Near the Lunar New Year 2 years ago, when the Bizzi employees took a break from work and returned to their hometown to celebrate Tet, Vu Trong Nghia (Nghia Vu) and his co-founder were still hard at work. His startup at that time was just born with a product that lacked many features.
“We almost don't pay attention to Tet anymore. Customers are on holiday and we have more time to develop products,” CEO Nghia Vu recalled.
Although only 2 years old, Bizzi has already made a mark in the Vietnamese startup community when it raised 3 million USD in the Pre-Series A round and won the Digital Transformation Award in Singapore.
This startup provides invoice processing solutions through the application of AI technology and robotic process automation (RPA). Bizzi's platform can be integrated with existing accounting solutions, and connects suppliers and customers to automate financial processes such as checks, reconciliations, bill payments, etc.
In the interview with PartnerCEO Nghia Vu admitted he was very lucky to have chosen the right time to start a business.
– Before starting his career, he worked for many multinational companies. Specifically, what was your job at that time??
– Previously, I worked for a number of multinational companies such as Unilever, GlaxoSmithKline, QSR Vietnam… The previous jobs were related to “innovation” such as developing a new brand or launching a new product into the Vietnamese market.
During my time at GlaxoSmithKline, I was in charge of bringing Sensodyne products to Vietnam market as Brand Manager. At that time, there were no products in the country for sensitive teeth. In foreign countries, it is called a product for "sensitive teeth", but in Vietnam, people do not know what to call this product. We went to market research, evaluate and understand consumers, thereby building a brand for sensitive teeth in Vietnam.
At QSR Vietnam, I used to work as a Marketing Manager, in charge of launching Warren Buffett's Dairy Queen upside down ice cream in the domestic market. When this brand opened 5 stores, I received a Fulbright scholarship to study MBA in the US.
During my 2 years of studying abroad, I joined venture capital networks, worked with many investment funds and technology startups in the US. Since then, I have a desire to build a startup when I return home.
– What was the fate that made you the founder and CEO of Bizzi?
– In 2019, I started to have the idea of Bizzi. At that time, I saw that in Vietnam there was a regulation that required businesses to use e-invoices. Some provinces and cities will stop using paper invoices from November 2021 and across the country from July 2022.
I see this as a great opportunity to apply technology to digital transformation for small and medium enterprises, especially for the finance and accounting department. In the past, when using paper invoices, it was very difficult to apply technology. At that time, OCR technology had to be used to scan invoices, which was inefficient, high cost and low accuracy rate. When switching to using electronic invoices, using software is much easier.
Vietnam has nearly 1 million businesses with billions of invoices in the market every year. Most businesses mainly do output electronic invoices, ie invoicing software, and no one has yet provided an effective solution and accounting support for receiving input invoices.
The difficulty of accountants when receiving input invoices is that it takes a long time and is very annoying because they are not familiar with electronic invoices at that time. After the check is done, the invoices must be archived. For small businesses that do not have a "server" to store, they will store it on Google Drive or in the mail box. This leads to difficulties in searching, and tax-related risks. And this is the problem I posed when I started with Bizzi.
– When you have a startup idea, who do you share it with?
– At that time, after returning from school in the US, I did not work for a business at all, mainly I worked on consulting projects. It wasn't until I met the technology Cofounder (currently the CTO of Bizzi) that the two sides exchanged ideas and saw this as an opportunity to shake hands with this startup.
– Is this your first startup?
– This is not the first time I have started a business, but if I say starting a business in the technology field, it is the first time.
– As you shared, your previous projects were oriented towards branding, moving into another field, did you have difficulty getting started?
– In fact, my job is not exactly branding, it is more like “build a new business”. Bringing a brand like Sensodyne or Dairy Queen into Vietnam is like starting a business. Those were skills that were essential when I started my business. In addition, the knowledge I learned during my MBA in the US also helped a lot in building a company.
– How were the early days of your startup and Cofounder?
– At first, we recruited 3 more programmers and software engineers to support the product development. The first year we only had about 7 people, working in a co-working space. The initial capital is not much, mainly I invest time, effort and brain. In the first stage, the two Cofounders also worked without salary.
- So what now?
– Now we receive full wages and can also be considered close to the market price (laugh). From 7 people, the startup now has 30 employees and after the latest round of funding, we are recruiting to accelerate product development.
– How long did it take you to get your first client?
– We started building the product in September 2019. It is also quite fortunate that in February 2020, the first customer began to appear, which is the GS25 convenience store chain. Before that, we met and presented the idea to customers, after Tet finished giving the product to them to experience.
To get the first customer, we met about 15-20 businesses and presented about the difficulties faced by accountants as well as the value that Bizzi's products bring. After listening, some parties also liked this product but did not drastically implement it. Meanwhile, GS25 loves to apply new technology and make decisions very quickly.
To date, Bizzi has about 150 large corporate clients. Large corporate customers are defined by us as multinational corporations, large retail chains, listed companies. In addition, many small and medium enterprises are using Bizzi's software.
– Before receiving investment of 3 million USD from Money Forward, Do Ventures and Qualgro, Bizzi was also invested by 500 Startups Vietnam. How do Bizzi's funding rounds usually go?
– 500 Startups is one of the investment funds pouring capital into the seed stage. They evaluate on many factors such as market size, general trend of automation applied in the field of finance and accounting, solutions launched by startups that have given results and have customers to try… They decide very much. Fast, after only 2 days of meeting, agreed to invest.
With the recent Pre-Series A round, it may be luck that the exchange of terms is also very favorable. After only 2 months, the two sides closed and signed.
– Convincing customers and investors, what do you find more difficult?
– I think convincing customers is the most important thing, when I convince customers, convincing investors is very simple. Investors are always looking for companies that perform well, grow well, they look at business results and growth. At that time, I don't need to convince anymore, on the contrary, investors will convince the startup to let them invest in.
– Is the Covid-19 pandemic one of the reasons why it is easier for technology startups like Bizzi to raise capital?
- I think so. Digital transformation has become a trend, not only in Vietnam but also all over the world. Therefore, businesses in the field of B2B SaaS like us receive great attention from investors.
SaaS businesses like Zoom have boomed during the pandemic or many companies in the field of automation have also received huge investments.
– Do you consider yourself lucky to have chosen the right time to start a business?
– It is true. Choosing the right time to offer solutions, the right time to call for investment capital plays a vital role in the company. If my idea was implemented a few years early, it would not have been able to have such a large growth, because at that time, when using paper invoices, businesses were not very interested. If you do it later, the market may have smarter solutions, then it will be difficult to compete. In my opinion, the decisive moment to 80% the success of the startup.
– Bizzi is introduced as a pioneering startup in Vietnam providing solutions to automate electronic invoice processing. Are there any similar products on the market today?
– Currently, my side is also developing many different products, and if we talk about the main product, recently a large Vietnamese technology company also launched a product with a similar solution. That proves this is a potential market.
– But competing with a "big man" in the technology industry, it will be a challenge that is not easy to overcome for Bizzi?
– Exactly, compared to the size of large technology corporations, we are only a part of them. However, I think large or small businesses will have advantages and disadvantages. Startups like Bizzi will focus 100% on what we are doing, which is automation and AI in the financial accounting field. Whereas large corporations have different focus on the big games.
Many people used to wonder why a startup like Bizzi just born has such large customers. The fact is that I came out at the right time when the market has no competitors, which is the advantage of startups in going fast and exploring the market. However, the long story of how to compete with the "big guys" is a matter to consider.
We have the support of many investment funds, in which Money Forward is a Japanese listed company with a lot of experience. Bizzi is not exactly a small startup to worry about survival story, we also have some resources to compete.
– Looking back at 2021, are you satisfied with what you and Bizzi can do?
– In addition to exceeding expectations and successfully raising capital from major investors, what I am most proud of is that Bizzi's solutions bring real value and are recognized not only in Vietnam but also in Vietnam. in the international community.
In 2021, Bizzi received the Top 10 digital startups award from the Vietnam Software and IT Services Association (VINASA) and at the end of the year received the Digital Transformation award in Singapore. This award, organized by the Swiss Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SwissCham) in collaboration with Deloitte, honors innovation and digital transformation initiatives in Singapore and across Southeast Asia. Bizzi is also the only Vietnamese company to win this award.
Of course, besides that, we still have a lot of things that have not been achieved, need to continue to build and develop. Due to the impact of the pandemic, in the past year, people have been working remotely, facing a lot of pressure and stress. That also affects the building of corporate culture.
– With the support of a Japanese company, does your startup plan to expand into this market?
– Japan is a special market, in the immediate future, Bizzi will focus on the Vietnamese market as well as the markets of countries in Southeast Asia. I think there are some countries in the region where Bizzi has the opportunity to grow. However, in the next 2 years, Vietnam is the market that we focus on 100%.
– When starting a startup, some people are afraid of failure, others are afraid of loneliness. What about you, what are you most afraid of when starting a business?
– Statistics show that 99.9% startups will fail in the first 3 years. So, when I started a business, I made it clear that it was possible to fail. I am no longer afraid of failure, but what I fear most is that I cannot develop myself fast enough to be able to lead and lead the company to develop to its potential. A company with 10 employees will be different from 100 employees then 1,000 employees. The CEO himself, the leader must grow very quickly to learn and develop, otherwise he will become a factor hindering the development of the company.
– In the past time, blockchain and cryptocurrencies are keywords that are very interested in technology startups. Do you yourself invest in cryptocurrencies?
– Regarding cryptocurrencies and blockchain, I study the technology very carefully because I think it will be closely related to what I am doing and in the future there will be many applications. However, when it comes to investing in virtual money, I'm out of the game. I would take a more approach to applying technologies to my startup than investing.
- Thank you.
Post: Dieu Tuyet Design: Bao Linh
Source: NDH
