BBT craze

• Yesterday, Singapore announced stricter measures for the country’s circuit breaker, including shutting down standalone F&B outlets ’til May 4. Bubble tea shops not spared.

• Just hours after the announcement, long queues were seen at bubble tea shops across the island — some made it home, others made it into Carousell.

• However, 500-backed Carousell saw this coming from a mile away. It made the decision to regulate all listings of the popular beverage on its platform.

https://www.instagram.com/p/B_Pzip3Hywl/

• We’ll get through this indeed. Bubble tea can wait!

SEA’s largest pharmacy network vs Covid-19

• Connecting over 150,000 pharmacists and pharmacy frontliners with 150 million patients in Southeast Asia, 500-backed mClinica is taking on the Covid-19 pandemic head-on.
• The company has been deploying its full resources to curb the spread by helping governments with digital tools for research and supplying medical supplies to the thousands of pharmacies that are deemed as “essentials” during this period.
• Besides that, it continues to work with leading healthcare organizations including the Ministries of Health in Indonesia, Cambodia, and the Philippines as well as renowned academic institutions like John Hopkins and USAID.
• Concurrently, the company is seeing blistering growth and on track to achieve $100 million in transaction volume in the following three quarters.

Pandemic and the SEA VC landscape

• 500 Durians’ Khailee Ng and 500-backed Fave founder Joel Neoh were featured in a Financial Times piece, weighing in on the coronavirus’ impact on SEA startups and future fundraising patterns.

• Fave, the regional online platform which has received $35 million funding from 500 Durians and Sequoia, impressively recorded $97.8 million in revenue and an annual growth rate of nearly 300% since 2015, according to FT quoting data from Statista.
• Ultimately, are SEA startups well-equipped enough to tide through this storm, especially the younger companies? More from the piece here.

Where are you now in your personal Covid-19 journey?

• The reality is that everyone is affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, some in more ways than one.
• Social distancing, lockdowns, shops shuttering, and livelihoods up in the air. What can we possibly glean from this situation?
• A graphic making rounds on social media and reshared by Tools of Titans author Tim Feriss shows three zones of growth. Each represents contrasting values.

• Where are you now in your Covid-19 journey?

Stay tuned to tomorrow’s Daily Markup!

Missed out on the last Durian Daily? Go here for a full recap.

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500 Startups is a venture capital firm on a mission to discover and back the world’s most talented entrepreneurs, help them create successful companies at scale, and build thriving global ecosystems. In Southeast Asia, 500 Startups invests through the pioneering 500 Southeast Asia family of funds. The 500 Southeast Asia funds have backed over 240 companies across multiple sectors from internet to consumer to deep technology. It continues to connect founders with capital, expertise and powerful regional and global networks to help them succeed.

This post is intended solely for general informational or educational purposes only. 500 Startups Management Company, L.L.C. and its affiliates (collectively “500 Startups”) makes no representation as to the accuracy or information in this post and while reasonable steps have been taken to ensure that the information herein is accurate and up-to-date, no liability can be accepted for any error or omissions. All third party links in this post have not been independently verified by 500 Startups and the inclusion of such links should not be interpreted as an endorsement or confirmation of the content within. Under no circumstances should any content in this post be construed as investment, legal, tax or accounting advice by 500 Startups, or an offer to sell or solicitation of interest to purchase any securities advised by 500 Startups. Prospective investors considering an investment into any 500 Startups fund should not consider or construe this content as fund marketing material. The views expressed herein are as at the date of this post and are subject to change without notice. A 500 Startups fund may have a financial interest in one or more of the companies discussed.