Circles.Life survived a crisis. It’s now looking to redefine the telco business

When Circles.Life took up a full-page ad on the April 22 edition of The Straits Times to poke a bit of fun at their “telco friends in red and green,” it caused quite a stir. Even though the Singapore-based digital telco is no stranger to cheeky marketing, this one was noticeably spicier than usual.

Two days later, at a subscribers-only Fireside Chat held in Singapore, Tech in Asia got a chance to speak with Rameez Ansar, co-founder of Circles.Life, to find out why the company picked a fight with the goliaths of Singapore’s telecommunications scene and how it secured a recent round of funding from Sequoia India, as well as the blood, sweat and tears involved with being a startup founder.

Circles.Life co-founder Rameez Ansar / Photo: Circles.Life

Established in 2016, Circles.Life has slowly but steadily gained a following among the Lion City’s mobile subscribers. At the time of writing, it commands a 5% market share, making it one of the fastest-growing telcos in the country.

However, compared to industry veterans like Singtel and Starhub, Circles.Life is still considered the new kid on the block. What, then, prompted Ansar and his co-founders to enter the fiercely competitive telco market?

“It started with frustration and pain,” explained Ansar. “It is about paying your bills every month and realizing that you have been randomly charged S$100 and you don’t know why. It’s about staying on the line for 30 minutes, being sent to three different customer service staff and not having a guarantee if you will have your questions solved. It’s about trying to pay my bills through internet banking, and [going] through a bunch of menus just to apply for GIRO.”

When a company monopolizes a market, Ansar added, it tends to adopt certain behaviors that stray away from customers.

However, Ansar did clarify that the telcos are not always at fault. For one, established players tend to already have technologies in place from decades before. “So when the technical stack is so backwards, you cannot focus on customers unless you throw all your junk out and start from scratch,” Ansar noted. “For example, name one cab company that’s bigger than Uber or Grab right now. None, right? This is what’s happening to traditional industries.”

How to win friends and influence investors

Earlier In February, Circles.Life announced that it had raised a series C round from Sequoia India – money that will fund its entry into five countries over the next 18 months. The expansion will begin with Taiwan in Q2, then it will be followed by Australia in Q3. Indonesia, too, is one of the markets included in the launch. During the Fireside Chat, Tech in Asia CEO Willis Wee asked Ansar about how the deal came to fruition.

Ansar revealed that Circles.Life spoke to a host of investors before the series C round came through, though few of them expressed interest at first. “But then our consumers spoke, and we found success in the market, so we received phone calls from people that said, ‘Hey, we had an interesting conversation, let’s have it again’,” he shared.

Positive word of mouth, however, was not enough. After each conversation with potential investors, Circles.Life also kept them updated about its activities via regular newsletters. “[And since] you can keep track of who’s read it and who hasn’t, if someone has opened your newsletter four or five times, you know that lead is hot,” Ansar said.

One of Circles.Life’s edgy marketing campaigns – a vandalized ad of a fake competitor.

As for Sequoia India, what really convinced it to invest in Circles.Life, according to Ansar, was authenticity. “[Investors] have seen tens of thousands of pitches, and they can smell when you are not authentic. If the ‘why’ is unique, if it is ambitious, I think that is what they are looking for,” he shared. “We talked about our journeys, we talked about our personal motivations, we talked about why we show up to work every day. So be vulnerable. Those things matter.”

Crisis mode

The future