Web 2.0 Expo is the place to track the trends on what is going on in the web world and they are having their first ever Startup Showcase to highlight new and upcoming companies. It might cost you a ticket and accommodation but if you have the right stuff in your start up this might be a “make it a break it” situation.

Submit your company to participate—deadline is August 2

This year at Web 2.0 Expo, we’re hosting our first ever Startup Showcase. Highlighting the startup ecosystem’s creativity and variety, the Showcase will give you a chance to get in front of hundreds of potential users and a couple of high-profile investors. On Wednesday night, September 29, we’re going to have approximately 30 startups demoing in one large room. We’ll provide you with a small table and room for two people to demo—you’ll bring a laptop (or two) and a founder (or two).

Expo attendees will have 50 minutes to see your demos (we’ll sound a chime every five minutes, letting people know it’s time to circulate). As they walk around, attendees will vote on their favorite demos. At the end of the hour, Tim O’Reilly (O’Reilly Media Inc.) and Fred Wilson (Union Square Ventures) will each announce their top pick along with the audience favorite. These three startups will then each give a pitch and have an on-stage conversation with Tim and Fred.

How do you qualify to participate? We’re looking for:

relatively young startups that aren’t drowning in investment (yet)
companies in all technology areas: hardware, software, B2B, B2C, mobile (just to name the most obvious categories)
If selected:

you’ll supply your own laptop for the demos (we won’t provide power, so we recommend bringing two laptops)
you’ll bring a maximum of two people (at least one of whom must be a founder or C-level equivalent)
the week prior to the event, you’ll supply us with a presentation of 2-4 slides that includes screenshots for your onstage pitch in case you are selected by Tim and Fred

An overview of marketing and branding for entrepreneurs in 6 parts – Part one, branding

Wikipedia tells us that “An entrepreneur is a person who has possession of a new enterprise, venture or idea and assumes significant accountability for the inherent risks and the outcome.” Which means that, as an entrepreneur, you are also responsible for most of your branding, marketing and advertising. These are vast areas of activity and we are trying to shed some light onto some of these issues that concern you. We can only focus on a few key things, but we aim at providing you with tips that you can utilize right away.

So, what’s a brand anyway?

Does your company have a brand? It sure does, as a brand is simply a synonym for “idea”. Let’s take a famous brand. “Google” for instance. All the name does is to spark a reaction for you to say “Search-Engine” or “Online Search”. When you start your business, you make a clear decision as to what the purpose of the firm is. That idea (see above) is your brand. When people see you, your logo and your other collateral, there should be a similar reaction. Your target audience should associate you with the service that you provide. Many people talk about branding in the context of an on-going activity. In our view, this is not the case. You define your brand once and then you keep working on making that brand successful. Only if the purpose of your company changes or if external factors force you to do so, you may have to “re-brand”. But then you are back to the same place where you have an idea that you need to communicate.

What does a brand look like?

Imagine an iceberg. Only 10 % stick out of the water. This is the portion that people will see. In the marketing context, that is your logo, advertisement, brochure etc. Underneath the surface lies the positioning, SWOT and PEST (SWOT = Strength, weaknesses, opportunity and threats PEST = Political, economical, societal and technology) analyses. Then there is the competitor analysis and much more. Everything that is below the surface shapes the look and feel of your brand. For instance, if you are in banking, certain colours, shapes and tones of voice apply. In the banking sector, you speak a specific language which differs from say soft drinks. The trick is to look different than your competitors. You also want to ensure that people like what they see. Remember, you never have a second chance for a first impression.

Since we are on this topic of impressions, let’s talk about the idea of being “cheap”. It is possible to focus on low cost, thus offering lower prices. However, you need to make sure that you don’t LOOK cheap. You still need to appear to be a trustworthy and caring company. This can be achieved by making sure your marketing material looks good. As an example: Air Asia. Ahhh! Cheapest flights (Now, that is the idea. In reality, MAS and Cathay Pacific can be cheaper). Note how Air Asia offers low cost but their material is top notch.

We use the idea of brand promises as the guiding light for an organisation. A simple statement that encapsulates what the place is all about. You can use it even for HR purposes. Let’s say your brand is to be “The provider of the most sophisticated websites”. If a client is asking you for a crude and un-sophisticated website, the answer is “Thanks, but we don’t do that”. Or if someone with very serious and stuck up applies for a job in “The funniest Kindergarten in town”, you turn them down.

Is a tagline really required? And what should it be?

Chances are that the name of your company is used by others. More importantly, not many people know what your company is doing. Today, you have about 7 seconds to communicate your brand. If your name and tagline can explain to someone what your business is all about, you have a winner. Many taglines don’t make sense. In fact, they are very important. Only when your business has grown to be a player that everyone knows and recognises, and then you may want to drop the tagline. Taglines used to be called “Bromides” after the plants that sit on other plants. And that is what they do. They go along with your logo. A good tagline enhances the brand.

Is your brand aligned with internal and external audiences? If not, you have a problem!

Now that you have decided what you are doing, what your organisation looks like etc, it is time for the field test. If people think of your place what you want them to think, then you have done a good job. If your target audience doesn’t associate you with your services and product, then you have issues. The same applies for your staff. EVERYONE and please allow me to emphasise this, EVERYONE, within the organisation needs to know what your brand is. As stated above, it will guide the organisation. The brand is the north star of corporate navigation. If people don’t know, then they steer into all directions and it is hard to move towards the chosen goal. As an exercise: Get someone from outside the organisation and let her/ him ask 10 staff across the organisation about the brand and what the organisations is all about. If you get 6-8 identical answers you are in a good shape. If you get 10 different answers, then you need to think about what went wrong.

Can a brand have more than one product?

Any brand should be treated as a single entity. “DingDong – We announce people” produces doorbells. If they were to offer car horns, they should create a new brand and whole new entity. If you think of it, you go to Royal Sporting House for your sports needs. Not to buy a coffee. The rule number one in marketing is to never confuse the customer. Your brand needs to be absolutely clear to them. It comes full circle. A brand is an idea and people can only connect one brand with one idea. So, if you are looking for a door bell, DingDong is the place to go. If you need a car horn it is a different vendor. Trouble is that you will have to manage a multitude of brands as opposed to products. That means that you need to have a website, brochure, logo, collateral etc for each brand that you have. However, this also comes with good news. Strong brands make more money and attract better suppliers, have more loyal customers and staff.

How easy is your branding really?

The most difficult part is to say “No!” to opportunities. If you are clear about what your brand does and doesn’t you are in good hands. There will be a time when people come to you and offer you money for something that is somewhat similar to what you are doing or simply because they think you can do it. It is best to turn these offers down. It hurts, yes. Think again. A hairdresser is good because all they do is to cut hair. They don’t offer haircuts with a service for your car. It is easy to attract customers if you are clear about what you offer. And if you are an expert, people happily pay more. Be absolutely focused! You may want to engage the help of third parties to do a brand audit in order to check where you are standing. The reason is simple: your clients, suppliers and staff may not tell you the truth about your brand, whereby they typically open up to a third party. You can then use the insights gained and incorporate this into your business.

“What do you think we are doing?” is a question you should be asking much more often. Internally and externally.

A final word of encouragement

Most successful brands have started small. You can do it too. Ensure that your material looks good, the brand expressions (Logo etc.) make sense and are appealing. Practice your elevator pitch and stay on track in pursuit of your brand building. Eventually, you will earn a reputation and become the “go-to address”.

In the next article in this series we will talk about marketing, which is often mistaken with advertising and promotion. We will show you how you can apply some simple but effective ways to go about your marketing.

About Launchpad

Launchpad is a full-service, branding, marketing and communications group of forward-thinkers, devoted to brands that will shape the 21st Century. As Asia’s only partnership of strategic, marketing, creative and technology people, the group has diverse backgrounds, vast experience and a long track

record of solving tough marketing challenges. Launchpad’s expertise spans marketing, advertising, design, branding, digital / interactive, technology, and beyond. They work best with brands that have ambition for growth and want to make a difference. Launchpad is your ‘marketing lift-off in Asia’.

Stefan Pertz is the Group Managing Director of Launchpad Sdn Bhd.

Passionate about marketing, Stefan has practiced what marketing textbooks teach. He set up direct distributions in Singapore and Sydney, helped to open offices in Hong Kong and Malaysia. The successful launch of a new brand under his supervision resulted in the client, a postal service, being nominated among the top 10 direct marketing providers. The name Launchpad (Your marketing lift-off in Asia) depicts the sole reason for its existence: the company boosts companies in the region to new marketing heights.  Learn more about Launchpad: www.launchpad.com.my or www.launchpadnews.com

OpenWebAsia – SEA is a regional technology and web business conference that brings together top minds in the web technology space.

In 2008, Open Web Asia was hosted in Seoul, South Korea at the Sheraton Grande Walkerhill.

For the very first time, in 2010, Malaysia is privileged to be selected as the host of this inaugural premier summit . This year it will be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia at Crowne Plaza Mutiara Hotel, on the 13th and 14th of July 2010.

The theme for Open Web Aisa – SEA 2010 is “Web Innovation In Asia”.  Never before has Malaysia  hosted  a congregation of the worlds leading technology giants from all across the globe,  with unprecedented speakers from Google, Yahoo,  Amazon, Facebook, Tech Crunch, Digg.com and  BANSEA just to name a few.

In Seoul, Korea Open Web Asia attracted 500 global leaders and delegates from across the globe to discuss on a Pan-Asian perspective on web businesses and groundbreaking technology waves that will shape the future of the world.

This global conference is produced by the Open Web Asia Workgroup , Malaysia Entrepreneurs , MSC Malaysia Innotech, IASA (International Association of Software Architecture), & Social Media Club KL.

   Aaron Tan Dani                     Christine Songco              Michael Francis Smith Jr                  Mohan Belani
        Chairman               Technical Program Manager                        Director                                     Director
             IASA                                         Google                                          Yahoo                                          e27
      Asia-Pacific                       San Francisco, USA                        Southeast Asia                            Singapore

        Lichi Wu                            Simone Brunozzi                        Dr. Serkan Toto                           Brian Wong

APAC Sales & BD                 Technology Evangelist                            Writer                     Business Development

  Former AdMob                                Amazon                                  Tech Crunch                               Digg.com

       Singapore                                 Asia-Pacific                                      Japan                                          USA

      Dr. Gang Lu                       Prof. Wong Poh Kam                 Patrick Chanezon                           Aaron Tan

            CEO                                        Chairman                       Client & Cloud Advocacy                 Brisbane Lead

Kuukie & Mobinode                         BANSEA                                        Google                                         MEGA

           China                                      Singapore                          San Francisco, USA                            Australia         

View FULL SPEAKER LIST here.

WEB INNOVATION IN ASIA
This conference addresses current issues in the area of:

a. Enterprise Web
b. Government 2.0
c. Mobile Applications
d. Android & iphone Development Platforms
e. Could Computing & Location Based Services
f.  Venture Capital & Funding
g. Social Media & Social Gaming
h. Architecture & Standards

WHO IS OWA FOR?

- Investors, Venture Capitalists, Private Equity Companies
- Directors, Business Owners & Entrepreneurs
- CEO’s, CIO’s, CTO’s & IT Managers
- Technology SME’s & MNCs
- Telcos & Communication Companies
- Web Developer, Programmers & Designers
- Advertising, Branding & Media Marketing Professionals
- Bloggers & Web Technology Enthusiasts
- Educators & Standard Institutions

Kuala Lumpur, 8 June 2010 – Cradle Fund Sdn Bhd, manager of the Cradle Investment Programme (CIP), today announced the first five (5) recipients of its CIP 500 commercialisation grant, which offers funding of up to RM500,000 to help local start-up companies attain commercialisation.

The five start-up companies, drawn from a range of industries, consist of CK Agrifeed Sdn Bhd, a company involved in research, development and commercialisation of microbial-based animal feeds; Inteltium Technology Sdn Bhd, which provides automated solutions based on their proprietary microcontroller
technology platform PlugIO™; Medical Devices Corporation Sdn Bhd, a research and development based regional leader in the manufacture of medical devices; Superceed (M) Sdn Bhd, a company that provides hosted contact centre software and on-demand workforce on their Virtual Contact Centre model; and TecForte Sdn Bhd, an ICT security focused company providing enterprise security management
solutions.

Nazrin Hassan, Chief Executive Officer of Cradle Fund Sdn Bhd, said, “The CIP 500 commercialisation fund, a pioneer pure commercialisation grant, is a medium term measure that helps fill up the dire funding gap at the commercialisation stage in Malaysia and plugs up a glaring market failure, as there is no private sector venture
capital player that is willing to fund at this stage currently. It is a trailblazing effort which we believe, will be emulated by other agencies under the 10 th Malaysia Plan – and that will help widen the commercialisation funding pipeline for more technopreneurs.”

With the first batch of out there will be a second batch are being evaluated. If you are interested in more on the funds being dispersed by Cradle like the CIP500, visit them at www.cradle.com.my.

7.45pm Updated Superceed’s webpage.

If you been wondering who are the startups in Echelon 2010, they have recently release the list. There will be over 40 startups around Asia including 1 from Malaysia will be at the exhibition booth. Malaysia will be represented by a ticketing solution we been using, SocialWalk.com which we used for out event TEDxKL quite recently.

As for the 10 startups launching on the day, all will be reveal on 1st June 2010.

Also Serkan Toto, the only writer for the famous web startup site Techcrunch will be joining Dave McClure and gang on the Geeks on the Plane. They will be all coming to Echelon2010.

Ipay88 have officially sign in as a partner for the Technopreneurs Association Malaysia to offer discount for their members.

Ipay88 is a local payment gateway run and operated by the guys behind the mobile portal Mobile88. They service a lot of local online merchant. It supports a lot of method of online payment including credit card, debit card, bank transfer and more recently they are an online channel for Paypal.

The two organization will sign their MoU this coming Team T3 event on 20th May 2010.

This is the second WebCamp in KL.

What is WebCamp?
WebCamp is a (usually) free event in the spirit of BarCamp.
Events will have a theme that is web-related, and may be semi-structured (some talks, some discussion sessions).

As stated by the organizers?

Open discussions. Still building momentum. Inviting the group for presentations, and feedback on how to improve WebCamp for Malaysian web heads. Email me (wuhan@mindvalley.com) if you would like to present something so that can schedule.

This is a bring your own cookies event.
Wuhan will provide milk and some cookies. So feel free to bring your favorite cookies to share.

These are the presenters so far:

1. Juan Martitegui, COO of MindValley LC. — Un-Design: Designing for Money and Action.
2. Hani Khaursar, Mistress of TheBlisscipline.com — TBA
3. Pavel Timofeev, Application Developer — How to Create an Awesome Social Network with Ruby On Rails.
4. Tristan Gomez, Web Developer — Applying “Shuhari” to Learning Web Development.
5. Praburaajan, System Administrator — State of ICT Security in .gov.my.
6. Wu Han, Design Chief — Something something something… Design.

Sign up here.

With the recent purchase of the Malaysia startup Octazen, Facebook is starting to hire some Malaysian developer using Jobstreet.

It seem like Octazen Solution which is previously an enterprise, have been converted to a private limited with the new company name Bonus Energy Sdn Bhd. There are no site for this company yet but according to JobStreet’s advertiser profile, it state that Bonus Energy Sdn Bhd is a subsidiary of Facebook.

What does this mean?

As mention in Facebook Insider that Facebook said ” This won’t become an office… It’s just a talent acquisition and they’ll be considered remote workers since we’ve opted to let them remain in Malaysia.”

The folks at Octazen are slowly building up their local team in Malaysia in anticipation of growth.
As stated in the ad.

With 400 million users and counting, Facebook’s Growth team is off to a good start. But there are still billions of people in the world that we need to reach in order to fulfill Facebook’s mission of making the world a more open and connected place.

The Growth team is looking for experienced Software Engineers who can build and maintain services that are relied upon for growth-critical processes. This position is full-time and located in Petaling Jaya, Malaysia.

Would this eventually evolved into Facebook regional office? We will never know for sure, but with Facebook overtaking Google as the most popular site in the US, it is bound for them to look for areas to grow beyond their own shores.

Update: Facebook to begin hiring in Hyderbad

The State government recently announced that as part of its plans to accelerate the transformation of Selangor into a knowledge-economy a number of technopreneur campuses will be set up throughout the state with i-City being the first and flagship campus. One of the programme under this technopreneur campus initiative is a State-sponsored Incubator.

i-City, PKNS and Plug and PlayTech Centre Silicon Valley would be forming a strategic alliance to set up the i-City Plug and PlayTech Centre Incubator (i-City PnP Incubator).

Plug and PlayTech Centre Silicon Valley will also consider investing in the technopreneur companies under this incubator programme as well as be a bridge for them to the US market and US venture capital funds. There are also opportunities for Malaysians to form joint ventures with the tech companies in the Plug and PlayTech Centre Silicon Valley campus to localize the products and services for the regional market.

In the initial phase, the Selangor state through its agencies would be investing RM 50.0 million in a number of technopreneur companies under this i-City PnP Incubator programme.

i-City PnP Incubator would also be working with MDeC and a number of Malaysian technopreneur associations to ensure that the incubation programme meets the local technopreneur needs.

i-City PnP Incubator would initially occupy a 2,000 sq ft floor space in the i-City Cybercentre Suite 1 complex and would be relocated to a dedicated building when this is completed in 2 years time. I-City PnP Incubator has also established a business services group to provide the necessary administrative, secretarial and legal services to the technopreneur companies. A mentor panel comprising experienced business leaders to coach and guide these technopreneurs are also in place.

In the first half of 2010, 10 to 15 companies will be identified to be nurtured and grow. The initial selection focuses on companies in the development of solutions for digital cities, mobile contents or products and services for the property and construction related sectors.

Moving into the second half of 2010, there will be an opportunity to incubate 20 to 30 potential individuals desiring to be technopreneurs. i-City PnP Incubator role for this phase would be to link these individuals with the relevant resources to enable them to move beyond the concept stage to developing the prototypes.

It is envisaged that it would take about 2 to 3 years for each technopreneur company to move from the initial concept stage to the growth stage and hence by the end of the next year, i-City PnP Incubator would be hosting about 50 incubatees every year.

In announcing this i-City PnP Incubator programme on 25th Feb 2010, the Menteri Besar of Selangor said the State has conferred the International Park status on i-City so that it can have entertainment and cosmopolitan lifestyle outlets as well as to operate 24 hours. At the same time, the State will also accelerate the construction of the direct access from the Federal Highway into the site. Both of these are part of the various plans to ensure the success of i-City PnP Incubator programme.

Meantime, I-Berhad, the developer of i-City, wishes to inform that its sector classification on the Main Market of Bursa Malaysia Securities Berhad has been re-classified to “Properties” sector from “Consumer Products” sector previously effective 1 March 2010 to reflect the change in its core business to property development and management.

The Stock Number and Stock Short Name of I-Berhad’s shares would remain unchanged.

It seems like there will be less money for technology based entrepreneurs (technopreneurs) in 2010 in form of government grants. According to the article below by the Star dated 4th Feb 2010, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation or MOSTI has lost RM1 Billion of its budget due to a cut.

As we know, grants such as the e-content grant and the MSC Preseed fund have recently run out(the last batch 21 closed on 3rd Dec 2009).

Looking at 2010 will be the in-between years of most grants technology related or otherwise because of the 10th Malaysian plan, it is highly unlikely for any agencies or ministries to give up more fund.

As for other grants in Malaysia, we think most ministry are in a look and see mode for the 10th Malaysia plan (RMK10) which will be only pen down in June but implemented in 2011. We figure that the ministries have already draft their proposal for the (RMK10), there are no indication yet that RMK 10 will benefit the technology entrepreneurs in Malaysia.

Taken from the Star 4th Feb 2010

KUALA LUMPUR: Technopreneurs hoping for funding from the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (Mosti) are in for a tougher time this year.

And the predicament has upset several applicants who are already not happy over the red-tape encountered when applying for such grants.

The ministry said its 2010 budget for such grants has been cut by RM1bil, leaving RM2.7bil in its coffers to be handed out to deserving applicants.

“Funds are quite limited for this year,” said Suhaimi Hamzah, deputy undersecretary for the commercialisation section at Mosti. “Sole proprietorships and certain partnerships and companies have about 10 months left to apply.”

“Our e-content grant funds have already run out,” he said.

Suhaimi was speaking at the National Chamber of Commerce and Industry Malaysia seminar on government grants and financial assistance for Malaysian companies, held in the capital on Tuesday.

Mosti has several funding programmes for various fields of research, development and commercialisation, including biotechnology, industrial, information and communications technology (ICT), sea to space technology, and science technology.

Another source of funding for technopreneurs is the Multimedia Development Corp (MDeC), which oversees the nation’s ICT initiatives.

The 10th Malaysia Plan, to be announced in June and which will only kick in next year, may or may not see an increase in the amount of future government grants.