Son Tran of Tiki: A Decade of Entrepreneurship in Vietnam

Dimitra Taslim

Today on GGV Capital’s Evolving for the Next Billion we have Son Tran, the founder and CEO of Tiki, which is short for search and safe in Vietnamese is a leading all in one commerce platform in Vietnam. They have three pillars, an eCommerce marketplace, a smart logistics platform called TikiNOW, and Tiki Trading, which is a retail subsidiary.

Hans Tung  

Starting Tiki as an online bookstore in 10 years ago, Son has turned Tiki into a top and trusted multi-select eCommerce platform for millions and millions of Vietnamese consumers. He held a double degree in software engineering and commerce in Vietnam and Australia. After graduating with a master’s degree at the University of New South Wales in Australia in 2007. Before Tiki, Son also helped to start Clip.vn, also known as the YouTube of Vietnam. Welcome to the show.

Dimitra Taslim

So maybe start with Son, you had an interesting journey, going back to Vietnam being one of the veterans of the tech ecosystem, not just the eCommerce ecosystem. So tell us a bit more about your journey of going back to Vietnam and founding Tiki in the very early days of the local tech ecosystem.

Son Tran

Yes. My background is software engineering, I studied engineering in Vietnam, and then for some random opportunity has a chance to go to work for the first on advertising startup in Bangkok in 2004, like decades ago. And that opened up the world to me at the time, even the internet is rare in Vietnam, so it’s my first exposure to what like internet and what does it mean to work like, 9 to 9 to 9 in the startup, around and around the clock, right? So, you know, a young guy and I loved it. I think that’s actually the CEO of the company told me like, forget about study abroad, just stay here work with me. I double your salary, but then I realized that’s something I really want to do, like something maybe I want to do it for myself in the future. So, I politely declined the offer and then continue my study in Australia and then have the opportunity thanks to the internet actually. I wrote a blog about internet what it mean you know, I had no idea at the time and somehow a guy, was writing on my blog, I say hey, I’m Son Tran, let’s move on to YouTube or Vietnam because Google just acquired it over 1.6 billion,  I didn’t know that guy, and we work remotely. He is in Hanoi. In three months, we launched it. In another three months, we got investment, and I came back to Vietnam. I’m not really sure if I should go back and never coming back to Australia, continue working there to grow the company, and then later on the investors at Clip, they say, hey, I have this eCommerce company, do you want to go there and help. And then I move to that and learn about eCommerce. Okay. This is ecommerce in Vietnam, it’s not what you read about Amazon, it’s very different. And I think that the top meat is the potential of it, how big it is. And I learned about how eCommerce works in Vietnam, the challenge for the previous company, and later on I say, hey, it’s my opportunity, let’s do something that fit with my belief. And I started in 2010.

Hans Tung  

What will be the three words or three adjectives you will use to describe how people shop online in Vietnam?

Son Tran

In the past or now?

Hans Tung  

Both.

Son Tran

Same, but different. I mean, in a sense that people in big city like Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh, or separate area, or rural area, they all want a large selection, fast delivery, free delivery, and high-quality products, so they all hope to get that benefits. Different meaning we saw our customers, as we grow, we become a platform, they are very unique. They are willing to pay $3 for two hours delivery. And they’re not worrying too much about price. But more about I get it fascinates, the best in class service. But as we grow into tier two, tier three cities, the priority check, they also want fast delivery, but you know, maybe same day, maybe next day, but it has to be free, so I think we have to be mindful about the different segment, especially when we grow, in the past when I just sell book, our customer are the same, like I said, someone like me, British English books, we as a small set and it’s easy to do that. But when you scale to 10 million customers, that’s the whole thing different. And we have to be mindful about that. And we have to build new capability to serve that new requirement for customers.

Dimitra Taslim

When you first started Tiki, what were you selling? What were some of the best-selling categories on your platform? And how has it evolved over time?

Son Tran

So I love books. One of the things I have difficulty incoming back to Vietnam is not able to find the book I want, or spending hours to look for English books, it’s not efficient. So, I started with English books, actually bought on Amazon, imported into Vietnam, and then sell it online. And then we gradually expand into everything book, then knowledge on electronics, cosmetic beauties. And right now, we have about 610 million selection across all the products from physical goods like TV, motorbikes to digital services like tickets, booking video and everything else.

Dimitra Taslim

And how has the shopping behavior changed? Can you talk a bit more about some high-level metrics, how often are people buying now? What’s the frequency of purchase? And what’s the typical basket size in Vietnam? How is that evolved over time?

Son Tran

Yeah. So that’s where we have to get mindful about different customer segments. So, let’s say our Tiki customer, the one who pay trillion dollars a year to have unlimited two-hour delivery, they buy almost every month or every week.

Dimitra Taslim

Tiki Now is the equivalent of Amazon Prime, right?

Son Tran

Yes. So they buy every week, especially we see the frequency increase when we launch more selection, when we launch groceries. So, NASA is this band, like even thousands of dollars a year. But on average, each deal very early, when you average out is about five times a year they buy. So for some customers, they just buy once every two months. So that’s the current situation. We believe that because we are very strong on consumer electronics, on average our basket size is pretty high, about $27. And from our intelligence, more than our peers. So, when you sell like $1,000 iPhone, $3,000 TV, then you also sell like $3 more average hours above $37.

Hans Tung  

Let’s talk about the competitive landscape in Vietnam for eCommerce. And you have some of our competitors have deep pockets like Shopee, as part of the Southeast Asia, companies that’s listed on NASDAQ, market cap is about $80 billion now. And they have the gaming assets of the arena that generate all the profits of acumen pouring into eCommerce. They also have Alibaba bought Lazada, several years ago, and now spend quite a bit of money into growing that business in Southeast Asia, including Vietnam, you have a startup Sendo as well. And you’re able to get JD to invest in Tiki. Tell us how you were thinking about the arms race in Vietnam? And how did you decide that you want to have JD to support you?

Son Tran

So I think this is me keeping repeatable over the years, we look at our peers, the core investors for Vietnam, eCommerce, and digital industry. Because when we started with $5,000, we are late, we’re less funded than anyone. So, at that time, I still remember we have 30 online bookshop and bookstore that go online. Some of them have VC funded, I have $5,000. And every single year, we always have, like 3,4,5 players that are much well-funded than us, even strategic advantage from their parents. So for the last 10 years, we keep expanding from retail to marketplace, to logistics, to digital services. And these peers, some have gone, some keep growing. It motivates you to be different and to be better. But again, I usually met with the Ministry of Economy, and as prime minister, I say, for Vietnam to be a $25 billion eCommerce industry, that’s the goal, my official goal from the government. In order to grow that $25 billion, and then maybe $50 billion digital economy, you cannot just out of thin air. I think you need talents, you need good players, you need resources like capital, so if just one guy, one company, I don’t think it will make the industry. So, you need a lot of that, you need a vibrant ecosystem. And I think this is proven over the years of more players coming in, we grow faster together. And we look at Vietnam right now as a $200 billion retail market. And eCommerce is only 4%. So, I think there’s a lot of opportunities for everyone. And as a startup like Tiki, I think we have to prove ourselves every single year to get the trust of the shareholders, the trust of the new investor to keep growing. And at the same time, you have to be sustainable, you have to make sure that you are not just grow for the sake of growing, you have to like, what’s your margin, what your bottom, when you will be profitable, like retail profitable, and then marketplace profitable, logistic profitable. You have to think about all that. And I think, so far, we are kind of lucky to get the trust of the shareholders.

Dimitra Taslim

Yeah. Very interesting. I have a question for Hans. Hans obviously has invested in many eCommerce companies around the world. And our firm GGV is also synonymous with the rise of eCommerce in China that was primarily driven by mobile internet, and a bunch of other factors as well. They invested a lot in education, logistics, built a lot of roads, and also train stations and railways, connecting all the cities together. I’m curious to ask Hans, how do you see the differences in the rise of eCommerce in China from your observations and also comparing that with Southeast Asia right now?

Hans Tung  

I remember moving to China in 2005 before moving back to the Bay Area in 2013. The first year that was in China, eBay came and pumped their chest and said that they’re going to throw so much money into China, you’ll make SoftBank regret of investing in Alibaba. And then over the next two years, you see Taobao continued to gain market share because of a different business model. And you realize that China is a manufacturing center of the world. So, you get more suppliers come online, buyers will come over time. So, they made a free for suppliers to shop, so initially you’re going to have back goods counterfeits and that kind of things plaguing the system. But over time as consumer tastes improve and cheaper capital rises, and given all the benefits in the infrastructure built up that Dimi mentioned earlier, the consumers become more discriminate. And better performing suppliers the one of higher quality and sup become bigger and went out, overtime the quality of the experience gets better and more and more people come because all the good suppliers are on Taobao. And eBay eventually shrunk because they couldn’t move as quickly. Any product change requires Silicon Valley approval. Given the time zone difference, it takes a week or two weeks to approve a change, whereas Taobao can do that within a matter of minutes or hours. And so that is something that consumers can feel the difference. And over time, obviously choose the faster and better service from a table instead. And that experience carries over to Southeast Asia as well, you see how aggressive, for example Shopee is, as some of the markets, you see how aggressive Grab is in some of those markets, including Indonesia. So even a player from Singapore, like Shopee. And also Grab can do well in the region. So, it comes down to execution. So, you see Alibaba being a local champion, when you see Shopee and Grab doing well as a regional player and not a critical local player in each area, each country because they execute. And the fact that Tiki is executing and getting the support from JD is a validation, it is working out well. It will be interesting to see how much effort Shopee put into Vietnam, you’ll be interested to see how Sendo continue to raise money to stay in the game. And so, it’s a fascinating country with a lot of potential and a lot of hard-working people like Son mentioned earlier.

Dimitra Taslim

Yeah, thank you for those insights on Vietnam, it’s an amazing place. Before COVID-19, the GGV team used to visit at least once a month, but we are looking forward to going back again. Well, I have a question for Son on competition. You mentioned you’re very strong in consumer electronics, and then you have Shopee who are coming in and look at this long tail categories, like health and beauty, fashion apparel, and they’re spending a lot of money. Like Hans said, the battles is often going to the supply side, going to this merchants who are selling this longtail categories, and they’re consolidating them. They’re acquiring these merchants. I’m just curious about what you think about that. The dichotomy between Tiki which is very focused on the high AOV electronics stuff, and then you have a newcomer up and coming from the bottom of the pyramid, and consolidating the longtail categories. How do you feel about that?

Son Tran

I always respected players in this industry. And I usually tell my team, we are happy for the opportunity to play chess with the grandmaster, Alibaba. So I think we know what we’re good at, when I started Tiki at a retail model, we know we could add authentic products, really fast delivery. And that fit with some agree, that’s why we are strong on TV, phones, consumer electronics. And this is a very big market attracting world class players. So, there will be players who come and play on that C2C marketplace, and we intense our strategies in a few years ago, not to go to play on that area, but keep prioritize our resource on logistics. That’s why we have you know, 2 hour delivery across Vietnam, we and the cost for deliveries is best in class. We know there is nothing wrong with Sendo or Shopee strategy. They chose that, they called on that Taobao builder model. I think that’s great. I think the consumer electronics in Vietnam alone is 10 to $1 billion market. And even the biggest retailer in Vietnam right now, you think the top 10 retailers in Vietnam account for 6% of the total retail. So I think, again, a lot of opportunity there.

Recently, when we launched the marketplace, we have the opportunity to go on the top and up the longtail. I think, for fashion, for lifestyle products. We use the marketplace; we call manage marketplace to complement to our retail model and actually is going very well. I think during the last few months during COVID. FMCG growing 3 times. And we launched groceries, actually about five months ago, it’s growing, turning 50% on month. And lifetime product, which is where we are within, okay, not outstripping two times great growing. So I think that’s something you know, at the end of the day, customer very smart, That we choose, I think because you know, 3 or 4 players to continue to choose, they continue to choose where it fit them the most and say, I want that, but what are our water or like shampoo into ours? Are they going to come to us? The cup of tea because we are offering to our delivery, So I think that’s something we can take, all the players have continued to innovate. We know our strength is on authentic products, high quality service, and very fast delivery. And we’ve come to feel that fit with that grocery is something fit with that heavy and bulky product. Actually, we launched Tiki Pro a few months ago, where customer for the first time in Vietnam and schedule the product to deliver, open the box and say you want to buy a TV, but you are only available at home on Saturday at 9 am. So, we can schedule that for you, wherever the apartment you are, we bring it to you to open, we do installation on the spot for you based on the logistics that we built. And I don’t know who it in Vietnam would do, like us. And based on the technology that we build it. So that’s something that when they know their strength and their weaknesses, they can do something of value for customers. That’s the main point.

Hans Tung  

Those are great features. I can see why consumers like that.

Dimitra Taslim

I also have a sort of a follow up questions. You mentioned some of the categories that are obviously taking off during COVID. You mentioned groceries as well, we’ve been looking at some of the data in Vietnam actually, the data has been looking pretty promising, I mean, we looked at the app and the numbers. And then the number of online shopping sessions reached about 12.7 billion in Q2 only for Android phones, which is the highest ever. And this is actually a 43% growth compared to the Q1 numbers in terms of number of sessions. When we look at the same number for Indonesia, the growth from Q1 to Q2 is much lower, which it’s about 34%. And for Southeast Asia overall, it may be 39, 40%. So Vietnam is actually higher than the average for Southeast Asia. Tell us a bit more about why you think that is, and your experience as the CEO of this company going through this rapid sort of adoption curve during COVID.

Son Tran

I think fortunately, Vietnam managed the COVID situation very well. I think the longest lockdown were like two weeks. So, we didn’t experience like months of lockdown like other countries. I think the main point, the customer go online in Vietnam not because of the short term lockdown, but because they look for value. I think even though Vietnam is one of the few countries in Southeast Asia have positive GDP growth this year, we expect to 3% GDP growth, but people are more conservative, they kind of like brace themselves for the uncertain time and might be fought they know that go online with offering more value. Not just convenient, not just fast delivery, but like better price, more selection. Maybe instead of buying more expensive phone, they’re looking for something of value, shifting their behavior, but anything online, give that choice, convenience and value. So for Tiki, we actually see the better conversion and quality of the traffic and users, right in the last 8,10 months compared to last year, we ended up last quarter about 45%, top line that previous one. And I think we use this opportunity to also improve our bottom line as well, we no longer push too much on the low-quality traffic, we have to strengthen our operations. So actually, our bottom line during that period improved 50%. So, we are happy with that for the first time in our history, our contribution profitable, and logistics. It’s not easy at all, extremely painful.

Hans Tung  

And also, we look at the sort of mobile adoption rate as picking up dramatically in Vietnam, probably among the highest in Southeast Asia. What accounted for that in your opinion? And how has that shifted your business model or your business approach over the last 5,6,7 years?

Son Tran

Yeah, I tell you this, we almost missed it. When I read the Facebook story, we are just like that. Because in 2016 or 15, we have been struggling with our fundraising, and we don’t have another resource. So, we cannot invest like 20 engineers just to do mobile app. So we almost missed it. I wish that we have more resources to jump on it a bit earlier. But fortunately, we actually launched it, and then right now mobile app is like 70%, 75% of our GMV. And I think Vietnam, one thing is very young population, the mobile internet is extremely affordable with $3, you have unlimited Internet access with your phone. So I think that’s something that helps with, the more adoption and people on the go, they ride motorbikes, they’re very mobile. So, I think it’s the same with China. It’s the same and we expect mobile application will be the dominant force in innovation for traditional economy, not just eCommerce. So our merchants use the app to check in filling the order. Tiki Express team use our mobile app to schedule, delivery, installation, and everything else. Even the payment. We rely mostly on mobile.

Dimitra Taslim

I just want to ask a bit more about something you mentioned, 70% of your purchases on GMV. I’m just curious in terms of your customer base, besides the two macro cities of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh, where else do these people come from in Vietnam? Tell our listeners a bit more about outside of these two cities. Where else is important for eCommerce?

Son Tran

Yeah, I think we have to be mindful about the time. So, in the past, 95% of our GMV comes from Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh. And right now, metropolitan areas around the city accounted for about 70%, and 30% comes from tier 2 rural areas, but it’s growing very fast. But in Vietnam, just like in other countries, the young population are moving to big cities. So, when you graduate and go to university in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh to study and just stay there, you try to make your career. So actually 40 million people in Vietnam right now living in what we call metropolitan areas. Right. And there’s a big gap between the GDP of the metropolitan areas and the rural areas.

So, 60% people are in rural area, 40% in urban areas. Metros, but like Ho Chi Minh GDP is like eight to $10,000. Where our app in Vietnam is almost 3000. So, the rural area is like, in some cities, that’s $1,000 per year. So, we expect this going up, we’re catching up. But you know, when you think about the strategy of the company, when it will come up, when is the right time to invest? You don’t want to over invest? You want to prioritize. So, I think we continue to invest a lot on that 40 million population in Metro cities. I think in the next, two years, the rural area will become very important just like China. A rural commerce just pop up about two, three years back. Vietnam and China basically have seven, eight years gap. So I think that’s something we are thinking and like investment on the rural areas will come, and maybe in the next two years will be very important.

Dimitra Taslim

In China, it’s so interesting, because if you look at the case, everybody loves this model, everybody talks about PDD. And people talk about why the model works, it was this guy who was selling toilet paper and fruits to people in Anhui Province. I think a lot of our listeners don’t even know where Anhui province is. And if you think about why that has worked, there are many reasons, internet access, even in rural areas in tier three, tier four cities was very good in China infrastructure was very good, making delivery a lot easier. Do you think a model like that social commerce or whatever eCommerce 2.0, 3.0 would work outside the core cities in Vietnam?

Son Tran

There are a lot of talks about the PDD model in Vietnam, of course, because they have become so successful, every country will look at that. They are some entrepreneurs trying to do that. One thing Hans pointed out, China is the factory of the world, it has abundant supply.

So, if we want to build the PDD model, it’s not just like how to bring friends and family, which we think we can do. But excessive supply, we haven’t figured it out. Maybe some of the ideas come from China, and I think if there is a PDD of Vietnam, it’s not as big, and maybe it will work better if it’s complimentary. for other Taobao, JD model, that could be better because Vietnam only has a 100 million population. So, the scale would be different. I think that two things to make PDD. One is a lot of cheap supply. Two is a lot people come with very low-cost traffic, usually leveraging social networks. And three would be very good logistics. Because PDD is able to do free shipping for what I remember like for 4r cents or 14 cents or something.

Dimitra Taslim

Yeah. Less than 5% of average order value.

Son Tran

Yes. So we think we can do that part like logistics very efficient and low cost logistics. That’s part we can do. We still figuring out Okay, how about the supply. And hopefully, if that hasn’t someone figured it out and it’s good for the economy, it’s good for the industry.

Hans Tung 

Another innovation that Alibaba had along the way obviously is Alipay. It essentially functions as an escort service. So for the buyer and seller that don’t have credit card, or online payment, I can sell it selling into Son, Son is going to put money into his Alipay, I see that, you have a deposit money into your account, I feel comfortable shipping goods to you, once you get it, you don’t complain, some days later, your money is released from your account to mine. So that’s how without credit card without PayPal, this transaction can work. And the money is looked after by Ali pay. In Vietnam, you guys see how the mobile payment market evolve. What are some of the innovations that you have seen that’s working to make it easier for transaction to happen? In the US, obviously square with square capital, and our GGV portfolios to seen that in tremendous well, in the last five years, and the growth really came after they’ve come public. And so, whether it’s US or China, two very different markets, you see how mobile payment plays a huge role in companies or SMBs, or suppliers growing. Just love to hear your thoughts on how the mobile FinTech market could evolve in Vietnam.

Son Tran

Wallet is something very interesting. We partner with some of the leading mobile payments in Vietnam on our platform. So I think it will be a tougher competition than eCommerce in Vietnam. Right now, from our analysis, there are eight strong players like eCommerce right now we come down 2,3,4. And right now is like a strong player on mobile payments, each of them like backed by very strong player like agglomerates, or big companies. Each one just has different competitive advantage by some social networks, some have early advantage, some half like the telco behind them, some like agglomerate behind them, some banks behind them. So, I think it will accelerate the speed. Mobile payments right now is still small, but I think in the next two or three years, we will see what’s the people we use that, we use either one of these platforms to pay.  And I think this is too early, we honestly don’t know who will win. Look at China, Alipay is way ahead of everyone else. And then Tencent, with that dominating a social networks view, WeChat pay. Right now, in Vietnam, I think all the players see that and jump into it. And like basically you let learning the playbook from China all over again, everybody who know how to play using the strategy. I don’t see much difference from the way the wallets in Vietnam, from what Alipay or WeChat pay implementing in China. So, this is interesting to see who can win eventually, you cannot have a wallet, right? It’s maximum two three. So for Tiki, we provide financial service, we have our credit cards, but we don’t do wallets, because that’s too much competition.

Hans Tung  

It’s burning a lot of money. But in some sense, you know, suppliers that sell well on your platform, consumers who may want to use money, use monthly installment payment plan to pay for goods. Innovation got on both sides. We invested in Affirm as well. In their monthly installment plan, working with a lot of merchants. Now including Shopify makes a huge difference. eCommerce space, and they themselves are growing rapidly. So, it is fascinating how in some other countries’ eCommerce has moved on to social and from social to FinTech. It just seems like there’s always more people can do. And in the US, there are 600 banks are publicly traded on NASDAQ and New York Stock Exchange. But my prediction is that over the next 10 years, many of them may not exist, just like with the physical retailers in the US, the Sears of the world don’t exist anymore. And neo banks were just continuing to do well, then some technology vendors who work for the top banks can do well, too. So, it will be a very interesting market as it evolves. I can’t wait to see how that mobile payment market in Vietnam shakes out, because the remaining players should be very healthy, very strong to do multiple things.

Dimitra Taslim

Yeah. Hence, I actually have a question for you. So, when we look at eCommerce, two of the biggest fundamental technological shift is usually people start paying, using cash on delivery, to online mobile payments, or even credit debit cards. Now the shift is from PC to mobile, and from your learnings and observation, what are some of the things that an eCommerce company has to get right when faced with these two fundamental shifts?

Hans Tung  

I think the second one first, I remember when Facebook, or Alibaba or Tencent, many of them treat mobile just as another channel. So, they set up a dedicated team who can program with mobile technologies, and you know, off they go to do that. And after trying that for a year, two years, the smart ones realize that, hey, that’s not going to work. The only way towards forcing all existing properties all develop a mobile app and force all of them to shift their emphasis on a mobile, says it becomes, we have a separate division doing it, then it’s someone else’s problem, you don’t care, you want to keep on doing stuff. That’s right. So, if you’re tasked to focus on doing mobile shift, your stuff to mobile yourself is from right pocket to left pocket, both of you. So, you will kind of bury that KPI and make that work. So that works much better later when that happened. So when you see a fundamental shift like that, the short answer is you got to be all in as a company and not treated just another channel, another division.

And in terms of mobile payment, it’s just amazing to see the e- commerce companies that get that, including Amazon, including Alibaba, Tencent, even Pinduoduo was trying it, Meituan was trying it, so Square has done a great job with it. And Shopify has his own shop paying as well now, so all the big mobile commerce players have to figure out ways to increase profitability per trade. And having that payment, option yourself gives you that edge to do that. And on top of that, as you know, you get a lot more data about both consumers and suppliers. So, you have more data than a bank, therefore, you can make lending decision much better than a bank does, you have a lot more detail, critical only gets the size of a transaction, doesn’t know exactly what you bought. While as eCommerce platform, you know exactly what’s inside our basket. So you have that data advantage by digital banks on half. And that’s why in the long run, eCommerce players will be known without regulation, support will beat the banks, consider moving faster, they have more data, there’s more personalization, of course, then come with better credit score on both their consumer and their supplier.

Hans Tung  

I remember having this conversation back in 2005. That is Alibaba gonna have become the AMEX at some point in the future. And in 2005, this question seems kind of silly, it’s inevitable. But what takes so long.

Dimitra Taslim

I want to sort of move the conversation to Son as well away from eCommerce and just want to ask you what does it feel like to be a founder in Vietnam right now, you know, compare when you first started to now as a veteran and then to also the young folks that you’ve seen. I’m sure people are coming to you for angel investments, advising their companies. What has changed and what hasn’t changed?

Son Tran

So I think Vietnamese people is super entrepreneurial. You know, people who play doing like double or triple jobs, selling stuff online and offline. So, I think that is ingrained in our DNA. I think what I saw is in the past, Vietnam is kind of what I use the term we have to wait for our turn. So the biggest country of the world, America, you know, Japan, China, we have to wait, we are not the most attractive net investment destination in the world. So I think right now it’s kind of like the right time.

Do we have more interest from every company investor try to invest in Vietnam? So I think that helps a lot on encouraging entrepreneurs and founders to go bolder. In the past, I struggle for two years playing bootstrapping to get my first $400,000 investment. So, it’s like a huge deal for me 10 years ago, I think right now, founders will have an easier time to attract support. Not just from the previous founders, but like VCs, local VCs, regional VCs. And because of that, they are bolder. I saw a lot of entrepreneurs really have the dream to go regional. In the past, I kind of like, Hey, you know, I don’t have that. I don’t think I have that plan early on. Part of that because eCommerce is very big. Now the easiest to see, market potential are kind of like occupied by someone.

So, the latest batch of founders are willing to go global or regional because of they see the potential they seem, like easier time to get resource and scale. The support from regional VCs are tremendous, but the capital like, Hey, I can help you to go to Thailand, to go Indonesia with your SaaS startups. Yeah, I think that’s amazing. I wish I had that 10 years ago.

Dimitra Taslim

Well, thank you for paving the way and doing the heavy lifting for the next generation.

Hans Tung  

Yeah, exactly. How do you see the founders today be the same or different from when you start off as a founder 10 years ago?

Son Tran

We are the one who have dreams and have a vision. We don’t change too much. And with the evolving ecosystem, I think they are border ready. I can go bigger. I can go faster. Things like that.

Hans Tung  

And are you actively investing as an angel investor?

Son Tran

Yeah, a bit. It’s more about life. I have a passion on education, aside from eCommerce. Education is something I’m really passionate about, so I wish I can do more on area.

Hans Tung  

We’ll do more with you.

Son Tran

Thank you very much. Yes. I have one question for you Hans.  You have been starting GGV trying to allow Southeast Asia.

Hans Tung  

So we have close to 10 investments in Southeast Asia. But when we have done one investment in Vietnam last year, we definitely want to do more.

Son Tran

Yeah. The Telio investment creates a lot of buzz around Vietnam. You know, startups, founders. So we talk to people. If they have the chance to as you like, what are you looking for, in terms of market, in terms of founders in Vietnam, I think founders we look at and you look for are the same, but for the potential. What are you looking for especially for Vietnam?

Hans Tung  

We feel that Vietnam is almost like the next China, extremely hardworking, very smart founders. Many sort of software development driven, and the characteristics are so similar, yet the ambition want to be building something as great as if not better than the Chinese counterparts is very, very strong. So this dichotomy of learning and measuring and being better is very evident in the Vietnamese founders. So we won’t be able to share what we know and then help them in the sectors, we’ll look at very similar to what we have looked in China and elsewhere in Southeast Asia. So it’s about transactions, companies that can generate what transactions, hopefully we’ll get more data, with more data be able to service a couple of even better solution and personalization for the consumer. So that’s why eCommerce is one, SMB tech is another online education, and then FinTech, and then SaaS. It’s almost like if one sector does well, you will make the next sector easier as well. So it’s all interconnected. If it takes off, then these five, six categories should all take off. And it seems that the government is putting more emphasis on building up an infrastructure to make it possible to have the better macro environment for the founders to be able to build something. If there’s no infrastructure support, it’s very hard to have a big enough internet user base to market your service to.

Dimitra Taslim

Yeah, I think I think Hans really hit the nail on the head. I just add a little bit to that. I mean, if you look at the GDP per capita of Vietnam right now, you said it’s close to 3,000, usually up to the GDP per capita of 3,000, 4,000. It’s a lot of the low hanging fruit gets plugged the eCommerce which you have done Son, so it’d be very hard for us to find another one to do it. The lack of Grab, some of the bigger B2C FinTech. And then in China, my colleagues have been telling me that they’re seeing the rise of automation and software companies, right the moment China’s GDP per capita across over 10,000. So, I feel like in Southeast Asia and also in Vietnam, we are in this zone between that 3,000 to 4,000 GDP per capita and 10,000 range where you can really do automation or software, but because people are so cheap, it just throw people at problems. And you also can do the low hanging fruits because likes Son transits the world have done eCommerce and the ride hailing. So, it’s between these 4,000 to 10,000, very specific things that can work. And we think that a few of these things are some of the things that Hans has mentioned. And we will look to uncover more and more thesis that can work between these 4,000 to 10,000 GDP per capita range.

Hans Tung  

For example, we have been looking at education in all the key markets, we haven’t backed up an EdTech company in Vietnam, it’s as soon as someone should build a company that will either teach coding better or teach English better or teach math and science better. So, it got to be things that are being built right now that  can help to educate and prepare the next group of workforce that’s going to be more educated and more ready to contribute in IT economy, digital economy. I’m sure it’s there, and we’ll love to be involved.

Dimitra Taslim

What was the most rewarding thing in your entrepreneurial journey? Like what kept you going for more than 10 years?

Son Tran

I see myself as a person who create, I love create things. I love playing Legos when I was young, and until now Lego is all over my house. So, the fact that I saw our team keep building innovation, create better things for our users, even though I usually told them like you are create things for yourself, you create Tiki Delicious, like grocery delivery for yourself. And we didn’t have that before in Vietnam, we didn’t have that kind of service before. So the ability could create that and basically create a spark for not just our peers to follow, to build things similar or even better than that make me feel very fulfilled. We benefit our children, for our friends, our family. That’s all I want to do. I have a pair of Nike shoes I always wear to work; it has embroidery on both sides, one left side it says make. On the right it says impact. So that’s my motto, making impact for the rest of your life. If I’m lucky to live, and continue for decades, and that’s my motto, I just want to make the biggest impact possible. We’re inspiring within TT or investing or making other things.

Hans Tung  

Sure, we’re going to go to a quick-fire session

Dimitra Taslim

The first is what’s something you read recently that you would recommend?

Son Tran

I actually recommend my teams to read more than just books. So whatever happened, they have to learn more. Actually one of my favorite play is podcasts and audiobooks. So of course, GGV next billion. And maybe Techbuzz China I recommend to my team. And high-quality blogs Stratechery by Ben Thompson, Wait But Why by Tim urban, it’s broadening your understanding? So one of the books I’m actually started reading a few days ago is like Wisdom of Finance. And it is a very good book.

Dimitra Taslim

Written by my professor actually.

Son Tran

I think that’s the book that helped me to understand, right why Wall Street, Main Street. Another book is a Facebook inside story. Right? Yep. You read it together with the documentary social dilemma, a great hack. I read a bunch of different things, but that’s something I’m enjoying right now.

Hans Tung  

Okay. who’s the founder you admire the most and why?

Son Tran

Walt Disney.

Hans Tung

It’s the first time on the show.

Son Tran

He’s the first amazing able to build the world. Right. He built his own world. And I think it will last not just one century, it will last few centuries.

Dimitra Taslim

The longevity is very impressive. Last one, if you could spend one day in someone else’s shoes, who would it be?

Son Tran

I thought about this. My kids. I don’t think it’s easy to be a kid, so if I have a chance to see my kids, I hope I can be more empathetic. I may be too strict with them. Hope to see it from their point of view, and grow them better. And I think we all want to be a kid, it’s great to be a kid again, refresh my view of the world. And you can come back, maybe you can do something better for a lot of kids.

Hans Tung  

That’s a great answer. Because of that, one more question. If there’s one piece of advice you can give to young Vietnamese founder today. What would that be?

Son Tran

Nothing different from what I believe, making the biggest impact possible for things that you enjoy.

Hans Tung  

Yeah. And they’re very fortunate right now. That’s the reason why we do this podcast because we love that the enthusiasm of today’s founders, there’s so much more could be done.