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Each week, The Rest of the World meets a notable tech or political leader in one of our regions for a three-minute Q&A blast. This is a rare insight into the minds of some of the most enterprising, technology-driven thinkers in Latin American, African and Asian countries. As we look over the horizon to an uncertain 2023, here are the “3 minutes with” takeaways that are in our heads, rent-free.
On Crypto Winter:
Remember that crypto has a use case outside of the US “There are weeks when I think, ‘Oh my God, I’ve completely drunk the Kool-Aid.'” If I lived in the US, I probably wouldn’t be such a bigot. [But] in emerging markets the context is completely different. Because we have a traditional financial system that is completely broken. Christine Chang, Venture Partner at Rally Cap. 🇲🇽
But it is not an endless pot of money. Our South Asia editor advised getting the following quote on a t-shirt. “Crypto[currencies] are not a get-rich-quick scheme. It’s a high-risk, high-return form of investment because it’s early stage and volatile.” Nishal Shetty, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange WazirX. 🇮🇳
For abbreviations:
Beware of laying off too many employees, too quickly. “Fired employees will not speak positively about the company. At a later point, if the company needs them back, they may not want to come back. Also, what about the employees who are being held back? If a company makes radical calls, the morale of other employees can suffer. They may even start looking for another job… Layoffs may indicate that the organization has not taken care of its employees in the past.” Somdeep Deb, vice president of consulting services at Right Management. 🇮🇳
On the reduction in funding:
Don’t discount the value of unicorns in the tech ecosystem. “While there is some glee surrounding some of the difficulties of unicorns in the current context – fewer investment rounds, more companies choosing lines of credit over VCs – the most iconic startups are still very important. They not only attract investment from global funds, but also return capital to investors, generally become “schools” for new founders and create support networks. They create what are known as ‘mobs’ – a term I personally don’t like, but it says a lot.” Luis Daniel Arbulu, partner in Peruvian venture capital firm Salkantay Ventures. 🇲🇽
For new trends:
10-minute superfast delivery is all the rage. “People don’t want 10-minute superfast delivery. What they want instead is to be able to order more things at once, and they’re fine if delivery takes longer… When we were delivering in 10-15 minutes, the average number of items per basket was three. Now there are 11. People are ordering three times as much because we worked on our assortment. … People want things fast, but they want good quality and the ability to put it all together.” Kasim Shroff, co-founder of Krave Mart. 🇵🇰
Where there’s a will: Gen-Z in China end up with virtual avatars. “Virtual avatars allow people to express themselves freely and build high-quality, deep relationships. Consumers are freed from the baggage that comes with age, job and other external labels and instead focus on personal characteristics that are closer to their hearts. Zhang Lu, founder of social media company Soul. 🇨🇳
Caveat emptor: A startup tracks your shopping behavior. “We can see what paths customers are taking, whether they’re coming in and turning left or right, and what area or product category they’re staying in. We also perform age and gender analysis to understand target audiences.” Patrick Tu, founder and CEO of data startup Dayta AI. 🇭🇰
On advice to investors:
Southeast Asia is not a “region”. “Southeast Asia as a region is really a delusion. Different languages, family power structures, regulatory policies — it’s not trivial to be successful in one market, let alone eight.” Eddie Chan, Founding Partner of Intudo Ventures. 🇮🇩
Keep this in mind when doing business in Nepal. “Preference for profitability over growth, risk appetite of local investors, collateral-based financing, high cost of borrowing, regulatory issues and repatriation of investor funds are major obstacles that continue to adversely impact doing business in Nepal . Biswas Dhakal, President of F1Soft International. 🇳🇵
How to raise female founders – from the earliest stages. “Expanding the top of the funnel by investing in exponentially more women-led companies at the pre- and early-stage stages is the best way to overcome the funding gap. If, as VCs, our job is to invest in great companies, we need to understand why our asset class is generally unattractive to female founders in Africa, and why they progress through our deal channels at different rates. Blaming the pipeline obscures the need to do this.” Eloho Omame, co-founder of investment company FirstCheck Africa. 🇳🇬
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