A global startup competition for up and coming markets, Seedstars World, awarded Acudeen Technologies at their World Pitch Competition in the Philippines. When they presented their idea to the panel of judges, Acudeen beat out seven other Philippine-based startups with their online P2P marketplace solution to help SMEs with income problems. Acudeen Technologies will go on to represent the Philippines in Switzerland at the Seedstars summit and join the race for a $1 million equity investment.
The Seedstar winners aim to help small and medium-enterprises with their income, and quickly. The idea behind Acudeen is that SMEs that struggle to meet bank loan requirements can sell their receivable with invoices to individual buyers. With this, those with bad financials and few assets have access to quality financing. This unique idea was confirmed when the Seedstars Asia regional manager, Katarina Szulenyionova said,
The reasons why we selected Acudeen were two-fold. It came up ranking very high... when they were evaluating criteria such as traction, scalability... investability, team and superiority of the product compared to the existing solutions available on the market."
Mario Jordan Fetalino III, also known as Magellan, is the Chief Executive Officer and founder of Acudeen Technologies. He completed a B.S. in Entrepreneurship at the University of Santo Thomas and is a part of the 3rd batch of the Manila Founder Institute. He has created award-winning business strategies for top-notch business firms in both Philippines and Hong Kong. Fetalino is also a member of the Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) Hong Kong and the Public Relations Society of the Philippines (PRSP). Although he is a part of the 15th batch of the Masters in Entrepreneurship program at the Ateneo Graduate School of Business, he later dropped out to pursue what he calls his "brain child", which later became Acudeen. Currently, Fetalino is the president of Mosman NewMedia Inc., Medical Observer in Makati City. Here he manages revenue growth while maintaining and expanding business partnerships.
Seedstars World received over 100 applications, and while Acudeen came out the winner, there were several industries that competed including agriculture, healthcare, and data analytics.
While PaidUp, another SME company, offers an alternative financing option by allowing small to medium enterprises to crowdfund investment from their customers, Acudeen offers greater scalability than both PaidUp and major banks, focusing on business founders and their ideas.
Acudeen is revolutionary for helping out startups with money problems, but how does the company measure up against major competitors in the industry? What makes Acudeen stand out is that they can't really be considered a loan P2P marketplace. However, it's been compared to major players like the Lending Club and Prosper. Other popular marketplaces are Kiva, Zopa, and Wellesley & Co. but they get too wrapped up in their own money.
Acudeen is different because SMEs can buy and sell what they want even if they're financial history isn't the best. Neither Lending Club nor Prosper, along with the aforementioned companies, can say that they offer discounted receivables to willing buyers.
