Online legacy planner Memori eyes Western expansion
Online legacy planner Memori is keen on expanding its services to the West after CEO and Co-founder Queenie Chong became the first Bruneian to be selected for The Edmund Hillary Fellowship (EHF), a New Zealandbased programme for visionary entrepreneurs.
In an interview with The Bruneian, Chong remarked how she was deeply honoured to be selected as an Edmund Hillary Fellow, after being nominated by a startup mentor she met during the Techsauce Global Summit 2019, an annual tech conference held in Thailand.
Launched in 2017, the EHF offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for innovating entrepreneurs, investors, and start-up teams to live and work in New Zealand to create a scalable positive impact.
Up to 100 international and 20
New Zealand-based fellows are chosen each year, and what the fellow entails includes a Global Impact Visa, a three-year open work visa for New Zealand, with access to partner networks and individualised support to succeed in their ventures.
According to Chong, the EHF would allow Memori’s work to be expanded towards Western countries, beginning with New Zealand, noting how the topic of death and legacy planning may be an easier subject to broach in Western cultures.
Memori is a one-stop online platform that provides affordable accessible legacy planning services, aiming to demystify the process and price of legacy planning for everyone by offering online Will writing courses and other features such as insurance packages and bereavement products & services.
“It will take some time to demystify the social taboo of endof-life planning in Asian culture,”
she continued, adding that Memori has begun to engage renowned Associate Professor from the University of Canterbury, Ruth McManus whose research interests lie in the sociology of deaths.
“She is also the President of (the) Society for Death Studies, a field which I’m strongly passionate about… I have already reached out to her (and) will be looking to explore more avenues for disruption in the death care industry,” added Chong.
Ultimately, the CEO and Cofounder of Memori is hoping to leverage the global network provided by the EHF, to expand the company beyond New Zealand and into the global market.
In the meantime, however, Chong is content at becoming a “collaborative bridge” for startups, entrepreneurship and youths between New Zealand and the sultanate.
“I would (also) like to work on an Impact Exchange between New Zealand and Southeast Asia to connect for network expansion, entrepreneurship education, advisors, mentors and investors, given that both New Zealand and Southeast Asia have a huge potential to work together,” she went on to say.
“I would start this off by onboarding my current and am looking for keen Bruneians (who are) interested,” she said, adding that interested parties can reach out to her at ask@memori.io
Other notable start-up entrepreneurs Edmund Hillary Fellows include Ara Hu, Cofounder of Mobike (acquired by Meituan Dianping for USD$2.7 billion), Cameron Priest, CEO of Trade Gecko (acquired by Intuit for an estimated USD$80 million) and Frederick Ehrsam, Cofounder of Coinbase (valued estimated USD$8 billion).
The Bruneian