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Taiwanese President Tsai shows up to “Next BIG” event to emphasize the startup ecosystem
National startup brand - Startup Island Taiwan, has held the ceremony event in Taipei 101 to award the 9 startups that were selected as NEXT BIG. President Tsai attended the ceremony in person to support the Taiwan startup ecosystem.
“Taiwan has been ranked as a "super innovator" with Germany, Switzerland, and the US in the last two years. In the latest report published by International Institute for Management Development(IMD), Taiwan has been ranked 8th around the globe in the Digital Competitiveness Strength, first time going into top 10,” President Tsai said, “The nine NEXT BIG startups have broken stellar records in different sectors. The government will keep fueling the Taiwan startup ecosystem to help more entrepreneurs go global.”
The Minister of National Development Council(NDC) Ming-Hsin Kung mentioned that Taiwan’s semiconductor industry is well known to the world, but what is Taiwan’s next world-class industry? NEXT BIG gives the answer.
The NEXT BIG startups symbolize the potential and strengthening of Taiwan’s innovation. The startups joining the programs are prominent in the fields including AI technology, SaaS, Clean energy, e-commerce, blockchains, and other pivotal industries, each of which has excellent performance in funding, sales, and awards.
The NEXT BIG startups have been announcing exciting news. The clean energy startup GOGORO just released the news that they will go public on Nasdaq; Kdan Mobile closed the USD$16M series B this July, and they keep expanding the US, Europe, Japan, and Korea markets. Furthermore, the blockchain startup CoolBitX has become the world’s top 3 cold wallet provider, and the product CoolWallet has reached 80 countries worldwide. Additionally, AI startup iKala announced plans to expand its footprint in Japan and open the Tokyo office.
Startup island Taiwan supports Taiwanese startups to go global
Startup Island TAIWAN is the national startup brand co-created by the NDC and the startup communities. Its primary goal is to promote Taiwan’s entrepreneurial ecosystem and to assist startups in expanding to international markets. Going forward, the brand will continue to bring the startup communities together to enhance Taiwan’s visibility to the world as the “Startup Island”.
The nine NEXT BIG are:
CoolBitX: founded in 2014, CoolBitX is committed to blockchain security technology’s innovation and development. They produced the world’s first cold wallet “CoolWallet” and provided tailor-made software services for simplifying the compliance process.
Gogoro: founded in 2011, Gogoro has become an innovation leader in vehicle design and electric propulsion, smart battery design, battery swapping, and advanced cloud services that utilize artificial intelligence to intelligently manage battery availability and safety.
Greenvines: established in 2011, Greenvines is a skincare brand, also the only B corp in Asia that has won the "Best for the World" environmental award for five consecutive years due to its sustainable attempts.
iKala: established in 2011, iKala provides AI-driven solutions for companies to achieve business transformation, acceleration, and creation of new business models. They currently provide services to more than 400 companies and 15,000 advertisers and brand owners across 8 countries in Asia.
KDAN MOBILE: established in 2009, KDAN MOBILE provides enterprise cloud solutions and now has their product achieving more than 200 million downloads. They have accumulated more than 10 million registered members worldwide, 65% of who are based in Europe and America.
KKday: established in 2014, KKday has become Asia’s largest in-depth travel e-commerce platform covering more than 30,000 itineraries in 92 countries, and 550 cities around the world.
Pinkoi: established in 2011, Pinkoi is the leading design e-commerce platform in Asia, providing digital transformation online, and brand experience offline, they continue to make an impact on the current and future generations of designers.
17LIVE: established in 2015, 17LIVE is the largest live streaming platform in Asia, combining AI and machine learning technology applications to provide more authentic, zero time difference streaming services. Starting from Taiwan, it has expanded to Japan, the United States and other regional markets.
91APP: established in 2013, 91APP is the first to provide Online Merge Offline (OMO) new retail software cloud service in Taiwan, aslo the first SaaS company listed in Taiwan. Providing three self-developed retail software to brand, 91APP now has a market value exceeding NT$40 billion.
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