Founders Drinks: Upsized feat CTO of Akamai and Co-CEO of Easy Taxi

What it's all about:

This month we are Upsizing Founders Drinks! We have TWO industry experts, Guy Podjarny (CTO, Akamai) on making responsive websites fast and Dennis Wang (Co-CEO, Easy Taxi) on strategies for taking startups global, sharing their expertise over at Hood Bar & Cafe. Akamai is also sponsoring food for the night on top of the complimentary drink you receive when you purchase a ticket.

Topic: Making Responsive Websites Fast

Did you know that by 2017,it is estimated, more than 90% of Internet users would access online content through their phones? What does this mean?

It simply means that more and more people prefer to use their mobile devices to surf the web and visit your website as opposed to their desktop or laptop.Many startups have taken to implementing responsive design to optimize their website's display on various devices but the performance of the site itself remains an issue.

Trusted by all top 20 global eCommerce sites and 9 out of 10 top social media sites, Akamai’s CTO Guy Podjarny will to share best practices on understanding and overcoming Responsive Web Design Performance issues. Responsive Web Design is quickly becoming the standard way any organization should tackle the post-iPhone web.

Guy will share how you can avoid falling into the most common performance pitfalls to keep your responsive site snappy and fun. He’ll also discuss how to combine a smart front-end and a smart server, and offer practical advice on how and when to use each one. Guy will mention some of the standardization efforts underway to help make this work easier in the future. Finally, Guy will also share his personal story on what drove him to start his company Blaze.io which was acquired by Akamai in 2012.

Topic: Global Expansion Strategies

In an increasingly connected world, globalization is the order of the day. A company with 4 employees based out of a co-working space can still have a global customer-base. It has become easier to access supply chains, tailor marketing messages, and establish customer service to customers via online channels, social media: now startups can go big right off the bat.

But expanding too quickly can cause serious problems. From recruiting, outgrowing office space to increasing production, doing too much too soon can have devastating consequences for a startup.

Dennis Wang, Co-CEO of Easy Taxi, will be sharing strategies and tips that you can use to help you expand your startup globally.

Easy Taxi is the largest taxi booking app in the world, available in 27 countries and 120+ countries. Easy Taxi had a humble beginning when its concept was first shared with the public during Startup Weekend Rio 2011. Their first 20 drivers were acquired in a gas station! Within their first year of business in 2012, they had acquired 5000 drivers and over 200,000 users. In July 2014, Easy Taxi secured US$40M in Series D funding.

About your speakers:

Guy Podjarny (Guypo) is a web performance researcher/evangelist and Akamai's Web CTO, focusing primarily on mobile and front-end performance. As a researcher, Guy frequently runs large-scale tests, exploring performance in the real world and matching it to how browsers behave, and was one of the first to highlight the performance implications of Responsive Web Design. Guy is the author of Responsive & Fast: Implementing High-Performance Responsive Design, coming from O'Reilly and Akamai in late June 2014.

Guy is also the creator of Mobitest, a free mobile measurement tool, and contributes to various open source tools. Guy was previously the cofounder and CTO of blaze.io, acquired by Akamai in 2012.

Dennis Wang is the Founder & Co-CEO of Easy Taxi . Prior to starting Easy Taxi, he was working with Merrill Lynch Investment, BNP Paribas Clean Energy Fund, and ABN AMRO Asset Management.

Event Details

Date: 20 August 2014 (Wednesday)
Time: 06:30 PM – 09:00 PM
Venue: Hood Bar & Cafe
Address: Bugis+, 201 Victoria Street, #05-07, Singapore 188067
Cover: $10.70 (Pre-registeration) / $20 (At-the-door) – Cover includes 1 complimentary drinks.

Be part of Founders Drinks with the hashtag #E27FD on all good social networks

Founders Drinks is proudly supported by the following partners:

We work closely with our partners to bring business value to the Founders Drinks community. Find out what's pertinent to your business below:

Akimi Technologies is a website and mobile application development company. Our main business is creating digital solutions using websites or mobile applications to solve real world problems. www.akimitechnologies.com

Infocomm Investments Pte Ltd (IIPL) builds and invests in Singapore and global infocomm technology start-ups. Managing more than S$200 million, we accelerate the development of start-ups in their formative phase, and invest further as they move towards growth and expansion. IIPL plays a central role in building a vibrant and sustainable ecosystem in Singapore for start-ups to flourish through our investments, partnerships across sectors and global reach. We are a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) of Singapore. http://www.infocomminvestments.com/

DBS SME Banking for startups' financial needs. www.dbs.com.sg/sme

Akamai is sponsoring the food for the night! Akamai helps enterprises accelerate innovation in the hyperconnected world by removing the complexities of technology so you can focus on driving your business faster forward. We enable enterprises to capitalize on market opportunities presented by trends like mobile and cloud while overcoming the challenges presented by security threats and the need to reach users globally. http://www.akamai.com/

Become a Founders Drinks Sponsor:

Be a cornerstone of community events and interact with an amazing community of innovative tech leaders who are impacting their markets daily.

For more information on sponsorship packages and how your brand can be involved, please contact our Business Development team at roy@e27.co.

Who is it for?

• Tech founders and teams looking to understand global expansion & responsive web design performance issues
• Tech investors who want to participate in dialogue shaping Asia's tech industry
• Tech and business leaders and mentors wanting more strategic insight into building a robust startup

Network with fellow founders and investors:

Founders Drinks is a platform for founders and founding teams to share their stories and learnings.

Passionate entrepreneurs, developers and investors kick back with a drink and learn from the successes of each other, and also to connect and form valuable relationships with each other.

Whether you’re new to tech and business or an experienced mentor, there’s always something and someone new to meet at Founders Drinks.