Standard Chartered, Atome Financial Partner to improve financial access and product choice for consumers

Standard Chartered has entered into a 10-year multi-product partnership with Atome Financial. This partnership will combine the strengths in finance and technology to deliver quality products to consumers and merchants across key markets in Asia.

The partnership will also include Standard Chartered investing $500 million in Atome Financial. This funding will enable Atome Financial to grow and connect a wider ecosystem of merchants to a larger customer base. Atome is the business unit under Advance Intelligence Group. Atome recently closed a $400+ million Series D financing round.

"Our deep knowledge of Asia’s markets coupled with Atome Financial’s experience in digital consumer finance will allow us to reach even more customers and drive greater financial participation of those underserved and underbanked,” said Judy Hsu, CEO, Consumer, Private and Business Banking, Standard Chartered Bank.

This partnership will include buy now pay later services initially. It will target a roll out in Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam in the coming months. The partnership will later expand to include digital lending products.

 

 

Indonesia opens Bali to tourists from 19 countries

Indonesia's holiday destination islands of Bali and Riau are open to foreign tourists from 19 countries after 18-month pandemic hiatus. Luhut Binsar Panjaitan, Indonesia's Minister of Maritime Affairs and Investment said that the incumbent Indonesian government had permitted tourists from 19 countries to travel to Bali and the Riau Islands. He also noted that the ministry chose the countries based on data showing low positivity rates. However, the United States was notably absent from the list.

 

The countries chosen by Indonesia are China, New Zealand, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, Liechtenstein, Italy, France, India, Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Portugal, Spain, United Arab Emirates, Sweden, Poland, Hungary, and Norway.

 

Eligible travelers from the chosen countries must be fully vaccinated with a second vaccine taken at least 14 days before traveling to Indonesia. They must have insurance coverage for Covid-19 treatment worth at least US $100,000 and pay for their accommodation during a mandatory five-day quarantine period.

 

Bali, Indonesia's leading tourism hotspot, had more than 6 million visitors in 2019 alone. Ever since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the island's streets, which would generally be filled with tourists, have been deserted. Many businesses are closed as tourism is the lifeline for the economy of the island.

How To Do A Proper Market Analysis For Your Startup

 

Before you even start a business, it's important you spend some time researching the market to understand its ins and outs. This will put you in a position to formulate a proper strategy that ensures your business can survive in a highly competitive environment. A market analysis is also vital to figuring out the best way to serve your customers.

As an aspiring entrepreneur, conducting a proper market analysis might seem daunting. However, it's actually simpler than you might think.

Here's a guide on how you should do a proper market analysis for your startup: 

What's A Market Analysis?

A market analysis is a detailed quantitative and qualitative assessment of the prevailing market conditions in a particular industry. The main objective of the market analysis is to examine the different market dynamics to get the answer to questions such as;

·      Who are your potential customers?

·      How big is your target market?

·      What are your customers’ buying habits?

·      Who's the competition?

·      What are your competitor's strengths and weaknesses?

Answering these questions will give you a much better grasp of the market conditions and your prospective customers. If you need any help, you should visit infinigrow.com or other similar websites to get help from professionals.

How Do You Conduct an Exhaustive Market Analysis?

Conducting a market analysis isn't complicated, but you have to spend some time researching thoroughly. Here are the steps you should follow during this process;

1.  Determine Your Purpose

Start by finding out the real reason for conducting a market analysis. Some of the reasons include creating opportunities, assessing business threats, and minimizing problems. It's crucial you know this right from the start because it helps stay on track the whole time.

You'll need to determine if the market analysis is meant for internal or external purposes. Internal purposes include business operations and improved cash flow while external purposes can be to request a business loan. Knowing the exact purpose is what will decide the amount and research you'll need to do.

2.  Research Your Industry

The next thing you should do is carry out in-depth research of your industry to understand it better and gauge the direction it's heading. You must always do this regardless of whether you're starting a large or small company. A comprehensive market research, will help you identify several essential industry metrics such as;

·      Projected growth rates

·      Prospective customer demographics

·      The market size in various locations

·      The industry's major trends 

You should frequently conduct market research to see whether investing your time and money in the industry is worthwhile. If so, the comprehensive market analysis will also help you identify the competitive advantage you have over your competitors that you can offer to your target market.

3.  Pinpoint Your Target Market

One fact you'll need to accept when starting your business is that your products or services won't appeal to everyone. You shouldn't waste your time and effort trying to convince uninterested parties to buy your products or services. Instead, you need to identify your potential customers. This part of the process is known as target market analysis.

To know your target customers, their expected buying habits, and how many of them are out there, you need to assess factors such as;

1. ·      Gender
2. ·      Age
3. ·      Education level
4. ·      Income
5. ·      Occupation
6. ·      Location
7. ·       Needs and interests

Factoring in all of these will help you design the ideal customer persona. In most cases, you'll have different personas that you should use this to help you pinpoint your typical customer. Once you do this, you'll be able to efficiently and easily cater to the needs of your potential customers.

4.  Research Your Competitors

Your market analysis won't be complete if you don't take time to examine your competitors, and this includes;

1. ·      Their main objectives
2. ·      Their strengths and weaknesses
3. ·      Their market saturation
4. ·      How they differ from you
5. ·      Their marketing strategies

You should also write down a list of your competitors and rank them based on their strengths and weaknesses. You can get most of this information from news and media sources, as well as your competitors’ physical store locations, websites, and social media pages. With all this in mind, you'll know how to differentiate your startup from the rest by filling any gaps left by your competitors.  

5.  Predict Your Market Share

The final step when doing a market analysis is to create a prediction of your prospective market share. This entails determining the percentage of the market you'll have in your control. Using this, you'll be able to figure out your projected revenue, pricing structure, and whether you need to get a business loan.

Takeaway

The goal of market analysis is to know everything possible about the industry you're planning to enter. This might sound somewhat intimidating for first-time entrepreneurs, but it doesn't have to be that way with the help of this guide.    

 

 

Climate Change: Time is Ripe for Revival

The Earth is the only habitable planet in the solar system. Even though 70 percent of the planet is covered with water, it hosts as many as seven billion human beings. Other than homo-sapiens, the planet supports a myriad of flora and fauna species. From polar bears to the lanternfish, the planet has been supporting life unconditionally.

Since the beginning of the 21st century, the natural setup of the planet has been challenged consistently. As a result, the disruption of the natural order has occurred. The most devastating factor was the invention of plastic in 1862. It has defaced the planet and made it sick. From aquatic to terrestrial life, the proliferation of plastic products is proving fatal. Oceans are filled, with incoming plastic piling up every day. According to a report, we are producing over 380 million tons of plastic every year. Besides plastic invasion, air pollution (carbon emissions) and several other forms of pollutions are ruining mother earth. This all has resulted in climate change.

From frequent flash floods to wildfires, mother earth seems to have hit the wall. It’s dying. Instead of taking preventive measures to save the planet, the rich are attempting to flee to other planets, such as Mars. One of the spectacular misfortunes of modern times is that the rich, who own industries, pay lip service to the cause. No constructive steps have been taken so far.

I remember an incident when the former president of the United States, Donald Trump, confronted Swedish environmental activist, Greta Thunberg, as she had poked the rich during a speech. It’s plain simple that Mr. Trump did not like her idea of shutting down large-scale factors that have been running for ages and therefore contaminating the environment one way or the other. As a matter of fact, governments across the world would want to tighten environment laws but couldn’t as the rich fund their election campaigns.

“The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, I say - we will never forgive you.” Greta Thunberg at UN Climate Summit, New York, 23 September 2019

“We showed that we are united and that we, young people, are unstoppable.” Greta Thunberg at UN Youth Climate Summit, New York City, 21 September 2019

The quotes used in this piece were extracted from BBC.