Taiwanese Innovators: Startup Island TAIWAN

Startup Island TAIWAN is a national branding initiative designed to highlight Taiwan's thriving startup ecosystem. The goal is to position Taiwan as a leading hub for innovation and entrepreneurship in Asia and globally. This initiative showcases the island's entrepreneurial spirit, technological advancements, and supportive environment for startups. Startup Island TAIWAN aims to attract global attention, encourage collaboration, and facilitate the growth of Taiwanese startups on the international stage. With that, why don’t you join me in learning more about Startup Island TAIWAN with its Director of Operations, Allen John Ku. 

What are the origins of Startup Island TAIWAN? 

Startup Island TAIWAN was created to allow a unified voice to represent Taiwan at different international events and conferences. We encourage the cooperation between different startup initiatives and ministries.

Beyond branding, what concrete resources or programs does Startup Island TAIWAN offer to support both domestic and international startups in Taiwan?

We organize our own on-site events in various hubs including Singapore and Japan. Working with local ecosystem partners such as Enterprise Singapore and JETRO.  In addition we also host online workshops and in-person workshops throughout the year,  inviting corporations such as LinkedIn Stripe, Google, AWS and others. 

How does Startup Island TAIWAN measure the success of its initiatives? What metrics do you track to gauge its impact on the growth of the domestic and international startup scene in Taiwan?

We have our own internal tracking sheets and keep accounts of our activities throughout the year, in addition our social media profiles to allow for dissemination of our audience.

Since the launch of Startup Island TAIWAN, how has this initiative impacted Taiwan's attractiveness as a destination for startups? Can you share any data or success stories?

We have seen incredible uptick and interest in Taiwan, especially for overseas founders looking to create their next company. Aquivio’s founder Daniel Hill moved to Taiwan to benefit from the well established IOT ecosystem in Taiwan and teamed up with his two Taiwanese technical co-founders. They have developed cloud connected bottleless beverage dispensers that allow drink personalization by adding nutritional ingredients upon user selection to craft your own wellness waters.

Already after incorporating they directly engaged within the Startup community from the beginning through Taiwan Startup Stadiums Lineup X and joined Startup Island TAIWAN’s Delegation for SWITCH 2023 which also marked their first international expansion after Taiwan. As by the words of Daniel Hill "Through Startup Island TAIWAN we been able to land and engage instantly with multiple local Startup Ecosystem stakeholders and I certainly hope that many future expansion markets in SEA will also have a presence of Startup Island TAIWAN, so we can repeat such an effective expansion approach."

Looking ahead, how does Startup Island TAIWAN plan to evolve its strategy to further solidify Taiwan's position as a leading startup hub in Asia?

I believe continuously onboarding new partners throughout the region to encourage each other's ecosystems to work together and each other's Founders to grow together is the best recipe. 

Allen John Ku is the Director of Operations of Startup Island TAIWAN. Allen is tasked with program management, partnership development, operational efficiency, and data analysis among many others. He continues to be of immense importance to the initiative since his role is to ensure day-to-day management and execution of the initiative's goals. As seen in him, Allen is eager to contribute to Taiwan’s emergence as a as a leading hub for innovation and entrepreneurship in Asia and globally

Visit www.techshake.asia if you would like to know and connect more with Startup Island TAIWAN https://www.startupislandtaiwan.info/.