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https://asia.nikkei.com/Editor-s-Picks/Interview/Fund-backed-by-Li-Ka-shing-sees-gold-in-Southeast-Asia?utm_campaign=GL_asia_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_source=NA_newsletter&utm_content=article_link&del_type=1&pub_date=20220831190000&seq_num=20&si=44594 Fund backed by Li Ka-shing sees gold in Southeast Asia Horizons Ventures' co-founder Chau also eyes Japan 'women-centric' startups Horizons Ventures is spreading its wings to Singapore where the company has set up its first overseas office. (Courtesy of Horizons Ventures) FRANCES CHEUNG, TAKESHI KIHARA, Nikkei staff writersAugust 31, 2022 16:50 JST HONG KONG -- Horizons Ventures, the private investment arm of Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing, is diversifying its U.S.-focused portfolio by beefing up deals in Southeast Asia while targeting "women-centric" investments in Japan, its co-founder says. With over 140 active investments in 17 countries, the company has about one-third of its bets in the U.S. But the Hong Kong-based group has bolstered its presence in Southeast Asia with the launch of a Singapore office earlier this year. "We have started a Southeast Asia cluster with a different focus: We want to see if we could fast-track a lot of new technology into the incumbent manufacturers," said Solina Chau, the fund's co-founder and a longtime business partner of Li, in a recent interview with Nikkei Asia. Southeast Asian startups raised at least $25.7 billion in funding last year -- nearly three times that of 2020 -- yet deal volume posted a sharp decline in the second quarter of this year on the back of souring macroeconomic trends, according to financial news website DealStreetAsia. "A lot of [venture capital] funds raised funds before the market was hit hard, so everyone is sitting on funds and not investing," said the 61-year-old Chau, who described the current economic turmoil as a "shakeout event" that would see weaker players fall. Solina Chau, co-founder of Horizons Ventures in 2005, is a prominent businesswoman and a confidante of Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing. (Photo by Takeshi Kihara) Against these global headwinds, some deep-pocketed companies have seized the moment to ramp up investments in emerging Southeast Asian markets. In June, Sequoia Capital announced it had raised $2.85 billion for investments in India and Southeast Asia. "There is a strong sense in the emerging economies and fast-changing societies across India and Southeast Asia that 'now is our time,'" Sequoia said on its blog. "Many large companies with regional and global footprints will emerge from this region in the decade to come." Horizons, co-founded by Chau in 2005, made its name with early investments in videoconferencing company Zoom and voice recognition software Siri, both lucrative bets for the now 94-year-old Li. The spotlight has turned to Chau, who helms the company and is kicking off a new business strategy. Horizons has two dozen investments across Pan-Asia, with 12 in Australia, five in Indonesia and seven in India. The newly opened Singapore office is the company's first outside Hong Kong and aims to support its portfolio companies' development in Southeast Asia. But the expansion has stoked rumors about the company relocating altogether as Hong Kong witnesses an exodus of talent and capital amid strict COVID-19 measures and two years after the installation of a Beijing-imposed national security law. Chau dismissed the idea that Horizons was looking to decamp from tax-friendly Hong Kong. "Our company is small. We have 20-something people. How many people am I going to relocate?" Chau replied when asked about the speculation. "I was born and bred in Hong Kong. ... [And] until the tax structure changes, it is still a very interesting place to be." Beyond diversifying across locations, Horizons is also eyeing new investments centering on sustainability and women-focused projects. "Do you have science [that can produce] formula milk that is better than breast milk? What's better for the world and better for the women?" Chau said. "It's what we are working on and building a cluster on that." Across the 146 countries covered by the World Economic Forum's latest gender-gap report, Japan was at the top of the list for gender parity in educational attainment. But it fell drastically to the 121st spot in the subindex of economic participation and opportunity -- worse than Congo. "There's a lot of unsaid discrimination in Japan against women founders," Chau said, quoting the female founder of a Japanese company in Horizons' portfolio. "We have an interesting [investment] focus in Japan [that] is totally women-centric." Japan is a rising star in Horizons' portfolio as it boosts a commitment to women's empowerment with investments in three female-founded businesses: Japanese venture capital fund MPower Partners, space startup ALE and dermatology research group Nanoegg. The Japanese government is moving to boost the country's startup scene by creating a ministerial post to oversee innovation policies, with a plan to increase the number of startups tenfold in five years. The ambitious strategy involves channeling public funds into promising ventures, though the government already has a huge national debt. "It is another big bureaucracy to solve a big problem," Chau said of the ministerial appointment. "[A] check is very important but your corporations have money too." Tokyo should bring together academics, startups and big companies to kick-start the sector, she added. "Time and dedication from the government are as important as their money," Chau said. "Japan should be a dynamo in the innovative startup world. There is so much deep science, like Europe."

https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Food-Beverage/Southeast-Asia-s-coffee-buzz-brews-opportunity-for-Suntory-Nestle?utm_campaign=GL_JP_update&utm_medium=email&utm_source=NA_newsletter&utm_content=article_link&del_type=4&pub_date=20211119090000&seq_num=8&si=44594 Southeast Asia's coffee buzz brews opportunity for Suntory, Nestle Region's growing middle class dumps sweet teas for low-sugar drinks A woman drinks her coffee at a rabbit cafe in Bangkok. © Reuters JUNYA HEMMI, YUKI KITAHARA and MARIMI KISHIMOTO, Nikkei staff writersNovember 19, 2021 06:58 JST TOKYO/BANGKOK-- Some of the world's biggest beverage groups smell fresh growth opportunities in Southeast Asia, where health-conscious consumers are passing over customary sweet teas for low- or no-sugar coffees. Japan's Suntory Beverage & Food introduced its Boss coffee brand -- known in Japan for commercials starring American actor Tommy Lee Jones -- to Thailand this month, offering three flavors, including black. Their price range reflects the rise of the region's booming middle class. The Boss coffee sells for 25 baht to 35 baht ($0.77 to $1.07) per bottle, a premium of about 20% over the typical canned coffee in Thailand. The brand is aimed at "white-collar workers and others who like premium drinks," a spokesperson for the Suntory Holdings soft drink unit said. Thailand is an important market for Suntory Beverage & Food. Drink sales there and in Vietnam drove half of its Asia-Pacific revenue of 215 billion yen ($1.88 billion) for the January-September period, up 11% on the year. A Starbucks in Bangkok: Nestle will sell bottled and canned Starbucks drinks in Southeast Asia. (Photo by Marimi Kishimoto) The Japanese company will use the tea distribution network it developed through joint ventures since the 2010s with local partners as well as PepsiCo. Possible moves going forward include taking coffee drinks elsewhere in the region. Rising incomes in the region give its coffee market growth potential. The middle class in the 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations will reach 350 million people in 2030, more than double the 2015 total of 135 million, according to a 2021 report from the Hawaii-based East-West Center and other researchers. Middle-income people are projected to account for 51% of these countries' total population in that year. Consumer behavior is also changing. Sweet teas have long found favor in a region known for its hot and humid climate and spicy foods. But in recent years, consumers, especially urbanites, are moving to black coffee and other no- or low-sugar alternatives. Rising health awareness during the COVID-19 pandemic has quickened this trend. "I'm avoiding sweetened and flavored drinks, so I drink straight black coffee," said a 35-year-old Bangkok office work, who says she drinks a cup a day. The introduction of so-called sugar taxes on sweet drinks has also played a role. These levies implemented between 2017 and 2019 in Thailand, the Philippines and Malaysia have "helped drive consumers toward no- or low-sugar coffee," said an industry source. Nestle, the world's biggest food and drink group, is set to bring bottled and canned Starbucks beverages that have been popular in other parts of the world to Southeast Asia next year. The Swiss giant will sell Doubleshot, Frappuccino and other drinks through supermarkets and online retailers, tapping both its own bottling plants and local producers. The company will "benefit from new growth opportunities" in the ready-to-drink business that is "attracting new and younger consumers," it said in a statement. Suntory's Japanese rival Asahi Group Holdings is expanding its Wonda coffee brand in the region, launching instant coffee -- the company's first -- in Malaysia this October, complete with a halal certification for the Muslim-majority market. The company, which sells Wonda products in Singapore and Brunei, will consider also selling instant coffee in other markets. Demand for coffee is expected to continue to grow in the region, home to major coffee bean exporters Vietnam and Indonesia. The market in eight Southeast Asian economies is on track to reach $8.1 billion in 2026, up 14% from the 2020 level, according to research firm Euromonitor. For multinationals eyeing the region's coffee drinkers, "the biggest challenge is price," according to a manager at Asahi Group Holdings. Lower prices than in Japan or Western markets make "turning a profit difficult," this person added. Additional reporting by Rintaro Hosokawa in Vienna.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Belt-and-Road/Southeast-Asia-s-Belt-and-Road-rail-hopes-beset-by-delays?utm_campaign=GL_asia_daily&utm_medium=email&utm_source=NA_newsletter&utm_content=article_link&del_type=1&pub_date=20211111190000&seq_num=20&si=44594 Southeast Asia's Belt and Road rail hopes beset by delays Only small fraction of Thailand's segment completed after 4 years A rail line from Kunming, China, to Vientiane, Laos, is slated to open on Dec. 2. But other parts of the pan-Asia railway face setbacks. (Photo by Vientiane Times) MARIMI KISHIMOTO, Nikkei staff writerNovember 11, 2021 02:41 JST BANGKOK -- Much fanfare greeted a Chinese plan to connect Southeast Asia through more than 3,000 km of high-speed rail when it arrived in Thailand in 2017. But on the ground near one of its many pieces, the project has so little visibility that a train station attendant struggled to find it. "A construction site for high-speed rail?" the mystified attendant in Nakhon Ratchasima, a two-hour drive north of Bangkok, said last month. "I don't know where it is." The site, only about 100 meters from an existing rail line, had been graded but no rails had been laid. Nor is this the only delay for a project touted as a centerpiece of China's Belt and Road infrastructure initiative. The rail network, variously referred to as the Kunming-Singapore Railway or the Pan-Asia Railway, is supposed to begin in Kunming in southern China and snake through Southeast Asia, ending in Singapore. Once completed, it would give China an artery to move goods and people from a landlocked province all the way to the tip of the Malay Peninsula. In Thailand, the 250 km stretch between capital Bangkok and Nakhon Ratchasima was designated as the first segment. The groundbreaking ceremony in December 2017 was attended by Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and other senior officials. But after nearly four years, only 3.5 km of rail has been laid. Nowhere to go: A section of rail in Thailand's Nakhon Ratchasima province had yet to be laid in October 2021. (Photo by Marimi Kishimoto) The first section was supposed to go into operation this year. Now the start date has been pushed back to 2026, according to the latest schedule by Thailand's Ministry of Transport. Because of delays, the second section connecting Nakhon Ratchasima with the Laotian border will not go into service until 2028. The project to build the section going south from the Thai capital to the Malaysian border has been put on hold. "Construction has been delayed because Chinese engineers can't enter the country due to COVID, as well as delays in land acquisition," said Pichet Kunathamaraks, deputy director-general of the transport ministry's Department of Rail Transport. The section connecting Kunming and the Laotian capital of Vientiane -- the only segment whose construction proceeded on schedule -- is due to begin service Dec. 2. China led that phase and covered 70% of the costs. The segment was completed in roughly five years. Elsewhere, setbacks have been frequent. Plans to build the 350 km segment linking Singapore and the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur were officially halted in January. The two countries formally agreed to the construction in 2013, but former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad froze the project in 2018. Despite efforts to renegotiate the terms of the project, the parties could not come to an agreement before the December 2020 deadline. For the Malaysian segment connecting the city of Kota Bharu in the north to Port Klang in the west, less than a quarter of the construction had been finished by the end of August. Completion is expected to be pushed back by a year from the current target of the end of 2026. The delays will sway the profitability of the various segments, which rely heavily on Chinese financing. Laos estimates that it will take 30 years after starting rail services to pay back the debt for building the line within its border. But that projection depends on receiving enough income from connections to surrounding countries. The spotty construction of the remaining segments will virtually guarantee that ridership will be weak. Some have expressed concern that Laos may be unable to pay back the loans and fall into a debt trap, in which China will take over the rights on a key piece of infrastructure. But for China, too, the ambitious rail project would lose strategic value as a major logistics artery if it remains incomplete. With the Chinese economy showing signs of slowing, there are indications that Belt and Road projects will not be immune to budget scrutiny. How long China will continue to provide financial assistance is unclear.

can't imagine the whole lot of exotics in sg, the programme sheet says that they would only be in sg for a day before leaving for KL. heads up, malaysian TP! they'd better catch some previews on youtube before the event man! they would only be parading with their cars down orchard road. no racing on ecp, kpe or whatsoever lol. http://www.cannonball8000.com/sea/rally-2009/route.php for prospective participants.