2021 – Page 83 – Digital Pulse

News: Squad Mobility eyes shared platforms as target for its compact solar electric quadricycle

September 9, 2021
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Squad Mobility’s vision of the perfect urban vehicle is a low-cost EV equipped with solar panels, swappable batteries and enough zip and range in its diminutive 6.5-foot package to meet the needs of city drivers. The early stage Dutch startup, which recently revealed the final design of its quadricycle, is now assembling working prototypes in

The early stage Dutch startup, which recently revealed the final design of its quadricycle, is now assembling working prototypes in Breda, the Netherlands. Squad has said the vehicle will have a base price of €5,750 ($6,790), excluding taxes. That price goes up if buyers want to add features like removable doors, air conditioning, heating and extra batteries.

Squad plans to present the prototypes this fall, Robert Hoevers, CEO and co-founder of the company said in a recent interview. Pre-production is also expected to begin this year with a goal to start delivering the car at the end of 2022.

Squad, like so many other new entrants to the EV car scene, will need more funds to reach its target.

In June, the company raised an undisclosed amount from Bloomit Ventures. To reach its production goals, Hoevers estimates Squad will need an additional €3.5 million ($4.1 million) for its next round, and then another €8 million ($9.6 million) to be able to deliver the first Squads. The company has not yet announced a round publicly, but says it’s in talks with various interested parties.

Interested customers can go on Squad’s website and pay a €5 reserve fee, but where Squad really sees its path to market is with shared mobility companies. The startup says it is in talks with a range of micromobility and car sharing operators that might be interested in diversifying their fleets with a compact, smart vehicle.

The Squad, which is a combination of the words “solar” and “quadricycle,” seats two, punches up to 30 miles per hour and is fueled by two swappable batteries with a capacity of around 1.6 Kwh each and a collective range of about 62 miles. This is similar to the battery capacity and range of electric mopeds.

For the average European city driver, that should be enough range. Squad also installed a 250-watt solar panel to the vehicle, which the company says adds another 12 miles per day given the amount of sun Europe tends to get.

Rendering of a Squad charging station for swappable batteries that can be used by shared mobility operators

Squad is coming onto the scene at the intersection of new mobility categories and EV charging innovation, which could be appealing to shared mobility operators looking to solve more use cases.

Shared micromobility companies are beginning to add electric mopeds to their fleets of e-scooters and e-bikes. The Squad could appeal to operators that want to appeal to a broader demographic, and one specifically more comfortable in a four-wheeled vehicle.

The potential savings from harnessing the power of the sun could attract operators as well. In the micromobility world, the labor costs associated with swapping batteries or charging vehicles represent a roadblock to profitability. A vehicle that’s constantly on a bit of a charge, at least during the daylight hours, might help alleviate that pain point.

“The idea is not to drive directly on solar,” Hoevers told TechCrunch. “The idea is to buffer the batteries with solar and then drive on the batteries. The sun is more or less drip charging the battery throughout the day, which is actually a very healthy way of charging. You don’t want to top off your batteries to 100%. You want to keep them at around 50% to 60% all the time for a longer battery life.”

Hoevers said Squad has been in talks with shared micromobility providers to pitch the quadricycle, and has found that most dockless vehicles see about four to five rides per day and drive about 36 to 38 miles per day, numbers that TechCrunch confirmed with a few micromobility operators and that are well within the range of the Squad car.

Squad also intends to equip its vehicles with cameras, sensors and other smart features like remote diagnostics and maintenance, which will make the company more attractive to shared operators looking a fleet that can be integrated into its management platforms. Hoevers also says he and his co-founder, Chris Klok, have used their collective 40 years of experience in mobility and shared past at long range solar EV company Lightyear, to develop a a strong CAN bus and drivetrain upon which new features can be added.

Whether Squad ends up selling fleets to micromobility platforms or car-sharing platforms might depend on the category the vehicle ends up in. With its current speed and weight, the Squad car will be in the L6e category for light four-wheeled vehicles.

“There are interesting cost and tax benefits in this segment,” said Hoevers. “For example, there is no congestion charge, no road tax, no parking fees, low insurance fees and no car driving license needed in most markets.”

Hoevers said the company is also considering producing a more powerful L7 that can go top speeds of around 45 miles per hour, which might be better for cities with more hills.

The competition

Squad isn’t the only company that has added solar panels to its electric vehicles. Germany-based startup Sono Motors told TechCrunch that it’s on track to begin deliveries of its electric Sion vehicle by 2023. The vehicle’s exterior is composed of hundreds of solar cells that have been integrated into polymer instead of glass and can add up to nearly 22 miles of extra battery life per day.

Although the Sion has not yet been released, the Sono app is already inviting owners of the vehicle to engage in a sort of car-sharing that’s reminiscent of Airbnb for Sions in order to make use of vehicles that otherwise sit parked and useless for most of the day. As of Thursday, Sono is expanding this vision to allow any car to be shared via the Sono app.

Aptera Motors, a California company that has promised to roll out the “first mass-produced solar car” this year, raised $4 million in a Series A this February that it is using to pay for fiberglass, carbon fiber and batteries for its spaceship-looking tricycle. Aptera says its vehicle, which is available for pre-order and could cost anywhere between $25,900 and $46,900, will be built with 34 square feet of solar cells that can add an additional 40 miles of battery capacity on a clear day.

Each of the players in the solar-powered EV space have differences in tech, path to market and style, but they’re all potentially finding ways to ease the strain on the electrical grid.

In the Netherlands, new electric cars make up 25% of total market share, and that number will only increase. It might not be feasible in the long run for all of those vehicles to each plug into the grid to power up, especially when industries across sectors are beginning to electrify.

While it’s clear that the technology isn’t there yet for vehicles to run purely on solar, Squad and other companies like it are laying the groundwork for future solar technology.

Revel’s Frank Reig shares how he built his business and what he’s planning

News: UK dials up the spin on data reform, claiming ‘simplified’ rules will drive ‘responsible’ data sharing

September 9, 2021
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The U.K. government has announced a consultation on plans to shake up the national data protection regime, as it looks at how to diverge from European Union rules following Brexit. It’s also a year since the U.K. published a national data strategy in which said it wanted pandemic levels of data sharing to become Britain’s

The U.K. government has announced a consultation on plans to shake up the national data protection regime, as it looks at how to diverge from European Union rules following Brexit.

It’s also a year since the U.K. published a national data strategy in which said it wanted pandemic levels of data sharing to become Britain’s new normal.

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCPS) has today trailed an incoming reform of the information commissioner’s office — saying it wants to broaden the ICO’s remit to “champion sectors and businesses that are using personal data in new, innovative and responsible ways to benefit people’s lives”; and promising “simplified” rules to encourage the use of data for research which “benefit’s people’s lives”, such as in the field of healthcare.

It also wants a new structure for the regulator — including the creation of an independent board and chief executive for the ICO, to mirror the governance structures of other regulators such as the Competition and Markets Authority, Financial Conduct Authority and Ofcom.

Additionally, it said the data reform consultation will consider how the new regime can help mitigate the risks around algorithmic bias — something the EU is already moving to legislate on, setting out a risk-based proposal for regulating applications of AI back in April.

Which means the U.K. risks being left lagging if it’s only going to concern itself with a narrow focus on “bias mitigation”, rather than considering the wider sweep of how AI is intersecting with and influencing its citizens’ lives.

In a press release announcing the consultation, DCMS highlights an artificial intelligence partnership involving Moorfields Eye Hospital and the University College London Institute of Ophthalmology, which kicked off back in 2016, as an example of the kinds of beneficial data sharing it wants to encourage. Last year the researchers reported that their AI had been able to predict the development of wet age-related macular degeneration more accurately than clinicians.

The partnership also involved (Google-owned) DeepMind and now Google Health — although the government’s PR doesn’t make mention of the tech giant’s involvement. It’s an interesting omission, given that DeepMind’s name is also attached to a notorious U.K. patient data-sharing scandal, which saw another London-based NHS Trust (the Royal Free) sanctioned by the ICO, in 2017, for improperly sharing patient data with the Google-owned company during the development phase of a clinician support app (which Google is now in the process of discontinuing).

DCMS may be keen to avoid spelling out that its goal for the data reforms — aka to “remove unnecessary barriers to responsible data use” — could end up making it easier for commercial entities like Google to get their hands on U.K. citizens’ medical records.

The sizeable public backlash over the most recent government attempt to requisition NHS users’ medical records — for vaguely defined “research” purposes (aka the “General Practice Data for Planning and Research”, or GPDPR, scheme) — suggests that a government-enabled big-health-data-free-for-all might not be so popular with U.K. voters.

“The government’s data reforms will provide clarity around the rules for the use of personal data for research purposes, laying the groundwork for more scientific and medical breakthroughs,” is how DCMS’ PR skirts the sensitive health data sharing topic.

After years of inaction against adtech, UK’s ICO calls for browser-level controls to fix ‘cookie fatigue’

Elsewhere there’s talk of “reinforc[ing] the responsibility of businesses to keep personal information safe, while empowering them to grow and innovate” — so that sounds like a yes to data security but what about individual privacy and control over what happens to your information?

The government seems to be saying that will depend on other aims — principally economic interests attached to the U.K.’s ability to conduct data-driven research or secure trade deals with other countries that don’t have the same (current) high U.K. standards of data protection.

There are some purely populist flourishes here too — with DCMS couching its ambition for a data regime “based on common sense, not box ticking” — and flagging up plans to beef up penalties for nuisance calls and text messages. Because, sure, who doesn’t like the sound of a crackdown on spam?

Except spam text messages and nuisance calls are a pretty quaint concern to zero in on in an era of apps and data-driven, democracy-disrupting mass surveillance — which was something the outgoing information commissioner raised as a major issue of concern during her tenure at the ICO.

The same populist anti-spam messaging has already been deployed by ministers to attack the need to obtain internet users’ consent for dropping tracking cookies — which the digital minister Oliver Dowden recently suggested he wants to do away with — for all but “high risk” purposes.

Having a system of rights wrapping people’s data that gives them a say over (and a stake in) how it can be used appears to be being reframed in the government’s messaging as irresponsible or even non-patriotic — with DCMS pushing the notion that such rights stand in the way of more important economic or highly generalized “social” goals.

Not that it has presented any evidence for that — or even that the U.K.’s current data protection regime got in the way of (the very ample) data sharing during COVID-19… While negative uses of people’s information are being condensed in DCMS’ messaging to the narrowest possible definition — of spam that’s visible to an individual — never mind how that person got targeted with the nuisance calls/spam texts in the first place.

UK’s COVID-19 health data contracts with Google and Palantir finally emerge

The government is taking its customary “cake and eat it” approach to spinning its reform plan — claiming it will both “protect” people’s data while also trumpeting the importance of making it really easy for citizens’ information to be handed off to anyone who wants it, so long as they can claim they’re doing some kind of “innovation”, while also larding its PR with canned quotes dubbing the plan “bold” and “ambitious”.

So while DCMS’ announcement says the reform will “maintain” the U.K.’s (currently) world-leading data protection standards, it directly rows back — saying the new regime will (merely) “build on” a few broad-brush “key elements” of the current rules (specifically it says it will keep “principles around data processing, people’s data rights and mechanisms for supervision and enforcement”).

Clearly the devil will be in the detail of the proposals which are due to be published tomorrow morning. So expect more analysis to debunk the spin soon.

But in one specific trailed change DCMS says it wants to move away from a “one-size-fits-all” approach to data protection compliance — and “allow organisations to demonstrate compliance in ways more appropriate to their circumstances, while still protecting citizens’ personal data to a high standard”.

That implies that smaller data-mining operations — DCMS’s PR uses the example of a hairdresser’s but plenty of startups can employ fewer staff than the average barber’s shop — may be able to expect to get a pass to ignore those ‘high standards’ in the future.

Which suggests the U.K.’s “high standards” may, under Dowden’s watch, end up resembling more of a Swiss Cheese…

Data protection is a “how to, not a don’t do”…

The man who is likely to become the U.K.’s next information commissioner, New Zealand’s privacy commissioner John Edwards, was taking questions from a parliamentary committee earlier today, as MPs considered whether to support his appointment to the role.

If he’s confirmed in the job, Edwards will be responsible for implementing whatever new data regime the government cooks up.

Under questioning, he rejected the notion that the U.K.’s current data protection regime presents a barrier to data sharing — arguing that laws like GDPR should rather be seen as a “how to” and an “enabler” for innovation.

“I would take issue with the dichotomy that you presented [about privacy vs data-sharing],” he told the committee chair. “I don’t believe that policymakers and businesses and governments are faced with a choice of share or keep faith with data protection. Data protection laws and privacy laws would not be necessary if it wasn’t necessary to share information. These are two sides of the same coin.

“The UK DPA [data protection act] and UK GDPR they are a ‘how to’ — not a ‘don’t do’. And I think the UK and many jurisdictions have really finally learned that lesson through the COVID-19 crisis. It has been absolutely necessary to have good quality information available, minute by minute. And to move across different organizations where it needs to go, without friction. And there are times when data protection laws and privacy laws introduce friction and I think that what you’ve seen in the UK is that when it needs to things can happen quickly.”

He also suggested that plenty of economic gains could be achieved for the U.K. with some minor tweaks to current rules, rather than a more radical reboot being necessary. (Though clearly setting the rules won’t be up to him; his job will be enforcing whatever new regime is decided.)

“If we can, in the administration of a law which at the moment looks very much like the UK GDPR, that gives great latitude for different regulatory approaches — if I can turn that dial just a couple of points that can make the difference of billions of pounds to the UK economy and thousands of jobs so we don’t need to be throwing out the statute book and starting again — there is plenty of scope to be making improvements under the current regime,” he told MPs. “Let alone when we start with a fresh sheet of paper if that’s what the government chooses to do.”

TechCrunch asked another Edwards (no relation) — Newcastle University’s Lilian Edwards, professor of law, innovation and society — for her thoughts on the government’s direction of travel, as signalled by DCMS’ pre-proposal-publication spin, and she expressed similar concerns about the logic driving the government to argue it needs to rip up the existing standards.

“The entire scheme of data protection is to balance fundamental rights with the free flow of data. Economic concerns have never been ignored, and the current scheme, which we’ve had in essence since 1998, has struck a good balance. The great things we did with data during COVID-19 were done completely legally — and with no great difficulty under the existing rules — so that isn’t a reason to change them,” she told us.

She also took issue with the plan to reshape the ICO “as a quango whose primary job is to ‘drive economic growth’ ” — pointing out that DCMS’ PR fails to include any mention of privacy or fundamental rights, and arguing that “creating an entirely new regulator isn’t likely to do much for the ‘public trust’ that’s seen as declining in almost every poll.”

She also suggested the government is glossing over the real economic damage that would hit the U.K. if the EU decides its “reformed” standards are no longer essentially equivalent to the bloc’s. “[It’s] hard to see much concern for adequacy here; which will, for sure, be reviewed, to our detriment — prejudicing 43% of our trade for a few low value trade deals and some hopeful sell offs of NHS data (again, likely to take a wrecking ball to trust judging by the GPDPR scandal).”

She described the goal of regulating algorithmic bias as “applaudable” — but also flagged the risk of the U.K. falling behind other jurisdictions which are taking a broader look at how to regulate artificial intelligence.

Per DCMS’ press release, the government seems to be intending for an existing advisory body, called the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation (CDEI), to have a key role in supporting its policymaking in this area — saying that the body will focus on “enabling trustworthy use of data and AI in the real-world”. However it has still not appointed a new CDEI chair to replace Roger Taylor — with only an interim chair appointment (and some new advisors) announced today.

“The world has moved on since CDEI’s work in this area,” argued Edwards. “We realise now that regulating the harmful effects of AI has to be considered in the round with other regulatory tools not just data protection. The proposed EU AI Regulation is not without flaw but goes far further than data protection in mandating better quality training sets, and more transparent systems to be built from scratch. If the UK is serious about regulating it has to look at the global models being floated but right now it looks like its main concerns are insular, short-sighted and populist.”

Patient data privacy advocacy group MedConfidential, which has frequently locked horns with the government over its approach to data protection, also queried DCMS’ continued attachment to the CDEI for shaping policymaking in such a crucial area — pointing to last year’s biased algorithm exam grading scandal, which happened under Taylor’s watch.

(NB: Taylor was also the Ofqual chair, and his resignation from that post in December cited a “difficult summer”, even as his departure from the CDEI leaves an awkward hole now… )

“The culture and leadership of CDEI led to the A-Levels algorithm, why should anyone in government have any confidence in what they say next?” said MedConfidential’s Sam Smith.

News: DoNotPay’s ‘robot lawyer’ can now help report potholes or fallen trees to the city, file damage claims

September 9, 2021
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Tired of swerving around the same pothole every day but don’t know how to report it to your city? Already reported it but feel like said report was fired off into the ether, never to be read much less fixed? DoNotPay, a company that makes annoying processes less annoying through automation, might be able to

DoNotPay, a company that makes annoying processes less annoying through automation, might be able to help. Their “robot lawyer,” as the company calls it, started out as a service meant to help people more easily fight parking tickets. Over time it’s learned a bunch of new tricks, like helping users end tough-to-cancel subscriptions, get refunds they’re owed and more.

Its latest thing? Helping users report issues like potholes, fallen trees/branches and broken streetlights to their city government — and if said issue damaged your property or cost you money, it’ll help get you paid back.

Image Credits: DoNotPay

“It just seems so unfair that if an ordinary American is driving down the street with a broken tail light, the government could give them a ticket and charge them money … but if there’s a pothole in the road, you can’t get money from the government,” says DoNotPay founder Joshua Browder. “So we’ve decided to create a product that is like a fix-it ticket for the government.”

When you start the process of reporting a city issue with DoNotPay, you’re given two options: report the issue or claim compensation. The first finds the correct place to report an issue in your city, then their chatbot gathers all the info it needs and sends it over to the city with your contact info. The second walks you through the small claims court process; their robot lawyer can’t represent you, but it’ll generate the documents you need and try to tell you everything you need to know to make your case.

DoNotPay started out as something of a side project but quickly grew into something more.

“When I was studying at Stanford, I got a bunch of parking tickets,” Browder tells me. “I learned … I was a terrible driver. But I also learned that the government issues tickets to make money, not necessarily to punish people. So I created the first version for fun — to help myself and my friends. Within two days of creating it, one of my friends posted it on reddit and it went completely viral internationally. I went from 10 cases on day one to like … 50,000. All this made me realize that this is bigger than just a side project. It really taps into what people hate: being ripped off. So I’ve decided to devote all my time to pursuing that over the past six years.”

Browder tells me these new reporting features are live now, currently work in the top 50-or-so biggest US cities, and are included in DoNotPay’s standard subscription price ($36 for three months.)

Image Credits: DoNotPay

News: Twitter introduces a new label that allows the ‘good bots’ to identify themselves

September 9, 2021
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Twitter today is introducing a new feature that will allow accounts to self-identify as bots by adding a label to their profile. This feature is designed to help people better differentiate between automated accounts — like bots that retweet the news, public service announcements, or other updates — from those operated by humans. It’s not,

The company has been contemplating labeling bots for years.

In 2018, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was asked during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing whether he believed users had a “right to know” if they were speaking to a bot or a human on Twitter’s platform. He agreed that Twitter should add more context to tweets and was considering identifying bots, to the extent that it could. However, Dorsey also pointed out it would be more difficult to identify bots that were using scripting to give the appearance of being a human, compared with those that were leveraging Twitter’s API.

Last year, the company finally solidified those plans, saying it would later introduce new features that would allow users to be able to distinguish between human-run accounts and those that were automated. When Twitter launched its account verification system in May, it reminded users that it would soon offer other ways to identify different types of accounts beyond the long-coveted blue badge — such as labels for bots.

Image Credits: Twitter

Today, Twitter says its new “Automated Account” label that identifies “good bots” will be made available to over 500 Developer Accounts. This group will test the feature and provide feedback before it’s opened up more broadly to all Twitter developers. As it’s still a test for the time being, the label won’t be required.

However, when Twitter updated its Developer Policy last year, it did ask developers to indicate in their account profile or bio whether the account was a bot, what the account is, and who’s behind it. These account labels would allow developers an easier way to comply with that policy rather than having to handwrite this information in their bio.

Twitter tells TechCrunch that based on what it learns during this experiment, it may decide to make adopting the label a requirement for all developers who run automated accounts in the future, once it becomes broadly available.

Image Credits: Twitter

To be clear, Twitter doesn’t have any problem with those who run good bots, as it understands how automation can allow accounts to update people with helpful, relevant, or, sometimes, just fun information. The company even celebrated a few of its favorite bots when announcing today’s developer news, including the public service account @earthquakesSF; a bot offering COVID-19 updates, @vax_progress; a bot that offers an ongoing breakdown of the last 100 bills introduced in Congress, @last100bills; an accessibility-focused bot, @AltTxtReminder; and others that just add value in their own way, like @met_drawings, which shares public domain works from The Met’s Drawings & Prints department, or the goofy @EmojiMashupBot, among others.

All these will be a part of the initial test group.

Twitter is also less concerned with how consumers may use automation to update their own accounts, perhaps by using third-party tools like IFTTT to post links or other content.

“You are ultimately responsible for the actions taken with your account, or by applications associated with your account,” Twitter’s policy advises Twitter users. “Before authorizing a third-party application to access or use your account, make sure you’ve thoroughly investigated the application and understand what it will do.” It also adds that Twitter users that adopt automation will still need to adhere to Twitter’s guidelines.

The company has been on a tear lately in terms of rolling out new features. Just this week, it has launched Communities, tests of emoji reactions, support for full-width photos and videos, and a way to “soft block” followers, among other things.

Twitter has not said how long the test would run before the Automated Account labels are rolled out more broadly.

News: Google and India’s Jio delay their smartphone launch

September 9, 2021
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The JioPhone Next, the much-awaited smartphone designed by Google and India’s Jio Platforms to tap hundreds of millions of users in the world’s second largest internet market, won’t launch on Friday, the Indian technology giant said Thursday midnight. In a statement issued just now, Jio Platforms said it has been testing the smartphone with a

In a statement issued just now, Jio Platforms said it has been testing the smartphone with a “limited set of users for further refinement” and is “actively working to make it available more widely” around the time of Diwali festival, which is scheduled for early November.

The Indian firm, which operates the largest telecom network with over 400 million subscribers, blamed global semiconductor shortages for the launch delay and said it expects the additional two months “will” mitigate that.

The JioPhone Next smartphone, unveiled in June this year, was scheduled to launch on Friday. Neither of the firms had given any indication in recent days that they may have to postpone the launch.

Mukesh Ambani, India’s richest man and the chairman of Reliance Industries, which operates Jio Platforms, unveiling JioPhone Next at an event in June this year Image Credits: Jio Platforms

Powered by “extremely optimized Android” mobile operating system, the JioPhone Next phone is marketed to be an “ultra-affordable 4G smartphone” to tap the roughly 300 million users in India who are still on slower networks. The two firms have said that they plan to eventually launch the smartphone in other markets as well.

At an event in June, the two firms said the JioPhone Next will feature a “fast, high-quality camera” which will support HDR, and will be protected by the latest Android releases and security updates. It will also ship with a range of features, including Read Aloud and Translate Now that will work with any text on the phone screen, including web pages, apps, messages and even photos, the two firms have said.

Analysts have said in recent weeks that the JioPhone Next — whose price and tech specifications are yet to be revealed — could disrupt the Indian smartphone market — the world’s second largest — and help the telecom network further solidify its dominance in the country.

“The companies remain committed to their vision of opening up new possibilities for millions of Indians, especially those who will experience the internet for the very first time,” the Indian firm said in a press statement.

The smartphone is the latest collaboration between the two firms. Google invested $4.5 billion in Jio Platforms last year. Facebook and scores of other firms have also bought stakes in the Indian firm. Jio Platforms operates a number of businesses including Jio Infocomm, which competes with Airtel and Vodafone Idea; and e-commerce firm JioMart, which competes with Tata-owned BigBasket, SoftBank-backed Grofers, and Amazon and Walmart’s Flipkart.

News: Investors are doubling down on Southeast Asia’s digital economy

September 9, 2021
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Southeast Asian tech companies are drawing the attention of investors around the world. In 2020, startups in the region raised over $8.2 billion, about four times more than they did in 2015.

Amit Anand
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Amit Anand is a founding partner of Jungle Ventures and an early pioneer and leader in the development of Southeast Asia’s venture capital industry.

Southeast Asian tech companies are drawing the attention of investors around the world. In 2020, startups in the region raised over $8.2 billion, about four times more than they did in 2015. This trend continued in 2021, with regional M&A hitting a record high of $124.8 billion in the first half of 2021, up 83% from a year earlier.

This begs the question: Who exactly is investing in Southeast Asia?

Let’s explore the three key types of investors pouring money into and driving the growth of Southeast Asia’s tech ecosystem.

Over 229 family offices have been registered in Singapore since 2020, with total assets under management of an estimated $20 billion.

Big tech

Southeast Asia has become an attractive market for U.S. and Chinese tech firms. Internet penetration here stands at 70%, higher than the global average, and digital adoption in the region remains nascent — it wasn’t until the pandemic that adoption of digital services such as e-wallets and online shopping took off.

China’s tech giants Tencent and Alibaba were among the first to support early e-commerce growth in Southeast Asia with investments in Sea Limited and Lazada, and have since expanded their footprint into other internet verticals. Alibaba has backed Akulaku, M-Pay (eMonkey), DANA, Wave Money and Mynt (GCash), while Tencent has invested in Voyager Innovations (PayMaya), SHAREit, iflix, Ookbee and Sanook.

U.S. tech firms have also recently entered the scene. In June 2020, Gojek closed a $3 billion Series F round from Google, Facebook, Tencent and Visa. Google, together with Singapore’s Temasek Holdings, invested some $350 million in Tokopedia in October. Meanwhile, Microsoft invested an undisclosed amount in Grab in 2018 and has invested $100 million in Indonesian e-commerce firm Bukalapak.

Venture capitalists

In Q1 2021, Southeast Asian startups raised $6 billion, according to DealStreetAsia, positioning 2021 as another record year for VC investment in the region.

The region is also rising in prominence as a destination for investment capital relative to the rest of Asia. Regional VC investment grew 5.2 times to $8.2 billion in 2020 from $1.6 billion in 2015, as we can see in the table below.

Venture capital investment by region 2015-2020

Image Credits: Jungle VC

Southeast Asia also has many opportunities for VC investment relative to its market size. From 2015 to 2020, China saw VC investment of nearly $300 per person; for Southeast Asia — despite a recent investment boom — this metric sits at just $47.50 per person, or just a sixth of that in China. This implies a substantial opportunity for investments to develop the region’s digital economy.

The region’s rising population and growth prospects are higher due to China’s population growth challenges, alongside the latter’s higher digital economy market saturation and maturity.

News: Box wins proxy board battle with activist investor Starboard Value

September 9, 2021
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A battle between Box and its majority shareholder Starboard Value over control of the board ended today when the company’s slate of directors easily defeated Starboard’s. It culminated months of maneuvering on both sides as they battled for control of the company. Box, in a somewhat generic statement, expressed gratitude for the results: Box appreciates

Box, in a somewhat generic statement, expressed gratitude for the results:

Box appreciates the support and perspectives we have received from our stockholders throughout this process. The Board and management team will remain focused on continuing to transform Box and executing Box’s strategy to grow profitably and deliver significant value to all Box stockholders.

Starboard on the other hand, as you might expect, was unhappy with the outcome and didn’t hide that in a letter to shareholders released earlier today.

“We are certainly disappointed by the results of this election, which were heavily skewed by the voting rights tied to the preferred equity financing and the use of stockholder capital to aggressively repurchase shares ahead of the record date from stockholders likely to support change. At this juncture, the future of Box is in the Board’s hands, and there is a significant amount of work left to be done. Many commitments have been made, and we hope that Box will finally be able to follow through on its promises to drive improved results, accountability, governance, and compensation practices,” managing director Peter A. Feld wrote in the letter.

This all began when Starboard Value invested in Box, taking a 7.5% stake, which would eventually grow to 8.8% in the company. With that stake, it became the largest shareholder, but it remained relatively quiet until March of this year. That is when public rumblings began that Starboard was unhappy with the direction of the company, a conflict that could have ultimately resulted in the ouster of founder and CEO Aaron Levie or the sale of Box.

Starboard Value takes 7.5% stake in Box

The situation took an interesting turn when Box announced it was taking a $500 million investment from KKR, a move that Starboard took great exception to and made clear in a letter published at the beginning of May that it wanted significant changes to take place. As we wrote at the time:

While they couched the letter in mostly polite language, it’s quite clear Starboard is exasperated with Box. “While we appreciate the dialogue we have had with Box’s management team and Board of Directors (the “Board”) over the past two years, we have grown increasingly frustrated with continued poor results, questionable capital allocation decisions, and subpar shareholder returns,” Starboard wrote in its letter.

Less than a week later Starboard made a move for board seats and the battle was on for control. Box’s position was strengthened by two decent earnings reports prior to the vote; the company took the unusual move of delivering the results early in order to give the voters that information prior to the vote.

The company also made the unusual move of filing a document with the SEC that pushed back against Starboard’s slate of candidates. In the end, Box won the battle. Alan Pelz-Sharpe, founder and principal analyst at Deep Analysis, who has been watching the content management space where Box operates for years, sees this as a victory for Levie and Box.

“It was not a surprise to me that Box won the day. In my opinion, Starboard misread and underestimated the loyalty that Aaron Levie generates. The fact is that to most Box employees and investors, the company is a success story, and they also know that the customer base is pretty engaged and that there is plenty of room for future growth,” he said.

“For Box this vote of confidence will mean that they can (if they want) make some acquisitions and invest more in R&D moving forward, without constantly having an aggressive investor looking over their shoulder,” Pelz-Sharpe added.

It’s hard to know what happens next, but Starboard still maintains its shares for now, and it still has some clout in those numbers. Throughout its ownership tenure, Box has performed better, as the recent earnings results have shown, and the firm says that this remains the ultimate goal.

“As we have repeatedly stated, our only goal has been to help Box perform better and adopt best-in-class practices across operating performance, financial results, governance and compensation in order to create long-term value for the benefit of all stockholders. We will continue to monitor progress at Box, and we hope to see the company embrace the changes catalyzed by our involvement and create long-term value,” Starboard’s Feld wrote.

Box takes fight with activist investor public in SEC filing

News: Epic Games to shut down Houseparty in October, including the video chat ‘Fortnite Mode’ feature

September 9, 2021
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Houseparty, the social video chat app acquired by Fortnite maker Epic Games for a reported $35 million back in 2019, is shutting down. The company says Houseparty will be discontinued in October when the app will stop functioning for its existing users; it will be pulled from the app stores today, however. Related to this move, Epic Games’ “Fortnite Mode” feature, which leveraged Houseparty to bring video chat to Fortnite gamers, will also be discontinued.

Founded in 2015, Houseparty offered a way for users to participate in group video chats with friends and even play games, like Uno, trivia, Heads Up and others. Last year, Epic Games integrated Houseparty with Fortnite, initially to allow gamers to see live feeds from friends while gaming, then later adding support to livestream gameplay directly into Houseparty. At the time, these integrations appeared to be the end goal that explained why Epic Games had bought the social startup in the first place.

8 investors discuss social gaming’s biggest opportunities

Now, just over two years after the acquisition was announced, and less than half a year since support for livestreaming was added to the app, Houseparty is shutting down.

The company didn’t offer any solid insight into what, at first glance, feels like an admission of failure to capitalize on its acquisition. But the reality is that Epic Games may have something larger in store beyond just video chat. That said, all Epic Games would say today is that the Houseparty team could no longer give the app the attention it required — a statement that indicates an executive decision to shift the team’s focus to other matters.

While none of the Houseparty team members are being let go as a result of this move, we’re told, they will be joining other teams where they will work on new ways to allow for “social interactions” across the Epic Games family of products. The company’s announcement hinted that those social features would be designed and built at the “metaverse scale.”

The “metaverse” is an increasingly used buzzword that references a shared virtual environment, like those provided by large-scale online gaming platforms such as Fortnite, Roblox and others. Facebook, too, claims the metaverse is the next big gambit for social networking, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg having described it as an “embodied internet that you’re inside of rather than just looking at.”

To some extent, Fortnite has begun to embrace the metaverse by offering non-gaming experiences like online concerts you attend as your avatar, and other live events. Ahead of its shutdown, Houseparty also toyed with live events that users would co-watch and participate in alongside their friends.

An Epic Games spokesperson tells TechCrunch the Houseparty team has worked on (and continues to work on) a number of other projects that focus on social. But some of the “multiple, larger projects” Epic Games has in the works remain undisclosed, we’re told.

In terms of social products, Houseparty’s technology now underpins all of Fortnite voice chat and the features they built are widely available for free to developers through Epic Games Services. They also worked on building out new social experiences, which have ranged from the social RSVP functions for Fortnite’s global events, like the recent Ariana Grande concert, to the upcoming “Operation: Sky Fire” event for collaborating quests and other game mechanics. More social functionality and new experiences are also being built into Fortnite’s user-generated content platform, Create Mode.

While it may seem odd to close an app that only last year experienced a boost in usage due to the pandemic, it appears the COVID bump didn’t have staying power.

At the height of lockdowns, Houseparty had reported it had gained 50 million new sign-ups in a month’s time as users looked to video apps to connect with family and friends while the world was shut down. But as the pandemic wore on, other video chat experiences gained more ground. Zoom, which had established itself as an essential tool for remote work, became a tool for hanging out with friends after-hours, as well. Facebook also started to eat Houseparty’s lunch with its debut of drop-in video chat “Rooms” last year, which offered a similar group video experience. And bored users shifted to audio-based social networking on apps like Clubhouse or Twitter Spaces.

Image Credits: Apptopia

According to data from Apptopia, Houseparty has been continually declining since the pandemic bump. To date, its app has seen a total of 111 million downloads across iOS and Android, with the majority (63 million) on iOS. The U.S. was Houseparty’s largest market, accounting for 43.4% of downloads, followed by the U.K. (9.8%), then Germany (5.6%).

Epic Games, meanwhile, said the app served “tens of millions” of users worldwide. It insists the closure wasn’t decided lightly, nor was the decision to shutter “Fortnite Mode” made due to lack of adoption.

Houseparty will alert users to the shutdown via in-app notifications ahead of its final closure in October. At that point, Fortnite Mode will also no longer be available.

News: Some of the biggest names in private equity think this go-go market has another year or two (at least)

September 9, 2021
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Earlier today, as part of a private event, this editor was afforded the opportunity to talk with some of the biggest names in the world of private equity, including Carlyle cofounder David Rubenstein; Bain Capital co-chair Steve Pagliuca; Jean Salata, the CEO and founding partner of Baring Private Equity Asia; and Sheila Patel, the vice

We covered a lot of ground, from how interested Carlyle and the other firms are in blockchain technologies (the feedback here was a little mixed), to how focused they are on sustainable and socially responsible investing. On this front, Rubenstein claimed that “private equity people are very focused on it,” and predicted that when a financial metric emerges to better assess companies on this front “within the next five years,” it will become a routine factor in evaluating companies.

Patel — who previously served on Goldman’s inclusion and diversity committee — agreed, noting upwards of one-third of investors right now find it impossible to measure so-called ESG criteria (though she expects this to change quickly).

Naturally, too, we discussed the current market, including how the investors differentiate their firms’ offerings when everyone these days has a money cannon — and how long they expect to be operating at hyper speed. In feedback that might surprise some readers and will seem obvious to others, the PE execs suggested that this go-go market could easily continue into 2023 if not beyond.

Only attendees of the event will have access to the full interview, but some notes from this last part of our discussion follow:

Steve Pagliuca:

[P]art of the reason we’re doing so well has been massive government intervention, which I think was was warranted. As that starts to wane, we may see an effect from that. The unemployment rate right now is just over 5.2% which is, to me, astounding in the middle of a pandemic, and it looks like there are lots of jobs out there still unfilled. Part of that is because the [government] payments came out, and less workers were looking for work, so we might see unemployment continue to go down as those payments stop, and the impact of that is going to be a key issue.

David Rubenstein:

They say this is the best of times and the worst of times. It’s the best of times for investors, because if you’re in the tech world, if you’re in the investing world and you’re investing in India, China, and the United States, you’ve made a lot of money and you’re beginning to think you’re a genius because you made so much money, and you just don’t realize that it’s the worst of times for people that don’t have internet access, [or who] work with their hands and not with their minds as much, [or who] aren’t educated [or] have childcare. Really, in the United States and probably other parts of the world, we are further and further creating [an] economic divide unfortunately and greater income inequality and a lack of social mobility, and that’s a real problem.

For those for whom it’s been the best of times, eventually something will end. At some point, the Federal Reserve will increase interest rates — probably not until 2023, but maybe before — and at some point, people begin to say, ‘I’m taking more of my chips off the table. I’m not going to invest as much at these valuations.’ I just got off a call this morning [regarding] a small deal in Asia where people want to pay things like 25 times projected revenues.

Jean Salata:

You cannot separate the context of where we are with interest rates from where valuations are. At some point, interest rates are going to go up, but but at the moment, what we have is a Fed that has bought something like $4 trillion worth of bonds over the last 18 months. I think right now, $120 billion a month is going into the system, which is depressing rates. [Meanwhile] people need to find a home for their investments to generate some kind of return, [meaning] pension funds, endowments, individual investors.

If you look at valuations today, they’re probably in the 99th percentile or near the peak as far as multiples go. But if you look at them relative to the rates and earnings yield, less the say the 10-year [Treasury] rate, I think that’s probably only in the 20th or the 30th percentile — it’s something like that. And as I look back to 1999 and 2000, which I lived through and barely survived, the difference today is that although valuations are similar in terms of the frothiness, in terms of multiples, [that] interest rates back then were about 5% or 6%, and today, they’re 1%. That is a big difference.

There are also structural things going on, and it comes back to this point about income inequality which is a big issue everywhere in the world, including in China, by the way, and is self-perpetuating. People with financial assets are benefiting from what’s going on with [the Federal Reserve’s bond purchases]. Valuations are rising, and then the people who have all that money save more, so savings rates are going up, and as you save more because you don’t need to spend that much money, [that cycle] depresses rates even further. [So] I believe that even when the Fed starts to taper off and starts reducing [how much it’s spending on bonds], you’ll see rates staying lower than they have been in the past, which could support higher valuations levels for quite some time.

Steve Pagliuca:

If you look at the ballooning national debt, if you applied a 5.5% interest rate to that, the interest that the government would be paying would be close to half the budget. So I just don’t see the politicians saying, ‘We’re going to [raise interest] rates really high.’ Instead, they’re going to keep them down as long as they can, because the taxes will go up enormously if rates go back to historic [levels]. They can handle the spending because rates are so low, so you’re going to [continue to] see low interest rate trends, which props up these valuations.

News: Sustainable jet fuel company Alder Fuels seals investments from United, Honeywell

September 9, 2021
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The aviation industry is notoriously difficult to decarbonize, in part because airplanes use a petroleum-based fuel to fly. Alder Fuels wants to change that. The new clean tech company, headed by Bryan Sherbacow, is developing a low-carbon jet fuel that can be used as a 100% drop-in replacement for petroleum fuel, without needing to adapt

The aviation industry is notoriously difficult to decarbonize, in part because airplanes use a petroleum-based fuel to fly.

Alder Fuels wants to change that. The new clean tech company, headed by Bryan Sherbacow, is developing a low-carbon jet fuel that can be used as a 100% drop-in replacement for petroleum fuel, without needing to adapt existing aircraft or engines. That’s notable because the only commercially available sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) still requires a 50-50 blend with conventional fuel.

The technology has piqued the interest of the aviation industry. Alder Fuels said Thursday it has inked a multimillion dollar investment from aviation giants United and Honeywell — as well as a purchase agreement from United for 1.5 billion gallons of fuel, the largest known agreement for SAF in aviation history.

United consumes around 4 billion gallons of fuel per year, a company spokesperson told TechCrunch, so the purchase agreement would account for nearly 40% of the airline’s overall annual fuel consumption.

Before the fuel starts powering United airplanes, it must meet specifications outlined by ASTM International, an international organization that sets the standards for a wide range of materials and products. From there, Alder and Honeywell expect to commercialize the technology by 2025.

Alder Fuels was formally launched earlier this year, but Sherbacow has been assessing the technology for around five years, he said in a recent interview with TechCrunch. It became clear through his previous work that the technology behind the low-carbon fuel — and especially the raw materials — needed to be scalable and widely available.

“What we’re all looking for is [ … ] how do you access these carbon oil precursors and efficiently convert them into something that works within the existing refining infrastructure?” Sherbacow said.

To solve that problem, he’s turned to carbon-rich woody biomass, like agricultural waste, which is turned into crude oil that can be used to make aviation fuel. The company uses a pyrolysis-based technology that transforms the biomass into a liquid and treats it in such a way that it can be put into existing refineries. Alder Fuels will initially use Honeywell’s proprietary “Ecofining” hydroprocessing technology. The ultimate aim is to make the new fuel compatible with all refining assets.

“There’s significant amount of [woody biomass] that’s already industrially aggregated but has either no or very low economic value today,” Sherbacow explained. “But it’s a great opportunity for us because it’s a store of carbon that we can utilize.” It could even open up new markets for companies in forestry, agriculture and even the paper industry, which are already generating plenty of biowaste.

Alder Fuels’ research is supported by the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency and the Department of Energy, and Sherbacow stressed the importance of public-private partnerships to decarbonizing the aviation industry. Climate change has been of particular interest to President Joe Biden’s administration, and incentives for sustainable aviation fuel will likely end up in the $3.5 trillion spending bill currently being debated by Congress.

“That’s one of the roles of government … to help the transition,” he said. “You need to incentivize the incumbents to change their behavior, or they’re going to resist a disruptive change.”

Yearly Archives: 2021