Navigating ASEANnovation: The Reservoir Principle and Other Essays on Startups and Innovation in Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia has been an emerging frontier for internet technology startups, with talent and capital flooding into the region's technology markets in recent years. Navigating ASEANnovation: The Reservoir Principle and other essays on startups and innovation in Southeast Asia is a collection of essays and interviews with founders and investors on what it takes to thrive and win in the region as a tech startup. From topics such as bringing together a founding team to exiting a company, the collection covers various aspects of startup growth, digging deep into the critical strategies tech founders and business leaders of different countries and industries can adopt, while embracing the diversity critical to understanding the region.

Navigating ASEANnovation serves as go-to compendium providing practical advice and mental frameworks for anyone interested in Southeast Asia and tech startups, highlighting the unique aspects of operating in the region that the world can learn from as well.

The collection was curated with commentary from Yinglan Tan, Founding Managing Partner of Insignia Ventures Partners, an early stage technology venture fund in Southeast Asia, and Paulo Joquiño, Editor of Insignia Business Review, the official publication of Insignia Ventures Partners.

<p><strong>Tan Yinglan</strong> founded Insignia Ventures Partners in late-2017 and is the Founding Managing Partner. Insignia Ventures Partners is an early stage technology venture fund focusing on Southeast Asia and manages more than US$350 million from sovereign wealth funds, foundations, university endowments, and renowned family offices. Insignia Ventures Partners is the recipient of two back-to-back ""VC Deal of Year"" awards for Payfazz (2019) and Carro (2018) from the Singapore Venture Capital and Private Equity Association and its portfolio include many other technology leaders in Southeast Asia.</p> <p>Prior to founding Insignia Venture Partners, Yinglan was Sequoia Capital's first hire and Venture Partner in Southeast Asia. He sourced multiple investment opportunities for Sequoia including Tokopedia, Gojek, Traveloka, Carousell, and Appier. Yinglan had also been a member of the Singapore Administrative Service, where he served in a variety of positions in the Prime Minister's Office (where he was part of a team that managed a S$360-million fund for innovation and enterprise), Ministry of Trade and Industry (MTI) and Ministry of Defence (Mindef). Yinglan was also the founding Director of 3i Venturelab China, a joint-venture between private equity firm 3i (LSE:III) and INSEAD.</p> <p>He also serves on the International Board of Stars — Leaders of the Next Generation, the Singapore Government's Pro Enterprise Panel, and the Committee on the Future Economy's Sub-Committee on Future Corporate Capabilities and Innovation. He is also a Board Member at Hwa Chong Institution an Adjunct Associate Professor at National University of Singapore (NUS), and an Investment Committee Member of the Strategic Research Innovation Fund at Nanyang Technology University.</p> <p>A Taekwondo black-belt holder, Yinglan has been named as an Eisenhower Fellow (2018), World Economic Forum Young Global Leader (2012–2017), a WEF Technology Pioneer Selection Committee Panel (2015–2017), Top ""40 leaders under 40"" by Prestige Magazine (2015), Milken Institute Young Leaders Circle (2016), one of 100 Leaders of Tomorrow by the St. Gallen Symposium (2010), 100 Global Thinkers (2011) by think-tank Lo Spazio della Politica, a World Cities Summit Young Leader (2014), a WEF Global Agenda Council member on Fostering Entrepreneurship (2011–2013) and a Kauffman Fellow (2012). Yinglan is a Forbes columnist and author of three books — <em>The Way of the VC</em> (Wiley, 2009), <em>Chinnovation</em> (Wiley, 2010), and a textbook, <em>New Venture Creation — An Asian Perspective</em> (Mcgraw Hill, 2011). Yinglan was educated at Stanford and Carnegie Mellon, and completed executive programs at Harvard and Oxford.</p><p> </p> <p><strong>Paulo Joquiño</strong> is a writer and content producer for tech companies. He is currently Editor of <em>Insignia Business Review</em>, the official publication of Insignia Ventures Partners, and senior content strategist for the venture capital firm, where he started right after graduation. As a university student, he took up multiple work opportunities in content and marketing for startups in Asia. These included interning as an associate at G3 Partners, a Seoul-based marketing agency for tech startups, running tech community engagements at coworking space and business community, ASPACE Philippines, and interning at workspace marketplace FlySpaces.</p> <p>While in university, he was also a member of YouthHack Manila, an independent student-led startup organization, where he organized local and international events in Manila and Seoul, including hackathons, pitching competitions, and accelerator programs. He graduated with a BS Management Engineering at Ateneo de Manila University in 2019.</p>