SG Digest: Ex-CTO weighs outright purchase of Cake Group; ZOLO, K-link bag funding

Former CTO of Cake Group U-Zyn Chua is considering an outright purchase of the company, while AI-powered B2B company ZOLO and customer service platform K-LINK have raised funding.

Former CTO may buy out co-founder’s stake in Cake Group

U-Zyn Chua, former CTO of Cake Group, a Singapore-based cryptocurrency investment platform, is now considering purchasing it outright. Chua, who had filed a petition for winding up the crypto company in November 2023, is looking to acquire co-founder and CEO Julian Hosp’s stake in the company.

This development was first reported by TechInAsia.

If Chua agrees to the deal, it would likely put an end to the months-long conflict between him and Hosp stemming from layoffs at Cake Group in November 2023.

The judge overseeing the winding-up application adjourned the case for five weeks so that Chua could review the offer.

In 2023, media reported that a co-founder of Cake Group initiated winding-up proceedings due to a shareholder dispute. During that time, Chua opposed the job cuts, claiming that Hosp had not informed him and made the decisions independently.

Student-led VC Protégé Ventures invests in ZOLO

Singaporean student-led venture capital fund Protégé Ventures (PV) on Wednesday announced an undisclosed pre-seed investment in ZOLO, an AI-powered B2B software company.

In a statement, PV said that ZOLO is an AI-powered B2B software designed to simplify orders, payments, and deliveries for food suppliers.

Founded in 2023, ZOLO is developing a solution to respond to a “growing trend” of restaurants utilising messaging apps like WhatsApp for B2B orders with food suppliers and is addressing the challenges posed by text-based orders for food suppliers which are time consuming and error-prone—for example, spelling mistakes, language variations, and incorrect interpretation of acronyms.

PV claims to be Singapore’s only student-led venture capital fund and the first such fund in Southeast Asia. It was established in 2017 by the Singapore Management University (SMU)’s Institute of Innovation & Entrepreneurship (IIE) with a partnership with Kairos ASEAN and funding partners—Wavemakers Partners and Dr  Jeffrey Chi of Vickers Venture Partners.

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