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| Source: myNEF. From left: Dato' Husni Salleh, CEO, TERAJU, Lilyana Abdul Latiff, CEO, New Entrepreneurs Foundation (myNEF), Tuan YB Gobind Singh Deo, Minister of Communications & Multimedia, Malaysia; Datuk Yasmin Mahmood, CEO of MDEC at the press conference for the Malaysia Rice Bowl Startup Awards 2018 |
Winners for the Malaysia Rice Bowl Startup Awards 2018 have been announced. The awards recognise startups in the country that harness digital technology, and celebrate rising tech entrepreneurs in various categories of excellence ranging from retail, media, digital, tech, products, services and innovative campaigns to women and social enterprises.
YB Tuan Gobind Singh Deo, Minister of Communications and Multimedia commented, “I am extremely happy to hear that Malaysian startups are accelerating faster than ever, and we hope that they become a significant contributor to our nation’s GDP and growth, and also become a significant type of business that employs and cultivate cutting edge talent and become a key source of employment.”
Said Lilyana Abdul Latiff, CEO of New Entrepreneurs Foundation Malaysia (myNEF), the organisers: “With over 50 nominations for Founder of the Year, and over 70 nominations for Startup of the Year at this year’s Rice Bowl Startup Awards - I think Malaysia’s tech startup ecosystem has matured rapidly in the past three years. It is a testament to the developmental investments and programmes by the Malaysian government, private sector support and independent initiatives. For a modest market size, we should be on track to produce Malaysian-based unicorns* within the next few years.”
Winners include:
- Best Accelerator or Incubator Program: Malaysian Global Innovation and Creativity Centre Global Accelerator Program (MaGIC GAP) is a programme to accelerate global startups to be investment-ready in four months, and build a strong startup community in ASEAN.
- Best AI / Machine Learning Startup: Hyperlab automates sales and support for visionary enterprises with their conversational artificial intelligence (AI) and robotic process automation (RPA) technology.
- Best Business Automation Tool: RunCloud is a modern control panel to help web developers manage multiple cloud hosting and web deployments.
- Best Coworking Space: PAPER + TOAST is the first coworking space in Malaysia. It aims to serve as a one-stop community platform for talents, entrepreneurs and startups to get together.
- Best Digital Marketing Solution: SushiVid helps brands launch and manage influencer marketing campaigns through their content management software.
- Best e-Commerce Startup: Tripfez Travel offers Muslim-friendly travel solutions.
- Best Ecosystem Initiative: The Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) is the lead agency in driving the digital economy in Malaysia. MDEC’s implementations and efforts are centred on building awareness on digital economy, creating credible talents for the industry, and encouraging digital technology adoption among the people (rakyat) and businesses.
- Best Fintech Startup: CurrenSeek is a platform for secure money-changing and remittances.
- Best FoodTech / AgriTech Startup: Stixfresh is a sticker that is placed on a fruit to prolong its shelf life.
- Best HealthTech Startup: MEDKAD provides a medical benefits automation system for companies to efficiently manage their staff medical benefits.
- Best IoT Startup: JomParking makes parking payments quicker and more convenient.
- Best Life Helper: Vidi is a visual discovery platform that helps travellers book experiences for their next holiday.
- Best Logistics and Supply Chain Startup: Zoom is an on-demand delivery platform for e-commerce businesses that require last mile fulfillment.
- Best Newcomer: Dropee is a B2B marketplace that brings suppliers and retailers together.
- Founder of the Year: Lennise Ng is CEO of Dropee. Her life goal is to push humanity forward through merging traditional businesses with innovative technology solutions.
- Investor of the Year: Andrew Tan is a serial entrepreneur and an all rounder venture capitalist. He is now at helm of a venture capital firm and a private equity firm with a pool of funds totalling US$50 million.
- Startup Of The Year: Carsome is a Southeast Asian online used car platform.
- People’s Choice: 11Tune is a music solution platform that connects composers with users in clicks.
A number of winners were also TERAJU Superb winners: Tripfez Travels, MEDKAD, JomParking, and Dropee.
TERAJU was established as a strategic unit in the Prime Minister’s Department in Malaysia to lead, drive and coordinate the bumiputera** agenda as part of the National Transformation Plan. The Bumiputera Entrepreneurs Startup Scheme (SUPERB) provides grants of up to RM500,000 to support innovative and creative business ideas. The programme is open to bumiputera who aspire to be an entrepreneur or bumiputera companies operating for less than three years. As of January 2018, a total of RM79.79 million out of a pot of RM100 million had been allocated.
Under the Rice Bowl Startups Awards rules, startups are defined as companies which have been in operations for five years or less, must be established in Southeast Asia. National award winners will proceed to compete at the regional ASEAN Rice Bowl Startups Awards 2018 to be held in Bali, Indonesia, in December, which highlights model entrepreneurship and inspires a dynamic community of startup enthusiasts, serial entrepreneurs, policymakers and diverse mentors in tech innovation.
Regional winners at the four-day ASEAN finale will benefit from partnership opportunities, media exposure, regional and global networking as well as funding from investors. They will go on to compete in the Global Startup Awards in 2019.
The Rice Bowl community consists of 3,372 alumni from 10 ASEAN countries and has seen US$108.4 million in pledged investments from 2015 to 2017.
Organised by the New Entrepreneurs Foundation Malaysia (myNEF) and now into its fourth year, the Malaysia Rice Bowl Startup Awards is the platform for recognising young startups disrupting old processes and industries. The Malaysia Rice Bowl Startup Awards and ASEAN Rice Bowl Startup Awards are among myNEF’s signature programmes.
MyNEF believes businesses can grow fast and be sustainable when they harness technology and knowledge. It plays a significant role in bridging industry players and the government, working closely with various agencies and government-related organisations to support existing and upcoming entrepreneur development programmes. The organisation believes that by celebrating startups, together they can solve the diverse local rice bowl issues faced by each country across Southeast Asia. This will ultimately benefit Malaysia and subsequently ASEAN as a region.
Hashtags: #malaysiaricebowl, #ricebowlaward, #ricebowlstartupawards, #arbsa2018
*A unicorn startup is valued at more than US$1 billion and typically comes from the technology sector. Like unicorns, unicorn startups are fairly rare.
**Bumiputera are local people, including people where one of the parents is a Muslim Malay; natives of Sarawak, the Orang Asli and Sabah natives.
