Startup Island TAIWAN Podcast

As the financial services industry embraces digital transformation through mobile banking and data connectivity, Fintech is reshaping finance and empowering consumers to take control of their financial lives. This has led to increased financial literacy levels compared to previous years. In 2021, Fintech startups raised over $120 billion, highlighting their growing importance. However, the Fintech...

Kneron has emerged as a leading provider of edge AI solutions. Despite the challenges of declining global financial markets, it raised $48 million US dollars at the B round in 2022. But did you know that it all started with an accident? Albert Liu, co-founder of Kneron, shared the story that he persuaded a former colleague to resign his job in Korea, move to Santiago and join a friend's startup pr...

Have you or your family members ever experienced difficulties swallowing pills and capsules? ‘’My granny was the inspiration behind Boncha Bio. I was raised by my grandparents, we were very close and seeing her struggle to take her supplements for recovery after her stroke was heartbreaking’’ Corina Huang, founder of Boncha Bio, started the chat with a ​​poignant story behind her entrepreneurship....

On March 10th 2023, Silicon Valley Bank, a major lender to tech startups, collapsed. Which became the largest bank to fail since the financial crisis in 2008. US regulators had to shut down Silicon Valley Bank and take control of its customer deposits. The banks’ swift closures have sent shock waves through the tech industry, Washington and Wall Street. SVB’s downfall triggered a global...

Did you know that YouTube was originally conceived as a dating site? Three of the co-founders had a vision for a platform where users could upload videos of themselves talking about what they were looking for in a partner. However, with zero video uploads in the first five days, they needed to find another direction. In a stroke of serendipity, they recognised the potential for YouTube to become a...

Next-generation social networking sites are expected to be more sophisticated and user-friendly than the current generation of social networking sites. They will be designed to foster deeper engagement, better privacy and security, and more personalised experiences for users. One trend that is likely to shape the next generation of social networking sites is the increasing use of artificial intell...

’’How do I manage, store and communicate the large amount of information and ideas I’ve accumulated?’’ was one of the questions that Alan Chan, got into YCombinator and has been thinking of how humans absorb knowledge, asked himself when the original idea of Heptabase first sprouted.  Heptabase is a Taiwanese-founded startup that specialises in providing data-driven solutions for individuals...

PicCollage, a Taiwanese-founded startup with an international team whose main application PicCollage has been downloaded more than 200 million times worldwide. Users spread among five continents, it has been ranked among the top ten photo applications in dozens of countries. Adhering to the original intention of simplicity and fun, the founder Jon Fan says that the pursuit of innovation and transf...

EV technology has progressed significantly in recent years, with the rise of awareness of climate change, air pollution, and the depletion of fossil fuels. Governments and consumers around the globe are increasingly demanding cleaner and more sustainable transportation options. Automakers are investing heavily in research and development to improve battery technology, increase the range of EVs, an...

Since OpenAI released its blockbuster bot ChatGPT in November 2022, users have casually experimented with the tool, even Insider reporters trying to simulate news stories or message potential dates. ‘’Software Is Eating the World, but AI Is Going to Eat Software’’ stated by Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia. AI is eating existing software not because it does things better but because it works at a compl...

Meat, be in hotdogs, hamburgers or bacon in BLT sandwiches, has long functioned as the centrepiece of the American diet. In recent years, due to the growing awareness of health and environmental impacts of meat, consumers are starting to seek out alternatives for meat. Alternative meat is a broad category, plant-based meat will be one of the brilliant options that encourage consumers to reduce the...

Pet humanisation trends have made pet parents increasingly willing to spend more on pet care, the global pet DNA testing market has reached USD 300 million in the year of 2022. DNA tests for furry felines are fairly new to the market, they haven't been around as long as the ones for doggies. As the interest has increased in recent years, there are products available on the market that are able to...

Taiwan is on the path to becoming a new startup hub in Asia. Despite facing numerous challenges in the past, the startup ecosystem in Taiwan has been on the rise. Taiwan is an ideal place to locate for Hardware & IoT, Social & Leisure and Energy & Environment startups. Israel-based Startup Blink has Taiwan ranked 25th globally and 4th in East Asia in global startup rankings in 2021. Wi...

Over the last decade, investment in SaaS startups has been showing continuous growth. Report of Silicon Valley Bank’s State of SaaS shows that the total investment in SaaS startups was $6 billion in 2010. In the past few years, the SaaS industry managed to benefit from the pandemic period while the vast majority of other businesses experienced tough times. In 2021, this number reached an incredibl...

Mark Birch, AWS Global Startup Advocate, brought his knowledge and delivered a keynote that touched upon how startups can get started on their journey with AWS. As a former founder, Mark also shared his stories of early experiences to depict what that journey might look like and how the ecosystem matters. ‘’You could be an incredibly talented individual, or you could have an incredibly talented te...

Technology, as we all know, moves at a rapid pace. With the advance of science and technology, only the companies that embrace the tools and solutions to get ahead are more likely to survive. It gave the opportunity for Fash Chang to initiate his entrepreneurship with Gosky. Helping businesses to grow loyalty and drive revenue by connecting marketing, sales, and CRM from the first social interacti...

William Hsu of Mucker Capital opened up to us about his story before funding Mucker Capital and shared his insights as a venture capitalist who witnessed Los Angeles turn into one of the most vital tech geographies in a decade from a no man's land for startups.    "Taiwan, as we see it today, is already better than what LA was in 2011 when Mucker Capital first started" William Hsu talked...

Will you use navigation when you are driving? Although we use navigation, we still get lost occasionally, since the map and the actual road conditions differ. This is also the opportunity for Cheng Ping Yu, the founder of AR navigation startup Phiar, to initiate his entrepreneurship. By combining deep learning with AI and AR technology, AR navigation provides the actual road conditions for drivers...

Pinkoi aims to create an Asian designer ecosystem. By promoting Asian design brands to the international market, Pinkoi connects and empowers both brands and consumers, creating a high-quality design ecosystem. Acquiring Japanese company iichi in 2015, Pinkoi became a well-known role model of cross-border acquisition in Taiwan. Despite the influence of the epidemic, Pinkoi's cross-border orders ha...

Under the impact of COVID-19, remote work has become an irreversible trend. International talent acquisition and management has become an emerging tide. What kind of role does Taiwan play in this new trend?  The competence of Taiwanese top talents is undoubted and recognized around the world. However, the domestic job market lacks suitable opportunities which meet their expectations. Good new...

Warren Buffett announced last week that he bought TSMC Stock - American Depositary Receipts (ADR), which is worth more than 4.1 billion dollars. This is a rare major investment in the technology sector by Buffett's conglomerate. How is TSMC favored by international investors? Be Everyone's Foundry, that is the main strategy of TSMC. In the 1980s, Taiwanese government planned to cultivate the semic...

With the advent of the global space age, countries are competing with each other for a foothold in outer space. What role does Taiwan play in this space competition? Among the 105 low earth orbit satellites launched by Space X in January 2022, one of them is a " spherical-motor-based " microsatellite developed by Taiwanese space startup Tensor Technology. The 22-year-old founder of Tensor Technolo...

What makes foreigners want to settle or even naturalise in Taiwan? What’s more, they make a gigantic contribution to Taiwanese cryptocurrency ecosystem.  “I’m convinced that the future of finance is cryptocurrency, in one form or another, and you can see that it has already become a reality,” says Leo Seewald, the former president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Taiwan (AmCham Taiwan)...

As the popularity of cryptocurrencies has increased, many companies have begun to invest in virtual currency. However, this new technology has also created new problems, that is, how to manage the "private key", which symbolizes the control of funds since once the private key is stolen or lost, the digital assets in your account will never be recoverable or cashed. Taiwanese startup Cybavo stands...

The emergence of blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and Bitcoin has influenced intensively the global financial situation. The extension of the blockchain, Web3, builds the foundation for the financial provision of the next generation, which is impossible to achieve with Web 1 and Web 2. Taiwan's neo fintech Web3 startup XREX builds a bridge between cross-border, virtual and reality financial world wit...