5 Things To Watch Out For In Asia In 2020

The Asian start-up scene is only now beginning to boom, and 2020 is expected to see that continue, even though a majority of Asian start-ups are in early stages of growth. Southeast Asia has the most potential moving forward for start-up activity, thanks to a new wave of investors who have an appetite for incubating start-ups. To catch the next start-up wave in the tech, auto, finance, consumer and pharma sector, Entrepreneur Asia Pacific spoke to several analysts, thought leaders, company executives and researchers about trends that could emerge in Asia in 2020.

- Aparajita Saxena

1 TECHNOLOGY

From healthcare and voice services, to hiring employees and managing finances, tech in 2020 aims to continue to make people's lives easier, especially with the help of AI.

HEALTH-TECH AND TELEMEDICINE WILL TAKE CENTRE-STAGE

“As technical advances continue and network connectivity issues lessen, we’ll see more healthcare clinicians get on board in 2020 with telehealth technology and start to offer video visits as part of their standard services. This is absolutely critical in not only helping to bridge the healthcare gap between rural vs metro areas, but also in giving professionals or those with mobility issues, the opportunity to access quality healthcare services, as and when they need it,” says Dr Silvia Pfeiffer, CEO, Coviu, an Australian health company.

TRANSPORT TECH AND VOICE TECH WILL START TO IMPACT OUR LIVES

“Big data has been the domain of large corporations but it was of little relevance to mere mortals, until now. In 2020 we will start to see the combination of big data and transport tech deliver real benefits in terms of better traffic management, smarter public transport and more intelligent cars that can make commuting faster and easier to organise,” says Chris Noone, CEO, Carly.

“Invoice tech, despite the emergence of Alexa and Siri for a very long time, the killer selling-point which gets masses to switch to using virtual assistants on a daily basis hasn’t arrived yet. My bold prediction for 2020 is that we are close to that inflection point. The technology is continuing to expand, especially around personalising the assistant so it can pick up on things like your mood. This is much more impactful than meets the eye: a smartphone AI assistant that you can trust, and can tell you’re getting stressed when driving or can predict needs based on your mood is enormously powerful,” he says.