Hsin Yao Cheng

🙌 Welcome back to Startup Wednesdays, featuring #VC, #founder & #operators here in South-East Asia. For this week, we have Pat Naranpat Thitipattakul, Investment Director at ORZON Ventures 💭 What does Orzon Ventures focus on? The idea is to combine the flexibility and decision-making expertise of a traditional VC with the extensive resources and ecosystem of a large corporate entity like OR. This approach aims to help startups grow by leveraging OR's existing customer base, infrastructure, and market presence. Orzon Ventures focuses on investing in startups particularly in sectors like mobility, lifestyle and food and beverage. The goal is to find innovative solutions that can benefit from OR's resources and customer network, ultimately fostering startup growth and corporate synergy. 💭 What motivated you to join 500 ? Unlike many who are determined to become venture capitalists,I initially applied for a position to manage an accelerator program at Disrupt, which was run by one of the GPs of 500 TukTuks. My interest in startups was piqued when a friend invited me to participate in a hackathon, which turned out to be an exhilarating experience. The fast-paced environment & the opportunity to connect with innovative founders inspired me to apply for the accelerator manager position. During the interview process, the CEO offered me a dual role: managing the accelerator program & joining the venture capital team. Despite my initial unfamiliarity with venture capital, I accepted the challenge. This dual role allowed me to witness the entire journey of startups, from their inception at hackathons to becoming fully-fledged companies. 💭 What are the biggest challenges for Thai startups? The Thai market faces significant funding challenges, with limited early-stage VC funds & a reliance on CVCs that invest mainly in Series A and beyond, creating a funding gap for earlier stages. Investors in Thailand are risk-averse & while there are fragmented angel investors, their limited capital makes funding difficult. This forces many Thai startup founders to reach profitability quickly or bootstrap, which can lead to better investment terms but is challenging. Additionally, foreign investors show interest but often lack confidence due to difficulties understanding the local ecosystem. 💭 What has been the biggest challenge as a VC in Thailand? For Orzon, the biggest challenge has been finding startups that synergize well with OR's existing operations. This adds extra criteria to our investment decisions, such as ensuring the new company does not overlap with current offerings and that there is cultural compatibility between founders and Orzon. 👉 For more news like this on the Southeast Asia startup and tech scene, make sure to hit the "Follow" button to stay updated 🚀 #Thailand #tech #innovation

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Investors need to hold founders accountable to the deliverables they promised. In this case, Wei Zhuang (Lenard) Tan needs to eat pickled fish. He made a post some time back about promising to eat a spoonful of Surströmming 🤢 (pickled fish) if Ailytics won the “Most Liked Startup award” at the ConTech Summit. And since VCs never forget… We know Wei Zhuang to be a man of his word, and sponsored the Surströmming (ikr, perpetuating the impression of VCs being big spenders 🤭).  After our monthly meeting, we gathered at our patio to watch him deliver on that promise. Needless to say it was a lot of fun, mostly for the bystanders. (including his co-founder Prateek Manocha) We’re happy when founders make good progress - milestones are worth celebrating. Or in this case, inducing a forfeit for. Enjoy the video. Any suggestions on the next odd thing we should feed him next?

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Underrated pitching advice for founders: avoid making weak statements like “we hope to raise” or “if things work out, we plan to do X”. It exhibits indecisiveness and lack of confidence. Replace them with strong statements like “We are raising XX, we will make yy revenue by ZZ” or “We will sell x products through Y channel to record Z profits.” Know that pitching is a confidence-winning game. Until you’re 100% confident of what you’re doing, it’ll not translate into the investor’s approval.

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For Southeast Asia’s tech ecosystem to be self-sustaining, we need some big changes. There are a few key elements I believe can unlock tremendous opportunity in the region. To name a few: ✅ Deep, varied capital stack - Sufficient capital at various stages from angels to growth capital. ✅ Diverse investors - Knowledgeable investors focusing on various industries and models. ✅ Exits infrastructure - Mechanisms for exits from IPOs to M&A. ✅ Strong founders - Awareness of the nuances of SEA and conviction to depart from “tried and tested” models adapted from matured markets like the US With these in place, it will accelerate interest and success for investors and founders alike. That said, I believe our core approach needs to change. Over the last decade, SEAsia has greatly matured. And with any nascent upstart, it’s applied what’s worked elsewhere... Focusing heavily on growth-at-all-cost and other US-inspired strategies. To the surprise of most, the results have not been the most encouraging as a result of this. On hindsight, the pitfalls were clear: - Unrealistic early-stage valuations. - Chasing very large outcomes in a fragmented market. - Applying US playbooks that don't fit our market. Startups will follow suit to match criteria that VCs set. It’s how the game works. With the current market downturn, it’s a good opportunity to reset and intentionally chart our own course for the region. Investors and founders that know how to meander this market with it’s unique strengths / market dynamics in mind, will succeed. As investors and long-time believers in this region ourselves at Tin Men Capital , We believe in working together to develop the ecosystem. Southeast Asia is still learning to walk before it begins to run. Venture capital is a team sport, and together, we can build a stronger, self-sustaining space for startups to thrive. Let's pull in the same direction and make it happen. 💪

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In this intimate fireside chat, we will learn more about the Public Investment Corporation Early Stage Fund, cleverly structured to adress a number of challenges faced by startups. Cant wait!

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The Council's first SPV of 2024 is down in the books and oversubscribed. Running SPVs where we have pro rata or extra allocation in fund deals is a muscle we are building pretty late in the game as a firm. As a solo GP with a tiny team, it's crippling to think of the extra work required and risk of not meeting platform minimums to run an SPV. But 7 of our port co's have recently raised follow on funding where we had pro rata. These are awesome deals for our LPs, angel members, and syndicate community. We simply can't afford to let them slip through the cracks. These allocations are only becoming more valuable as our firm grows, so we must start NOW! Proud to say this one went off without a hitch and our syndicate community is small but THRIVING. Wish us luck as we keep building. Note our SPVs are now on Sydecar. The best way to get access is to know someone on The Council Fund team and be on our SPV email list. **What's an SPV?** An SPV is a Special Purpose Vehicle. It allows multiple angel investors to pool together into one larger investment into a company. This helps the founder keep paperwork and investor relations to a minimum (less names on the cap table = simplicity!). When people say they're investing with a "syndicate" or they are "syndicating a deal," SPV is the entity and process by which they do that. A "syndicate" is like a community of people that invest via SPVs together.

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How's the busy summer season in the startup world like? Screening 400+ early stage deals with NUVC.ai, doing 10+ VC funds' DD for Asian Investor Club. All thanks to AI and all my friends, and finally after 3 months of hardworking, meeting investors and founders, I would love to share one new addition to of the 2024 vintage of my alternative investment portfolio: 🪽 Exciting news – I’ve just invested in Pretty Privilege and joined their Advisory Board! Empowering younger generations through community building is one of my core investment thesis: #Impactinvesting Pretty Privilege is revolutionizing the concept of “Pretty Privilege” by bringing exclusive influencer perks to an entire generation of young women. With over 21,000+ Gen Z and millennial members, the fastest-growing lifestyle club in Australia is partnering with 70+ top brands in beauty, fashion, wellness, and lifestyle to offer exclusive giveaways, events, and premium discounts. The business is already seeing explosive growth, with 10,000,000+ organic social media views in the past 90 days and a strong, engaged community. With an A+ team and a proven model, Pretty Privilege is poised to become Australia’s next unicorn. And don‘t forget the recent ESIC early stage innovative company accreditation by the ATO providing tax benefits to investors. Thanks so much to the founders and can't wait for this next phase of growth. Watch this space! 🚀 Message me if you want to know more. www.prettyprivilege.club https://lnkd.in/g7ardbNV #angelinvesting #angels #earlystage #startup #melbourne #femaleinvestor #girlpower

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The Best Operating Roles for Syndicate investors/LPs Below are a few of different operating roles that we see frequently in the syndicate & make for some of our best angels/LPs. This is a segment of our Last Money In post titled “The Ideal Angel Investor: Profiling 4,000+ SPV Limited Partners”. Founder/Co-founder These individuals understand company building. They are likely heavily invested in their own company and could benefit from some diversification into others. As founders, they are likely obsessive with business and curious about others as well. Engineer/Engineering Leader These roles are paid very well. They build products and understand technology as well as anyone. Many are interested in other companies' tech products and given their compensation, and are enthusiastic about investing and diversifying into some of the most exciting tech startups. CEO’s I am not talking about your typical “startup co-founder” rather someone who has been running a profitable (maybe bootstrapped) business for many years or was brought into a company as a CEO or has taken over a business as CEO. These CEO’s are aid well and have disposable income. They obviously understand how to run a company as that is their role and many are interested in diversifying capital into early-stage companies with the potential for outsized returns. Chief Revenue Officer/VP of Sales These roles are the highest level of sales management in a company. They have likely had a successful career selling products B2B and a deep understanding of prospecting, pitching, closing, hitting quota. Every B2B company needs a leader like this at some point. These roles are also very well compensated as they oversee the sales organization and are directly tied to revenue of a given company. Not only do these roles have disposable income to invest in startups, but they have relevant experience to most of the organizations they would be investing in, connections to help the company staff up with sales talent, and potentially connections to potential customers of the company. Agency Owners Many agency owners do well financially as business owners and also typically help startups/fortune 500 companies' specific needs (i.e. branding, design, marketing, sales, product etc). While their business model is typically services based, it is likely of interest to identify other ways to invest in a more scalable fashion. These agency owners also understand their area of expertise better than startup founders and therefore are interested to deploy personal capital into companies they are generally excited about, or companies that do a great job of what their agency offers. Agency owners are business owners who are business/growth-minded and typically have personal capital to deploy. -- Powered by Sydecar, Last Money In is the most actionable Venture Capital newsletter with ~60k+ subscribers. Written by Zachary Ginsburg and Alex Pattis, global syndicate leaders with 800+ VC SPVs closed.

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🎙️ Cohort talks: fundraising masterclass with Arjit Johri (VP, Mars Shot Ventures)🚀 We hosted Arjit for a no-nonsense chat on fundraising last week. Key insights: 1️⃣ Perfect the pitch: master multiple versions—1-minute, 5-minute, 15-minute, and a detailed deck. 2️⃣ Follow-up: keep potential investors engaged with strategic updates and progress. 3️⃣ Rejection isn’t final: when it comes to investors, a “no” today doesn’t mean never. Maintain relationships, keep them in the loop. This advice echoes what my YC mentors shared during my own fundraising journey. What stood out for you? Bhavesh Kotwani, Nikhil Mehta, Pooja Midha, Rana Vivek Singh, Pawan Kumar, Mohit Nagaria, Navajith Karkera, Kartik Subodh, Sparsh Arya, Jitesh Bhasin, Akshat Grover Varun Aggarwal Shailendra Nath Jha

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"How do you switch VC firms?" I get this question a lot 👆 from VC's looking to make a move. In our Moves in VC newsletter tomorrow, we'll be sharing an interview with Sri Ayangar, who has some great advice on the topic. He's had solid stints at 2 firms already, and has just announced this week that he's moving to Lakestar. Watch the clip below to see how he recommends a #vc approach this delicate topic 👇🏻

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Join for free 500+ family offices, VCs, venture studios, founders & angels on Zoom at the 𝐀𝐏𝐀𝐂 𝐅𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐥𝐲 𝐎𝐟𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐞 & 𝐕𝐂 𝐎𝐧𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐟 on Sept 20th. Buy network & recordings: inniches.com/apac. Must-attend if you’re investing/fundraising/partnering with Singapore, Australia, India, China, Indonesia, New Zealand, Thailand, Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Philippines & other Asia-Pacific countries. 1. How does our Single Family Office evaluate venture funds & startups? – Nitesh Aggarwal, CIO @ SFO Fund, AUM $130M, invested in 38 funds & 27 startups. 2. Panel "VC Trends in APAC in 2024" with Nruthya Madappa, Partner @ 3one4 Capital, $520M+ AUM; Ashwin Raguraman, Co-Founder and Partner @ Bharat Innovation Fund, Fund I - $100M. 3. How GPs can leverage and work with their LPs to drive more value to the investment portfolio? – William Bao Bean, Managing GP @ Orbit Startups, Chinese VC with $180M+ AUM. 4. Why and How I Invested in 315 YC Companies? – Yotam Rosenbaum, Partner @ Access Fund, raised 6 funds and invested in 315+ Y Combinator startups. 5. How to fundraise from Family Offices? – John Milanovich, Director @ Family Office Club, #1 ultra-wealthy investor club incl. 7,500+ investors: Family Offices & UHNWIs. 6. Panel "Ways to Partner between Family Offices, VCs, and Venture Studios" with Sheetal Khullar, Growth Lead & Sustainability Expert @ FutureLabs Ventures, Venture Studio & VC with 30+ multi-$100M high-growth ventures. 7. How to fundraise for the venture studio and set up relationships with investors? – Farhad Alessandro Mohammadi, CEO @ Mamazen Startup Studio & IH1, Italian venture studio with €4,5M raised and €6M own funds. 8. Venture Building and Investing in the New Economy for Traditional Family Offices – Harshit Joshi, Founding Partner @ Favcy Venture Builders, venture-builder with 30+ portcos and go-to platform for 5,000+ angel investors and family offices. 9. Panel "Family Office Allocation Strategies: in What Assets do APAC Family Offices invest?" with Shiraz Poonevala, Director Investment @ GP Group. 10. Panel "How AI is changing venture building" with Toby Cox, Partner & Chief Venture Technologist @ Paloma Ventures , portfolio valued at $250M+. 11. The Transformation Factor for Breakthrough Startup-Team Performance – Ariya Chittasy, Director @ Engenesis Ventures, Australian Venture Builder that has worked with 800+ startups. 12. Why venture studios might be interesting to Family Offices in the APAC region? – Keirn O'Connor, Single Family Office. Other speakers and moderators: Kate Park, Reporter @ TechCrunch; Leesa S., Managing General Partner @ R3I CAPITAL; Jeremy Au 区汉辉, COO of Lucence & Host of BRAVE Southeast Asia Tech podcast; Sunil Goyal YourNest Venture Capital; Subham Panda @ Xartup. More speakers will be announced soon. Tag relevant VCs, family offices & founders in APAC.

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🎙️ Had a blast joining Lior Atias on his podcast, delving into the world of growth lending investments. We discussed which companies can benefit from this funding alternative, key considerations before taking a loan, what is good timing, and useful insights for navigating this dynamic landscape. We even wrapped up with an optimistic tone, which is quite valuable these days. Check out the episode (Hebrew) in the first comment. #GrowthLending #Funding #FinanceInsights 🌱

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Super excited to welcome back Prof Aswath Damodaran for a second year on TRIUM Angels Ascend Program and R3i Venturers. 9 Key Takeouts from our workshop on #StartupValuation 1. Numbers Meet Storytelling: Every valuation starts with a narrative. You can't understand a company's value if you don't know the story behind it—whether it's a growth market, a disruptive force, or a brand with cultural cachet. Your company isn't just about products and financials; it's about where it's going and why. 2. Revenue Growth & Target Margins: Growth potential is sexy, but profitability is the goal. Investors care about the path to target margins. Can you scale without bleeding cash? Show them the road—profitable, and efficient. 3. The Corporate Lifecycle: Understand where the company is—startup, growth, maturity. Different phases need different strategies, different stories. Not every company is meant to be the next Nvidia, but every company needs to understand where it stands. 4. A Good Narrative: Keep it simple, make it compelling, and hook the audience. Nobody remembers buzzwords, but they do remember a powerful story about unmet needs and market gaps. Make it memorable, not just measurable. 5. The Runaway Story: Charismatic leadership, disrupting an unliked status quo, with a bonus benefit for society? That's a formula for a runaway narrative. People root for the underdog—and that includes the market, sometimes even irrationally. But be careful—don't let hype override rationality. 6. Check the Narrative Against Reality: A great story is compelling, but it’s even better when backed by numbers and common sense. Always pressure-test your narrative—does it hold up to market dynamics, macro factors, and historical precedent? 7. Link Story to Value: If it doesn’t impact cash flow or risk, it doesn’t impact value. Make sure every part of your story affects a key value driver—revenue, margins, reinvestment. The narrative must translate into financial outcomes. 8. Keep Feedback in the Loop: Defending your narrative without critique is a one-way ticket to poor decisions. Open yourself to opposing views—have the people who disagree with you the most challenge your assumptions. Hubris kills investors. 9. Be Ready to Adapt: Market conditions change, competition moves, your strengths may turn into weaknesses. Always be ready to adjust the narrative—because what works today may not work tomorrow. Huge thanks to Professor Aswath Damodaran sharing knowledge this #Deepavali on TRIUM Angels program. What does it take to be the most loved Corporate Finance Professor on the planet? A heart of #servantleadership, #passion, #humility, and a consistent commitment to  #accessibility, #disruption, and #excellence. The spirit of TRIUM Global Executive MBA and our fellow alumni at NYU Stern School of Business HEC Paris and The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) shines brightly this #deepavali.

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Weekly Update: Had an interesting week 1. Got a response back from someone on Uber Press Team 2. Finished up an exciting content collab call 3. Attending a Private Fireside virtually- with Garry Tan of Y Combinator 4. Planning for a demo day in Singapore 5. Coming up on 4 years of Business Podcast by Roohi in late May/ early June Power of creating content, and posting it is so powerful Will be sharing more such updates every week

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Founders raising for the first time? This is an awesome guide. 👀⤵️ All credits to Brian Ortiz 👏🏽 #firstdegree #founders #investors
#alwaysbelearning #sharingiscaring #changethewaywework

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This is so important to call out Chang (CK) Kim. It’s such a rat race in the Valley. When you surround yourself with people working in corporate big tech who are paid big salaries and stock, you can feel so small and broke as a startup founder trying to build something. You envy them for them for their stability and income, but they envy you because you’re pursuing your dreams. You can often feel like a failure because you can’t provide the same things for yourself or your family. At least in Silicon Valley there are many other founders around and people understand what you are doing. I remember when, in places like New York or Los Angeles, saying you’re a founder at a dinner party might as well be saying you have an infectious disease or are unemployable. I remember turning down invites to glamorous weddings in exotic destinations because I just couldn’t afford it on my startup budget. It wasn’t until I started surrounding myself with other founders who could relate to my experience that I was able to be in a better mental space and stop questioning my self-worth. Of course you will still compare yourself to your founder peers when they raise a new round or have an exit, but you’re rooting for them at the same time, because you hope that will be you someday. There’s a fellowship among struggling founders, because they’re the only ones who understand the rollercoaster of emotions you go through every single day. You can literally be happy one moment because you closed a huge deal and terrified the next because a key employee hands you their resignation letter. This is the biggest reason I started the Asian American Founder Circle, because we as founders had a whole separate load of baggage we had in common. Find your people, you’ll be better off when you realize you’re not alone.

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The “chiriakhana (zoo)” of angel investors The Angel investor ecosystem WA is abuzz with debates about Vinod Khosla’s recently made statement that 90% investors add no value to their investment and 70% detract value. They inspired the title from the legendary director Satyajit Ray’s old thriller movie about the idiosyncrasies of a highly heterogeneous group of people in one contained colony… aka the angel investment ecosystem. Here’s my take on the different types of Angel investors. Any resemblance to anyone specific in my angel networks is, of course, purely coincidental if not totally unintended. 1. The “Divine angels”- they are the God’s gift to founders - those who strike up a close relationship with founders and get involved on a regular basis from making connects, to brainstorming ideas to being an agony aunt/uncle. They are a rare breed. 2. The “main bhi CEO”s- these are the ultra intrusive folks who gun for 100% credit of success, 0% of failure with 5 % of effort. Founders suffer them due to SHA constraints before being compelled to rudely refuse the persistent advances. 3. The “impact players” - these investors only get deeply active during critical events like fund raises, big business pivots etc. Founders may dislike them when challenged but sometimes grudgingly respect them post facto. 4. The “main bhi angel”s - they are typically the victims of peer pressure in funding someone familiar with a “change the world” story, usually having to write those initial (mis)adventures off and retreating into inactivity before falling again for FOMO. Failed founders, if contactable, have to deal with their “how could this happen” lament. 5. The “equal opportunity” investors - blessed with large corpuses they invest in anything that sounds interesting … law of averages inevitably catches up with them. Founders love them as much for the money as for their indifference. 6. The “probability punters” - they follow their own versions of optimum portfolio size aspiring to improve the abysmal probability of success by leveraging multiple levels of curation through experts and platform processes in addition to their own instincts. They may wear the hats of “impact players” and “divine angels” for a few of their investments. 7. The “Shashi Tharoor” investors - typically tenured large company professionals who have ill adjusted to the start up ecosystem…they attempt to apply mega businesses idioms to fledging startups leading to incredulous founders and co investors. 8. The “consultant uninvestor” - they love the sound of their own voices and on angel platforms typically ask questions which are longer than the answers and, unsurprisingly, find very few ventures worthy of investing in. Many angel investors are like chameleons.. they can change their colours for different founders. But all of them are convinced that they are at least always in the 30% and on a good day in the 10% as per Mr. Khosla’s definitions. We are all exceptions.

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