Startups are mushrooming all across Southeast Asia, especially those focused on creating an impact while making a profit. At the same time, investments into startups doubled in the region in 2021. Startups need support with institutional partners — be it governments and multilateral agencies, or corporates and private investors — to help to launch their ideas, test their concept, and increase their access to market.

For episode 2, Changing Tides with The Incubation Network speaks to Anurag Maloo, Regional Director for Asia-Pacific & VP of Global Partnerships & Business Development for Seedstars, a global community that runs acceleration programs for startups around the world to develop innovative, commercially viable solutions to marine plastic waste.

“The infrastructure and overall ecosystem support is not going to happen in one year, or one program will not change anything. It’s a decades-long journey, it’s a journey that takes time. There is still a lot of room for innovation, which opens up a lot more opportunity for talented entrepreneurs to come and start building ventures that solve plastic pollution for the region, rather than copying something from the west and just try to replicate it here,” says Anurag.

In this episode we discuss:

• Why is it challenging for startups to grow and scale?
• How do we increase startups’ access to knowledge, capital and networks?
• What kind of startups do partners consider for cooperation?
• How can we support the growing industry in the Southeast Asia innovation space?