Letter to readers: When the world’s richest men collide

Dear readers,

Competition is the lynchpin of innovation. This is why Tech in Asia often covers the rivalry among technology startups as well as the more established players.

Last week, one of our best stories delved on the intensifying ecommerce rivalry between two giants – Amazon and Reliance – in India. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos upped the ante when he visited the country and pledged to invest US$1 billion over the next five years to help digitize smaller merchants in the world’s second-most populous nation.

Bezos’ move comes as Reliance boss Mukhesh Ambani woos neighborhood shops – called kiranas– by providing them point-of-sales terminals that will enable shopkeepers to automate store inventories and automatically order from suppliers. A Reliance smartphone app also lets the kirana stores take grocery orders and deliver the goods to consumers.

Reliance Jio’s Mukesh Ambani is the richest Indian.

The Amazon versus Reliance story is Kenan Machado’s maiden story for Tech in Asia. Having worked for international news organizations such as The Wall Street Journal, CNBC and Reuters in the past decade, Kenan will help us build our coverage of the Indian tech scene.

While the battle lines have been drawn for Amazon and Reliance, our founder Willis Wee is advocating a merger between super apps Grab and Gojek in his weekly commentary.

Some of you might say it’s too early for this deal to happen, considering that Grab just merged with Uber two years ago. But stay tuned: Willis is diving deep into industry data to bring you more insights to show that such a combination is plausible. That should fuel interesting conversations over Chinese New Year reunion dinners this weekend.

Indeed, adaptation is the key to success, especially if projects or products don’t gain traction. This is what TradeGecko, a provider of inventory management software, is trying to do after an increase in sales and marketing budget failed to sufficiently boost the company’s revenue. CEO and co-founder Cameron Priest tells me he is confident sales growth will be sustained with the changes he is introducing after retrenching 35 of the company’s 125 employees.

Even if a startup is successful, it sometimes needs to listen to market feedback and adjust its operations accordingly. That’s what Tech in Asia strives to do. We’re definitely not resting on our laurels despite having our first profitable year. Watch this space as we bring you more exciting content.

Similarly, Malaysian startup Carsome has been tweaking its operations to improve its service and extend its reach. Co-founder Eric Cheng tells our Jack Ellis that Carsome initially targeted advertising and selling used cars on its platform. However, the company evolved as a trader of used cars to other dealers instead.

Now, Carsome wants to become the biggest online marketplace for second-hand vehicles in Southeast Asia. Using the $50 million from a series C funding round, it plans to expand its operations across Indonesia.

Meanwhile, some entrepreneurs are increasingly relying on artificial intelligence and machine learning to push their industries forward. Indeed, a number of startups this week raised money to finance investments in AI and machine learning technologies.

Apart from innovation, persistence is another ingredient for successful entrepreneurs. Our Jakarta-based reporter Aditya Hadi Pratama tells us an inspiring story of Indonesian businessman Doni Priliandi, who burned through his savings to keep startup Happy5 afloat. Happy5, which sells human resources software, is now profitable and competing against Silicon Valley bigwigs such as SAP, Facebook, and Workday.

For more inspiring tech startup stories, do subscribe to our premium content here.

Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Cheers,

Terence