Google’s Thomas Zybulski & Saejoon Oh on APAC’s New Wave: Data, Fintech & Vietnam’s Rising Talent

Sinchao Vietnam. We are in Google Think Apps event with dear friends Thomas and Sejun. Sejun is head of apps and gaming in Korean market and Thomas is head of scale and insights IPAC region. So today we will be providing you some insights, cool stuff, what is happening, what is up, what is hot. How was the show? Did you enjoy it so far? this uh
very much very insightful. I learned a lot of new things from the speakers from engaging with partners. I think it's always valuable to hear directly from from across the region. It's very rare that we get a lot of partners into one space. So it was really really engaging for me.
If you look at APAC is single region but we have a lot of different countries and cultures but when you get to get a chance to mix them up in a single venue that's where I think we get the secret sauce
literally. Uh I would like to actually kick it off in a you know bigger picture. So like we have been hearing a

lot APEC is booming it's going great and it's been like years today where you know are we heading in uh this term feel free to like take it from general to because scale and insights are huge topics. So feel free
a lot of publishers that we and developers that we see here today um a lot of the bigger ones but we also look at the ecosystem of the smaller ones the new developers and I think that's especially for the part that I'm looking at is very important so how do we get and reach some of the smaller publishers that are just starting out we have an as we've seen on the stage as well like we have an incredible developer ecosystem new developers um a lot of new people coming out of university interested in the space and we need to keep them engaged Right? There's other industries that are very lucrative like crypto, like AI where developers maybe are tending towards now, but we want to keep them and make sure that they understand like this business is still growing, it's still vibrant, and we want to bring the developers in. So for us, it's a lot

like how do we get to reach them very early.
Yeah.
And then also have them exchange with some of the developers that have been in the space for a while. So I think that's a lot of what I'm focused on with my teams and working with Sadron and his uh his group on exchanging what are some of best practices at
actually I would be very happy to take on your thoughts uh on this level too kind of bigger picture both from Korea side and also APE and maybe afterwards we would go to challenges and opportunities in
yeah so um like as Thomas mentioned this APE region is like full of energy full of passion we see a lot of new developers coming in joining the game. If you see from Vietnam perspective,
yeah,
they're so young, right? Drilling into Korea, some things that's catching my eyes was that Korea was super gaming heavy market. Casual gamers, casual gaming developers, looking at the global market, uh developing puzzle games, match three games and so on. But yeah, from like last year onwards, it was like booming from the non-gaming end. Like for example, finance and fintech

companies, they started investing into ad monetization business. It was like okay we are earning money but we want to go a bit deeper. So it's like hey we want to go deeper because we want to understand our users more and then we want to maximize our LTV. So LTV we've heard that a lot right?
So yeah those are kind of the new like initiatives that I'm noticing from the market.
Very very actually interesting insights because uh I feel like we will hear fintech and as well as e-commerce more and more and the answer is simple. They are doing good but more money is I think better than
Yeah. Exactly. [laughter] Exactly.
How about the Apex side like covering more you know making it inclusive on the challenges and opportunities level. How do you see the markets? Something that I noticed today and which is something that's very encouraging to see is as even though we still have vibrant and a growing um ecosystem and apps there's an uninvestment in understanding data and quality and looking at it from a data um introducing datadriven decision-m um being very scientific in in a way about

how do you approach success of your app and development of your app and and the direction that you take and I think that's something that I noticed heavily now um that I haven't seen in that emphasis in previous years and I think that is really good good to see but it's also recognition that it takes a bit more going one or two levels deeper to to really differentiate yourself you know and bringing a good in the end it's about the user experience and I think data in that is is essential and I think some of the apps that we have seen being successful they use uh data very effectively um and and I think that's a challenge if how do you do that if you don't have that expertise on the teams and that you know maybe you need to consult with a few experts that that know that space like stuff like
um how do you advise on data quality and on data that turns into quality and um healthy user experience? I think it's also because of the like competitive oversaturated market like it's kind of a skill that we must obtain if don't we

cannot survive and how do you see it from this angle in Korean markets challenges to opportunities and like you already mentioned fintech is going well but apart from that like with partners do you hear uh you know a lot about oh the profitability is either going down or like oversaturated market Oh, actually it's already super innovative and you know just differentiating with lots of updates.
So uh first of all I do hear a lot about like uh it's so hard to get access to new users. Your acquisition cost is surging postcoid as everyone knows. So I think that's where like the fintech companies came up to the idea we need to earn more money and that's like being spread across the market. But then as a result, I think the competition is getting more like it's crazy, right? You want to like acquire high quality user like you have to spend tons of money
but then I think that's where the developers take it that as a market

feedback and try to think innovatively
and then like they do come up with like new business models or new like app service or different kind of genres. So I think competition is necessary for the market to grow and innovate at the same time.
One thing I want to add is like I think APE has been very good at identifying new trends like where what are some new verticals new technologies that are you know potentially recognized and uh engaged with by users. I think that fintech was one but there's genai that has been taken up very quickly especially here in Vietnam some of our developers something that we'll continue to see in the region probably also in some of the other regions maybe that's accelerating I do think that that has been
just looking at from a knowing the global space a little bit I think that here that has been um one of the cornerstones of the success is just taking the risk to go into some verticals that you might not see in other regions
so I'm curious about uh as Final part

you have seen here and there and you have definitely lots of insights and scale. So what would be advice for small to mid studios also even indies challenging competitive uh oversaturated markets? Yeah, just curious about your advice.
My one advice would be don't assume what you've done is all you can do. Continue to think innovatively and challenge your challenges. And by doing so, I've seen a lot of successful cases and like a lots of new business coming out from it. And also don't assume that AI is going to solve all of your problems. You're the one who can solve your problem.
Definitely so true. And especially mentioning AI like from development to marketing, it's hot topic everywhere. And I'm actually curious how it will be next year. Maybe we come again to Vietnam and talk about AI. It doesn't have to be AI but like you know you also have been seeing APE overall with insights and scaling advices for studios. I think especially as you're starting off or even if you're not just

starting off but integrate data and measurement um early on and I think that what we've heard today and what we've seen is that the testing experimenting in order to get the right user experience and seeing which ones work better here and there and that might be marginal I think that will be a difference maker and that will continue to be a difference maker for a long time. I think that investing in that early um getting that right and trying because you can then try quickly and and iterate I think that's been a good recipe for success. Totally agree and I think like we are in an era that being datadriven has never been this important because like you know back then hyper casual era you were just oh I found a heat like surprise but now yeah definitely thank you so much for joining us and uh insights thanks Google for having us in Vietnam Ho Chi Min City we'll definitely come next year again and talk about mobile apps and gaming industry maybe food too possibly
and some drinks.

Drinks.
So, thank you Google.
See you.