Phạm Nam Long, CEO Abivin.

 HÀ NỘI — Phạm Nam Long, CEO of Vietnamese logistics company Abivin, was named as one of three winners at the fifth ASEAN Entrepreneur Award at the 21st World Knowledge Forum (WKF2020) in Seoul.

Long shared the title with Rachmat Kaimuddin, CEO of Indonesia’s e-commerce firm Bukalapak and Nang Kham Noung, deputy chief of Myanmar’s KBZ Bank.

Long realised the increasing population and downgraded infrastructure are causing problems for the shipping industry, raising costs for logistics, adding: “High supply chain costs result in high product prices and this leads to the reduction in customers.”

With his firm’s Abivin vRoute, Long said the hidden costs, information on distances and the journey of the fleet were always visible in real time, enabling his customers to focus on their core competency more efficiently.

Abivin's algorithm analyses factors such as order, cost, vehicle type, weight, restricted roads and more than 20 other delivery constraints to optimise the delivery route, keeping costs at a minimum.

By lowering the cost from 10 to 30 per cent with his firm’s technology, he won big customers in Việt Nam, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia and would like to expand to others in the region.

Abivin beat rivals from 40 countries to win the Start-up World Cup 2019 winning US$1 million worth of future investment into the firm. It also won Việt Nam’s start-up and innovation contest Techfest Vietnam 2018.

Alongside the World Knowledge Forum, the Try Everything event saw the participation of business leaders and start-ups from around the world.

Participants were able to meet global start-up leaders at panel sessions, including Jeffrey Lee, co-founder of Northern Light Venture Capital; Tina Wei, senior advisor at Oceanpine Capital; Hur Jin-ho, partner at SEMA Translink; Abraham Shim, founder and chief executive of Ziktalk OU; Sohn Yu-jin, director at ICONLOOP; and Jason Han, chief executive of Ground X.

Participating in the forum, both online and offline, speakers shared their strategies for start-ups to attract investment at various stages and solutions to new challenges post-COVID-19.

Jack Ma, who attended the forum for the second time, told young entrepreneurs to: “Believe in the future, believe today is a great time to start a business, and find a good team to work together.”

He also stressed the importance of “starting from small” no matter how big the dream is.

He said he believes the “digital economy” will “empower young people, developing countries and small companies,” so we have to move fast to make sure every business, school and country can be digitised.

According to Startup Genome, a global research agency for the start-up ecosystem, Seoul where the forum was hosted stood at twentieth in the global start-up ecosystem ranking in 2020. The start-up ecosystem value of the Korean capital city that aims to move up to No. 5 is estimated to be at $39 billion.

Try Everything is expected to expedite meetings between investors and start-up founders to boost early investment and provide the opportunity for start-ups to make overseas entries, which will help Seoul’s overall competitiveness in the global start-up ecosystem ranking. 

Try Everything, which will be held alongside the 21st World Knowledge Forum, the annual business convention hosted by Maekyung, is to seek innovation momentum to combat the challenging times. The inaugural event will be held under the theme “Make it Possible.” — VNS