A major victory for AIS The Startup, as the sole recipient of the Global Startup Award (GSA) in Thailand, emphasizing its longstanding leadership
15 Feb 2020
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On December 11-14, 2019, the Global Startup Award event was held in conjunction with the Global Startup Summit at Changsha, the People’s Republic of China (PRC), in which AIS The StartUp received the Global Startup Award (GSA) for The Best Accelerator and Incubator Program). Before proceeding to congratulating them on this landmark success, let us take a look and explore deeper with regards to the origin of this award, and find out what the AIS The Startup team had to encounter before receiving this prestigious award.
What is the Global Startup Award (GSA)?
The ‘Global Startup Awards’ is an entrepreneurial business competition program that focuses on a startup ecosystem with the largest sustainable business plan in the world. The Best Accelerator and Incubator Program award is usually given out to organizations that have established clearly defined teams with a fixed-term, and who possess a definite purpose and operational pattern based on Global Benchmarks, or a global standard in providing tools, internal and external resources, connections, as well as connecting knowledge and experts to promote and drive sustainable business growth of entrepreneurs and companies with local and global innovations.
Why did AIS The StartUp receive this award?
AIS The StartUp was closely watched by the judges based on their key message that clearly reflected their goals and strategies, which includes;
1. Short description EN: Business and Go-to-Market Platform to Strengthen Startup Business with Growth Opportunities, Locally and Globally
2. Short description TH: Platform for businesses, for the distribution of startups’ products and services, to strengthen growth both domestically and abroad.
AIS The StartUp aims to create a digital and technology alliance between AIS and startups. The resulting cooperation will create digital commercialization that will drive the progress of the digital economy at the national and regional level, with AIS The StartUp providing support in several dimensions. In addition, it has also partnered with the Singtel Group Alliance to provide access to a larger regional market.
Our Values & Contributions
From 2011-2019, AIS The StartUp was able to contribute in driving up the digital economy value, to as much as;
- Digital Economy Value: +12B baht per year
(calculated from the economic turnover generated from the services of AIS The StartUp, both from end-consumers and B2B)
- Digital Creation / Job Creation: Employment +2,000 Positions
- Digital Product / services: Currently, there are 47 products and services that are available
(Last updated: December 2019)
AIS The StartUp was able to achieve a high digital economy value was a result of delivering the following values to startup business groups
- Build a win-win partnership between corporations and startups, in order to accelerate digital services to the market.
- Increase trade and market advantage the members of the AIS The StartUp.
- Knowledge and experience sharing within the ecosystem.
- Connect startups with the global network, for both Market Access and the Entrepreneur Ecosystem.
What the team had to experience before acquiring the award?
Acquiring the Global Startup Award (GSA) was not based on a single one-time competition, but had to be subjected to several screening processes which took up to almost a year. There will only be a single recipient in the world of the GSA award in each category. AIS The StartUp was among more than 1,000 nominees from around the world that had to go through the rigorous screening process before finally being chosen as “The Best Global Accelerator and Incubator Program”
Selection process for the Global Startup Award (GSA)
The award would comprise of prizes at the National, Regional, and Global levels, the details of which are as follows; The selection process at the country or national level was as follows:
1. Open for public nominations by a secret ballot that does not reveal as to who made the nomination or the one that was nominated. AIS The StartUp was nominated as one of the candidates was due to their past performance which yielded tangible results and was sufficiently accepted enough to be nominated.
2. The nomination was considered by a panel of judges, which if they would deem it appropriate, would then officially notify AIS The StartUp of the nomination
3. AIS The StartUp, would then submit additional information for the judges to consider.
4. 50% of the votes are made by the panel of judges, while the remaining is made by general votes.
5. Announcement of AIS The StartUp being selected as The Best Thailand Accelerator and Incubator Program.
At the regional level (ASEAN), the selection process was as follows:
1. After being awarded as the national winner, AIS The StartUp will represent Thailand to compete at the ASEAN level together with 10 other countries, in the ASEAN Rice Bowl Award.
2. The ASEAN level selection process is made based on 50% voting by a judging committee, with the remaining from public votes.
3. According to the ASEAN Rice Bowl Award, AIS The StartUp received 2 awards, which includes The Best Accelerator and Incubator Program in ASEAN, and the People’s Choice Award (the public’s favorite award, which was obtained from votings within ASEAN ).
At the global level, the selection process was as follows:
1. Upon being awarded the winner at the regional level, AIS The StartUp will then be subsequently chosen to represent ASEAN to enter the global round. Therefore, qualifying into the global rounds is just not a matter of representing AIS or Thailand, but all of the 10 ASEAN countries, in competing with representatives from other regions or continents as well.
2. There are no voting at the global level, but each team will be judged on their past to present achievements, as well as future plans, based on considerations from qualified judges, such as,
- Spencer Jentzsch (USA) : CEO, Head of HR, Tinder Consultant Korean
- Linguist Hans Sundstrom (USA) : Global Business Executive at Blue Brich Venture, Expertise in the Commercialization of Leading Edge Technology,
- Matthias Zwingli (Switzerland) : Startup Ecosystem Builder @digitalswitzerland
All of these has been a result of cumulative experiences in which AIS The Startup has always strived to develop and continuously keep up with the global trend, and most importantly, stressing the need to push for startups to move forward with us, with tangible results and being awarded for attention to every detail. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that today, AIS The StartUp has been awarded the Global Startup Award (GSA) for The Best Global Accelerator and Incubator Program.
And in 2020, AIS The StartUp is emphasizing on this award by taking the operation to the next level by working with startups, both domestically and abroad. It can be said that it will be a year of unlocking, adding value, and creating more value for startups, as well as being a year of sharing valuable experiences between corporations such as AIS and various other innovative companies, to support the upcoming 5G industry, with AIS's New Business Beyond Telco collaboratively working with Singtel Innov8 to introduce leading technology from around the world based on Innov8’s investments, to the Thai people to use as well.
For anyone who would like to obtain additional information regarding AIS The Startup’s background, in-depth details, ideas, processes, and planning process, please refer to our second article, “How did AIS The StartUp became the only sole recipient of the award in Thailand?”
by
AIS The StartUp
