Catherine Shu

Catherine Shu

Senior Reporter

Catherine Shu has covered startups in Asia and breaking news for TechCrunch since 2012. Her reporting has also appeared in the New York Times, the Taipei Times, Barron’s, the Wall Street Journal and the Village Voice. She studied at Sarah Lawrence College and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism.

Disclosures: None

The Latest from Catherine Shu

Gravel gets funding from NEA to support Indonesia’s booming construction industry

Indonesia’s construction industry is growing quickly, driven by residential and industrial building, alongside infrastructure development plans by the government. Sourcing skilled labor is still a t

Backed by East Ventures, Fr8Labs aims to digitize Asia’s logistics industry

In Western markets, freight forwarders are well into digitizing their operations, but the same doesn’t hold true in Southeast Asia, say the founders of Fr8Labs. The reasons for that include the lack

FEBE Ventures launches $75M second fund

FEBE Ventures’ name stands for “For Entrepreneurs By Entrepreneurs,” and true to form, it is continuing to support seed-stage startups with the launch of its second fund. Targeting $75 million,

Wind.app makes DeFi accessible to the average consumer

Hussain Elius is best known as the co-founder of Pathao, one of Bangladesh’s top ridesharing apps. For his latest startup, however, Elius is exploring the world of DeFi with Wind.app, a self-custodi

Inflow connects small fashion brands with manufacturers in Vietnam

Textiles and garments contribute 16% of Vietnam’s total GPD, but it’s challenging for small garment brands to take advantage of the country’s manufacturing prowess. Inflow is stepping into the g

Pakistan-based BusCaro is providing safer transportation options, especially for women

When Maha Shahzad was 19, she was forced to drop out of junior college in Southern California because of a six-hour daily commute. When she moved to Pakistan for work, half of her salary was spent on

Singapore-based Climate Alpha analyzes the impact of climate change on real estate

Founded by an expert on geography and globalization, Climate Alpha’s AI-based platform helps real estate owners and investors analyze the impact of climate change on their portfolios. The Singapore-

Avarni gets backing to help large enterprises hit their net-zero goals

For a lot of companies, Scope 3 emissions make up the bulk of their carbon footprint, but are time-consuming and expensive for them to track. As more regulation mandating Scope 3 reporting is passed,

Composable CDP startup Hightouch acquires HeadsUp

Customer data-syncing startup Hightouch announced today it has acquired HeadsUp. As part of the deal, HeadsUp co-founder Earl Lee will join Hightouch, working on Customer 360, a product that uses AI a

Refilled wants to save 100 million plastic bottles from the landfill

The Australian government recently set new packaging regulations after an official review found just 18% of plastic packaging is recycled, falling far short of a 70% target by 2025. Refilled, a Sydney

etaily is a ‘one-stop solution’ for consumer brands that want to enter Southeast Asia

E-commerce in Southeast Asia grew rapidly during the pandemic, and that momentum is continuing. A McKinsey report found that between now and 2026, the market is expected to triple at a compound growth

Blackbird invests in Carepatron’s ‘radically accessible’ healthcare management platform

When TechCrunch covered Carepatron’s pre-seed last year, the startup was focused on serving solo practitioners and small health practices. Now the healthcare management system has scaled along with

Dashtoon uses AI to turn storytellers into comics artists

Dashtoon wants to make anyone with a story to tell into a comic-artist, even if they can’t draw. It provides aspiring comics creator with a suite of generative AI tools, and a publishing platform th

Southeast Asia funding at its lowest level in six years

Every year, Temasek teams up with Bain & Company on the e-Conomy SEA report. It covers Southeast Asia’s digital economy and is published by Google. This year’s report, published today, undersc

Korea Investment Partners is the latest Korean VC firm to launch a Southeast Asia fund

More South Korean investors are putting money into Southeast Korea startups, creating an “investment corridor” between the two regions. The latest one is KIPSEA. Short for Korea Investment Partner

Singapore-based fintech YouTrip picks up $50M led by Lightspeed

YouTrip, a Singapore-based fintech that offers multicurrency wallet for consumers and business accounts with corporate cards for SMEs, has its eyes on growth throughout Southeast Asia after landing a

Blackbird backs Heidi Health’s AI platform for overworked doctors

Many doctors are overwhelmed by paperwork, leaving them stretched thin, with less time to see patients. Based in Melbourne with plans to expand around the world, Heidi Health wants to ease the burden

Triple-A gets funding from Peak XV to help more businesses use crypto

Created by the founder of Thunes, global digital currency payments institution Triple-A wants to close the gap between traditional finance and blockchain-based payments with its white-label solutions

Temasek’s Xora backs Cosmos Innovation’s next-generation solar cell technology

Perovskite silicon tandem solar cell technology is a mouthful, but it’s basically perovskite crystals layered on top of silicon cells. The combination captures energy from the sun more efficiently t

Tofu automates content creation for massive omnichannel B2B marketing campaigns

Creating the many types of content needed for large-scale B2B campaigns often results in marketers juggling dozens of tools. This makes it difficult to ensure cohesive messaging across their emails, l
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