2016

2016 Jul 07

Indian Startup Ecosystem Versus China – More Similarities Than Differences

Entrepreneur India

Sneha Banerjee, Senior Correspondent at Entrepreneur India, interviews James Tan for a feature in one of India’s most well-read magazines.

“On the qualities the firm looks for in an entrepreneur, James said that he doesn’t particularly check whether an entrepreneur is a product or a business person because ultimately every founder has to have a team. “No one is an all-rounder. Even Jack Ma has a team behind him. We want to see whether the team members of a startup compliment each other and there must be a little bit of “healthy” competition between so that they drive each other along”, he added.“

2016 Jun 27

Investors rush to fund China tech start-ups

The Straits Times

The Straits Times interviewed two venture capitalists in China, GGV‘s Jenny Lee based in Shanghai and Quest Ventures’ James Tan based in Beijing, for their thoughts on the funding landscape in China, and the opportunities and risks that are present in this gold rush.

“According to research firm Preqin, private investors had poured around US$26.2 billion (S$35 billion) into 796 Chinese tech firms as of the middle of this month.

Beijing-based James Tan… find Chinese tech firms to be very good at localising new ideas from Silicon Valley and achieving superior results on the mainland.”

2016 Jun 24

Quest Ventures now a co-investment partner with Malaysia’s Cradle Fund

Deal Street Asia

Quest Ventures inks co-investment partnership with Cradle Fund, an agency under Kementerian Kewangan Malaysia (Ministry of Finance), becoming a part of the MYR200 million (USD50.92 million) co-investment war chest for Malaysian tech startups.

2016 Jun 23

Dana Pelaburan Bersama Cradle Bernilai RM161.2 Juta Dengan 6 Lagi Rakan Kongsi

Bernama

Firma dana modal teroka, Cradle Fund Sdn Bhd bekerjasama dengan enam lagi rakan pelaburan bersama untuk menyokong syarikat permulaan teknologi Malaysia, menjadikan dana pelaburan bersama kini bernilai RM161.2 juta berbanding RM159.2 juta dalam kumpulan kelimanya pada Februari.

Enam rakan kongsi baharu itu dan Quest Ventures — menjadikan Cradle Fund mempunyai 25 rakan pelaburan bersama ekuiti berbanding 19 pada masa ini.

2016 Jun 15

His startup survived 5,000 rivals in China to list on Nasdaq. Here’s what he learned.

Tech In Asia

Managing partner James Tan was interviewed by Tech in Asia on execution and going public.

James was the first Singaporean founder in the C-suite to list a Chinese tech company on NASDAQ. This came after several hurdles were crossed, including new Chinese regulations on ownership that affected all foreign-listed entities (eg, Baidu).

Going public with about $1 billion in gross merchandise volume, 55tuan was the first ‪‎O2O‬ Chinese company to list, and the first tech IPO of a Chinese company on NASDAQ that year.

2016 May 27

Essential online shops for farm-to-table produce

Michelin Guide Singapore

Cafebond, a new e-commerce startup aims to bring the liveliness of the Australian coffee culture to specialty coffee lovers in Singapore. Their website started taking orders on June 1, and the startup already has plans to penetrate coffee markets in China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong with the backing of Chinese investment giant Quest Ventures.

2016 May 18

Quest Ventures selects 2016 WIT Indonesia Start-Up of the Year

Web In Travel

An “admittedly intimidating judging panel of industry experts, including Kei Shibata (Venture Republic), David Peller (Booking.com), Brett Henry (AngelVest) and Timothy Hughes (Agoda), Kusumo Martanto (GDP Venture), Steven Vanada (Cyber Agent Ventures), and James Tan (Quest Ventures)”, selected Deepdive as WIT Indonesia’s Start-Up of the Year after several rounds of pitching competition.

2016 May 06

走近投资人系列活动之七十：安芙兰创投暨走近投资人活动

互动吧

求索创投及安芙兰创投，长石资本，泽厚资本等创投机构联合主办走近投资人活动。

#走近投资人#系列活动自2012年11月开展以来，活动城市包括北京、上海、深圳、成都、青岛、烟台等，截至2015年12月，累计200+名投资人（其中合伙人60+名）、120+家知名早期投资机构、2000+个经过筛选的优质早期创业者参加活动现场交流、参加活动的企业中已经有N(N>20)家顺利获得投资。

2016 Apr 30

Quest for the Best

The Edge Markets

In this cover story, Quest Ventures Managing Partner, James Tan, tells The Edge Markets what he looks for in startups, why he enjoys kopitiam sessions and why he thinks you should drop out of school if you need to.

“Although small, it has an impressive track record… When selecting start-ups to invest in, Tan says he looks first for ideas that are both scalable and replicable. “We try to differentiate between scale and replication,” he says. “If you go from a $1 million business in Kuala Lumpur to a $10 million business, that’s scale. But to move from KL to Penang, and from Penang to Bangkok, that’s replication. That’s not scaling.”

2016 Apr 21

We’re Karl Mak & Xiao Ming, co-founders of SGAG. Ask us anything!

Tech In Asia

Quest Ventures-backed SGAG joins Tech In Asia Ask Me Anything (AMA) session. Today SGAG’s content is consumed by over 3 million people weekly across our 6 content distribution platforms with the mission to make every Singaporean’s day a better one. Ask them anything!