1415T2g1 South Korea/Reflection/day3
South Korea
| Day 2 |
Contents
Day 3: Reflections
JJS Media
JJS Media created a crowdfunding platform called MyMusicTaste which helps artistes and promoters accurately measure the quantifiable demand and purchasing power of fans for global artistes to hold concerts in their countries. Previously, this was done through guesswork and gut feel, which increased the risk for both artistes and promoters. The speaker, CJ, raised many valid and interesting points which are critical to improving the chances for success for a startup:
- An awesome team is better than a good product because investors are more likely to tolerate failure because they know the team will eventually deliver in the end.
- In Seoul (and especially in China), other companies and competitors with more capital can easily copy a startup’s idea and force it out of the market. Thus, to succeed, it is crucial to create a product that is extremely difficult to imitate.
- Even though the speaker is a fanatic fan girl, she is able to hone her hobby effectively to market to MyMusicTaste’s targeted audience, who are also mainly fanatic fans who are eager to meet their artistes.
- It is crucial to find a focus for a startup (e.g. MyMusicTaste initially focused on the Kpop market only) as resources should be pooled into a single focus to form the startup’s unique selling point.
- It is extremely important to have effective leader(s) who are willing to sacrifice everything to ensure the survival of the startup. Such selfless behavior will no doubt inspire the employees effectively.
- Free and popular collaboration tools widely used by startups
- Trello, an easy to use project management/collaboration app
- KakaoTalk, a popular instant messaging app in Korea with features similar to WeChat
- Slack, another popular instant messaging app which effectively synchronizes messages between desktop and mobile devices.
FiveThirty
FiveThirty’s latest app consist of ZimBox,ZimMan,and ZimCar, which represent different components required for moving house for single families (getting empty boxes to contain belongings, getting movers to move stuff, and getting a vehicle to contain the belongings). Mr Chung and Mr Lee raised many interesting points with regards to executing a successful startup:
- Having a concrete idea or vision from the start is essential for success, or else the company will not have a clear direction to advance.
- The startup creator(s) must have enough passion for the product or service and never be deterred by failure.
- In today’s age, sometimes it is just sufficient to reinvent the logistics and perception for existing services for a new idea. For example, Zimcar’s idea focuses on flat prices, single point of contact, and good quality control as compared to similar house moving services which usually require extensive negotiating to overcome the longstanding problem of overcharging.
update here
JJS Media
As JJS office is not open when we arrive thus a lady brought us to tour around the building. The building consist of few levels. Mainly the 9th floor which is open to anyone to use. The lady mentioned that students can use that area as well. And I felt that the area looks like SMU Labs back in Singapore. And at the 7th floor, it’s the Content Korea Lab Gyeonggi. They have a recording studio as well as a big 3D printer! There are currently 28 start-ups and they can stay there for 2 years max. The minimum period is 6 months, but there will be an interview again on the 5th month. Unfortunately, this program is mainly for Korean.
The representative from JJS Media is a lady called CJ. JJS Media have a product called MyMusicTaste. Artists and promoters can use this application to measure the demand while the fans can request for the concerts that they want. Currently they are targeting K-Pop. That’s because they are from the same country and that K-Pop stars prefer to work with Korean company as compared to foreign companies. However, CJ also mentioned that they are preparing to flip, which means that their HQ will be at US, and Korea will only be the branch.
From CJ, I learnt a lot. According to CJ, the biggest hinder is to convince others to believe that the product is good and the team will be able to support it. Thus, the team is very important. They select their team member by sitting down with them and look at their personality. They will only hire if there have something that is in-line with the company. Hence, grades doesn’t matter to JJS Media. Also, CJ felt that you should not be frustrated when she calls you at 5am on a Saturday for work related issue. If you will be frustrated, don’t go into the start-up industry.
She also compare Korea start-up ecosystem against Singapore and US. The Korea government provide help to the start-ups. Example JJS Media is located in a government owned building. Their rental fee for 6 month is USD1000 only. However, this benefits are more towards the Korean citizen. On the other hand, Singapore too have government funding. But they benefits the foreigners as well. And most importantly, people in Singapore knows English! That is something that Korea do not really have. As for US, especially Silicon Valley, it is the best place to get funding if you have a great idea. There are a lot of VC there and “they are just waiting to throw their money in”.
FiveThirty
The latest product/service that FiveThirty do is the ZimCar, ZimMan and the ZimBox. This is targeted for the single family who need help in moving house and they are flexible in time (meaning 24 hours). The ZimCar provide the vehicle to carry the items and will cost 49800 krw (S$61.69). The ZimMan is the mover and will cost 33000 krw (S$40.88) and ZimBox is provide the box to store the items as well as the necessity that is needed, such as bubble wraps. It cost 25000 krw (S$30.97) each. There is a bundle price of 249800 krw (S$309.42) which consist of 1 ZimCar, 2 ZimMan and 1 ZimBox. FiveThirty are not worried that others will follow them and be their competitors. Instead, they mentioned something that inspire me: “People can follow them. But they (FiveThirty) started first. So they have an advantage. When others are following them, they still need to get the contacts and material, but they (FiveThirty) had all the materials already, thus able to do more and go further than others”. From the speech, I learnt that to have a higher success rate in start-up, we need to focus on our passion. Passion is the thing that keep us moving and to push our team. They felt that if you are below 25, it’s okay for you to try doing a start-up first. However, if you are more than 25, you should do some work first before proceeding to start a new business. They also agreed that it is not easy to attract employee. Unlike big companies, start-up generally can’t provide a high salary to their employees. Thus, in start-ups, the company will tend to give their employee some stocks instead.
