One of WIM2020 first day's speakers was Christine Tsai, who spoke as a founder and chief executive officer about emerging trends in the Global Tech Startup Ecosystem.
On December 9-12, EqualOcean was holding the World Innovators Meet (WIM) 2020. This year, the event's main topic was 'Technology and Innovation Connect the World.' WIM2020 gathered innovators from Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas to share their knowledge and key achievements, promoting the concept of 'Tech for Equal.'
"Innovation truly is global. That's why today I have this opportunity to share my insights with people all over the world and to follow Paul Romer, the Nobel Laureate in Economics. I think this concept is a mainstream one nowadays. Let's look back to 2010; technologies and innovation were concentrated in Silicon Valley, so everyone invested in Silicon Valley. But now, after 10 years, only those who are working in Silicon Valley still thinks that it's the best choice," joked Christine Tsai, CEO and Founder of 500 Startups and lead speaker for the Leadership Chapter.
To start, Christine told the WIM2020 audience about her venture capital firm that over 10 years has been investing around the world in about 2800 companies and portfolio companies from 78 countries. 500 Startups' mission is to uplift people and economies around the world through entrepreneurship. 500 Startups takes a different approach in framing an entrepreneur system that matters through cooperating with countries around the globe. 500 Startups has funds and accelerators that invest in the most talented entrepreneurs and people who just want to contribute to a healthy environment. The sectors that 500 Startups invest in depend on certain timeframes and what is on the top – for example, now these sectors include FinTech, mobility, fashion, AgriTech, supply chain, digital health, AI, etc.
Discussing how COVID-19 impacts on innovation and investors' gains, Christine Tsai reflected on a decade that has produced tremendous innovation. Although now it's too early to draw any conclusion about investors' gains specifically during this recession, we can see clearly that there are a number of gain making and industry-changing tech giants, such as WhatsApp, Uber, Venmo and Twilio, in each case, the startup showed an ability to adjust to a new reality. Christine added that for the early-stage global venture capital firms, huge shifts in consumer behavior mean huge opportunities to come and find solutions to respond to consumers' needs. Simply waiting for a capital opportunity to drop out of nowhere is very risky. It's a great time to be investing, but only 5% of companies make the effort to do it. Apart from deciding to take the risk to begin with, if the company's portfolio is also diversified, it gives an extra window to emerging trends around the world.
In terms of the impact of COVID-19 on VC investments, Christine Tsai claimed that many investors now are putting things on hold, because they don't know what will happen next, so they are not focusing on new investments, but on their own portfolios – in order to understand how each portfolio was impacted by this unknown condition and how to organize it to get revenue. Uncertainty – a condition that all the world experienced for 9 months. Now we have more understanding about COVID-19 in terms of what may probably happen in the technology and innovation field in 2021. For 91% of VC companies with major indexes going forward, investors will try to find new companies for investments, which means that now VC companies are keeping an eye on sectors that have been impacted by COVID-19. 500 Startups' team helped VC companies to break through the COVID-19 by this framework.
In the left box, in the short term, we can see a positive significant impact on demand for things like PPE; but this is flitting, it will not last for too long, and along with a negative impact on the oil and public transportation sectors, we can outline effects that will diminish when this situation is under control. In the right box, in the long term, we can see an accelerated future that means changing customers' needs and preferences, leading to wider adoption of innovative technologies, for example, HealthTech, FinTech, education, etc. The new normal means that sectors that declined during the COVID-19 will come back but in different forms such as the retail and hospitality industry. In terms of the accelerated future, the sectors that are changing now are the health care industry, education, ways of working, entertainment and supply chain. The health care industry has so many opportunities for developing technologies and innovation like telemedicine, mental health, remote monitoring, virtual hospital visits (mobile clinics). Education was influenced by COVID-19 as well – we saw a remote education system evolve fast, one that is supposed to be improved with regard to contents that should be appropriate and convenient for consumption remotely. Secondly, teachers and students should be more experienced in using technologies that were implemented to simplify the process of studying.
Concerning the way of working – some companies have chosen to work remotely until next year and some of them have chosen to go hybrid. Particularly, some tech giants like Google, Facebook, Uber, are going to work remotely all next year. As for entertainment, it will move to new forms. Theater and movies will be replaced by digital events, instead of sports outside there will be more e-sports, instead of gathering with friends, digital gaming, much of it means that there will be no need to leave your place. The supply chain is another sector that also has been changing under the impact of a pandemic in the accelerated future. The big things for a supply chain are being on time, crossing international borders without any obstructions. During a period of the pandemic when the borders are shut down, another important thing in the supply chain is centralized production. Now an emerging trend in the supply chain is training to localize production to boost automation, have transparency inside the supply chain. There are many opportunities for companies to optimize their operations with the help of improving their supply chain. It’s quite a stressful system that responds to many changes in the world. But the market is always looking forward to companies who have a better organized supply chain.
Christine Tsai and her 500 Startups team, as global investors, believe that the Chinese market has many talented founders and entrepreneurs, even when considering the 'many markets in the world' that they have invested in. The Chinese market is very well established, but still, there are so many things to be discovered for future investments. "We certainly value in our work collaboration with strong partners such as China. I think that in 2021 we will continue to find and help to support Chinese talented entrepreneurs and founders who are interested in cross-boarding and international experience investing, and to empower China's Startup Ecosystem. I think it's something that we are excited to do over 5-10 years," how Christine Tsai outlined her firm's plans for the Chinese market next year.
About WIM
Hosted by EqualOcean, the World Innovators Meet (WIM) (click to watch the online event on December 9-11, 2020) is a global event for innovators. It provides limitless opportunities to learn from and connect with the most sought-after technology pioneers.
About WIA
The World Innovation Awards (WIA) are announced at WIM to recognize game-changers across various industries and geographies. Selected by a committee of distinguished experts, entrepreneurs and investors, WIA are designed to acknowledge technology disruptors striving to make a positive impact on a global scale.
See this year's WIA lists and download the research reports in English and Chinese on EqualOcean and 亿欧智库 respectively.