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Hello reader,
I recently heard a phrase about working with other people: “Underpromise, overdeliver.”
It alludes to the idea of playing it safe and beating expectations. If you tell people you can only achieve below your true potential, you give yourself room for error if something goes wrong.
On the other hand, if you do manage to get things done in a way that surpasses expectations, you get to deliver a pleasant surprise.
That said, there are two caveats:
* You can’t always do this, or else people will realize that you’re not being honest.
* No matter how much effort you put in, sometimes things just don’t work out the way you want them to.
The latter appears to have happened between Malaysian sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional and Indonesian aquatech firm eFishery, as the former pulled out of the latter’s series D round. Today’s premium talks about what went down between the two firms.
Today we look at:
- How Khazanah’s involvement in eFishery’s fundraise fell through
- Tech in Asia getting acquired by SPH Media
- Other newsy highlights such as a new global investment firm launched by a former EDBI executive and MAS slapping DBS with a ban.
Premium summary
Goodbye Khazanah
Image credit: Timmy Loen
Even though Khazanah may no longer be the lead investor for eFishery’s series D round, I do hope that the situation doesn’t lead to too much of a falling out. According to Tech in Asia’s sources, there were two main reasons why this happened.
- Everyday I’m shufflin’: The first is a “management reshuffle” in Khazanah that affected staff who were involved in the eFishery deal.
- Bigger price tag: The second is eFishery revising its valuation upward in the middle of its negotiations with Khazanah.
- Communication is key: While this is not an ideal situation, our sources pointed out that both firms were in constant communication with each other while the deal was being ironed out. It’s just unfortunate that things didn’t turn out as well as they could have.
A source involved with the deal, however, says these reasons were false.
We’ve been acquired!
Did you miss last June’s meetup? Great news: We’re coming back to HCMC for another round of our exclusive, founders-only networking event!
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