EY Entrepreneur of the Year Singapore winners find opportunities in tough conditions
Roundtable participants:
Lim Mun Wai chief executive officer, Doctor Anywhere (DA).
Akshay Garg, co-founder and chief executive officer of FinAccel.
Julian Ng, chief executive officer and executive director, Grand Venture Technology (GVT).
Jonathan Lim, chief executive officer, Oddle.
Melissa Tan, chief executive officer, Wah & Hua Pte Ltd (W&H).
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Kane Black, chief executive, INEX Innovate.
Moderator: Benjamin Cher, The Business Times
Q: What is your core business in 20 words or less?
Julian Ng: GVT provides precision engineering and manufacturing solutions to the semiconductor, life sciences, medical, electronics and aerospace industries, among others.
Melissa Tan: Wah & Hua is one of Singapore’s leading waste management and multi-material recycling company providing one-stop solution from collection to resource recovery.
Akshay Garg: FinAccel is a financial technology company, operating under the brand Kredivo, focused on making retail credit fast, affordable and accessible for the under-banked population of South-east Asia.
Jonathan Lim: Oddle digitally transforms the F&B industry and grows their sales by helping them know their customers.
Lim Wai Mun: Doctor Anywhere is Southeast Asia’s omni-channel healthcare provider delivering care to over 2.5 million users in 6 countries, via telehealth and physical clinics.
Kane Black: INEX Innovate develops molecular diagnostics tests in the area of fetal health and women’s oncology, such as breast, ovarian and endometrial cancers provide patients with peace of mind and ensuring improved patient outcomes.
Q: Where do the opportunities lie in your sector?
Julian Ng: We are intent on capturing opportunities in the front-end semiconductor equipment space in South-east Asia. Many companies have realised the importance of supply chain diversification and localisation in the aftermath of the global supply chain disruption. As the global supply chain shifts to South-east Asia, we are well-positioned to capitalise on such customer demand with our capabilities and capacity across Singapore, Malaysia and China. Additionally, with the opening up of most major economies post-pandemic, the aerospace industry should offer good growth potential for us.
Melissa Tan: The saying “Trash is Treasure” is where the opportunities lie. By maximising the value of waste, we will then be able to minimise environmental impact and in the longer run build sustainable resources for circularity for supply chains. But these are only achievable if everyone plays our part, to help collectors and recyclers like myself, simply by disposing of the right waste in the right bins.
Akshay Garg: Despite the fourth largest population in the world, a US$1 trillion GDP, nearly 100 million smartphone users, and 70-100 million strong middle class, access to credit is a huge problem in Indonesia. We saw a huge opportunity to build the region’s first automated retail credit platform, using a variety of data (from 1st-party and 3rd-party sources) for credit scoring, solving for approval speed, affordability and accessibility. Not only Indonesia, there are other markets in Southeast Asia such as Vietnam, Thailand, and Philippines, with similar demography and significant gaps in retail credit access due to structural bottlenecks that need the same solution.
Jonathan Lim: All restaurants want more revenue and lower cost. Based on experience, a good way to reduce costs and increase revenue is to digitise the business, which is what Oddle does to help increase margins by retaining customers for our restaurant partners and reducing the cost of operations by tapping into technology. The most efficient way to succeed is to connect them with their best customers and increase customer retention.
Lim Wai Mun: In particular, we see opportunities in the cross border medical specialist care space in South-east Asia as a 2.0 for telehealth, and we are actively looking to tie up the region’s healthcare by helping our users find the most appropriate care provider on our platform. With consumers embracing and realising the benefits of digital health technologies like telehealth, there are also greater opportunities for engagement, awareness, and enabling individuals to take greater action and ownership of their health, especially on the preventive health front, as with the Singapore Government’s “Healthier SG” push.
Kane Black: The possibility to develop diagnostic technologies which are more accurate, more accessible and more affordable thereby increasing screening participation rates across Asia and improving women’s lives by ultimately finding cancer in its early stages when outcomes are greatly better. Without quality diagnostics, there is no treatment.
Q: What are the challenges ahead for you amidst macroeconomic headwinds and uncertainty?
Julian Ng: The headwinds faced by the back-end semiconductor businesses is currently quite strong, which makes our expansion into the provision of higher-valued, front-end semiconductor solutions a timely one. Having said that, it has been quite a challenge expanding our team of engineers, given the vast shortage of engineering talent, particularly in Singapore.
Melissa Tan: With prices of commodities increasing rapidly, fuel and energy being a huge component of our operations, there will be more challenges on business survival – if members of the public do not play our part for the environment. On the other hand, interest in sustainability is on the rise within companies. But how much do they know about sustainability and like any other implementation of projects – sustainability comes with costs. This will be a challenge for companies in my sector, if the expectations in recycling increase to 145 per cent but contract value remains.
Akshay Garg: We’re obviously looking at the macro environment very closely and making relevant adjustments wherever required. At the same time, it’s important to call out that Indonesia (and broadly South-east Asia) has been relatively insulated from the global growth slowdown. In fact, the region represents a rare bright spot as economic growth is rebounding strongly.
Jonathan Lim: To me, our macroeconomic headwinds would be whatever the restaurants are facing. As long as we solve their problems, then we will solve our own problems. By linking our own commercial success with our merchants’, it validates our “Always Restaurants First” philosophy where we provide solutions affordably and in a transparent results-based format that is designed to give each F&B operator maximum yield at minimal costs.
Lim Wai Mun: We’ve found that consumers are now more informed and willing to invest and take action to ensure their long-term health, albeit more cautiously. We continue to be on the lookout for new horizons of growth, expanding our range of offerings and services to better serve our customers’ needs. Among our key focuses are to drive engagement of our users so as to facilitate greater cross-functional services uptake, and also continued innovation to deliver a more holistic healthcare offering.
Kane Black: Following our rapid ramp up and pivot into Covid-19 testing at the start of the pandemic, we have since last year moved focus back into our core research, development and subsequent commercialisation in women’s and fetal health. As a company with a history of execution, an underlying recurring revenue stream and wide distribution network, we are well placed to pass through any impending headwinds. That being said, we have put a planned IPO on the Singapore Exchange on hold, pending more optimal conditions.
Q: Which areas will be of focus over the coming year, and what plans are you looking to execute to grow?
Julian Ng: In the year ahead, we will be looking to deploy artificial intelligence and machine learning to expand our digitisation ecosystem in Singapore, in order to increase our productivity while maintaining the standards of precision. We are also investing in key capabilities in the front-end semiconductor equipment space to ensure that we meet the stringent precision engineering requirements of our customers. Grand Venture Technology is one of a select few companies in Asia that are offering precision engineering services for advanced materials like quartz and ceramic, and we intend to sharpen this competitive edge by enhancing our in-house capabilities in this area. We are also keeping a lookout for suitable opportunities for inorganic growth.
Melissa Tan: The focus over the coming years is to diversify business solutions and overseas expansion, so we are still in the research and sourcing stage, there is not much to comment on the growth plan.
Akshay Garg: We recently announced the acquisition of a majority stake in Bank Bisnis Internasional (Bank Bisnis) to expand the addressable market beyond digital credit and Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) services now to enter digital banking and larger ticket loans in the future. This acquisition is a very significant step for us to fulfill our commitment of serving customers with a wide variety of through financial services that are fast, affordable and widely accessible. We recently announced our commitment to the EDISON Alliance’s 1 Billion Lives Challenge, pledging to provide access to digital financial services to up to 20 million people in Indonesia, as well as Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines over the next five years.
Jonathan Lim: Next year, we plan to power product development and regional market expansion in Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Some aspects of our business, such as takeaway, QR Ordering and reservations, will go beyond the four countries that we currently operate in, penetrating new markets with a self-serve model. We will continue to charge ahead with our “Always Restaurants First” philosophy and go deeper into providing more solutions to F&B merchants.
Lim Wai Mun: We’re focused on enabling a more holistic, seamless and personalised healthcare experience for our 2.5 million (and growing) users, whereby adding complementary healthcare verticals can ensure future relevance, and better health outcomes. We’ve begun offering new services such as mental wellness, chiropractic, and specialist (2nd opinion) services, alongside our DA Marketplace (wellness, supplements, health products) and contraceptives subscription service.
Kane Black: INEX has returned to its core business of expanding its portfolio of proprietary women’s and foetal health diagnostics, guided by a vision to make technologies accessible to women across Asia and around the world. Additionally we are currently in advanced discussions pertaining to potential acquisitions in South-east Asia and North Asia, which will serve to expand our presence and also provide strategically located laboratory facilities for us to launch our own proprietary technologies in, in essence acquiring the downstream.
Q: What does the EY Entrepreneur of the year award bring to business leaders? What does winning it mean to you?
Julian Ng: The award is a good recognition of the entrepreneur’s effort in growing its business meaningfully and in a way that positively impacts the society. It will encourage established and aspiring entrepreneurs alike to continue reaching for greater heights. I am extremely honoured by this win. It is an affirmation that I have surpassed myself in turning my dream into reality. To leave a positive impact in all areas of a business is the true definition of success and a true win.
Melissa Tan: In my point of view for the EY’s EOY award, it is like a report card to acknowledge the direction and strategy I have set with my family and team to grow and sustain the business even through difficult times. Also being an SME and winning under the environmental solutions category, it is not just a recognition for myself or my company. But as an industry, it is also a recognition that waste is getting trendy and sexy in current times, which hopefully becomes more acceptable to the younger generation with the evolution of the sector.
Akshay Garg: I am deeply humbled and grateful for the recognition. This award isn’t for me, but it’s a recognition of my immensely talented and motivated team at Kredivo that has worked tirelessly to pioneer a new industry (digital data based credit scoring), a new business model (BNPL) in this region and accelerate the delivery of credit to underserved and underbanked populations in Indonesia first and now in South-east Asia.
Jonathan Lim: Entrepreneurship is a lonely journey. While you’re working on your own journey, while it is encouraging to get support from friends and family, not everyone understands the hardship and challenges you face. The EY Entrepreneur of the year award is definitely motivation for other entrepreneurs to grow their businesses and work towards contributing and creating an impact on our community. It is very encouraging to know, while we’re all working on our own set of problems, that there are many like-minded individuals who are solving problems in their own fields of work.
Lim Wai Mun: The EY Entrepreneur of the year award is a great recognition of business leaders, entrepreneurship spirit, and leadership that is also an inspiration for the business community. It is an honour to win EY Entrepreneur of the year award among other prominent local business leaders, many of whom share the same experiences of growing their organisations and people towards success. Doctor Anywhere’s journey also celebrates local entrepreneurship and Singapore’s pioneering spirit, growing from an unknown entity to a regional healthcare leader. I hope that the distinct experiences and sharing from the awardees inspires the business community and the next generation, especially our brilliant young minds and entrepreneurs-to-be who aspire to make a difference to the world.
Kane Black: As an entrepreneur, to be recognised by one of the world’s most prestigious, if not the most prestigious awards is a terrific honour. The award does not only honour me but honours my entire team – a fantastically talented, dedicated, hard-working group, for whom I am incredibly grateful and fortunate to have!
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