I need space: This sibling-powered startup gives solutions for an extra home space

No renovation required, just your smartphone.

If you have a small apartment and don't have enough room to keep your stuff, you know there are several self-storage facilities willing to do that for you. But if you are too busy and you simply don't have the time to go to the facility to deposit or pickup your things, why don’t you try Spacebox.

Spacebox was born from brothers Lewis and Stuart Cerne’s desire to give people in Hong Kong a tool to help them transform their homes from being cluttered to being more spacious. They aim to trigger a revolution in the way people use space.

Founded in September 2014, Spacebox allows users get extra space in a convenient way at a very accessible price. Spacebox tears the barriers down from the traditional self-storage which limits users the access from their things. “You can place anything in Spacebox: your bicycle, books, sports gear, winter clothes, memorabilia, and children toys, and after they are out of the home you can access them anytime from your phone,” said Lewis.

Changing how people interact with their things, Spacebox works with standard strong boxes being delivered to users upon each order of “space”, before the team collects the packed boxes for storage. When clients want to retrieve items stored in Spacebox, all they need to do is access the web app through their phones, can browse their inventory to select items they need, and request their belongings to be sent back at a specific time.

As the company is currently seed funded, Lewis said that they will be looking for an additional fundraiser in Q1 2015. Lewis adds that their funding has come from a group of private investors.

In the future, the Spacebox team targets to achieve a variety of plans to boost their technology, branding, and promotion. Lewis adds that the key challenge for them is-fine tuning their message to customers so they can see the value Spacebox delivers.  

______________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Company Name: Spacebox
Founders: Lewis Cerne and Stuart Cerne
Website: https://www.spacebox.com.hk/
Total Funding at hand: HKD10M
Source of Funding: Founders and Private Investors
Start of operation: Business Launch:November 2014

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Here’s a startup that allows real-time booking for corporate access

In just two years, it has raised a total of $US3.7m in seed and series A funding.

Corporate access has been a growing trend elsewhere with fund managers willing to allocate over a quarter of their $5bn-a-year commission pot to brokers that allow them an hour to meet the senior executives of corporate clients. The 2013 Thomson Reuters Extel Survey of 5,400 portfolio managers and buy side analysts revealed that 25% of client commissions are being used to reward brokers for providing corporate access. Home-grown fin-tech startup WeConvene, however, finds that the process of bringing investors and clients together is 'broken' and 'inefficient’. It wants to bring efficiency to the process by allowing real time booking, tracking, analytics and providing compliance tools to an increasingly regulated industry.

“Today, Corporate Access providers, usually investment banks – the sell side, have teams of people writing, sending and monitoring a mountain of invitation email. Customers, usually an investment fund – the buy-side, are forced to sort through this deluge with no systematic way to filter, identify and monitor the event invitations that matter to them,” says Radek Barnert, co-founder and CEO of WeConvene.

Basically, WeConvene de-clutters email inboxes. It automatically syncs booked events to the calendar so that any meeting a buy-side user books automatically goes into the user’s diary. WeConvene provides a separate easy to use workflow that enables coordinators and assistants to share all events with the team and book on their behalf.

Founded in 2012 by Radek Barnert (CEO), Mike Barnert (CTO), Jeff Wang (Chief Software Architect) and Jadeite Hui (Chief Administration Officer), WeConvene has built a platform for the global Corporate Access community. It bills itself as the only shared platform designed for both the buy-side and sell-side together, and the only product that offers real time booking of corporate access events. It has raised US $2.5 million in a Seed and Series A rounds last year and recently acquired a UK business called Extel.

WeConvene started as a self-funded startup for a time, with early seed money coming from industry contacts who also understood the problem and believed in the WeConvene vision.

Rad explains that it’s not unusual to receive up to 1000 emails a day. It is simply not possible to prioritise, filter, or identify valuable meetings given this volume of email and the buy side’s current solution is to employ people to do this job. The system is broken and inefficient.

“We started WeConvene to remove the reliance on email and to put both sides back in control of the process – the buy side can filter events based on preferences and then book with a single click, while the sell side maintain full control over their distribution and can, for the first time, accurately track and monitor interest and response.” Rad said.

According to Rad, their primary goals for the next 24 months are to grow the customer base and community globally, to add premium features and functionality to enhance revenue opportunities, to introduce corporate participants to the platform and to develop connectivity with the major financial information vendors globally.

____________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: WeConvene
Founders: Radek Barnert, Mike Barnert, Jeff Wang and Jadeite Hui 
Website: https://weconvene.com/
Total Funding at hand: USDS3.7m 
Source of Funding: Seed and Series A funding
Major Investors: NA
Start of Operation: December 12, 2012

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com
 

Do you want to build a killer app?

Altitude Labs will make your ideas happen – Silicon Valley-style.

Claiming that there is a lack of technical knowledge in Asia, a team of designers and developers put up a digital agency in Hong Kong with a goal of bringing Silicon Valley methods to the region.

Justin Yek, Jaclyn Tsui, Willson Mock, and Eugene Choi quit their stellar careers in investment banking and in Silicon Valley to move from San Francisco to Hong Kong in hopes of making a difference to the Hong Kong tech community. They founded Altitude Labs which provides technology services and digital design to well-funded startup entrepreneurs and corporates in the region. It bills itself as the first Silicon Valley-style design and development agency in Hong Kong.

Justin argues that there are proven approaches to developing software in Silicon Valley that to a large extent have not found its way to Asia. The culture of innovation, collaboration and believing in the impossible is also lacking, he adds.

“Clients hire us to solve problems and grow businesses. We design and build everything from responsive websites to complex and scalable applications. Current and past projects include a social travel photography platform, a Bitcoin exchange, a talent discovery platform, a mobile game and a financial tool for stock exchange filings,” says Justin.

“The team has a unique combination of technical, design, finance, marketing and investing expertise, which allows us to add value to businesses that we work with beyond pure software development. We apply the best practices from Silicon Valley to build products of the highest quality,” says co-founder Justin.

Members of the team are also regular contributors to popular open source projects, teachers at General Assembly and speakers at TedX.

The team met in San Francisco. Justin, Willson and Eugene were at Hack Reactor, an advanced web development immersive. Jaclyn was considering taking up a software engineering position in Silicon Valley. When the idea of bringing Silicon Valley methods to Asia came up, everyone thought it was a great idea and that is how they started.

According to Justin, they have all taken big risks to make Altitude happen. He quit his job as an investment banker. Jaclyn gave up the opportunity to work at a tech company in Silicon Valley. Willson and Eugene gave up their careers in Silicon Valley and bought one-way tickets to Hong Kong.

Justin Yek, 29, is a former investment banker who left to pursue his passion for building products. He is an instructor at General Assembly and TedX speaker. He started deploying tech products at age 14. He worked as a software engineer at Monsoon Company and is a Columbia University graduate.

Jaclyn Tsui, 29, is a female engineer from Hong Kong. She is a serial entrepreneur and former investment analyst, techstars alumnus and product manager at Coachbase. She is also an Imperial College London graduate.

Willson Mock, 29, is a former online advertising consultant at AppNexus. He is also a former manager in risk and information management at American Express and has worked as a software engineer at Famo.us. Wilson is a Cornell University graduate.

Eugene Choi, 22, has also worked as a software engineer at Famo.us. He is a former professional gamer which ranked at 3rd place in Major League Gaming (Columbus – North America Region). He studied political science and computer engineering at UC Berkeley.

Altitude Labs builds web and mobile products for clients. The team claims of applying modern technologies and methods such as agile development to build great products quickly. Justin says that the team also has a ‘unique’ approach to project management which basically involves working on small teams, building products iteratively, shipping early and often. “We also work closely with clients, prioritizing important features first and maintaining product visibility throughout the development cycle,” explains Justin.

“We don’t just work for clients and answer to briefs, we partner with them to develop and guide them through this confusing environment,” he adds.

The funding

According to Justin, the team did not raise funds when they founded the startup as the nature of their client-facing business is cash flow positive. They signed their first contracts before they landed in Hong Kong. Within their first quarter of operations, Justin says that they already have customers in Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Australia. “We are incredibly excited and humbled that there is a lot of interest for what we do and believe in,” he notes.

Altitude Labs is internally funded but the team plans to raise funds for some of its internal products.

_____________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: Altitude Labs
Founders: Justin Yek, Jaclyn Tsui, Wilson Mock, and Eugene Choi
Website: https://www.altitudelabs.com/
Total Funding at hand: Undisclosed
Source of Funding: Cash flow from operations
Major Investors: NA
Start of Operation: April 2014  

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Having trouble finding the right gift? Call your BUTLUR

A former internationally ranked junior tennis player founded this company.

Believing in the vision of what BUTLUR is trying to become, Brian Chin, its founder, left his job at a well paying hedge fund in New York to move to Hong Kong and start his company.

BUTLUR aims to help discerning people enhance relationships by assisting them in the discovery of thoughtful gifts. Those who join the social commerce platform will have access to gift recommendations generated by BUTLUR’s adaptive algorithm.

“Gifting has always been a problem with me. It’s really time consuming and I never know what to get someone whether it’s a girlfriend or my parents. There is nothing online that caters towards the upper middle class in terms of price point and taste,” he said.

BUTLUR believes that there is an information gap between the buyer of a gift and what he/she thinks the gift recipient wants and what the recipient actually wants.

BUTLUR uses an innovative social network and iterative algorithm to bridge this gap.BUTLUR aims to combine social data and commerce with personalized recommendations at no cost to the consumer.

BUTLUR membership is free membership while their curated gifts are sold at retail price. In addition, BUTLUR members receive access to premium services such as custom designed products, personalization options and gift wrapping.

Brian said that he decided to start the Company in Hong Kong given its distinct population mix and attractive demographics relative to BUTLUR’s target audience.

BUTLUR’s target demographic is the mass luxury market with sophisticated taste. He revealed that the company looks to further expand into the US and Mainland China from its headquarters in Hong Kong.

“We have set up our business to have minimal fixed costs, which allow us flexibility to maximize margins and sustain our business over the long run.” said Brian.

Brian said that the company is currently self-funded but they plan to raise some funding to grow BUTLUR’s member base and develop some additional technology functionality.

The founder

Brian Chin enjoys investing, golf, travel and eating yummy food. Fully appreciating the difficulties of finding the perfect gift, he hopes to use his experiences to help ease the process for all.

Brian has an MBA degree from Columbia Business School, a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Amherst College where he was selected captain of the varsity tennis team and attended the General Course Program at the London School
of Economics.

Before BUTLUR, Brian was an internationally ranked junior tennis player and traveled the world to compete in tournaments. After graduating from Amherst College,

Brian worked in consulting and investment banking before being accepted into Columbia’s prestigious Value Investing Program. After graduation, Brian was looking at global public investment opportunities for a US$40B investment
fund in New York.
__________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: BUTLUR
Founder: Brian Chin
Website: https://www.BUTLUR.com/
Total Funding at hand: NA
Source of Funding: NA
Major Investors: Founder (Seeking to raise outside funding in the near term)
Start of Operation: November 2013

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Here’s a Facebook-like neighborhood social network just for Hong Kong

Do you want to make sure that the person you are sharing the lift with is a neighbor and not a stranger?

We live in a fast-paced society where most people have limited spare time so they appreciate convenience and practical support. It may be more convenient to ask local neighbours for help than to ask friends who live far away. It is even more practical to maximize the resources around the neighbourhood than to seek products all over town.

Aiming to build quality technology platforms that provide value-added services in the community, Matthew Tam and Antony Wong founded Linkingsource Limited. Linkingsource has came up with two products, Myflat.hk and Closeby, to represent a new frontier in connecting people, focusing on one’s physical proximity, and in particular the
 people in their neighbourhood and community.

Myflat.hk, bills itself as the Hong Kong’s neighbourhood social network. It is a commercial platform designed to connect residents with their real neighbours. By providing them with a convenient channel to communicate, they can support each other within their communities and strengthen the culture of local help and sharing.

Closeby meanwhile expands upon the Myflat.hk platform to connect residents with their local merchants through rich content delivered via an innovative, dynamic advertising channel.

In an interview with Matthew Tam, Linkingsource co-founder, he shared that they started the business because they wanted to do something that was different and that added value to the community. They both call Hong Kong their home, but there are two problems that they are trying to address which they think can also be applicable to other similar urban cities.

First, there is currently no way for residents to connect easily with other neighbours, said Matthew. “People often find it difficult to engage in conversations with someone else in a lift or in the lobby. He/She may not know if the other person really lives there or if they’re visiting someone. With Myflat.hk, however, they verify the identities and addresses of users so people can be assured of connecting with your real neighbours once they log on.”

Secondly, Matthew said that merchants do not have an effective, affordable channel to reach local customers. “Online advertising can be expensive and too wide in its reach, while physical flyers are ineffective, costly and not eco-friendly. Using the Myflat.hk platform, Closeby offers a targeted, dynamic advertising channel for merchants to connect easily and effectively with their local customers. Merchants can expand or minimise their reach as desired.”

Linkingsource has been funded to date by the co-founders and by individual investors who are made up of family and friends. Matthew said that they have funding that is in the HK$ 7-digit range to date. But they are now seeking an angel funding to help with staff hires for both technology and marketing support.

Matthew added that after Myflat.hk’s neighbourhood social network launched its public beta in December 2013 and has been steadily growing its user base, the Closeby apps for iOS and Android will be launched in September 2014.

The founders

The two co-founders met when they worked together at a global investment bank in Hong Kong. They both have years of experience working as managers on large-scale projects that required strong teamwork and collaborations with technology teams.

Matthew Tam was born and raised in Switzerland but his family roots are in Hong Kong. After obtaining an engineering master’s degree in Industrial Management and Manufacturing, he worked in banking in Switzerland and Hong Kong.

Antony Wong was born and raised in Hong Kong, observing business lessons from his father’s cloth dyeing company from an early age. Antony obtained his business degree from York University in Canada before returning to Hong Kong to work in banking.

_____________________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the company: Linkingsource Limited
Founders: Matthew Tam and Antony Wong
Website: www.myflat.hk
Total funding at hand: Undisclosed
Major Investors: N/A
Target Funding: HK$10m+
Source of funding: Individual investors comprised of family and friends
Start of operation: April 2012 

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Here’s a 3D printing pen you can hold in your hand

It’s a popular project which collected over US$2m from 26,457 backers during its 34-day crowdfunding campaign.

Have you ever just wished you could lift your pen off the paper and see your drawing become a real three dimensional object? Well now you can!

3Doodler, designed by WobbleWorks bills itself as the world’s first and only 3D Printing Pen. 3Doodler uses both PLA and ABS plastic (the material used by many 3D printers), 3Doodler can draw in the air or on any surface. Unlike conventional 3D printers it’s compact and easy to use, and requires no knowledge of software. Just plug it into a power socket and can start drawing anything within minutes.

In an interview with Daniel Cowen, co-­‐Founder and COO of WobbleWorks, the core characteristic of WobbleWorks is their desire to take an idea and bring it to physical reality, whether a new product, a process, or a design variation. “This was the essence of our work prior to 3Doodler, when we were using 3D printers to rapidly prototype our own ideas and inventions. The hope is that by placing the power of 3D creation in such a simple and accessible form, even more people who previously may not have considered themselves makers, creators or even artists will become exactly that,” he said.

According to Daniel, prior to their Kickstarter campaign, WobbleWorks LLC and 3Doodler were self-funded. They were able to operate this leanly due to the infrastructure support they have had from the Artisans Asylum, and due to the fact that they do all of their own R&D.

3Doodler has raised over $2.3 million from their Kickstarter campaign, attracting 26,457 backers during their 34 day crowd-funding campaign, meaning at the time the project was the most popular 3D consumer printing device and one of the top 25 Kickstarter projects of all time.

“Taking 3Doodler to Kickstarter was the plan for at least half a year prior to launch. We took 3Doodler to Kickstarter because we wanted to speak directly to the maker community and get their feedback as well as get 3Doodler off the ground. That nexus of fundraising, proof of concept, and building a community around our product was perfect for us,” Daniel added.

Daniel also said that they have an exciting product roadmap for the 3Doodler and surrounding products, such as accessories and materials. At the same time, they are putting a lot of focus on the community aspect of the product, ensuring that their users will have the content and support to create truly amazing things with their 3Doodlers.

“As for the evolution of the 3Doodler, look at it this way: in just under a year we have shipped 100,000 pens to individuals across 80 countries. We went from 100 to 100,000 in such a short time, and the degree of creativity we are seeing is just amazing, with our users inspiring other around them. Now times that by three, and then again by three, and we’re close to 1m pens in the hands of 1m individuals. I think we'll start to see some truly remarkable things once we hit that scale. We're already seen the power of this creative tool in our own hands and the hands of thousands of users. Now times that by millions!,” Daniel exclaimed.

The founders

Maxwell Bogue and Peter Dilworth met while working at WowWee in Hong Kong, originally starting WobbleWorks in late 2012, and then joined forces with Daniel Cowen in late 2012 to launch the 3Doodler.

At WowWee, Maxwell was responsible for taking products from ideation right through to production and distribution, while Peter was working there as an inventor, specifically working on robo-dinosaurs that could be taken to retail. Daniel previously worked as a corporate lawyer, manufacturing consultant, and launched two award winning software companies of his own. Max and Pete have know each other for six years and worked on multiple products together at both WowWee and WobbleWorks, and he has known Max for almost seven years now, and Pete for two.

The idea came about as they frequently use their own 3D printers for rapid prototyping. They wanted to see if the process could be sped up and made "freer" by placing the parts of the 3D printer in a pen form. “The first iteration was called the “teacup", basically an extruder with a handle. It worked horribly, but it did work! We then added to this, creating a unique cooling mechanism and evolving to the 3Doodler you see today,” said Daniel.

The craziest things they did for their startup

Daniel revealed that starting up costs them insane amounts of sleep deprivation. They have gone without sleep for 50-60 hours when they first launched the 3Doodler on Kickstarter.
“The adrenaline rush was intense, and the buzz of what we had achieved kept us going, but after that we were completely exhausted,” said Daniel.

And after the Kickstarter, they pulled out all the stops and built a team, taking a product from handmade prototype to mass production with tens of thousands of units in just six months. Daniel added that anyone who knows about manufacturing and production will tell you what a feat that is, and it required that they relocate to Hong Kong to be closer to the factories so that they could monitor things night and day.

Daniel also shared how they used modern marketing methods to launch 3Doodler with their initial mailing list.

“We had a list broken down by country, and as countries woke up we would systematically email bomb them one by one, seeing what the clock and reaction rates were. Country by country, timeline by timeline, we amended the pitch to make the intro email that much more effective; from the success we had on Kickstarter we can only assume we’d nailed it by the time the USA woke up!,” Daniel explained.

________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the company: WobbleWorks
Founders: Daniel Cowen, Maxwell Bogue and Peter Dilworth
Website: https://the3doodler.com/
Total funding at hand: $2.3M
Target Funding:
Source of funding: Kickstarter campaign
Start of operation: 2012

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

SocialAgent connects independent sales agents with companies

It aims to help companies to gain more sales leads and more customers.

SocialAgent.me, is a marketplace to connect independent sales agents with companies. Clients use the website to list their sales opportunity and how much commission or bonus they pay for sales representatives. Agents primarily use SocialAgent mobile app (on Android and iPhone) to view these jobs, as well as manage their contacts (basic mobile CRM) and then send leads/customers to the client for their bonus/commission.

Michael Michelini, co-founder and CEO of SocialAgent claims that the app is the first global “social connector” marketplace. And they help companies connect with their “mobile social agent” workforce to help them gain more sales leads and customers in their business.

“We believe there is a huge opportunity for Small and Medium Enterprises to leverage the power of Social media - but they don’t have time to manage their own marketing campaigns - they want to tap into local sales reps who have these social relationships and pay them for their efforts in building leads and sales,” said Michael.

Michael added that anyone with a mobile phone can now earn money from their relationships. Agents aren’t required to have a blog/ website, and many agents never even use their web-app at all. They can earn money online or offline from their various relationships and “hustle.”

AgentSocial started in a Lean Startup Machine in Shanghai which then got the attention of Chinaccelerator incubator where they received seed funding and a 3 month hands on program. Now, with USD15,000 total funding at hand, Michael and his team plans to open the international market after starting in China. And after his recent trip to USA, he has actively dealing with investor interest and local BD team representation.

And since they have gained a lot of engaged user and client feedback, on early March of this year, SocialAgent has released their new version of the app to further improve its stickiness and to grow their user base.

Michael also shared that their team’s future plans for the fourth quarter of the year would involve a social network for agents to add friends so that they would be able to send contacts to each other and also exchange money for deals they help each other.

The founders

Michael Michelini, co-founder, CEO, is an American with 5 years experience in China specializing in e-commerce and cross border business. He have done successful e-commerce and web businesses since 2004 both in USA and China.

Chris Li, co-founder, CTO, is a Hong Kong web guru who returned from Canada a few years ago to tap into the Asia startup scene. Self taught programmer, Chris manages the tech development and product team

Dant Sont, co-founder and mobile developer, is a Canadian programming guru, came to China about 1 year ago to tap into the opportunities here. Having worked on CRMs in Canada at development shops, he is a talented developer in a wide range of programming languages.
___________________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the company: Social Agent Limited
Founders Michael Michelini, Chris Li, and Dan Sont 
Website: www.socialagent.me
Major Investors: SOS Ventures
Total funding: 15,000USD
Target fund: 500,000USD
Source of funding: Chinaccelerator incubator
Start of operation: August 2012

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

From photo to print: Your phone cover just how you want it

Will this self-funded startup be the leading online provider of customized products?

In the past, a person/business customized products and services could either hire a designer to develop and coordinate the production of marketing materials or produce printed materials themselves using desktop software and an inkjet or laser printer. A designer can produce a professionally coordinated portfolio of marketing products and services, but this is a significantly more costly and time-consuming alternative, whereas a traditional self-service model typically produces less sophisticated and lower quality output. Zi Yin Zhan founders believe that neither alternative satisfies the needs of the persons/businesses, which typically lack the resources or skills to generate satisfactory results using either approach. As a result, they believe this market has been underserved historically.

Zi Yin Zhan, which started its operation in December 2012, aims to be the leading online provider of portfolios of customized products and services to consumers and businesses in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. It offers a broad spectrum of photo-to-print products starting from mobile case covers, t-shirts, calendars and photo books.

Zi Yin Zhan founders are Maggi Ho Piu Yan and Luo Zhi Tan. Maggi was born in Hong Kong. She studied in UK and has marketing background and business startup for 7 years. While Luo Zhi Tan, is a Chinese citizen with trading and production background for 10 years

The founders believe that, in response to the growth of the Internet and the emergence of digital production technologies, consumers/businesses are shifting from traditional suppliers of customized products toward online alternatives. Online commerce, they argue, provides significant advantages and opportunities to consumers/business seeking customized products and services at affordable prices. These customers, they add, do not typically need the large quantities that are traditionally required to achieve low per-unit pricing and do not maintain dedicated procurement departments to negotiate pricing effectively.

“We believe the high price, inconvenience and complexity of traditionally procuring customized marketing products and services have historically dissuaded micro business customers from purchasing these products and services. We believe that the highly fragmented, geographically dispersed nature of the market is ideally suited for Internet-based procurement, as the Internet provides a standardized interface through web browsers, availability seven days a week, 24 hours a day, the ability to offer a wide selection of products and services, and the opportunity to efficiently aggregate individual orders into larger and more efficient production units, says Maggi in an interview.

Maggi believes that the overall market opportunity for customized products is very large as consumers are seeking customized announcements, greeting cards, calendars, stationery, apparel, personalized gifts, photo books and related photo products. In the past, Maggi explains that many such products were supplied by an industry comprising print manufacturing wholesalers and local retailers, such as stationery stores. Compared with today’s Internet-based alternatives, traditional offerings, she says, were relatively limited, prices were significantly higher, and delivery often required longer lead times. Moreover, graphic designs were limited and it was rarely possible to incorporate full color photography into the design, she adds.

“We recognize that our customers have differing needs, skills, and expertise, and we offer a corresponding range of products, price points and customer service options. Our websites offer a full complement of tools and features allowing customers to create a product design or upload their own complete design, and place an order on a completely self-service basis,” says Maggi.

According to Maggi, a key reason that their customers will buy from them is their ability to sell custom designed and manufactured products and services in quantities that are appropriate for consumers and businesses, which can often be a single unit. At the same time, she boasts that their high volume, highly automated production facilities are producing small quantity orders at low cost, allowing them to sell at low prices. “Our manufacturing facilities operate in a controlled environment as our quality assurance systems employ principles of world-class manufacturing designed to ensure that we consistently deliver quality products,” says Maggi.

According to Maggi, the self-funded Zi Yin Zhan currently has USD30, 000 total funding at handW. She also adds that they have spent the last 12 months transforming the idea in to a BETA version website www.ZiYinZhan.com that has been going through market runs of accepting real world orders, payment gateways testing, processes, production and deliveries.

Speaking of their future plans, Maggi says that they aim to do a marketing and promotion drive to get users growth to 100,000 and hit an order volume of 1m yen. They would also want to further enhance their competitive advantages which include fully integrating order-to-manufacturing set up, focused professional websites that continues to innovate with multiple products in a one-stop-shop online platform and customer Services and quality quarantined.

______________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: Zi Yin Zhan 
Founders: Maggi Ho Piu Yan and Luo Zhi Tan
Website: www.ZiYinZhan.com
Total Funding at hand: USD30,000
Source of Funding: Self-funded
Start of Operation: December 2012

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

HK startup develops an app that organizes photos and videos automatically

This technology startup has raised over USD100K.

No one generates more photos than newborn babies. Whether they're yours or to somebody else, the moment we see them our hands fly to grab the camera. Unfortunately our phones' memory is so limited. Cloud storage can't just do enough. This is a problem faced by 36-year old Ashok Jaiswal who founded a multimedia tech firm Ezee Systems November last year. It’s flagship consumer product EzeeCube was originally aimed at solving their personal problem of managing family photos and videos.

Ashok shared that they had their baby born 18 months ago. During the first 6 months, their whole family took so many photo that everyone was running out of phone memory. They did not want to keep them on cloud or personal computer. Frustrated with situation, Ashok tried look for a solution but could not find anything suitable so they decided to build EzeeCube.

After more than a year, they now have a working prototype of EzeeCube, apps for iOS and android in the app store and design for manufacturing ready. According to Ashok, to go into manufacturing, they have raised more than USD100,000 on Indiegogo and plan to start delivering EzeeCube by Christmas this year.

What is EzzeCube?

EzeeCube, is a technology startup with an open source media center box, which automatically consolidates content from all the devices in household and automatically organises them, deletes duplicate photos. Its capabilities can be extending by stacking accessories. 

“EzeeCube is unique with our patent pending stack-to-extend functionality, linux based OS and open source software on our hardware, EzeeCube’s unique design and ease of use UX of our software. Our geographic location provides us unique advantage of building hardware technology company and our team’s software capabilities adds to this hardware raise the barrier to entry,” said Ashok.

How it works?

EzeeCube’s patent pending stack-to-extend technology allows users to simply stack the new components they need to transform EzeeCube from smart media storage hub into a game console or blu-ray player, it makes any TV a smartTV to which users can stream internet content, enjoy their family photos and videos.

Users just need to connect the EzeeCube to power supply, download the EzeeSync app and the photos, videos and contacts from their iOS or Android devices automatically gets synched to EzeeCube. Once synced, EzeeCube will:

  • Automatically syncs photos, videos, and contacts from across your iOS and Android devices
  • Automatically syncs 'Pictures', 'Movies', 'Music' and 'Video' files from your Mac or Windows PC
  • Identifies and sorts similar and duplicate photos from each of your devices
  • Organises your photos and videos into places, dates, events, and even people
  • Keeps your content safe at home so you can share it with family and friends anywhere
  • Helps your family revisit memories from the comfort of your couch thanks to a beautiful slideshow that plays on your TV
  • Streams EzeeCube’s synced photos and videos to any iOS/Android device or Windows/Mac PC from anywhere

The funding

According to Ashok, they started EzeeCube development a year ago, it was self funded until last month. They raised USD100K so far from their indiegogo campaign and raised USD30K seed funding from Big Bloom. With crowdfunding, Big Bloom and their personal funds, it sums at USD175K and this should close at USD250K at the end of indiegogo campaign.

When asked about their future plans, Ashok shared that they want to deliver the crowd funded units and expand into retail by Q2 2015.

The founder

Ashok Jaiswal, 36 years old, started his career in multimedia technology at WASP3D in Delhi, moved to Singapore at muvee. Before moving to Hong Kong, five years ago for his MBA at HKUST, he worked with few more startups in New York and Beijing.

After finishing his MBA, he joined Goldman Sachs multimedia technology division to build and improve video conferencing facilities.
_____________________________ 

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: Ezee Systems 
Founders: Ashok Jaiswal
Website: https://www.ezeecube.com/
Total Funding at hand: USD150K
Source of Funding: Indiegogo, self and Big Bloom angel funding
Target Funding: Closing USD250K at the end of indiegogo campaign
Start of Operation: November 2013

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Hello SaaS providers: This may be the startup for you to ramp up your revenue

Japan’s OnLab / Digital Garage believed so much on this that it provided $150,000 funding.

Realizing the financial advantages of selling a virtual appliance to enterprise customer, Alexander Williams, co-founded Unscramble which brought the web service called Jidoteki with his bestfriend for 10 years. Both has worked with Github, a Git repository web-based hosting service before founding their own company.

Alexander and his best friend Patrice LaFlamme are originally from Montreal, Canada.Alexander worked at GitHub in the enterprise team, focusing on GitHub's enterprise virtual appliance.

“Working at GitHub allowed me to see the financial advantages of selling a virtual appliance to enterprise customers. A lightbulb moment occurred a few months after leaving GitHub, while searching for "something to do". I realized their model can be applied to other companies. My deep experience with enterprise software/sales process, virtual appliances, and automation were a natural fit to provide this solution to other companies,” said Alexander.

Alexander describe how this financial advantage works, “GitHub's least expensive 'paid' plan is USD $7/month/user. With their enterprise virtual appliance, they are selling a minimum of USD $5000/year/20 users. That's an incredible increase in recurring revenue for GitHub, and this is a yearly license instead of a monthly subscription. Anyone in finances can tell you it's a great idea, despite the added cost of providing enterprise support.”

Jidoteki, is mostly concerned with automation, security and privacy in the IT industry. Jidoteki’s service helps SaaS providers package and sell their web application as a virtual appliance (one file download). SaaS providers can then sell their virtual appliances to Enterprise customers, so they can use it on-premises, behind their corporate firewall.

“What makes us unique is our ability to provide a service which helps our customers increase their revenue, without increasing their workload. A lightbulb moment occurred a few months after leaving GitHub, while searching for "something to do". I realized their model can be applied to other companies. My deep experience with enterprise software/sales process, virtual appliances, and automation were a natural fit to provide this solution to other companies,” said Alexander.

According to Alexander, with Jidoteki, they are solving two problems at once. The first is the problem of Enterprise customers who are not able, can't, or will not use SaaS/cloud-based applications due to security, privacy, and even government regulations. The second is the problem of SaaS providers who can't sell their service to Enterprise customers, for the reasons mentioned above.

How it works

After signing up, customers fill a few forms for Jidoteki to automatically create and customize their virtual appliance. Jidoteki will allow them to upload their SaaS application which is added in their virtual appliance. They will then create download links which can be shared with enterprise customers (for a fee + yearly subscription cost). Their customers, generally, already have a demand from enterprise customers, so they turn to Jidoteki to help them create the final distributable product.

“We bootstrapped through IT consulting for 2 years, started on 2012 Then we joined Japan's most famous seed accelerator: OnLab / Digital Garage. They provided us with JP¥2M (~HK$150,000) and more importantly, some great mentoring. We also won a special award during our Demo Day presentation in April,” said Alexander.

Alexander also presume that a SaaS/Cloud provider will save a lot of time building and updating virtual appliances with Jidoteki. It is orders of magnitude simpler, quicker, less expensive, and less painful than doing it yourself. He also adds, that they are looking to acquire more customers - SaaS providers.  

____________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the company: Unscramble
Founders: Alexander Williams and Patrice LaFlamme
Website: https://jidoteki.com/
Major Investors: OnLab / Digital Garage
Total funding at hand: ~HK$150,000
Start of operation: October 2012  

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

How a startup was born from a simple jam meetup of two strangers

It helps businesses to design user experience integrating the online and offline worlds.

Fed up with the culture of agencies and working in client services, Patti Hunt and Kristin Low came up with a business that will give them a choice about who they will work with and that will made enough money. In May 2013, the founders put up On-off Design & Technology, an experience design and service innovation company.

 On-off stands for online and offline - this technology design experiences that integrate the digital and physical worlds.

 “We are unique because we want to break down the boundaries between 'work' and 'not work'. That's why we designed a hybrid business that is part lab, part studio and part community. The lab is where we experiment and play with ideas and technologies, the studio is how we make money to sustain ourselves (through a variety of experience design and service innovation engagements) and the community is where we socialise, learn and create with people who share the same passions. They all kind of feed and nurture each other,” said co-founder Patti Hunt.

Patti is originally from Melbourne, Australia. She has a design trifecta, having held roles as a user experience designer, service designer and strategic designer. After cycling across Spain with little money and no maps, Kristin found his way to Melbourne where he met Patti at a weekend jam event. In 2013, they moved to Hong Kong to explore Asia and get a different perspective.

According to Patti, they started the business with their own funds and investments. And even before On-off, they did lots of community activities such as jams, mentoring and hack-a-thons, writing articles, speaking at conferences. Then, Kristin founded the Design Thinking network when they first arrived in Hong Kong. Now, they hire people from there, they make friends and get business from it too. After a year of operation, Patti said that the team is now consisting of 8 people.

“We haven't sought external funding or investment so far because our plan is to be self-sustainable and self-directed as much as possible in the early days. We do intend to seek funding in the future as we build up the lab side of the business, to develop digital products, ship and scale. We have developed design-led techniques that we believe will give us an advantage in the market. Our focus will be on radical design and hyper-fast development,” Patti said.

_______________________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: On-off Design & Technology
Founders: Patti Hunt and Kristin Low
Website: https://on-off.com.hk/
Start of operation: May 2013

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com
 

This startup could be a good buddy for small scale businesses

You’d be asking hundreds of people just to like your page no more.

Realizing the difficulty faced by many small and home businesses in promoting their products and services due to current scale and limited budget, two Indians set-up a platform that aimed at bridging the gap.

Hidden Truffles started about 6 months back as a platform to “Help Hong Kong Discover High-Quality Local Businesses & Home Businesses”.

Hong Kong is home to several fabulous small business and home business. Hidden Truffles co-founder Sai Sudha however commented that due to their current scale - most businesses have only 2-3 team members, including the founders who run the entire show while a majority of them are mothers or day job holders who juggle this - they end up doing a lot of administrative work and hence have lesser time to spend to on working on their products & services or time to spend to increase their reach. As a consumer, on the other hand, she noted that it is impossible for them to follow 50 Facebook pages of various business they like or get newsletters from 50 different businesses.

“We think there are no other platforms available in Hong Kong today.There are listings and directories that are less useful for customers who only want to know the high quality small businesses in Hong Kong. Our edge is our passion for what we do and our first mover advantage,” Sudha said.

How it works

Hidden Truffles personally profile and review hand-picked small & home businesses in Hong Kong.

“These businesses have fantastic products and services. However, some of them don’t have websites yet and most of them are managed by less than 5 employees. Hidden Truffles want these businesses to be able to reach more of their target audience in an easier and cost-effective manner," Sudha said. 

They also want customers in Hong Kong to be able to easily find these businesses as well. At Hidden Truffles, customers can go through them, read about their founder and his/her background and browse the products and services including listings, pictures and reviews.

“We interview each entrepreneur before we profile the business. This is because we believe it is important for the customers to connect with the face of the business, especially if it’s a new or small business. Each business is accompanied by 10 pictures, including one of the founders, which captures the story visually for the customers. Customers can also rate and review their favorite businesses and simply get in touch with the founders directly through our page,” Sudha explained.

According to Sudha, they are currently self-funded with lots of expansion and development plans. They have currently invested < $80,000 HKD in the venture.

When asked about their future plans, Sudha said that their target customers today are Hong Kong citizens who speak English. They think that their customers are likely to be female.

“We estimate that the total addressable market is ~700,000 people (10% of total Hong Kong population = ~7 million), of which ~350,000 would be women (50% of 700,000). While we don’t attach a $ value to this market yet, we believe that we can monetize this audience in the future through e-commerce,” she said.

In the short to medium term, founders of Hidden Truffles plans to enable e-commerce capabilities that will allow customers to buy products and services from these small businesses through their website to further enhance the value of their platform to both businesses and customers.

In the medium term, they want to reach a larger audience of businesses and customers by opening up Hidden Truffles to Mandarin and Cantonese speakers as well. They think that this will also be a win-win for both businesses and customers.

“Finally, in the longer term, once we think we have a working model for Hong Kong, we don’t see any reason not to expand to other cities in Asia... and the world!,” Sudha exclaimed.

The founders

Sudha, Co-Founder of HiddenTruffles, has completed her MBA from Great Lakes Institute of Management, India and a specialisation course at Harvard University. Her past experience includes account management, start-up business development and co-founding a successful online boutique in India.

Anasua, Co-Founder of HiddenTruffles, has completed her MBA from Hong Kong University and under graduation from IIT, Bombay. Her work experience includes working in a non-profit organization and a management consulting firm.

The founding story

Before Sudha moved to HK in 2012, she stayed in India for 2 months so that her children could spend time with the family before the big move. That is when she decided to take her mother’s home boutique online on Facebook.

Within 2 weeks of creating the page, she came to the conclusion that it was the single most difficult thing to get LIKES on your page and to get people to follow you. In a month she got 500 LIKES which meant she had asked 500 people including every customer to check their FB page and LIKE it if they would like to follow the business, its products and new collections regularly. That is the moment, when she realized how difficult it is to promote a business online without an ad budget and her respect for small business owners sky-rocketed! The idea of creating a platform for such small businesses was planted in her head then.

Shortly after moving to Hong Kong, she came to realize that the city had a lot of high quality small businesses providing a wide range of products and segments. However, most of these businesses were not well known and had to rely exclusively on word-of-mouth to advertise themselves. They faced the exact same problem as she had faced. This is the point when a firmer idea of Hidden Truffles started forming in her head.

Anasua was a very good friend of Sudha’s with whom she shared many similar interests. When Sudha shared the above idea and thoughts with her, Anasua completely resonated with them. They started discussing more and realized that they were very keen to work on this together to find a solution. It took them nearly 6 months of attending fairs and local markets, speaking to small and home businesses, conducting consumer surveys with friends and strangers and slowly building and building the website – and thus Hidden Truffles was born!

_____________________

COMPANY PROFILE

Name of the Company: Hidden Truffles
Founders: Sudha and Anasua
Website: www.hiddentruffles.com
Total Funding at hand: < $80,000 HKD
Start of Operation: December 2013
 

 For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Former investment banker launched HK's first financial comparison site

The startup raised $3m funding in just one year.

Price comparison websites are mushrooming elsewhere in Hong Kong to cater for specific needs of consumers searching out for the best deals available.

In the financial area, HongKong-based startup MoneyHero claims to be the pioneer in featuring an independent comparison portal and a comprehensive product database. With operations starting May last year, the portal also comes with useful tools and guides aimed at helping customers save money and make the right financial decisions.

After realizing the lack of comparison sites for financial needs in Hong Kong, the investment banker turned startup founder, Alister Musgrave discussed this idea with his friend and a former colleague, Gerald Eder, Managing Partner of CompareAsia Group, who was, by coincidence, setting up a comparison site in Malaysia at the time. Two weeks later Alister joined him and arrived in Hong Kong, setting up MoneyHero, with seed capital from Nova Founders Capital and some local HK venture capital investors including Stem Capital and angel investors within a year.

“I lived in the UK for many years, where I used comparison sites all the time for my banking and insurance needs. In 2013, I went on several trips to HK and I noticed that when I tried to get a credit card, I was faced with hundreds of offers but found that there wasn’t a site where I can compare like I was used to back home. I did some research and was surprised to see that there were no local comparison sites to help you compare thousands of financial products,” said Alister.

Alister serves as the Managing Director of Money Hero. He was an investment banker at Morgan Stanley for four years. He has been quoted in quite a number of online publications, including a Forbes article, “An Open Letter to Hong Kong Angel Investors.”

Helping Alister is a team composed of individuals who were holding lofty positions on the corporate ladder before betting on this new venture.

Stuart Glendinning, Head of Channels, was former managing director for MoneySuperMarket.com, which is billed as the world’s first financial marketplace. Lawrence Chau, VP, Business Development, was former Strategy Executive at JobsDB. He also has a background in consulting. Stefan Bruun, CMO, was formerly APAC CMO of Groupon, and was an investment banker at Morgan Stanley before he co-founded Nova Founders Capital, which incubated MoneyHero and the entire CompareAsia Group.

More about the business concept

According to Alister, MoneyHero.com.hk is all about bringing the power back to the consumers—the power of choice, the power of information—by giving them free access to user-friendly comparison tools so they can compare the most essential financial products, such as credit cards, personal loans, and medical insurance.

“Consumers in HK come across thousands of offers for credit cards, loans and insurance, but no one site to compare them all. MoneyHero simplifies the search for financial products, so that anyone can go online and find the best products they need; compare them all in one spot, apply online, and save money and time,” he said.

Alister added that MoneyHero represents only the facts and ensures a fully optimized on-site experience for the users. They don't put advertisements and other elements that would compromise that user experience.

“Ultimately, we are helping consumers change their lives for the better. Money saved is more than just cash in the bank; it’s perhaps an education, medical treatment for your loved one, or a holiday for your kids. By having a reliable go-to comparison site where consumers can compare all available options, there’s no longer a reason for them to merely settle for the most convenient choice as offered by their bank or local insurance agent. Everyone is empowered to find the best choice. Everyone is empowered to save money and improve their lives,” said Alister.

At the same time, through the promotion of better transparency among local providers, MoneyHero is confident that these providers will be encouraged to improve their products and services, and be more competitive in terms of pricing, for the greater benefit of the consumers.

According to Alister, MoneyHero continues to optimize their comparison tool to make searches faster, easier, and more customized for the consumer.

“The opportunity is ours to win, so now we just have to focus on providing the best service for the user and being a valuable money-saving resource for Hong Kong,” said Alister.

___________________________

Company Profile

Company Name: MoneyHero.com.hk
Founder: Alister Musgrave
Website: www.moneyhero.com.hk
Major Investors: Stem Capital, Nova Founders Capital
Total funding at hand: USD3 million
Source of Funding: Nova Founders Capital, HK based Stem
Capital, and local HK angel investors

Start of Operation: May 2013 

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

HK startup sets up a site enabling people to donate to charities using bitcoins

That’s at almost zero transaction fee.

Gatecoin, a one-year old digital currencies exchange and remitance solutions platform, is setting up bitcharities.org that will allow people to donate bitcoins to charities, and the charities to receive those donations through local transfers at almost zero transaction fee.

In an interview with Gatecoin founder Aurélien Menant, he said that Bitcharities.org, is a project to disrupt the donation systems to charities that charge excessive fees to donors.

To be financed through a crowdfunding campaign, Aurélien said that the Bitcharities.org is aimed at becoming the Kickstarter of Charities which could receive donations in Bitcoin/fiat currencies.

“It could show that Bitcoin has a real and concrete utility for people. Most of donations amounts are below USD100. The issue is that whenever you want to give to a small foreign charity, you will have to pay important international transfer fees and FX spreads. Overall, those fees will represent between 20 to 30% of such a donation and even more than 100% for a donation below USD20,” said Aurélien.

He added that accepting bitcoins will also be a way for the charities to promote themselves. Meanwhile, Gatecoin will foster their promotion by developing a KickStarter-like website where donors will be able to browse them by type, location, etc., in order to select them.

"We leveraged our status of co-founder of the Bitcoin Association of Hong Kong to set partnerships with bitcoin businesses and investors. We also partnered with a financial institution to create a white labeled bitcoin loaded prepaid card, that other companies will be able to sell. Those partnerships will bring us large amount of bitcoins that we will be able to sell. We are also to support this growth by implementing the creative marketing plan we have elaborated, since we are very aware that the quality of our solution is not sufficient in itself to generate sales: we have to market it," he added.

According to Aurélien, those actions will leverage their brand recognition and increase their customers’ sales. For businesses and investors, they will also create unique transaction fees discounts.

"By the end of the year, we would launch other Bitcoin products and services which are very attractive for consumers and investors in this business, such as a Derivatives solution, or a remittance solution," said Aurélien.

Gatecoin was officially registered in Hong Kong on July 1, 2013. So far, USD180,000 have been invested into their business. They are hoping to raise USD1 million in their second round of seed funding.

The founder

Aurélien, who serves as Gatecoin CEO, founded the company with two co-investors: Albert and Etienne.

"Being passionate about finance, computer sciences, I was very interested in digital currencies. After having discussed about it with Albert, and seeing the solutions on the market, we realized we were able to do much better and also offer other services," he said.

Albert, an experienced trading system designer for a major bank whom he met during his past professional experience, and Etienne, an IT engineer working for a major IT consultancy, specialized in finance.

"I have worked for several years in the investment banking sector. Working on M&A and financing deals, I acquired a substantial experience in business management and development. I have always being interested in entrepreneurship and I have participated in many entrepreneurial events such as the first Start-Up Week End in Paris in 2009 that we won with a project of my own," said Aurélien.

Using their past experiences in investment banking to digital currencies they want to transpose the processes and systems in order to provide a bank grade quality service.

"I partnered-up with Albert, an experienced trading system designer for a major bank whom I met during my past professional experience, and Etienne, an IT engineer working for a major IT consultancy, specialized in finance. Together, we share the same interest for digital currencies and we gather all the required skills to run a related business," said Aurélien.

According to Aurélien, Gatecoin's trading engine designed by investment banking professionals is more efficient, scalable, reliable and secure significantly different from their competitors.

"Unlike other digital exchanges, we will have a global footprint. Indeed, we have developed multiple partnerships with financial institutions across the globe. The results will be that we will reach clients who have local bank accounts in more than 60 countries: they could transfer their money cheaper and faster than our competitors making it the best solution for individuals and businesses,” he said.

__________________

Company Profile

Company Name: Gatecoin
Founder: Aurélien Menant
Website: www.gatecoin.com
Total funding at hand: USD180,000
Target funding: USD1 million
Start of Operation: 2013

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com

Hong Kong startup creates first intellectual property marketplace in APAC

It has over 27,000 patents to date.

Hong Kong startup IP Nexus bills itself as the first marketplace for intellectual properties in Asia Pacific. Founded in 2012, IP Nexus matches IP owners with interested buyers, licensees or their agents globally and offer a range of other complementary services and features for all parties involved in intellectual property monetization.

In an exclusive interview with Hong Kong Business, founder Hidero Niioka shared that they have signed partnerships with a number of significant IP players including the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). “ We have already made successful matches with a firm offers and transactions closed for IP on our platform. As of May 2014, we list over 27,000 patents and other intellectual property on our platform," he added.

IP Nexus team are experts in IP law, practice and commercialization themselves. Their in-depth knowledge and experience in the complex field allow them to actively and strategically market the IP on their platform and offer added value to IP owners seeking to monetize their inventions.

Niioka is born in Japan but grew up in Germany. He obtained his PhD at the Max Planck Institute. He holds a LLM from Stanford Law School and has worked as an IP litigator and investment banker. He drew on his dual experience in IP law and investment to develop this unique marketplace solution to IP monetization.

"While working in the IP field, we saw that there were very few opportunities for smaller companies, startups and individual inventors to monetize their IP. At the same time, buyers and licensees sometimes struggled to find unique and unsifted IP. We felt there was an opportunity to match these two groups through an online marketplaces,” he said.

According to Niioka, the platform started being self-funded with an early support from the Hong Kong Cyberport incubator platform. It has successively raised USD880,000 total funding. IP Nexus recently secured its first seed funding from a renowned venture fund, and a number of successful individual angel investors.

When asked about their future plans, he shared that they have been focusing on their platform capabilities and is launching new platform in beta this July with a range of new features and services for everyone involved in IP development, protection and monetization.

"We want to continue our momentum in attracting interesting IP and have set strong targets for the number and quality of IP we want to see on our platform," he said.

______________________

Company Profile

Company Name: IP Nexus
Founder: Hidero Niioka
Website: www.ipnexus.com
Total funding at hand: USD880,000
Start of Operation: 2012

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com 

See how Zyppos allows you to hire travel experts for worry-free flights

It helps you find the best flights and lowest fares.

Hong Kong startup Zyppos is a crowdsourcing platform of travel experts which started just last March. It is aimed at removing the stress of looking for flights in conventional search engines. In particualr, it uses its registered experts and travel consultants to help users get amazing savings on all trips and flights.

"Zyppos aims at helping users focus on the joy of travels and encourages everyone to start travelling more,” said founder Guillermo Ginesta.

Born in Chile, raised in Brazil, and long-term Hong Kong resident, Guillermo is 28 and a fervent marketing and growth hacker expert.
He is currently on his 12th year in Hong Kong.

Guillermo believes in the motto that led to building Zyppos, “it’s all about making life a little bit more awesome!”

“The business comes from a real problem. Looking for flights online can be overwhelming and really stressful as there are just so many flight search engines.How do I know I’m using the best one? How can I be sure I am getting the lowest quote? I thought it would be great if everyone could ask an expert; whether a seasoned traveller or an experienced flight hacker,” he said.

Zyppos started using Ginesta's money. As the project grew from just an idea to a viable business proposition they received funding from an Angel Investor to continue development and to launch a Minimum Viable Product. It currently has HKD200,000 funding.

"Zyppos is growing organically and user adoption has been really positive. Travellers are seeing a saving of 30% on average. The idea is to continue to develop new features and add to the user experience.”

They are now considering to take a round of seed/early investment if growth continues at the current rate in order to expand the team and launch a few features earlier.

______________________
Company Profile

Company Name: Zyppos
Founder: Guillermo Ginesta
Website: www.zyppos.com
Total funding: HKD200,000
Source of funding: Angel Investors
Start of operation: March, 2014

For startups wanting to be featured, send your message to Lee Anne Babierra at research@charltonmediamail.com 

See how this fashion startup aims to fill the gap where Pinterest has failed

It plans to be the go-to site for future brides.

Eight years ago, Shana Buchanan was on top of a $1.1b portfolio of ASX-listed firms as a fund manager. Her market experience spans marketing with bigwigs like Red Bull and selling real estate developments. She also ran a family textile company which got picked up by Harrods in London.

Today, Shana, who has a deep passion for interior design, is making a big leap from finance to fashion as founder of idecorateweddings.com (IDW), a Hong Kong-based startup offering stylish décor at competitive prices using a styleboard tool.

"We want to be the go-to solution for couples planning their wedding. Our vision is to become the leading global brand for online wedding décor by disrupting the way couples currently plan their wedding," shared Shana in an exclusive interview with the Hong Kong Business.

"IDW seeks to be the Net-A-Porter of weddings and provide the solution where Pinterest and Polyvore fail," she said. IDW banks on the simplicity of the homepage design which allows infinite scrolling of imagery with minimal effort and distraction.

"In an effort to mesmerize users, images take up the majority of space. The styleboard is an essential tool (like a budget or checklist) that couples use to communicate how they see their wedding.

Brides-tobe can easily send products and inspiration to their styleboard with a simple click, add photos of their dress, venue or cake inspiration and share it with loved-ones and people involved such as planners and florists etc," she said.

"The inspiration for iDecorate Weddings came to me when I was engaged and overwhelmed. Like most brides, I spent countless hours online (mostly at work) searching for products and inspiration but was frustrated that I couldn’t buy the products I’d see on Pinterest, in magazines or blogs.

If I could find them for hire they were so expensive; it made more sense to buy the items and resell them. With my shopping obsession and wedding frustrations, iDecorate was born," she said.

Despite its achievements, IDW isn't resting on its laurels just yet.“We see our site evolving almost like Pinterest for weddings but with a key difference – you can buy the décor you see in styled images and have it delivered to your door. We built our first site on a very limited budget and we knew we needed to make it better. We’ve listened to our customers and
added features to make the site more user-friendly but also more cutting edge. We still have a long-
way to go.

We want the wedding industry and couples to tell us what they want from a one-stop-wedding-shop and we will keep listening and developing the site to meet the needs of brides and grooms online,” she added.

__________________________________________

COMPANY PROFILE:


Name of the company: iDecorate Weddings Ltd trading as IDECORATEWEDDINGS.COM
Founder: Shana Buchanan
Website: WWW.IDECORATEWEDDINGS.COM
Major Investors: Private investors in 50% Australia and 50% in Hong Kong
Total funding: US$200k
Target fund: US$500k-US$1.5m
Source of funding: Angel Investors
Start of operation: Feb 2013