Combining biology with technology
- The field of regenerative medicine will accelerate thanks to a partnership between 500-backed biotech startup Pandorum Technologies and Wipro, a company that provides AI-based solutions.
- Regenerative medicine is an alternative option for many patients awaiting donors for transplant.
- Together, the two companies aim to build an AI system that learns from Pandorum’s R&D data and provides actionable insights for the development of successful regenerative therapeutics to enable better outcomes for patients.
- Initially, the collaboration will focus on ‘bio-engineered liquid cornea’ and will expand across the product pipeline including lung and liver regenerative tissues.
- More details in the full article here.
Saying ‘No’ to say ‘Yes’
- Within two years of its launch, 500-backed StoreHub was presented with a customer opportunity that many startups dream of – Starbucks Malaysia approached the company for help to digitize its POS system.
- Co-founder and CTO Congyu Li recognized that this could be a million-dollar opportunity. However, the StoreHub team decided not to pursue the project, staying true to their mission: to build systems that empower underdogs like SMEs.
- Their tenacity paid off. Today, the startup serves over 15,000 F&B and retail SMEs across Southeast Asia. In 2020, the startup launched Beep Delivery to help F&B businesses run sustainable food delivery, enabling them to adapt to the pandemic.
- Congyu offers this advice to female founders: Surround yourself with a supportive community, and this includes finding like-minded co-founders, building a strong network of mentors and experts, and bringing in dependable investors.
- Read the full interview here.
Normalizing mental health talk for founders
- “Asians struggle in seeking help for mental health for three reasons: fear of judgment, cost of therapy, and seeing mental health as a clinical issue rather than an everyday one,” said Theodoric Chew of mental health startup Intellect at a DealStreetAsia event.
- Khailee Ng, managing partner of 500 Global added that in the startup world, founders tend to cocoon themselves. “(In) entrepreneurship…it’s about me and my success, then you realize I’m so special, I can’t even talk to my own wife about my problems because she’s not going to understand,” he said.
- In addition to normalizing getting professional help, the panelists suggested we can take simple steps to improve our well-being such as going for walks, drinking more water, and being kinder to ourselves.
- The speakers agreed that seeing it as something that can be addressed rather than a medical problem or disability will help, and we can start by calling mental health “brain health” instead.
- Read the full event recap in DealStreetAsia.
