Here’s how this online higher education portal slowly but steadily conquered 27 countries globally

These days, it’s not hard to find someone who proudly holds a college degree. Don’t be fooled, though – these don’t come cheap at all, and university tuition fees continue to rise year after year. In Malaysia, for example, certain private universities revealed that they raise their tuition fees by five to ten percent every year.

As a result, many households perceive higher education as a significant investment – and as with all investments, research is a must. The trouble, however, is that information on higher education is scattered all over the web, making it hard to draw comparisons between institutions.

Edwin Tay, co-founder and CEO of Malaysia-based online higher education portal EasyUni, recalls that his niece was having a hard time choosing the college of her dreams back in 2008:

She wanted to find out more about these institutions, but there wasn’t any one single platform that gathered all the relevant information. She ended up having to go for events and asking around to find out more – it was a very cumbersome process.

His co-founder’s nephew faced the same issue too, and it was his initiative that sparked the idea of creating a comprehensive and accurate portal for prospective undergraduates to use.

A slow start

With that, the duo began working on EasyUni. At first, the company progressed rather slowly, largely because Tay was still working on his first startup – a digital agency named Netinfinium. The real work began in December 2010, when Tay sold his agency to a publicly listed company in Malaysia, and finally made the plunge to build the portal full-time.

The team eventually got their platform up and running with funds from the founders, as well as three grants from the government across a period of time – MYR150,000 (US$47,000) from the Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC), as well as MYR150,000 (US$47,000) and MYR500,000 (US$155,000) respectively from Cradle.

Due to their day job obligations, the duo spent a large amount of time listening to prospective clients, but procrastinated when it came to taking follow-up action.

“In hindsight, we definitely should have moved faster to implement whatever we had at that point of time, rather than simply brainstorming and coming up with a ton of ideas,” says Tay. “When we finally got going, we tried to implement everything – that was a bad idea.”

Another challenge they faced lay in trying to meet their aim of connecting global students with global institutions. Right from the start, Tay understood his team had to build a portal with a global audience in mind. At first, it was very difficult to reach the rest of the world, as many local startups in Asia can attest to. The portal started off with 100 institutions spanning five countries, but their audience consisted mainly of Malaysians.

Working faster, harder, leaner

A balancing act