Start-ups often emerge from founders attempting to address a specific issue. In 2018, Christopher Choo founded Qashier, a provider of point-of-sale systems for retailers, after recognising the need for more efficient operations at his aunt's small neighbourhood store.
“There was a customer that bought two or three bags from my aunt, and she wrote everything down with a pen and paper on a receipt, before using a calculator to sum up the total price and accepted (only) cash for payment,” Choo recalls in an interview with The Edge Singapore.
Choo quickly realised that many SME retailers - mom and pop shops - were like his aunty. “Nowadays, there's so many different kinds of cashless payments -- you have your cards, E-wallets, pay now, and more. A typical payment module will have multiple terminals with probably five to six different QR codes. We thought that didn't make any sense.”
Choo also points out that SMEs typically have separate software systems for different processes such as sales, inventory management, accounting, or online ordering. “You end up paying 10 different vendors or 10 different subscriptions, none of which are integrated, none which talk to each other. It's expensive and complicated to manage,” he adds.
Choo, whose background is in finance and private equity, found a complimentary partner in Franklin Zhao, whose expertise lies in computer science. Both however, had a shared entrepreneurial spirit.
Choo managed commercial operations and corporate approach, focusing on the outward-facing aspects of Qahier’s operations, while Zhao oversaw product engineering and the internal aspects of the business.
See also: Singapore-headquartered Purpose Venture Capital co-invests US$17.3 mil into biotech startup
“I came up with the strategy, the business model. Frank (Zhao), because he's poised to commercialise, picks the first version of the product and goes to market. So I think this combination let us go from zero to one very quickly,” explains Choo.
Together, the pair worked to address inconvenience through streamlining payment and processing, with the goal of allowing SME business owners to manage all payments and operations from the front office to the back end on a single platform.
“Even before we hired our first employee, we on-boarded the first 100 merchants ourselves. Franklin built the first product, and I went to the first 100 stores myself and to get them onboard the platform,” recalls Choo.
See also: Silicon Valley start-ups had their worst funding year since 2019
Investor interest
Since then, the pair have come a long way from going door-to-door to canvas sales. In 2020, Qashier raised $1.2 million in seed funding, led by Singapore-based venture capital (VC) firm Cocoon Capital and San Francisco-based VC Hardware Club, using the funds to invest in product development and to expand the team from a two-man operation. A year later, the company raised $6.4 million via New York-based venture capital firm Exor Seeds, to expand into Southeast Asia.
When asked by The Edge Singapore on Aug 21, Choo and Zhao said the company was not presently raising funds. “It's still relatively early in our organisation. We are four years old, and we’ve raised two rounds of funding so far. So we are still at a relatively early stage and there is a lot to be done,” explained the pair.
However, Qashier announced on Aug 30 that it had raised $13.6 million in a series A funding round this year, co-led by IFP Securities and Delivery Hero Ventures, an independent VC fund backed by Delivery Hero, the parent company of FoodPanda.
This latest round of funding looks to play a key role in Qashier's growth strategy, enabling the company to accelerate its expansion in its primary Southeast Asia markets and venture into new international markets. “We’re thrilled to have secured this new round of funding, which will allow us to continue to innovate and expand our reach,” says Choo in the funding update’s press release.
Secret to success
Typical of many start-ups, Qashier faced numerous obstacles along the way. The pair had limited resources and struggled to gain traction in the market. Potential clients often questioned their track record and experience, making it challenging to build credibility. “In the first few merchant visits, we literally spent hours with owners, trying to understand their operations and pain points, as well as trying to explain to them how technology could help their business,” recalls Choo.
For more stories about where money flows, click here for Capital Section
Undeterred, Choo and Zhao remained authentic in their approach, tailoring the development of Qashier specifically to the growing needs and challenges faced by SMEs. “Our core value is that merchant success is equal to our success. We always believe that as an organisation, we can only be successful when we help our merchants,” claims Choo.
Qashier has displayed this core ethos of solution development in their different products since its inception. The company initially focused on providing cashless smart POS solutions, but swiftly pivoted to include online ordering and delivery solutions in the form of QashierEats when the Covid-19 pandemic disrupted traditional retail and dining.
Today, Qashier’s latest offering is the Qashier app, a freemium POS and payment solution aimed to allow SMEs with an accessible, user-friendly solution available for download on the Google Android Play Store.
Choo reckons a large reason for Qashier’s successful rate of adoption amongst merchants stems from relatability. “I think even today, we face a lot of the same challenges that SMEs face. We develop solutions specifically for retail and restaurant businesses but as a tech company ourselves, our software and the tools we use are extremely fragmented. So we look at what we're facing today as a SME ourselves and then try to relate it back to the businesses we help,” he explains.
Presently, Qashier’s pool of over 5,000 merchants consists of a “good mix” of both retail and F&B businesses, with a “very broad” range of different age groups amongst operators.
As such, Zhao and Choo have designed Qashier’s platform to be fuss-free and simple to use. “We always like to say anyone who can use a smartphone or tablet can use our platform!” proudly quips the duo.
The next step
For Qashier’s founders, keeping the requirements of SMEs in mind will continue to be crucial as they point out that around 90% of businesses throughout Southeast Asia are SMEs, and large workforces are often dedicated to the sector.
According to Choo, SMEs are still very underserved. “For example, if you're a large bank, you want to serve a large enterprise client, because that’s a lot more profitable for you. So a lot of SMEs today are being left out, especially when everything is shifting towards digitalisation. To me, that’s a very sad sight.”
“I think that's why we are so passionate in what we do. When we see SMEs coming onboard our platform, we know we can be a small part in helping them transition towards the digital economy,” he adds.
For now, Qashier’s plans for the future are detailed towards continued investment in its products, as well as market expansion. “We’re trying to see how we can integrate with other third party apps, bring more apps into our ecosystem and try to solve the continued fragmentation so we can deal with more third party software, for example. Or maybe we can integrate other third party accounting tools and allow merchants to be able to extend their business horizontally,” says the founders.
Qashier’s journey reflects the challenges and triumphs commonly associated with startup ventures. As they continue to grow and evolve, their commitment to addressing merchant pain points, simplifying operations, and fostering SME success remains unwavering.
Whilst acquisition or an IPO may be considered at some point, Choo and Zhao’s ultimate goal for Qashier is not only to achieve financial milestones, but to build a lasting company that positively impacts SMEs and will continue to do so for generations to come.
Meanwhile, the company has maintained its focus on making it easier for SMEs to manage their payments. On July 25 this year, Qashier introduced the SME Support Package, a year-long initiative enabling eligible applicants to receive up to 53% sponsorship for the company’s POS solutions.
Open to all Singapore-registered businesses, the package bills POS users an annual or monthly software subscription fee, and can be applied for regardless of annual sales turnover or employee headcount limit.
According to Choo and Zhao, they have made it a point to keep upfront cost “very low” for merchants to come on board (the support package). “Hopefully, they’ll see the value in what we are providing. For us, the profits come later as long as they (merchants) succeed and grow with Qashier.
