FWD Start-Up Studio and 1337 Ventures have announced the Cohort 4 winners of their Alpha Startups™ for Insurtech Pre-Accelerator Program. The top two winners, Handibee and Carpedia, will each receive RM 150,000 in seed funding.
Handibee is reimagining home maintenance and repairs to make home ownership much simpler. What makes Handibee unique is that their service is a subscription-based home warranty that covers the repair of appliances or systems that malfunction due to wear and tear.
Mohamed Shakir, the founder and CEO of Handibee, shared that a prior home repair company’s high costs and never-ending repairs were what motivated him to start Handibee.
With the RM 150,000 in seed funding from Alpha Startups™, Shakir will focus on developing an application for homeowners and technicians. “This will allow Handibee to grow their customer base and provide a better user experience. Funds will also be allocated to new product development, marketing, and, lastly, scaling up,” he concludes.
Carpedia is helping jobseekers get sustainable income while waiting for jobs by providing them with instant part-time jobs like e-hailing drivers, parcel delivery crews, and private drivers. The platform currently has 4,000 registered gig workers.
“Alpha Startups™ for Insurtech Pre-Accelerator Program provided me with the clarity I needed to not only prepare myself but, more significantly, to view Carpedia from all angles. The one-on-one weekly sessions with seasoned mentors were unquestionably the high point because they improved my confidence in my next move,” according to Hazim Azhar, CEO of Carpedia.
Along with the top two winners, Cohort 4 of Alpha Startups™ for Insurtech Pre-Accelerator Program witnessed HappyPreggie, MakeTimePay, NEXFTS, Wahine Capital, Web3Gate, and WeHantar as the top eight finalists.
Panellists assessing the pitches at the physical demo day include the Group Head of Innovation at FWD Group, Murtaza Gulamali Kanchwala; Senior Manager of Digital Innovation Strategy at FWD Technology and Innovation Malaysia, Marc Fong; Senior Manager of Digital Innovation and Delivery Centre at FWD Technology and Innovation Malaysia, Ivan Loh; and CEO and Founding Partner of 1337 Ventures, Bikesh Lakhmichand.
Launched in March 2021, the FWD Startup-Studio Alpha Startups™ for Insurtech Pre-Accelerator Program is designed to help Malaysian entrepreneurs ideate, validate, and fine-tune their product-market fit and scale their businesses within the Fintech, Insurtech & Takafultech, and Islamic Fintech industries. To learn more about the accelerator and get updates for 2023, visit www.fwdstartupstudio.com.
