Helping entrepreneurs in Singapore make a bigger global impact
Editor’s note: This post comes from Grace Sai, CEO and Co-founder of Impact Hub Singapore, Singapore’s largest community of entrepreneurs dedicated to prototyping the future of business, society, and technology.
Two and half years ago, Ematic Solutions joined the Impact Hub Singapore community as a two-person team with an idea about revolutionizing e-mail marketing. Today, they are a 130 person strong startup, with teams in seven countries across Asia, serving companies like Grab and Sephora as customers. The core of the team still calls Impact Hub Singapore home.
That’s just one of the more than 1,200 member stories we’re so proud to have been a part of in the last five years. But, we know there is so much more potential here. In Singapore, the number of startups has grown from 350 to more than 3,500 in half a decade. Singapore, dubbed the “Sand Hill Road” of Southeast Asia, has the largest amount of venture capital available for startups. In a short span of time, this island nation consistently ranks among the top 10 countries in the world for startups, and ranks first in the world for startup talent.
That’s why we’re extremely excited to join the global Google for Entrepreneurs partner network today, as the first member from Southeast Asia joining a worldwide community of 50 partners.
As Singapore’s earliest and largest co-working community, our mission at Impact Hub has been to create intimate spaces and communities that support an entrepreneur’s journey from launching an early-stage startup to overseeing a mature venture. We have two spaces in Singapore — Hub@Cuppage and Hub@Prinsep. Recently we have also launched our own venture fund to invest in the pre-seed and seed stages of tech startups; and a corporate innovation practice to enable more collaboration between startups and corporates. To get a feel for our space, here are a few photos:
Everyone has a seat at the table at Hub@Cuppage
Since we opened our doors five years ago, we have supported more than 1,200 members—affectionately known as “Hubbers”. We’re proud to have been the home to some of the country’s most successful startups—from burgeoning high-growth ventures such as Nugit, Saleswhale, Grain all the way to ‘Unicorns’ such as Braintree and Twilio. Entrepreneurs working out of our space have raised more than $180 million (S$250 million) to date.
This partnership provides us with a share of Google’s tremendous support in the form of financial resources and expertise for our community. Hubbers will have access to programs such as Google for Entrepreneurs Exchange, a series of weeklong, industry-specific global immersion programs aimed at helping startups gain access to new markets and insights as well as Google Demo Day, an event that brings together a diverse group of startups from around the world to showcase their technology and meet top investors and mentors in Silicon Valley. With access to these global programs we hope to smoothen the journey for Southeast Asia’s entrepreneurs into larger regional and international markets, and ensure they have the tools to quickly scale and be even more successful.
As a member of the Google for Entrepreneurs partner network, we’re now one step closer to this reality. Thanks to this partnership, our community will have access to work, tinker and dream from more than 20 spaces—from Sydney to Seoul to San Francisco and Sao Paulo. They now also have the benefit of meeting new folks and building their businesses from any one or all of Google’s six Campuses.
From our earliest days, Impact Hub Singapore’s community has been described as a tribe. We couldn’t be more excited to join forces with Google—a truly global tribe—to champion the growth and success of our entrepreneurs who are at the heart of everything we endeavor.
