9 September 2015 – The start-up innovation arms of Singtel (Singtel Innov8), Orange (Orange Fab), Deutsche Telekom (hub:raum) and Telefónica (Telefónica Open Future) have joined forces to bridge the start-up ecosystems across Southeast Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.
The partnership aims at catalysing the growth of eligible start-ups and launching them beyond their respective home markets. Selected start-ups will have the benefit of tapping into the resources and network of the four leading communications companies. This includes market insights, introductions to partners, the use of co-working spaces and access to the companies’ operating businesses. Selected start-ups may also have the opportunity to gain access to the operators’ collective mobile customer base of over one billion people across four continents.
Mr Edgar Hardless, CEO, Singtel Innov8, said: “This is a great opportunity for us to deepen our connections with leading innovation hubs around the world. More start-ups harbour aspirations to venture beyond their own markets and go global. Through Singtel Innov8’s deep connections in Southeast Asia, we can help open doors for African, European, Middle Eastern and Latin American start-ups to the region. Similarly, our portfolio companies can leverage this partnership to expand beyond their home markets.”
Ms Nathalie Boulanger, Start-up Ecosystem Director, Orange said: “Having built up extensive experience of working hand-in-glove with start-ups across the world, Orange sees the formation of global partnerships such as this as the critical next step to ensure that digital innovators continue to flourish. With our collective and complementary footprints spanning four continents, we can provide start-ups with access to new markets, thereby enabling them to accelerate their growth further.”
Mr Min-Kin Mak, VP, hub:raum, Deutsche Telekom said: “With the partnership between Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Singtel and Telefónica, we see a huge opportunity to develop the bridges between the ecosystems in Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America and to provide start-ups with critical market access, funding and expertise to become more successful with their international expansion.”
Mrs Ana Segurado, Managing Director of Telefónica Open Future said: “This agreement is a unique opportunity to reinforce our engagement to develop open and innovative initiatives to help telco operators enhance the digital experience of companies all over the world. With this alliance, Telefónica seeks to complement its open innovation strategy, being its latest key initiative since the launching of the Communication Investment Platform (CIP) 5 months ago. As a leader in the CIP, Telefónica Open Future is establishing itself as a front runner in forming ‘innovation factories’ to create new and disruptive technologies”.
The partnership benefits are available to start-ups supported by hub:raum, Orange Fab, Telefónica Open Future and Singtel Innov8, as well as all members of Innov8 Sparks – a network of start-up support and funding initiatives across Southeast Asia, founded by members of the Singtel Group.
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About Singtel (singtel.com)
Singtel is Asia’s leading communications group providing a portfolio of services including voice and data solutions over fixed, wireless and Internet platforms as well as infocomm technology and pay TV. The Group has presence in Asia, Australia and Africa with over 550 million mobile customers in 25 countries, including India, Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand. It also has a vast network of offices throughout Asia Pacific, Europe and the United States.
About Singtel Innov8 and Innov8 Sparks (innov8.singtel.com)
Singtel Innov8, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Singtel Group, is a venture capital fund, with its own set of decision making, approval and funding processes. It has a fund size of US$250 million with offices in Singapore, Silicon Valley, Tel Aviv and Beijing. Singtel Innov8 focuses its investments on technologies and solutions that lead to quantum changes in network capabilities, next generation devices, digital content services and enablers to enhance customer experience. It works closely with the ecosystem of leading innovators, developers, government agencies, R&D and capital providers to bring cutting-edge technologies and solutions to the various markets the Singtel Group operates in.
Innov8 Sparks is a network of start-up support and funding initiatives across Southeast Asia, founded by members of the Singtel Group. Founding members include Singtel Innov8 (Singapore), AIS The Startup (Thailand), Kickstart Ventures by Globe Telecom (the Philippines), Optus-Innov8 Seed (Australia), and Teman Dev by Telkomsel (Indonesia).
About Orange (orange.com)
Orange is one of the world’s leading telecommunications operators with sales of 39 billion euros in 2014 and 154,000 employees worldwide at 30 June 2015, including 97,000 employees in France. Present in 29 countries, the Group has a total customer base of 248 million customers worldwide at 30 June 2015, including 190 million mobile customers and 16 million fixed broadband customers. Orange is also a leading provider of global IT and telecommunication services to multinational companies, under the brand Orange Business Services. In March 2015, the Group presented its new strategic plan “Essentials2020” which places customers’ needs at the heart of its strategy with the aim of allowing them to benefit fully from the digital universe and the power of its new generation networks. Orange is listed on NYSE Euronext Paris (symbol ORA) and on the New York Stock Exchange (symbol ORAN).
For more information on the internet and on your mobile: www.orange.com, www.orange-business.com, www.livetv.orange.com or to follow us on Twitter: @orangegrouppr.
Orange and any other Orange product or service names included in this material are trademarks of Orange or Orange Brand Services Limited.
About Orange Fab (orangefab.com)
Orange Fab is a start-up accelerator programme launched by Orange that aims to accelerate and boost innovation and entrepreneurship. Born in Silicon Valley in 2013, the programme is now present in 10 countries in Europe, Africa, the USA, the Middle East and Asia. Orange Fab has accelerated or is currently accelerating107 start-ups since its launch.
Orange Fab offers selected start-ups three months of support to allow them to develop their products and services. They also receive valuable advice from Orange innovators and experts as well as a number of entrepreneurs. In certain countries, eligible start-ups also receive funding in the form of convertible bonds.
Supporting start-ups is one of the pillars of Orange’s open innovation approach to accelerate the marketing of innovations that will benefit its customers. The Group aims to support 500 start-ups across the world by 2020 with a focus on the rapid realisation of commercial partnerships, or in some cases, joint ventures, via Orange Digital Ventures, its investment fund for early age start-ups.
About Deutsche Telekom (telekom.com)
Deutsche Telekom is one of the world’s leading integrated telecommunications companies with around 151 million mobile customers, 30 million fixed-network lines and more than 17 million broadband lines (as of December 31, 2014). The Group provides fixed network, mobile communications, Internet and IPTV products and services for consumers and ICT solutions for business customers and corporate customers. Deutsche Telekom is present in more than 50 countries and has approximately 228,000 employees worldwide. The Group generated revenues of EUR 62.7 billion in the 2014 financial year – more than 60 percent of it outside Germany.
About hub:raum (hubraum.com)
hub:raum connects the digital startup ecosystem with Deutsche Telekom, linking tech entrepreneurs and high growth startup companies with the expert network, capital, and business opportunities of Deutsche Telekom. hub:raum offers various programs in 3 locations: hub:raum Berlin covers Germany and Western Europe, hub:raum Krakow covers the CEE region and hub:raum Tel-Aviv covers Israel. They have all range of programs from seed investment, incubation, acceleration and specialized programs like Fit4Europe and offer benefits like co-working space, mentoring, networking events and connections to Deutsche Telekom business units like partnering as well as access to customers.
About Telefónica (telefonica.com)
Telefónica is one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world in terms of market capitalisation and number of customers. With its best in class mobile, fixed and broadband networks, and innovative portfolio of digital solutions, Telefónica is transforming itself into a ‘Digital Telco’, a company that will be even better placed to meet the needs of its customers and capture new revenue growth.
The company has a significant presence in 21 countries and a customer base of 329 million accesses around the world. Telefónica has a strong presence in Spain, Europe and Latin America, where the company focuses an important part of its growth strategy.
Telefónica is a 100% listed company, with more than 1.5 million direct shareholders. Its share capital currently comprises 4.938.417.514 ordinary shares traded on the Spanish Stock Market and on those in London, New York, Lima, and Buenos Aires.
About Telefónica Open Future (openfuture.org)
Telefónica Open Future is the area of Telefónica that, since 2014, gathers all the global initiatives related to open innovation, investment and entrepreneurship of the company. Its aim is to connect start-ups, investors and public and private organisations worldwide, guiding innovative technologies and solutions towards the development of viable projects, by means of a model that gives visibility to local talent wherever it takes place.
Through Open Future initiatives (Think Big, Talentum, Crowdworking spaces, Wayra, Telefónica Ventures, Amerigo and the CIP platform), Telefónica covers all stages of support for entrepreneurship: ecosystem and local talent empowering, ideas and disruptive projects acceleration, scale up and investment on IT SMBs.
Open Future universe has a network of more than 30 spaces in 3 continents (Latam, Europe and Asia) through its offices in 17 countries. With a portfolio of over 550 start-ups invested worldwide and 62 agreements with public and private partners, Telefónica and its partners have committed EUR 550 million to Open Future and helped creating 7.000 jobs around the Globe.
Twitter: @OpenFuture_
Our investment partners:
Active Venture Partners (Amérigo): http://active-vp.com
Axon Partners Group: http://axonpartnersgroup.com
Coral Group (CIP): http://coralgrp.com
Kibo Ventures (Amérigo): http://kiboventures.com
Inversur (Amérigo): http://inversurcapital.com
Invest Tech (Amérigo): http://investtech.com.br/pt/index.php
Shortcut Ventures: http://shortcut.vc
Media Contacts
Singtel
Ivy Tan
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Phone: +65 9787 8399
Orange
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Nicole Clarke
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Deutsche Telekom
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Telefónica
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