I’ve always been interested in startups in Asia because they’re filled with talented developers and smart people with impressive skills.
However, I’ve noticed some differences when these individuals decide to start their own companies compared to their counterparts in other countries.
Western vs. Asian Startups
After having many one-on-one conversations with founders from the United States, Australia, Korea, and Southeast Asia through Zerobase, I’ve seen a clear difference in priorities.
Western founders usually focus on developing and launching their products quickly to get into the market early. On the other hand, Korean and other Asian founders often concentrate on raising money before even starting to build their products.
There’s a common belief among early-stage Asian founders that they need to secure funding from investors before they can start creating their product. This approach leads to several issues:
Networking Over Product: They spend a lot of time attending events to meet investors instead of working on their product.
Too Many Events: While attending startup talks can be motivating, it often takes time away from actual development.
Shallow Problem Understanding: They might only understand the problems they want to solve on a basic level.
Skipping Validation: They rarely take the time to thoroughly test and validate their ideas.
Overcomplicating Ideas: They tend to make their product ideas too complex, making it hard to create a simple first version.
It almost feels like raising money has become a necessary first step before founders can start working on their ideas.
I looked at some data from our Zerobase program comparing Western and Asian founders, and the results were interesting:
Time to Create an MVP (Minimum Viable Product):
Asian Founders: 6 months
Western Founders: 2 months
Western founders can go through at least four cycles of improving their product by the time Asian founders release their first version, giving them a significant advantage.
Number of Improvement Cycles in a Year:
Asian Founders: 2–3 cycles
Western Founders: 10 cycles
Western founders make five times as many improvements each year, helping them find a good market fit much faster.
Survival Rate After 2–3 Years:
Asian Startups: 40% are still around
Western Startups: 70% are still around
This difference makes sense because Asian startups take longer to develop their MVPs and go through fewer improvement cycles, making it harder to find what the market wants or to become profitable.
These findings aren’t surprising, so why aren’t more people in Korea or Asia changing how they approach startups?
Many Asian cultures value perfection and paying attention to every little detail, which is great in many areas. However, for early-stage startups, being too focused on details can slow things down. Startups need to move quickly and adapt, and striving for perfection can get in the way of that.
It’s time for a change in how startups operate in Asia. By focusing more on building and improving their products quickly, Asian startups could see much higher success rates.
Very interested to see how Zerobase playsout in Asia.
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