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Empowering Innovation: Celebrating the Winners of Stellarate 3.0
Empowering innovation for startups in Singapore
Organisers, judges and winning start-ups of Stellarate 3.0
Driving innovation in transit retail
This year’s Stellarate 3.0 Innovation Programme, a tech accelerator organised by SMRT Corporation’s business arm Stellar Lifestyle, and partnered by UOB, JRE Ventures, Enterprise Singapore and Singapore Management University’s Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (SME IIE), celebrated three winners: Flow Coffee, HeyMax and Konbini Technologies.
In this edition, startups were invited to solve four challenges in retail tech and ad tech: enhancing Out-of-Home (OOH) advertising impact, boosting retail sales through real-time data, enabling manpower-lite operations, and transforming last-mile delivery experiences.
Winners have the opportunity to receive grants of up to S$65,000 each and opportunities to access the Japanese market through JRE Ventures and pilot their solutions with existing transit retail merchants in prime spaces within SMRT’s retail ecosystem.
In line with UOB’s efforts to connect SMEs to growth opportunities, the winning start-ups will receive the following benefits from the bank:
- Waiver of annual and facility fees for financing support for the first 2 years
- Access to increased profiling opportunities, and new connections through networking
- Complimentary advice on optimising business operations through digital transformation and exclusive credits to get started with digital solutions under the UOB BizSmart programme
Paul Kan, Country Head of Business Banking Singapore who was part of the judging panel, said: “As F&B and retail businesses face evolving consumer demands, rising costs, and manpower challenges, innovative solutions from winning start-ups can help build resilience and drive sustainable growth. We look forward to partnering the winners through their growth journey with access to banking and business solutions, advice and network connections.”
Meet the winning startups of Stellarate 3.0
1. Flow Coffee
Mr Zhang Qing Yuan, Marketing Lead, and Mr Wei Sheng Chang, Founder and CEO of Flow Coffee
Flow Coffee was born out of the founder’s struggle to find affordable quality coffee in Singapore. To disrupt the grab-and-go coffee market, the startup uses technology to deliver the same barista-grade product at 40% cheaper via its AIoT-enabled vending machines.
From beverage options to milk and sweetener alternatives, Flow Coffee’s offerings are designed to be inclusive. To build a more sustainable business, Flow Coffee is looking at adopting eco-friendly practices, including minimising single-use plastics, using biodegradable cups, and recycling and upcycling used coffee grounds.
Mr Wei Sheng Chang, Founder and CEO said, “We are very grateful for this opportunity and intend to make the most of this opportunity. Through this programme, we hope to get to know more corporate partners to allow us to do more test beds and connect with other business founders that can help us build up the circular, sustainable ecosystem in our industry.”
2. HeyMax
Ms Jialu Zhong, Co-founder and Chief Product Officer, and Mr Kenneth Tan, Head of Marketing at HeyMax
HeyMax is a travel-fintech startup founded by four software engineers on a mission to make aspirational travel experiences accessible to everyone and unite fragmented loyalty currencies into one wallet for travellers.
Through its AI-powered app and an extensive ecosystem of over 500 merchants and partners, consumers can maximise rewards by earning “Max Miles” on top of their credit or debit card rewards each time they shop, dine, or spend. These “Max Miles” can then be redeemed for flights, hotels and lifestyle experiences.
Their unique position in the ecosystem helps them address challenges and generate benefits for 3 parties:
- Customer acquisition and deeper engagement for merchants
- Customer acquisition and expansion into destination markets for loyalty partners, like hotels and airlines
- Maximising everyday spend into rewards for end users
“Moving forward, we want to dive into the challenges and pain points of all the supporting partners in Stellarate 3.0 and aim to prototype something as soon as possible to help deepen the partnerships and, at the same time, continue to grow our ecosystem. We appreciate the support that can help us grow to the next level,” said Ms Jialu Zhong, Co-founder and CPO.
Mr Jing Quek, Founding Director, and Ms Arina Hunid, Operations Manager at Konbini Technologies
Konbini Technologies is the start-up behind Konbi.Vision, a retail AI machine vision checkout system which recognises multiple food items via camera within 3 seconds, automatically tabulates the cart total, and channels customers to self-checkout. This removes the need for price tags or QR codes, reduces manpower needed and speeds up the checkout process.
Apart from being useful as self-service checkout tool, Konbi.Vision helps with processes such as automating product entry on physical retail POS systems, and inventory counting and tracking.
Founding Director Mr Jing Quek said, “Our key selling point is that our system works very accurately with a very short and simple learning curve for operations staff, and we are now looking to reach out to more customers for more opportunities to demonstrate the benefits of Konbi.Vision. We are excited to expand our sales network through the Stellarate programme and the opportunities provided by UOB.”
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