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Indonesian start-up founders still look to Singapore for first leg up
The city-state is still Asia Pacific’s best sandbox for early-stage start-ups, but other countries in the Southeast Asian region are becoming more competitive, tech industry insiders say.
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Singaporean Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat delivers his opening address at SWITCH 2022. (Enterprise Singapore/-)
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espite a slowdown in investment, Singapore is still Asia Pacific’s best sandbox for early-stage start-ups, but other countries in the Southeast Asian region are becoming more competitive, tech industry insiders say.
Indonesian founders admit that a presence in the city-state remains important for attracting pre-seed and seed funding from foreign investors.
“To get early-stage funding, we need an international presence, and Singapore is important in that sense. Not every start-up needs a Singapore presence, but if we have a Singapore company involved, we have better access to international funding,” said Imam Karnohartomo, CEO of FitHappy, a wellness start-up in the pre-seed round.
The shock of the pandemic, as well as current macroeconomic turbulence, have done little to stop Singapore’s dominance; the country was ranked first in Asia Pacific and seventh in the world in StartupBlink’s 2022 Global Startup Ecosystem Index.
However, Peter Ong, chairman of Enterprise Singapore — a government agency for enterprise development — said at the Singapore Week of Innovation & Technology 2022 (SWITCH) on Thursday that “fundraising and listing prospects had become less favorable”.
Ong revealed that Singapore has minted four unicorns so far in 2022, which is significantly fewer than last year’s 11, and the US$11.4 billion worth of deals closed in the country up to the third quarter also marks a decrease from $11.6 billion in the same period of last year.
Read also: Singapore beats Hong Kong as Asia’s top finance center
