ARTICLE PUBLISHED BY DIGITAL NEWS ASIA 8/10/2021

 

Since March 2020, 1337 Ventures has organized eight different digital accelerators under its Alpha Startups™ Digital Accelerator (ASDA), and has just announced their Top 10 teams out of 74 hopefuls for their Demo Day for Cohort 38. At the Demo Day on Oct 15^th 1337 Ventures and Amanz Media will be looking for the most promising startups to invest US$11,950 (RM50,000) into as seed funding. In addition, all the Top 10 startups can expect thousands of dollars in digital credits and infrastructure.

“It’s an exciting journey for us as startup founders turned investors. 1337 Ventures’ expertise and filters startup using trusted methodologies ensuring participants have reached a certain degree of polish, helps investors identify investment at a glance.” Ikhwan Nazri, CEO & Head of Creative of Amanz Media

Supported by Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) and Digital Penang, ASDA is designed to be flexible as almost 50% of the participants are currently employed elsewhere. Head of Education Programmes at 1337 Ventures, Kavidha Natarajan, says that the cohort started with 94 applicants, from which 71 were selected for Cohort 38. The Top 10 teams were selected from the best of the graduating 42 that successfully completed the programme.

“MDEC, as the lead digital economy agency of Malaysia, will always strive to support and create a conducive ecosystem for our startup industry to thrive in. Via effective collaborations with the private sector such as 1337 Ventures, we continue to share our expertise and know how to mentor companies, from pitching improvement, idea refinement to product-market fitting, in ensuring that they succeed. This will be crucial as we work towards economic recovery of the nation, in line with the goals of the 12^th Malaysia Plan and MyDIGITAL,” said Gopi Ganesalingam, Senior Vice President, Tech Ecosystems & Globalisation, MDEC.

Tony Yeoh, CEO of Digital Penang echoed similar sentiment, adding that “Digital Penang believes in partnering with professionals like 1337 Ventures, to create a more robust pipeline of startups, and looks forward to finding the first unicorn in Penang”.

“We’re looking for the trifecta of a good startup business, which is Desirability; that is something the market wants and needs, that looks and feels good. Then there’s Viability, which looks at business models, sustainability and market size. Finally, there’s Feasibility, which is talking about the team to make this happen, the tech behind it, and the resources needed. Underpinning all of this is timing, of course,” Bikesh Lakhmichand, CEO & Founding Partner of 1337 Ventures said.

The finalist teams will strive to convince a panel of judges, consisting of Bikesh, Ikhwan Nazri, CEO & Head of Creative at Amanz Media, Yvonne Yong Chuan Yin, Head of Startup, Innovation & Community Building at MDEC and Tony of Digital Penang

The Top 10 teams of the Alpha Startups™ Digital Accelerator (ASDA) Cohort 38 are:

Artmeet

Artmeet is developing a LinkedIn-like creative job marketplace to help SMEs increase recruitment efficiency and reduce costs with our free job advertisement solution and paid talent solution that can filter the right candidates in seconds.

Cabvisiontech

Cabvisiontech Sdn Bhd is developing a holistic hotel solution to help hotels increase sales and customer retention as well as managing the backend processes to increase productivity and reduce operating cost to have higher profitability by converting 18 years of operations experience into a smart AI digital assistant.

Cikguu

Cikguu is a social network where everyone can ask questions and book lessons with experts.

MyFitTech

MyFitTech Sdn Bhd is developing an AI app for hyper-personalized workout solutions to provide sustainable fitness results. This platform will ultimately be the heart of the Internet of Fitness Things (IoFT) for health & fitness shareable data.

OpenTunes

Open Tunes is developing an NFT platform to help music artist and producers to be able to market their work with the help of NFTs.

Qarbotech (UPM START-UP COMPANY)

Qarbotech has a patent-pending technology that can bio-hack leaves which helps agropreneurs grow their crops bigger, faster, healthier at a lower utility cost. Harvast is the technology that enhances the photosynthesis rate of plants by 30%. This translates to 30% increase in plant growth and 25% reduction in crop cycle. Harvast-treated crops have shown resilience to drought. Our technology can also help indoor farms to reduce their energy consumption by 40%.

Date of Input: 24/12/2021 | Updated: 24/12/2021 | asrizam