Startup Talk

Le Xuan Nguyen
(There is a whole slide about this guy!)
Agenda

Introduction

Understanding startup financing

Startup ecosystem in Vietnam

Learn to disrupt from the best

Q&A
About me

Start the Integration into Vietnam

09/2019
Startup through the lens of investors
References

VC 101: How, What & Why VCs Do What They Do, Published on Nov 10, 2016, by Andrew Russ, Start-up &
Venture Capital Business Development, AWS

Private Equity and Venture Capital by Università Bocconi, taught by: Stefano Caselli, Vice Rector for
International Affairs

Venture capital, From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venture_capital

https://www.slidebooks.com/products/venture-capital-101?variant=20050791877
But wait … can I ask: “what is a startup?”
What is a start-up?

An early-stage venture founded by an entrepreneurial individual. A startup

venture is typically distinguished from an SME or lifestyle business by its
degree of innovation, disruptive capacity and…you guessed it, providing
(new) economic value.

https://www.quora.com/Whats-the-difference-between-startup-founders-and-entrepreneurs
What is Private Equity?
Private Equity is a source of financing (alternative for loans) and PE is an investment in
for equity in non-listed company (versus public company)
Benefits of Private Equity?
• Certification: Due to the long screening phase before deciding to invest in a
company, if the PEI finally does choose to invest in the venture-backed company, in
a way, that confirms the very high quality of the company’s accounts.

• Network: The PEI can give the company a very strong network, in terms of
suppliers, customers and banks therefore multiplying its possible contacts.

• Knowledge:
• Soft Knowledge: the capability to manage the business
• Hard Knowledge: the specific-field knowledge of a business, this applies
particularly to high-tech or pharmaceutical industries

• Financial: The financial benefit is generated through the injection of cash in return
for shares of the venture-backed company.
PE investment stages
Venture Capital Financing Stages
• The Seed Financing (Early): is the most complex and riskiest activity among the PE
investment. It is the investment of an idea or of an research and development (R&D)
project, it is in fact very industry-oriented

• The Startup Financing (Mid): is the financing of a new company starting its own initial
operations. The entrepreneurs and the founders’ need of cash derives from the necessity
to buy the necessary equipment to start (e.g. equipment, inventory, building, etc.) the
business.

• Early growth Financing (Late): is the financing of the first phase of growth of a new
company that has started generating sales. The entrepreneurs and the founders’ need of
cash derives from the necessity to buy inventory and to sustain the gap existing between
cash flow and money needed.
Startup scenes
Vietnam
Number of startups 500+ (92 deals in 2018, total $889Mil), projecting $2B in 2019
Top sectors Fintech, eCommerce, Travel, Media & Entertainment, Logistics,
Education
VC/CVC, Angel IDGVV, CyberAgent, Mekong Capital, 500 Startups, Monk’s Hill,
Dragon Capital, FPT Ventures, ESP Capital, Hatch Ventures,
VinaCapital Ventures, Viet Capital Ventures, Startup Viet Partners,
Vintech City (Vingroup Ventures), Grab Ventures
As&Is VIISA, TFI (Topica), Saola (500 Startups), Vietnam Silicon Valley, Zone
Startups, Expara Vietnam, SI-HUB, QTSC, SHTP Incubator
Co-working space Up, CirCo, Toong, WeWork, Dreamplex, Hive
Top startups VNG, Tiki, Foody, Topica, Momo, Sendo, Adayroi, Yeah1, Vexere,
Haravan, GHN, VnTrip, Base.vn, FastGo, Leflair, Logivan, Luxstay, Jio
Health, Propzy, Utop, TIMA, be group, F88
Top challenges for startups to execute

• Not enough technology workforce (most developers work in outsourcing industry

or in large tech conglomerates i.e. FPT, VNG, etc.) as well as shortage of product-
mindset engineers to deliver MVP with speed and quality

• Inability to build brand, culture and career development early to attract and
retain talents

• Insufficient scale from local markets that will help to push the valuation of
startups up for exits

• Technologies are considered quite expensive (when it’s good) and too low quality
(when it’s cheap)
Benefits of Private Equity? Remember this slide?
• Certification: Due to the long screening phase before deciding to invest in a
company, if the PEI finally does choose to invest in the venture-backed company, in
a way, that confirms the very high quality of the company’s accounts.

• Network: The PEI can give the company a very strong network, in terms of
suppliers, customers and banks therefore multiplying its possible contacts.

• Knowledge:
• Soft Knowledge: the capability to manage the business
• Hard Knowledge: the specific-field knowledge of a business, this applies
particularly to high-tech or pharmaceutical industries

• Financial: The financial benefit is generated through the injection of cash in return
for shares of the venture-backed company.
Learn to disrupt from the world’s largest start-up
WHERE INNOVATION STARTS
The
we start with the customer and
Institutional
work backwards

YES!
 AMAZON’S INNOVATION EQUATION

The (mechanisms * culture)

Institutional
f(innovation) = (org * arch)

YES!
 » Mechanisms
Working Backwards Process
Andon Cord
Correction of Error (COE)
How do we
organize for » Architecture
Micro-services Architectures
innovation? Loosely Coupled Applications
Self Service Platforms – No Gatekeepers

» Culture
Our People: we hire builders, innovators,
entrepreneurs
Our Beliefs: Amazon Leadership Principles

» Organization
Experimentation
Two Pizza Teams
 » Mechanisms
Working Backwards Process
Andon Cord
Correction of Error (COE)
How do we
organize for » Architecture
Micro-services Architectures
innovation? Loosely Coupled Applications
Self Service Platforms – No Gatekeepers

» Culture
Our People: we hire builders, innovators,
entrepreneurs
Our Beliefs: Amazon Leadership Principles

» Organization
Experimentation
Two Pizza Teams
Everyone of us
is a leader on
our mission
 » Customer Obsession
“Start every process with the customer and work
backwards.”

Our culture of » Long Term Thinking

innovation “Be stubborn on the vision but flexible on the details.”

» If you want to be inventive, you have to be

willing to fail.
“We are willing to go down on a bunch of dark alleys
and occasionally we find something that really works.”

» You have to be willing to be misunderstood

for a long time.
“We are very comfortable being misunderstood.”
 » Mechanisms
Working Backwards Process
Andon Cord
Correction of Error (COE)
How do we
organize for » Architecture
Micro-services Architectures
innovation? Loosely Coupled Applications
Self Service Platforms – No Gatekeepers

» Culture
Our People: we hire builders, innovators,
entrepreneurs
Our Beliefs: Amazon Leadership Principles

» Organization
Experimentation
Two Pizza Teams
WORKING FROM THE
The
CUSTOMER
Institutional
backwards
YES!
 The
Institutional
YES!
write the press release
 The
Institutional
YES!
write the FAQ
 » Mechanisms
Working Backwards Process
Andon Cord
Correction of Error (COE)
How do we
organize for » Architecture
Micro-services Architectures
innovation? Loosely Coupled Applications
Self Service Platforms – No Gatekeepers

» Culture
Our People: we hire builders, innovators,
entrepreneurs
Our Beliefs: Amazon Leadership Principles

» Organization
Experimentation
Two Pizza Teams
 Most Robust, Fully-Featured Technology Infrastructure Platform
HYBRID MARKETPLACE
ARCHITECTURE
Business Business DevOps
Security Networking Databases Storage
Apps Intelligence Tools
Integrated
Networking TECHNICAL & BUSINESS SUPPORT

Professional Partner Training & Solutions Account Security &

Support
Services Ecosystem Certification Architects Management Billing Reports

ANALYTICS APP SERVICES MOBILE SERVICES DEVELOPMENT & OPERATIONS IoT ENTERPRISE GAMING
Direct APPS
Connect Data Queuing & API One-click App
Rules 3D Game
Warehousing Notifications Gateway Deployment Virtual
Engine Engine
Desktops
Business Single Integrated
Intelligence Console DevOps Resource
Workflow Management Device Character
Hadoop/ Shadows Designer
Identity
Spark Sharing &
Identity Application Lifecycle
Collaboration
Federation Management
Streaming Data Device Multiplayer
Analysis Search Sync
SDKs Service
Containers
Streaming Data Mobile Corporate
Collection Analytics Email
Email Device Cloud
Machine Triggers Gateway Integration
Integrated Mobile App
App Learning Testing
Deployments
Elastic Push Resource Backup Twitch
Transcoding Registry
Search Notifications Templates Integration

SECURITY & COMPLIANCE

Key
Identity Monitoring Configuration Web application Assessment and Resource &
Data Backups Access Control Management &
Management & Logs Compliance firewall reporting Usage Auditing
Storage

CORE SERVICES
Compute Storage Databases Networking
VMs, Auto-scaling, Load Balancing, Object, Blocks, File, CDN Relational, NoSQL,
VPC, DX, DNS
Containers, Cloud functions Archivals, Import/Export Caching, Migration

Integrated
Resource INFRASTRUCTURE
Management
Availability Points of
Regions
amazon vertraulich
Zones Presence
 Evolution of Applications
LAYER PRE-2007 2007 - 2017 TO 2027

UX/UI The
Type/click Touch/text Multi-sense

Software
Institutional
Mostly “on-premise”

Servers &
SAAS adoption

Public & Private

Intelligent Applications

Serverless & Event-

Infrastructure

YES!
Datacenters Cloud driven
 » Mechanisms
Working Backwards Process
Andon Cord
Correction of Error (COE)
How do we
organize for » Architecture
Micro-services Architectures
innovation? Loosely Coupled Applications
Self Service Platforms – No Gatekeepers

» Culture
Our People: we hire builders, innovators,
entrepreneurs
Our Beliefs: Amazon Leadership Principles

» Organization
Experimentation
Two Pizza Teams
 Experiment Frequently
• AWS Services enable
The
experimentation via primitives
• Companies can build on
existing services
Institutional
• Rapid prototyping and iteration
are key
• Embrace failure YES!
 Two Pizza Teams
• Decompose to Primitive
Problems
The
• Single-threaded focus
• Small “Two Pizza Teams”
Institutional
• Enables self-directed teams
• Fosters ownership & autonomy
YES!
My learnings working for Amazon & VNG

 “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” – Peter Drucker

 “Managers light a fire under people; leaders light a fire in people.” –

Kathy Austin

 "Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships."

– Michael Jordan

 “The only competition that matters the most in life, is the one between
you and your old self.” – Edmond Mbiaka
Q&A – Thank you