Burrp Story–Deep Conversation With Deap Ubhi [UnPluggd Video]

Burrp is celebrating its 5th anniversary this week and the startups’ story is something really important to know – especially given all the stories surrounding the valuation/funding etc.

At UnPluggd3, Deap Ubhi shared insights regarding Burrp, the funding story, rejections etc and we strongly recommend you to watch his talk.

A few highlights:

- 50L lasted 19 months.

- We were rejected by Battery Ventures, Accel Partners, IAN, KPCB and pretty much every VC across the board

- ibibo acquisition story.

- Few team members were not cool with the acquisition. A painful time in our existence.

 

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CEO of Wealink Resigned, Professional Social Network in China Still Uncertain?

We wrote a lot about Chinese professional social networks recently. It seems that the local market is really boosted by the IPO of Linkedin. Especially for those new comers such as Dajie, UShi, Hengzhi which are either raising more money or claiming millions of users. Every player feels very positive about the market, except one man who is actually the truly veteran working on this field for years. It is Lerry Zou, the founder and CEO of Wealink, one of the oldest and leading Chinese Linkedin. We’ve just been told he had resigned and also left the company to start a new project.

Lerry were talking to us about the market, and it’s only 1.5 month ago. In that interview Lerry shared lots of honest experience and thoughts on doing a Linkedin in China. But after 4 years’ trying, the decision made by Lerry is, surprisingly, a Give-up, even at the time when the market is about to heat up.

We called Lerry and he confirmed his leaving. As for his new startup, he said it’s not ready for the public, yet. But he said, it’s still to do with the social networks, but it will focus on mobile. With his experience, I think it indeed makes sense.

Now the question is left to the rest of professional social network founders and the investors, do you still believe China needs a Linkedin? and how long can you stick for it? and how fast and efficient can you adapt the idea to Chinese market?

Related posts:

1. Wealink, 4 Years Experience on Chinese Professional Social Networks, A Slow Business
2. Tianji CEO Says It Is the Best Professional Social Network in China – Interview Part II
3. RenRen's Professional Social Network Launched, At The Same Day When Linkedin Reaches 100Millions Users

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Mobcent, Making SNS Available to Mobile Apps

If you are a mobile app developer, maybe you should check out Mobcent, who presented at Technode’s TNT event last Sunday.  Founded last October in Beijing, Mobcent provides tools  for mobile apps developers.   With a few lines of code, they can add the complete social network functions to their apps.

“Adding social network will naturally increase page-view of an app, and hence, its advertising revenue,” said James Zhao, co-founder of Mobcent, “Moreover, it is an effective way to increase user stickiness and user loyalty.”

Furthermore, as many of us might be aware of, adding social network also helps app developers to get user feedback and hence they can improve their apps accordingly.  And once an app has a group of loyal users, it is easy for the developers to launch a new app, by targeting the existing users in the social network.

However, the effectiveness still depends on the type of applications and how the developers manage their social networks, said James. He believes life style related mobile apps, such as those for travel, health and fitness, sport, etc., would benefit the most  from adding a social network, as most of their users have a need to discuss their experiences with others.

“We just provide the platform.  It still leaves to the developers to make their users active,” said James.  He expects 300 third party mobile apps will use Mobcent’s platform to build their social network by the end of this year, covering 2 million users.

Mobcent also provide the required servers and bandwidth, which is a good news for small developers.  ”Most app developer teams are small.  They cannot afford to pay for servers and bandwidth,” said James.  According to Youmi Mobile Ad network, 42% of mobile app developers are individuals and 28% are teams of 2-5 persons.  60% started their business in less than a year, said Analysys International.

 

Before starting his own company, James was VP for technology of Yicha, a leading mobile search company in China.  Apart from China, Yicha also has a strong presence in Japan, where it partners with Yahoo Japan to do mobile advertising.  Currently, Yicha earns over US$1 million a month from its Japanese operation.  James was responsible for building the technology platform.   “Market in Japan is very different from China.  Mobile advertising is very mature there.  All the rules are clear and the cost-per-click is much higher,” said James.

Japan is one of the first market in the world to introduce mobile ad and Yahoo Japan is one of the first to do it, said Sammy Hsieh, CEO of i-Click, an online market firm based in Hong Kong.

Currently, Mobcent focuses mostly in Chinese market, but soon it will also develop oversea markets.  ”In fact, many app developers in China are targeting oversea markets. English, Japanese and Korean version [of Mobcent's platform] will soon be ready,” said James.

 

 

 

 

 

Related posts:

1. New Mobile App Advertising Network Launches For Consumers To “Serendipitously” Discover Apps Online.
2. Yicha plans to list its Japanese division in Japan next year
3. Japanese DeNA Launched Mobage, the Mobile Social Game Platform for China

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Interview with Clare and Mag from blogshop Her Velvet Vase

Did you know? is a project targeted at spreading the spirit of entrepreneurship through sharing success stories about entrepreneurs in Singapore. It was done by five youthful individuals, Grace, Kimberly, Ki Wan, Siyu and Yiyuan who are deeply interested in entrepreneurship. This video is republished with permission.

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Video: Chinese man made a huge toy tank, looks no different to a real one

Grown-ups also like toys, or more exactly, like the toys they create by their own. Mr Hao and his fellow team from Hangzhou, China, built a toy tank for themself, which is really hug, with weight of ten tons, and the size is the same as a real one. Only judging by the look, you at big chance think it is a real evil machine that could go to battle field and ruin human lives as easily as you kill an ant. The only difference it has to a real one is that it can’t carry out bombardment. No mention about how much it cost, Mr Hao said they took seven months in all to built it, from design to accomplishment.

[Source:youku]

• Video: Chinese Young Man made his iPad 3
• Transformer got Shanzhai-ed in China, Built from an old truck, 9.7 meters in height
• Funny DIY Device With Subtle Control of Steel Balls’ tracks
• Yet another Lego Mindstorms Rubik’s Cube Solver

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Indonesia Digest: TMG plans to expand to Jakarta, blocking 4shared, and more

Here you can find some interesting startup news from Indonesia, not only in its capital, Jakarta, but also other their tech startup hubs such as Yogyakarta, Medan, Surabaya, and many more. These listed news are taken from our partner, DailySocial, a leading blog on Indonesia’s tech startup scene.

(1) Singapore-based gaming company The Mobile Gamer (TMG) closes a series-A financing round of S$1 Million from India’s One97 Communications. With this financing round, TMG also plans to open up their Jakarta office and start hiring engineers to develop their games. This move shows their faith in the Indonesian gaming market, and for a good reason. “We are the biggest developer on mig33, which have over 27M users in Indonesia. We forecast that 70% of our total users/growth comes from Indonesia,” Alvin said to us via email.

(2) Minister of Communication and Informatics, Tifatul Sembiring states that the ministry haven’t blocked any sites after the official initiative announcement a few weeks ago, although they’re focused on blocking big sites like 4shared.

(3) A service manager and financial planning company called NgaturDuit working with Detik to provide financial facilities check-up.

(4) Not wanting to be beaten by the innovation of Sony Ericsson and Universitas Bunda Mulia (UBM)’s M-Campus, Telkomsel and Research in Motion (RIM) Indonesia as principal of BlackBerry announced Mobile Campus for Universitas Pelita Harapan (UPH). The app is developed by Better-B and only took three months to be completed.

(5) Now there’s a local daily deals site from Surabaya called MurahRek.com. The name already carries the charm of its city of origin. MurahRek.com isn’t that different from other deals sites and the offerings are even similar (food, spa, restaurants, car wash, travel, etc.) and the discounts are quite attractive, ranging from 50% to 90%.

(6) Former Yahoo! Indonesia Country Editor Budi Putra and Jimmy Kembaren (also ex-Yahoo) announced their new project, and sure enough it’s a blog. Sort of.

(7) Jogjakarta based gaming company SoybeanSoft announced their strategic partnership with East Ventures. SoybeanSoft is a multiplatform game developer focusing on the local market such as ‘Hunter Story’, an action-RPG for the web, iOS and Android.

This has been brought to you by SGE and DailySocial. DailySocial is a blog that covers the Indonesian tech startup scene. They publish in both Indonesian and English.

Thank you to nordicfactory for the flag image.

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Social enterprise Post Museum is now history

Post Museum, a social enterprise in Singapore that provides a platform for community causes and the arts, has closed shop on August 7, after four years of existence. The venue hosted a regular soup kitchen, NGO talks, and even a beer festival. It also has studio spaces for artists in residence.

According to newspaper Today, they are not the first of such cultural spaces to disappear recently. Blackhole, a community space focusing on music, lifestyle, and the arts, was shut down last September. Evil Empire, an eclectic arts space which holds events like a drawing contest and faux auction, followed suit in April this year.

One reason Post Museum has shut down was because they could not get enough funding to cover their costs. The co-founders only accept money from donors who give them complete control for their projects. Most of their funding is crowd-sourced.

Jennifer Teo told Channel NewsAsia: “For a lot of spaces and…activities and events that get corporate funding, there are always compromises they need to do. We actually don’t. We’d rather not get the money. There’s always a need for people to be independent from greater influences.” Another reason was the lack of manpower. They were unable to find someone to take over or help manage it.

But we won’t be seeing the last of Jennifer and partner Tien Wei, as they are planning to do one-off events in different venues and countries. The new initiative will be called OutPost.

Photo: An photo exhibition at Post Museum. By Aameerule

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Introducing: The Appnomy Conference For App Developers [August 27th, Bangalore]

Pluggd.in team is glad to announce the launch of ‘Appnomy Conference’ – a 1-day event dedicated towards app ecosystem in India.

The current state of App Ecosystem in India

Like product startups, the app ecosystem is still in its infancy, though the good news is that Indians are among the top consumers of apps. But unfortunately, we aren’t the top producers – and that has to change.

Look at a typical app developer’s mindset – for them, app development process ends with submitting the app in the app store. There hardly is any marketing/sales effort, and most of the times its ‘spray and pray’ approach.

And we believe that this needs to be changed. App developers need to really look at app development as any other product business and that’s the notion we’d like to bring on.

Introducing- The Appnomy Conference.

Date: August 27th, 2011 [Saturday].

Venue: The Oxford PG & UG College, HSR LAYOUT CAMPUS, No.32, 19th Main, 17th ‘B’ Cross, Sector IV, HSR Layout, Bangalore 560 102 [map link]

Appnomy Agenda

Like UnPluggd, the focus will be on insightful content – mix of entrepreneur journey and app showcase.

Here is the broad agenda:

10 AM – 1 PM: Talks by Entrepreneurs (Mobile industry) regarding their startup journey/challenges faced.

1-2PM: Lunch.

2 PM – 6 PM: AppTalks + App Demos.

Similar to UnPluggd, Appnomy Conference will have a showcase of apps developed by Indian app developers and if you are one, do submit your app here (last day to submit is August 22nd).

As far as talks are concerned, we will share the detailed agenda very soon. But be assured that these will be straight-from-the-heart talks by entrepreneurs from mobile industry.

Game? Book your tickets right away.

Discounts?

Hop here (http://www.appnomy.com/appnomy-conference-tickets). Use the discount code “FREEDOM” to avail 20% discount on tickets (valid only till August 15th).

So See you @Appnomy Conference – If you are an app developer and really serious about building an app business, you can’t really afford to miss this.

Got questions/suggestions? Do let us know in the comment section.

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BlackBerry PlayBook brings localized Music Store app to Singapore

Research in Motion (RIM) together with 7digital have brought over nine million tracks to BlackBerry PlayBook users in Singapore through their new Music Store app. The launch of the first localized music store on a tablet called for a celebration at TAB, Orchard Road, last night. According to John Leung who overseas sales and marketing in the Philippines, Singapore and other emerging markets, “It’s a first for Singapore, it’s a first for a tablet and it’s a first for BlackBerry.”

With this music store in place, it makes RIM the manufacturer of the first tablet in Singapore to have a dedicated music store for users who will now be able to purchase their music in Singapore dollars and with a Singapore credit card without any complications. On top of the that, the songs are bought DRM-free through arrangements that 7digital has with the local music labels. The localized music store services are available in the US, UK, Australia and now Singapore. RIM has not revealed which country is next on their road map for the music store but have hinted that they are working closely with 7digital to expand their services to their users.

According to John, Singapore was chosen as the first Asian country because ”The actual appetite for paying for music, downloading music, smartphone usage, tablet usage in Singapore is number one in terms of penetration. So strategically it was a perfect fit.” With over 300,000 registered BlackBerry developers, the platform and the tablet itself looks to be a major contender in the tablet wars. ”We believe it is the best, ultra-portable tablet you can get on the market. Not only because of the music store but you have got an awesome browser that is fully Flash and HTML compliant. We have got multimedia experience that is to die for. That music store adds on to that,” said Oliver Pilgerstorfer who manages RIM’s public relations in Southeast Asia.

A short demo from John highlighted some of the key features in the PlayBook. One interesting application is the BlackBerry Bridge which is creates a secure bluetooth connection between your PlayBook and BlackBerry smartphone. In addition to providing data connectivity via your smartphone’s telecommunication contract, it also allows you to use the PlayBook to access documents and media files that are stored on the phone. This allows you to run, for example, videos taken on your BlackBerry smartphone on the seven inch screen of the PlayBook. Other features that are accessed through the BlackBerry Bridge it full email, BlackBerry Messenger and the calendar app.

The event was held in style with a good lineup of entertainment. The highlight was, of course, the three PlayBooks RIM had out for grabs. One through a lucky draw and two by holding a deejaying competition that showcased the music capabilities of the tablet. The event had a strong focus on RIM but we felt that a lot more content could have been added to draw better attention to the PlayBook and it’s capabilities as a consumer product.

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