Startups given venue to link businesses with investors

MATCH PH ROADSHOW

More than a hundred startup companies in the Visayas and Mindanao are encouraged to explore a venue or platform to link them with possible investors that can help scale up their businesses.

Jay Yuvallos, Philippine representative to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations Business Advisory Council (Asean BAC), made this call to startup companies in these areas especially the 148 startup companies present during the Cebu stop of the Meet ASEAN’s Talents and Champions (MATCH) Philippine Roadshow at the Radisson Blu in Cebu City on Tuesday.

“You guys are the champions. You are the potential. You are the game changers. Our goal is to connect your creative ideas to capital,” said Yuvallos, who is also the president of Interior Basic Export Corp.

The MATCH is a platform that aims to facilitate deal-making by showcasing ASEAN startups and growth enterprises and linking them to top local and global investors.

The roadshow is also a way for the Asean BAC to help these startups especially the 148 startups, who attended Tuesday’s event.

These startups come from sectors like food and agriculture; consumer and retail trade; business services; transport logistics and storage, healthcare and medtech; professional services; and information and communications technology.

How this is done — is through a curated deal-making MATCH portal that matches ASEAN enterprises to potential investors which could enhance their access to quality funding, expertise and networks.

Those interested can access this portal through https:// www.surveymonkey.com/r/ASEANMATCH. This is also where interested investors can access to see the list of companies they can invest in.

The other way of connecting startups to capital is through a MATCH conference under the Singapore Fintech Festival which will be held in Singapore in November.

The conference will feature keynote presentations and leadership dialogues by prominent entrepreneurs, founders and investors, and cover topics of interest like financing strategies and enterprise value creation.

The ASEAN BAC is organizing the MATCH Roadshow in partnership with the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), Go Negosyo, and SGV & Co (EY Philipines).

“When I heard that MAS will be having a MATCH Roadshow in the Philippines, I convinced them to come to Cebu. We have a very vibrant IT-BPM, tech startup industry ecosystem here in Cebu. They said prove it to us, and you all showed up,” Yuvallos said addressing the startups who attended the event.

Prior to the roadshow in Cebu, another one was held in Manila last Monday, July 9.

During the Cebu roadshow, SGV & Co Partner for Transaction Advisory Editha Viray-Estacio discussed about the different types of investors which include strategic investors who usually invest for long term and looks for startups that have synergies with their own businesses.

Estacio suggested that businesses should asses their own needs for investments.

For example, if they need investments as soon as possible, they should just consider borrowing from banks which will be faster.

For investments which can wait for one or two years, she said they can look at other opportunities like investors coming in.

But these investors may have some demands like taking over some of the operations of the company including majority of the shares of stakes of startups so these owners should also prepare for this.