Schoolab: Sparking Innovation Across Borders

Schoolab, a global innovation studio, goes beyond consulting by fostering collaboration and driving positive change. They design tailored innovation programs, such as intrapreneurship bootcamps to train employees to accelerate innovation projects within their organizations, for, support startups with incubation and acceleration programs, provide in person and online training and e-learning resources, and manage spaces for co-creation. Using human-centered design and a global network, they tackle social and environmental challenges across industries like food, mobility, and education. Schoolab isn't just an innovation studio - it's a platform for collective impact, empowering innovation for a better future. With that, why don’t you join me in learning more about Schoolab with its APAC Region Manager, Arthur Mossa.

Could you tell us about your journey to becoming the APAC Region Manager of Schoolab. What attracted you to this role and Schoolab's mission?

I have a business academic background. I graduated from a master’s degree in economy and international negotiation. I worked in the corporate finance industry in Singapore and Australia for a French company, with a short stay in India as well.. After that, I moved to Chile to open the largest gastronomic Pisco Bar in Santiago, Chile, and managed its successful launch before relocating to Asia.. I worked for a Chinese company based in Shanghai that imports wine. I was in charge of the Beijing and Tianjin areas, and I lived and sold wine there for two and a half years. 

I was amazed by the developed use of technology I could see in  China. An example of this was WeChat, essentially the only "super app" during that time. The notion of a super app was not very well known in Europe and Western countries then, and it is still not as developed even today. This amazed me and I decided to go back to France to learn coding, because otherwise, I felt like I would be left behind if I didn't know how these technologies worked. After that, I moved to Thailand where I became a digital project owner. I really liked my job, but I felt like I was missing the UX/UI skills that I had acquired during my digital training. I went back to France, and learned more about web development and UX/UI design. I ended up teaching at the same school I was studying, and got hired as a lecturer.

This was how I found Schoolab. The institute had a partnership with Schoolab for a UX/UI designer to join the company as a freelancer. I became Schoolab’s freelance UX/UI designer. I really loved the company’s culture and mission as they share the same values of collaboration, creativity and sustainability as me. Not too long after joining them, they offered me a full time position as a project manager. I quickly climbed the stairs and got promoted to the role of Mission Director in charge of innovation programs and developing the African market, with multiple open innovation programs run in Madagascar, Angola, Côte d’Ivoire…

One of my last projects before leaving for Vietnam, was a student program run simultaneously in Cote d'Ivoire and Madagascar. We worked on a project to improve the collection and recycling of used motor oils. The idea was to understand how oil flows (where does the oil go from its beginning to end of life), the governing laws and regulations on the waste management, and to design solutions to give the best possible use for those oils and upcycling.

With my extensive experience in the Asia market and emerging markets, Schoolab’s management decided to offer me the opportunity to take over the Vietnam Country Manager position and manage our APAC team to further develop our activities in the region. 

The idea was to bring in all my previous experiences as a designer, teacher, entrepreneur, and consultant with me to the Vietnamese office.

What is Schoolab and how is it different from its other competitors? 

Schoolab is an innovation studio and is heavily impact driven. We provide three main services: we design and run open innovation programs, we do innovation consulting, and we train and coach entrepreneurs and employees.

It all started 20 years ago, when Jean-Claude Charlet, one of Schoolab’s founders was studying in Stanford. He was impressed by the startup ecosystem in San Francisco that was flourishing with entrepreneurship. He brought this energy and mindset back to France and decided to teach it to the new generations. As a result, he created a program called CPI (Création d’un Produit Innovant, Creating Innovative Products). This program brings together the best students from top business, engineering, and design schools. Each Thursday, for three to five months, students were learning about design thinking and then applying what they learned to the real corporate challenges they were working on. Very often, one student would suggest new ideas or prototypes which impressed the corporate partners. It was a big success, and the program is still running now with over 5 spin-offs around the world. 

Naturally, we developed a second service branch: consulting. We bring experts from our network and our own team together to help companies launch new projects or services. Finally, we started to have an edge at entrepreneurship. We created our own accelerator and incubator. The success multiplied, and we run more than 10 white-label programs per year, in the name of corporate partners and public entities. For example, we run Rungis Market’s incubator, Rungis&Co. Rungis is the world’s largest fresh produce market, and the startups that join us benefit from high-level coaching from some of the leading food logistics corporations. Rungis & Co is 100% dedicated to developing the future of food, developing circular economy models, and transitioning to sustainable and transparent supply chains.  Similarly, we are also doing this here in Vietnam. We worked with the German Public Investment Fund (GiZ) to create a program around green tech and energy efficiency. The program ran for 6 months, in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, supporting the startups in their acceleration and fundraising. For example, one of our alumni, Solano, offering a solar panel and battery solution to private homes so that they can generate their own electricity, have raised more than $1 million USD after our program. More recently, they were able to close the $50 million USD mark a few months ago.

We are operating many programs as well here in Vietnam and 100% of our programs are impact driven. This covers green tech, sustainable food industry, equity and inclusion, and circular economy among others. We are also pushing the promotion of design thinking in startups. This is a relatively new thing here in Vietnam and in ASEAN. We also want to promote intrapreneurship in order to promote innovation within the companies, most especially in corporations. We organize workshops, with many different collective intelligence ideation and prototyping formats. 

The principle of collective intelligence is easy. All companies face challenges, and while the team or teams in charge of the challenge might have a hard time finding effective solutions, the capacity to generate original ideas is often already within the company. They just do not know how to structure the solution. Bringing different backgrounds together following the Schoolab methods, they can come up with fresh and out-of-the-box ideas, with a clear roadmap and business model for its implementation. 

What strategies are you implementing to attract and retain qualified mentors for Schoolab's programs in the country?

It’s very important to create an ecosystem. Teamwork is essential in creating an ecosystem that supports ideas, a place where ideas grow and develop. So far in France, with the CPI program running for 20 years, we now have a huge pool of former students who became mentors. It’s the same here in Vietnam. We have been here for five years and have been working a lot with students, experts and consultants across the industries. On top of that as well, we team up with a lot of other partners to conduct projects. This is how we make sure that we have the right person to coach the right startups based on their expertise.

Can you share some examples of how Schoolab has made a positive impact on the startup ecosystem in the country and beyond?

In Vietnam and Asia, we are especially proud of the startup-corporation partnerships we have helped to develop. We have accelerated more than 15 startups and helped them find investments and corporate partners to develop pilot solutions. For a big food manufacturing multinational, we helped them find solutions to reduce their carbon footprint in product delivery by connecting them with a startup building electric scooters and helping them to design the right scooter matching delivery drivers' needs and specificities. We conducted testing with the drivers as well to see how the current bikes are working and how they could be improved. Lastly, since I am based in Ho Chi Minh, the center of ASEAN and APAC, I am able to keep in touch with the region easily. One of my colleagues was in Laos recently for a program. She was managing a program called EPPIC (Ending Plastic Pollution Innovation Challenge) which was initiated by the UNDP. The aim of this program is to accelerate startups to reduce the plastic pollution in coastal areas. The top two startups who pitched were granted grants to launch their prototypes.

What are your thoughts on the future of the startup ecosystem in the country? How do you see Schoolab playing a role in shaping this future?

In Vietnam, we can see many opportunities. There are a lot of investors and there is an improvement in public funds. Because of the resources, the landscape, and the work ethic here in Vietnam, there are gazillion opportunities for people to launch their own businesses or side hustles.

Vietnam is facing great momentum and shows positive signs. However, it is still lacking some key technologies, skills and local patents. That's why there's a big move from the government to attract Vietnamese working abroad to come back and bring with them the expertise they have learned elsewhere. In order to develop the country and make sure it becomes fully independent and self-sufficient, there is a real need to find decarbonized solutions. There is also a need to work on energy efficiency and food production efficiency. Compared to its neighbors, Vietnam still has a lot of room for improvement in terms of patents. Vietnam published less patents than Indonesia, Thailand, and Singapore for example.

Despite this, Vietnam is catching up very fast. Especially thanks to the government strategy to develop the startups ecosystem and to help them to innovate. What’s key now is to link that ecosystem to ASEAN or APAC since the area is so rich in terms of population, cultures, and commodities. Lastly, Schoolab is also a catalyzer. Our role is to facilitate and enhance innovations. We have ambitions to be more and more present in ASEAN, to help entrepreneurs launch new ideas and tackle big problems.

Arthur Mossa is the Vietnam Country Manager of Schoolab and APAC Region Manager. Arthur leads the company’s local team in the region, secures business opportunities, champions community innovation, adapts global strategies to the local context, and most importantly, drives impactful change. He is an imperative figure in securing the success of Schoolab in the region. As witnessed in this interview, Arthur is incredibly passionate about driving change and enhancing technology and support at a local and global scale.

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