1. Stable political environment

Vietnam elected an all new class of General Secretary, President and Prime Minister in April 2016, which leaves people wondering in which direction the new leaders will take. So far, we’ve seen a surprisingly determined push towards a more pro-business, pro-investment government. While corruption remains an issue, Vietnam has a fairly stable political environment, ideal for sustainable economic growth. This stability is especially valued, in light of the political tumult in other Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand or the Philippines.

2. Impressive GDP growth

When most of the developed economies are still in recovery mode…

This is one of my favorite books that I frequently revisit. As I grow older and as my career develops, life continues to present a flux of possible choices and opportunities. This is mostly a good and fortunate thing (not many people have the luxury to choose). But clearly, too many choices can be paralyzing.

To solve that problem, Greg Mckeown proposes a somewhat radical approach: eliminate most and pursue few. …

Freelancers are like the white walkers — they’re multiplying FAST. In the US alone, there are roughly 53 million freelancers, accounting for 34% of the country’s total workforce. It’s expected that in 5 years, this number will reach a staggering 50%. Remarkably, the same trend is also observed across Europe.

Why is this shift happening? I think there are a few drivers underlying this shift:

1. Technology makes remote working much easier: ubiquitous access to fast internet, cloud/mobile softwares, live communication tools — these all have helped unchain workers from their desks. People can now work from almost anywhere.

2…

Definition by Oxford English Dictionary.

In the world of consumer internet, curation is no longer just a trend. It has become intrinsic to digital products and their core strategy. Curation is the product.

This shift is no surprise considering the growth of the World Wide Web in the last decade. In 2004, there were about 51M websites, and currently more than 915M.

As a VC analyst at Partech Ventures, I’ve processed through hundreds of pitch decks. Some are fascinating, some boring, some are really well-designed, and some look like they’ve been preserved from the 1990s. I generally prefer speaking to entrepreneurs, but because of time constraint, unfortunately pitch decks are still the most common way for founders to introduce their startups.

After some time, I’ve started to recognize a pattern: the decks that generally make it to the “next round” (introductory call) all have one element that other decks lack or fail to convey clearly: the vision.

By “vision”, I don’t mean…

3 years ago, during my junior year in college, my iPhone broke, so I began looking for a new phone online. I was on a student budget, but having a smart phone was very important to me, so I decided to invest on a good one.

At the time, The Google Nexus was one of the hottest new smart phones. It had this thin shiny look to it, and on the website, it bragged to have one of the most powerful processors on the market which closed the deal for me. I ordered the phone from Google’s website and it…