ScaleUp Malaysia: Creating Gig Economy Jobs In A Pandemic
Welcome back to an all new Head’s Up. This week, we covered ScaleUp Malaysia’s Cohort 3 Roadshow webinar: Creating Gig Economy Jobs In A Pandemic where Mo, CEO of ERTH, enables e-waste recycling through his Heroes, and Nadira, Founder and CEO of on-demand childcare service provider, Kiddocare share their experience and thoughts on how they managed to increase the number of gig jobs in the pandemic.
Till our next issue, stay safe and stay healthy.
News & Announcements
MDEC disburses US$1.33 mil to 45 SME grant recipients
MDEC, Malaysia’s lead digital economy agency, announced today it has disbursed US$1.33 million (RM5,524,896.00) to 45 recipients under four grant programmes; Global Technology Grant (GTG), Digital Content Creators Challenge, Digital Content Grant, and the #SMART Automation Grant (SAG). The announcement also indicates that MDEC’s new grant framework is now completed and fully operational.
The #SMART Automation Grant 2021 opened for submission on 26th August, with a four week call for submissions. Applicants can register and check their eligibility criteria at mdec.my/sag.
By Poojalexmi,
The gig economy provides employment opportunities for those who have lost their jobs during the economy. With close to four million freelance workers in Malaysia today, startups and E-hailing seems to influence the gig economy by offering them job opportunities.
Being capable to contribute to the gross domestic product (GDP) of the country, the Malaysian Government recognises gig economy as a source of economic growth and makes it part of the 12th Malaysia Plan 2021-2025.
Having close association with the gig industry, founders of Kiddocare and E-waste Recycling Through Heroes (ERTH), Nadira Yusoff and Mohamed Tarek El-Fatatry joins in Scale Up Malaysia’s Cohort 3 Roadshow to share their thoughts on the creation of gig economy jobs.
Empowerment of the Gig Economy
Having a common goal of empowering gig workers, Nadira and Mohamed also known as Mo started out in different ways. For Nadira, Kiddocare was created out of the problems she faced as a working mom during an age where parenting was struggle.
In an effort to have both a career and a good nurturing environment for her kids, she co-founded Kiddocare that provides babysitter services for other parents wanting the same as well.
Eventually she realised how it does not only offer childcare services but empowers women with job opportunities at the same time. She soon realised that there are women that could be trained and be provided with a mechanism to allow them to progress within the job and enjoy what they do.
“Empowerment is a circle. We empower women with the right skills and job opportunities in the childcare industry who in return support other women to pursuit their careers,” she adds.
Today, she has around 2000 registered babysitters that work either full time or part time. It is a flexible working platform that also aims to solve the issues of underpaid workers in the childcare industry. Kiddocare also empowers more local women by training them to be involved in this industry.
On the other hand, ERTH was created as a way to handle e-waste in an environmental friendly way. In the first 6 months of the business, being the only person working to collect e-waste from homes, he realised he needed more people to aid him.
He felt the locals will be a good fit to be his gig workers or as he likes to call them, heroes. He calls them heroes because they help people feel good about disposing electronics in an environmental friendly way and pay a cash reward. With locals as heroes, they would know the collection areas well and is efficient as well as affordable for the business.
Creating a business that involves gig workers required him to empower his workers with good profit as well. It took Mo a year to be able to optimise the hero fees and increase the cash reward.
When ERTH did not get Ministry of International Trade & Industry (MITI) approval during the Movement Control Order (MCO), he integrated with MrSpeedy, a delivery service company to collect his orders.
“It was tough times to get a job. So, I wanted to integrate and widen the circle of people that help us.”
To be able to continue their empowerment and push their companies to the next level, both founders joined ScaleUp Cohort 2 programme. Fortunately, both were chosen to be in the top 10 companies that obtained investment.
Why ScaleUp Malaysia?
ScaleUp Malaysia is an accelerator that focuses on growth stage companies to aid them in getting more funding, expansion into the market and connection with new partnerships. With two cohorts successfully done, ScaleUp Malaysia is now getting ready with Cohort 3.
Startups wanting to grow more should join ScaleUp Malaysia for several different reasons. Firstly, they would get mentorship and guidance from the partners in the program who are seasoned entrepreneurs. Nadira explains how ScaleUp provides both support and strength to companies to push through.“It takes an ecosystem to develop a startup,” says Nadira.
Additionally, ScaleUp Malaysia also provides structure to startups that would have otherwise got it from hired consultants or would have struggled to figure it out themselves.
Besides that, startups that have some traction and revenue will also benefit from Scale Up’s World Class 3 Months Accelerator Programme. Companies would also gain market access to local and global customers through Malaysian Global Innovation and Creativity Centre (MaGIC), Technology Park Malaysia and Venture Capital Firms. On top of that, both MaGIC and ScaleUp Malaysia would aid companies to get green lane entry into the National Technology Innovation Sandbox and access to Global Market-Fit Programme (GMP) along with MyStartup Hub.
The Road Ahead
The accelerator programm requires companies to go through 3 months of workshops and one-on-one sessions with ScaleUp partners. After 3 months, 20 companies will be chosen to pitch to the investment committee. Around 10 companies would receive RM250,000 investment coming from ScaleUp Malaysia, Quest Ventures and Indelible Ventures.
Hard work continues on as these companies will move into the investment process and continue to be strengthened to scale higher for the next 24 months.
At the end of the 6th month, chosen startups would present their plans to outside venture capitals and corporate partners on Demo Day. Throughout the period, companies will focus on product, sales and marketing. Through the guidance of Scale Up partners, there will also be focus on funding and financing.
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