Analyse Asia with Bernard Leong
Business:Management
In Episode 333, Nadine Freischlad, writer from The Ken, joined us in a conversation on the influence of both US and Chinese tech giants in the third most important market in Asia Pacific: Indonesia, the secondary exits spanned by venture capitalists and founders in Southeast Asia and the story of Kopi Kenangan in Indonesia. We began the story with Nadine's journey from startups to The Ken, and why Indonesia is an interesting and hot market after India and China. We discuss the influence of tech giants from US and China in Indonesia and how Google has fired the first salvo with bringing their cloud platform in Jakarta. Following on, Nadine explained why venture capitalists in Southeast Asia are exiting in secondary markets. Last but not least, she discuss why Kopi Kenangan in Indonesia will not follow in the footsteps of Luckin Coffee.
Here are the interesting show notes and links to the discussion:
Nadine Freischlad, Writer, The Ken (@nfreischlad, LinkedIn, The Ken Profile, newsletter) How did you start your career? What brought you to Asia and eventually to write for The Ken? Why are you in Indonesia and why is Indonesia the most interesting market in Southeast Asia? Influence of US & China Tech Giants in Indonesia Reference: “Google’s Kormo, AI Hurdles & Indonesia’s job recruitment nightmare”, “Google fires first volley in Indonesia’s cloud wars” and “Facebook, Paypal’s payments play a super app-ortunity for Gojek” Can you describe how the US tech giants, for example, Google, Facebook and Paypal, have built their influence in Indonesia? Google has recently launched a job recruitment site called Kormo in Indonesia, can you explain why that came about and what Google wants to achieve out of Kormo? In terms of cloud infrastructure, Google is the first to enter the market before Amazon and Microsoft, does it hurt local hosting providers? Facebook and Paypal have invested in Gojek (along with Google and Tencent), how does that supercharge Gojek’s ambitions to be a super app in their war against Grab? While the US tech giants have invested into Indonesia’s top unicorns, what are the Chinese tech giants doing in Indonesia? Given the recent pushback from India and US on Tik Tok, will the Indonesian government follow suit with the influence of chinese apps in Indonesia? Secondary market for Southeast Asia startups Reference: Southeast Asia’s startups surf a secondary wave Given the number of exits from startups are few and far between in Southeast Asia, how are investors justifying their returns to the LPs (limited partners)? We do not see a lot of IPOs in Southeast Asia. Can you talk about how VCs managed to generate liquidity by secondary shares sales and elaborate how the secondary share sales work? Are there platforms where the secondary shares sales can be transacted between investors, employees and founders of the startup? Are there sources of friction generated between founders of startups & their investors (VCs, PE firms) on the secondary sales shares given that it will disrupt the capitalization table (or cap table in short) of the company? Do you see secondary shares sales as an important mechanism for VCs and PE firms to generate liquidity? Is this similar to how Silicon Valley VCs and angel investors sold their shares to SoftBank two years back? Kopi Kenangan in Indonesia Reference: “Kopi Kenangan wants to walk in Luckin’s path, not in its shoes” Can you briefly describe the company Kopi Kenangan in Indonesia? Indonesia is a coffee country most well known for the javanese coffee beans, how is the coffee culture in Indonesia and how does it help Kopi Kenangan to reach its customers? How has Kopi Kenangan as a business scaled up in the recent year for example, their number of retail outlets and customer reach? Are they having any issues of massive burn? Can you explain the unit economics of Kopi Kenangan in Indonesia and contrast this with Luckin Coffee in China? (Refer to Part 2 of The Anonymous Report on Luckin Coffee’s flawed unit economics) In your perspective, what makes Kopi Kenangan able to move away from the shadow of Luckin Coffee given the latter’s recent scandal? Closing Can you recommend your book, podcast and something which has recently inspired your life? How can my audience find you?Editor's Note: Our apologies as there were some issues during the recording on Nadine's end. Hence you will hear a little background noise towards near the end during the Kopi Kenangan part of the conversation. We will hope to improve our recording with our guests in the future.
Podcast Information:
RSS Feed Apple Podcasts Himalaya Spotify Libsyn Google Play Overcast FM SoundCloud Luminary Twitter Facebook Video Facebook Page Linkedin Stitcher Castbox RadioPublic Acast PodBean ListenNotes TuneInThe show is hosted and produced by Carol Yin (@CarolYujiaYin) and originally created by Bernard Leong (@bernardleong, Linkedin). Sound credits for the intro music: Taro Iwashiro, "The Beginning" from Red Cliff Soundtrack.
Deploy and PropTech in 2024 with Jordan Kostelac
Akamai Cloud Computing & The Age of Edge AI with Jay Jenkins
Saison Capital and Real World Asset Monetization in Crypto with Qin En Looi
Digital Report 2024 and why Generative AI did not show up this time with Simon Kemp
Is TikTok going to be banned in the US? An Asian Perspective with Jing Yang
Don't Ignore Asia Tech with Catherine Shu
Will the stocks from China recover & Asian Century Stocks with Michael Fritzell
How Arta Finance Democratizes Wealth Management with Caesar Sengupta
BYD vs Tesla: The New EV Empire with Lei Xing
AC Ventures & The Indonesia Venture Capital Report 2023 with Adrian Li
Vertex Ventures & Venture Capital in Southeast Asia & India with Carmen Yuen
Yana TV and Change Makers in the Asia Pacific with Yana Fry
Glints & Human Resources in the Age of AI with Oswald Yeo
The Power of Play and Future of Work with George Kesselman
The State of China 2023 with Shai Oster
The State of Generative AI and Crypto in 2023 with Kelly Choo
Undivided VC & Investing in the Built Environment & Sustainability with Alexander Bent
Decoding the e-Conomy SEA 2023 Report with Sapna Chadha and Florian Hoppe
Dow Jones & AI in Risk and Compliance with Joel Lange
The Art of Product Management with Tom Verrilli
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
The Commercial Edge: Unleash the Power of People
The emPOWERed Half Hour
HCI Leadership Revolution
Human Capital Leadership
The Power of Music Thinking
BusinessWISE
Business Wars