she started searching for online learning platforms. “What I don’t like about local edtech platforms is that there are too many ads. That isn’t the case for foreign platforms.”
It also doesn’t help that investments in Vietnam’s edtech sector have been fairly limited, with only US$3 million record for the first half of 2020, according to an estimate by Do Ventures. In contrast, US$64 million flowed into retail during the same period.
Tram Ho, co-founder and CEO of Kyna for Kids, an online learning school for children and students below 10th grade, explains that it’s challenging for local edtech startups to raise substantial funding. “You need a larger pool of startups with proven, go-to-market solutions,” she says.
“Edtech startups need initial funding to build products […] It’s not just about building a platform to match demand or a marketplace to sell courses. It’s really about building engaging content and technology for a seamless learning experience and optimized operations,” she adds.
Tram also previously ran Kyna.vn, a marketplace that provides skills-focused short courses for adults, directly competing with Topica’s Edumall. In December 2019, she sold Kyna.vn to Navigos Group, which owns popular job and recruitment portal Vietnamworks.com.
The absence of sizable funding rounds means that some edtech companies have to opt for a merger. A notable name in the K-12 segment is online education marketplace Hocmai (which means “keep learning” in Vietnamese).
Founded in 2007, Hocmai claims to serve 4 million students and has 1,200 courses for every grade level on its website – still a rather modest number for a 13-year-old startup. In August, it was acquired by Vietnamese media and entertainment group Galaxy.
Knocking on the door
Meanwhile, foreign players are giving Vietnam’s edtech scene a necessary jolt.
Leading Indonesian edtech startup Ruangguru, which raised a whopping US$150 million last year, quickly expanded to Vietnam as its first overseas destination.
Though its efforts in Vietnam are nascent, Ruangguru operates Kien Guru, which targets students from elementary to high school. According to advertisements on its website, Kien Guru has 6,500 video lectures and tutorials with more than 50,000 practice questions, which are available to users for as low as 3,400 dong a day (US$0.15).
US-based language-learning app Duolingo, which is valued at US$1.5 billion, also considers Vietnam as a high-priority market in Asia due to a strong interest to learn English.
In February, Snapask, an on-demand tutoring app based in Hong Kong, announced its US$35 million series B round. Founder and CEO Timothy Yu specifically identified Vietnam as its next expansion target in Southeast Asia, citing a growing demand for tutoring and private education services.
Photo credit: Snapask
To compete with well-funded foreign providers, especially in English and language learning, local startups need to capitalize on their understanding of what Vietnamese parents and students demand, says Kyna’s Tram.
For example, courses on Kyna for Kids tend to be more test-oriented rather than game-based. “We understand that Cambridge English Assessment is very popular and well-regarded in Vietnam. So we focus on helping students to do well on the test – that would open doors to good schools,” she adds. “It would be very difficult if we compete based only on animation or content with edtech startups from more advanced countries like China or South Korea.”
Ngo from Everest Education also thinks that foreign players can leverage “their tech ability and general know-how,” but the go-to market has to be hyperlocal.
“So many players have tried to be a regional one-stop shop. But you can’t be Sea or Grab because their business models are more easily adaptable across geographies, which is fundamentally different from edtech,” says Ngo. “For edtech, we have to provide different content for each market. Your curriculum and assessments are going to be different.”
The right model
But whether Vietnam’s edtech scene can produce more star players like Topica or Ruangguru could depend also on the rise of fintech companies, which can spur online payments for education services, or telecom providers, which can bring cheap internet even to the country’s far-flung areas.
In emerging markets such as Vietnam, business-to-consumer edtech models “are attractive but difficult to get off the ground where the ability to pay is low,” says Spies of HolonIQ. “On the other hand, business-to-business sales in education is traditionally very slow and fragmented.”
While the country’s edtech sector seems to be under the radar compared to fintech and ecommerce, its potential could attract more investor interest in the future.
Shuyin Tang, a partner at Patamar Capital, agrees that there’s tremendous opportunity in the sector. “While Topica is the leader in delivering upskilling for working professionals, the K-12 segment is much more fragmented. The challenge here is how to deliver an engaging, effective learning experience at an affordable, mass-market price point.”
The Tech in Asia Conference 2020 report predicts that many parents in Southeast Asia will be more willing to invest in their children’s schooling. To benefit from this, edtech startups can bridge the gap between online and offline learning or improve learning management and communication.
Holon IQ estimates that from 2015 to 2020, Southeast Asia drew about US$480 million in edtech VC investment.
A survey conducted by Do Ventures of 50 active funds among six major markets in the region identified education as among the top three sectors that investors will focus on in Vietnam in the coming year.
“Our fund has been actively looking for startups in the edtech sector. We prefer to invest in startups that can provide an innovative online class model with good content and quality instructors,” says Vy of Do Ventures.
Source from: vnexplorer.net