Dsion S$100,000 Startup Challenge announces winners

Empowering expatriates to ensure the salary they send home is not abused won the top prize in the inaugural Dsion S$100,000 Startup Challenge. Dsion – a global Blockchain investment platform – and Singapore-based investment firm Block On Capital were the main sponsors for the event.


Beam And Go, a three-year-old startup that allows Filipinos working overseas to remit money in the form of vouchers, beat nine other finalists to win over the judges. The Beam And Go e-vouchers allow the families of foreign workers to redeem anything from groceries, mobile phone top-ups to health insurance.

Said Beam And Go’s CEO Jonathan E. Chua: “This is an affirmation of what we do and that we are on the right track.”

Chua started the website in 2014 to give foreign workers a tool to manage their remitted money, so that the cash would not be abused back home to fund bad habits like gambling, drugs or alcohol.

The 15-man company won S$15,000 in cash, which it says will go towards boosting the company’s investments in sales and marketing, product development, and partnerships with merchants.

Lendor, a startup that created a rental marketplace, came in second. Good For Food, a firm that supplies smart bins that can document the kind of food that are thrown away at restaurants so as to reduce food waste, finished third, tying with Goals Mapper. They took home S$3,000 and shared S$2,000 respectively.

Dsion CEO Seo Jong-pil said, “What they have offered is a crucial and needed service. I believe the numbers of foreign workers around the world will increase in time, and it will develop into an important system.”

Jagdish Pandya, Chairman of  Block On Capital, whose investment portfolio includes Tune Token, Gcox, Airwallet, Alluma, Quickx, and Crebaco commented, “What Beam And Go has done is to come up with a solution, and also create a layer of trust and confidence,” he said. “I’m impressed with the proposal that tackles a real-life problem.”

While he is pleased to see the wealth of startup talent in Singapore, Pandya warned that the road to success is not smooth. “You will fail. Probably multiple times,” he said.  “But don’t get discouraged. This happens to everyone, and it’s what allows innovations to happen.”

Co-organised by AlphaXLab, Block Ventures and Singapore Business Meets (SBM), this is the first time the Dsion Startup Challenge has been held in Singapore.

Seo said his company will be looking forward to return the next year. “The organisers have done a great job with this event,” said the Dsion chief. “And I’ve been very impressed with the business ideas that Singapore startups have come up with. I have seen three and four proposals that I can implement in South Korea straight away.

“I’m very happy with this, and we will return next year.”

Other winners included:


People’s Choice: Towber, which produces an automotive assistance and rewards app

Investor’s Choice: Good For Food

Finalists also receive access to a pool of S$80,000 in incubation fund, grants and services offered by event partners, including:

- Three companies to receive S$10,000 from an incubation fund by Founders Space

- One company to receive S$20,000 from a MVP fund* from JJ Venture

- One company to receive a S$30,000 SG First Entrepreneur Grant with Founders Space

*MVP stands for 'minimum viable product', or a product that has just enough features to satisfy early adopters and allow them to provide the maximum amount of useful feedback to create the best version possible.