October at Hatch
October has been one of our busiest months yet! Not only were we a part of major startup conversations such as Disrupt Asia and Shape South Asia, but we had global personalities in the startup world visiting Hatch and making big plans about the future of business.
Here’s an overview of what our calendar looked like in October.
- Enterprise Security
On October 03rd, experts in cybersecurity such as Kasun Rajapakse — Senior System/Automation Engineer (Cloud), Nuwan Prasanjith — Network & System Engineer, Nipuna Ruhunage — Systems Engineer, Uditha Wijesundara — Director of IT ISMeGROUP and Susantha Silva — Principal Consultant at Azure discussed corporate security approaches and strategies. - Seedstar Colombo
Hatch partnered with Seedstar World to host Seedstar Colombo which included a private Bootcamp on October 4th where the participants learnt about investment, the art of pitching and received a mentoring session followed by the final pitching event on October 7th.




3. Fintech Fast Track with Visa India
Hatch signed a partnership with Visa, and as the first initiative of it, held a programme that taught fin-tech companies how to scale their solutions with Visa’s payment assets done by experts from Visa Global in India.
4. Shape South Asia 2019
Hatch hosted the preliminary session, lunch and an innovation session for Shape South Asia which is a regional conference for young innovators (aged 20 to 30) who are exceptional in their achievements and contribution to society. We demonstrated how advanced the Sri Lankan startup ecosystem is by allowing these international delegates to witness the acceleration and incubation capacities within Hatch. Close to 100 community members from across South Asia gathered at Hatch to share knowledge and learn on the theme of ‘Shaping Equilibriums’.

5. ‘Visioning 2030’ with Disrupt Asia
Hatch was an ecosystem partner to Disrupt Asia 2019 organised by ICTA (Information and Technology Agency of Sri Lanka) to help Sri Lanka’s startups gain key insights, new connections and direction through focussed messages.
Within the event, Hatch hosted the “Visioning Workshop” where experts in tech startups across the world shared their learnings and insights with the Sri Lankan ecosystem builders who brainstormed and envisioned the tech startup vision for the next ten years in the country. “We derived knowledge from the people who have made it big in Asia and in the world and reflected on what we need to do together,” said Randhula De Silva CEO of Hatch.




“We are also proud to have global giants in the startup scene such as Casey Lau confounder of Rise Hong Kong, Amarit Charoenphan and Blake Larson visit our space and have them witness the thriving culture we strive to create here in Sri Lanka for the startup ecosystem with what we do,” added Randhula.
6. Hatch Nurture Round II
Round Two of our mentorship programme “Hatch Nurture” kicked off on October 11th with ten startups pitching their ideas to a panel followed by a speed dating session in which mentors and startups had a one-on-one to discuss each startup.
“We’re very proud of how Round I of Hatch mentorship programme concluded last September with all the startups making incredible progress,” said Razia Esufally, Mentor & Partnership Associate at Hatch Works
7. Good Life X — How to Find Co-Founders
We partnered with the German Development Corporation (GIZ) on their intensive program called “Good Life Accelerator” (GLX) to focus on six startups in the food and agriculture sector. The six startups receive coaching in management, HR, finance, internationalisation, investors, marketing and law and are given strict deliverables that will take their brands to the next level.
On October 16th, we held a session titled “How to find co-founders?” conducted by Stephan Anpalagan from MHP — A Porsche Company.
“The World is no longer only interested in what numbers you put on the table. We are interested in what value you bring in. What is your impact? Why are you driven to do your business? What changes do you make in society? Do you make profits sustainably?” asked Stephan speaking about the shift in the importance of “numbers” towards the value that humans add to the equation and to the greater society.
8. Burnout: Let’s talk solutions
Hatch and Workout.lk organised a discussion about a burning issue in our personal as well as professional lives; Burnout. Panellists Dr Tyrol Ferdinands, Mahesh Pathirana, Rekha Krishnamoorthy and Mei Flynn discussed how to identify and avoid burnout, how to be productive, nutritional deficiencies and it’s effects on the body and mind, how to curb short and long term stress and so much more.
“Don’t blame germs for your sickness. It’s an easy way out and you don’t take responsibility for your health,” said Dr Tyrol Ferdinands who spoke about using food as medicine. “Don’t subcontract your health to a doctor,” he said.
“Use your bedroom only for sex and sleep and you will turn your life around,” he added talking about the dangers of the digital “rat race” we’re in, especially in a startup context. The dangers of “doing what you love” means that you might not differentiate between professional and personal life. All these add to stress, even without us realising it.

Commenting on all these efforts, Randhula from Hatch says “We have Stephen talking about how businesses can become more aware and parallelly, in another hall we’re talking about becoming more aware of our body and wellness overall. To me, creating this synchrony in dialogue is beautiful.”
October concludes with all these incredible activities and people championing each other.
Join us on another whirlwind month in November!

