Category: Alec

My time at Elefos is just about wrapped up now, and I’ve just finished completing all of my projects. I believe I performed well and didn’t have trouble meeting any of the deadlines. I do believe that in splitting up the work for the Points International equity valuation assignment by year rather than by section, we were unable to give a satisfactory opinion and overall view of the company, making it our weakest combined effort overall. But in all other assignments, I feel I was able to directly provide something of value to the company and help them further determine their pivot. I feel my best effort was my independent undertaking of a new website design; I read through the company’s design documents and tried to better incorporate the company’s message and motifs into the design, while also seeking to make the information flow more nicely. When I presented it to Robert, he called it an “evolution of the previous design,” and a “huge improvement,” which was immensely gratifying. My biggest goal coming into the company was that I wanted to make a significant impact, and that when I left I wanted some of my work to outlast my physical presence. I think I achieved that goal, and I hope the LinkedIn and new site – which are the most apparent outword mementos that I was here – serve the company long into the future.

As for areas of growth – I feel I’m more capable of explaining my reasoning and speaking with vindication now, and the differences between Robert’s reactions in my first and last presentation are worlds apart. In addition, while designing the site, I spoke to the company’s designers and was taught many valuable design standards and styles. I was also given numerous books to read on everything from design to equity valuation, and in my reading and asking questions, I was able to bolster my knowledge greatly. Lastly, I feel my finance and accounting knowledge have been expanded and refreshed, as I got to exercise both very practically in my work – especially in regard to the accounting skills, this may be the first real time.

The trip was life-changing, and I feel like I’m coming back a different person. Or rather, a greatly improved 2.0 version of myself. The difference has already been noticed by others in ACM meetings – I can’t quite describe the change myself, but it’s been noted that I hesitate less when making big decisions and am more confident in general. I feel more organized, more clear-headed, more at-ease in general… I can’t wait to get back to campus and pick up where I left up, a stronger leader and business student in general.

There is one particular moment that comes to mind when I look back on my own actions that I’m proud of. There was a point early on where we didn’t quite yet know where to go with some research, or what to do with it, and so I decided to make an Excel spreadsheet for myself that would compile all of the point-of-sale distributor information in one place. That way, if I ever needed to recall one of those companies, I had the website, basic information, pricing, etc. all listed right there before me. What I couldn’t have predicted was that later that same week, shortly after completing this spreadsheet, an investor came to the office and asked for that information. When our supervisor approached us and told us to quickly put something together, I simply popped open that file on my laptop and presented it to the investor directly, directly speaking with him on my own research and answering his questions. Our program director Jason once told me “opportunity is luck meets preparedness,” and this was one of those opportune moments presenting itself.

Many of my accomplishments definitely come in my presentation and networking skills; Robert did a great job of providing feedback and giving us advice to follow when giving presentations in a brief but effective way, and the idea of crystallizing most of the knowledge so that it doesn’t need to be written but can instead be verbalized definitely enhanced my later presentations. Robert was always difficult to impress, but I feel as if I’d managed to do so at least a few times in answering his questions and presenting some of my developments. Recently, I feel that the changes I suggested and mocked up for the company’s website to more clearly define it to investors and attract consumers were also well-received, and I feel my ability to justify each decision was an important factor in this. With this and the pitch deck I will be finishing up, I believe I will have left a significant impact on this company after I’ve departed.

I can’t say I’ve had an earth-shattering shift in my view on life, and I don’t know how many of the smaller changes will translate back to the United States well, but I did definitely make some positive developments in my time here. Fitness and health became a big priority outside of work, and I hope to maintain my consistent 5-day-per-week gym schedule once I return. The diet I’d prepared for my “cutting” period wasn’t really do-able here in Vietnam, so I learned to make do and began intermittent fasting – which, while initially rough, has overall made me feel more energetic and less prone to eating unhealthy foods in the long run. I’ve learned to enjoy the outdoors much more, which was a goal originally, and I’ve come to love the beaches I once dreaded visiting. I’ve had a wonderful person by my side, accompanying me to church each Sunday and keeping my attendance consistent, so even in terms of spirituality I think I’ve been boosted. Lastly, I think I’ve become a much more decisive and leadership-oriented person overall, having been put in a decision-making position daily both in work and among friends. Learning to adapt to the unexpected and quickly make decisions is a common occurrence here, and a motif of this journey as a whole, and when I return to the United States, I imagine there’ll be little I can’t handle.

Elefos is a company that is still very much in its infancy: upon joining the team early last month, the company had just pivoted to an entirely new industry and we were first tasked with looking into everything about it. Competitors, market trends… A lot of writing was done on our part to try and either disprove or approve the thesis that people want what our company has to offer. I’m actually not able to talk about what this offering is, as we were given NDAs at the beginning of our second week, but we made many discoveries that support this thesis. Vietnam is actually one of the largest global markets for consumer loyalty programs, with an 84% rate of people who participate in one or more of such programs. The Asia-Pacific region as a whole is a very great market for such products, and in addition, it’s also easily the most high-tech market with most consumers preferring to have digitally-based programs and points stored on apps or under account names/personal information. The market is definitely conducive to our success, and luckily, there are few competitors in the Vietnam region specifically which are trying to accomplish the same goal as Elefos.

A SWOT analysis of the company is telling of this as well: the strengths of our company are that we have the fastest technology in all of Vietnam, developed entirely in-house, a wide range of products which can make use of this flagship innovation, and it’s positioned in one of the world’s strongest markets. The team also carries several very high-profile developers and technology experts, one in particular who is enabling the company to be the first to partner with a university in Vietnam for more research. Weaknesses are the company’s relatively small size, with only 9 full-time employees, and the company doesn’t yet have enough partners to facilitate the spread of this new product. However, both of these issues are a result of the company’s youth, and I definitely believe they will be alleviated with time. The opportunities are numerous, especially with how well the company is positioned in the Asia-Pacific market and how poised it is to easily shift to the global market once their product has penetrated this region. There are very low barriers to entry, very low competition, and the company is able to carry a significant price advantage that other companies are unable to have with their use of slower proprietary software. The biggest threats facing the company are the larger global competitors, which won’t be a concern until the company tackles the rest of the world longer-term. Overall, I feel the company is positioned very strongly, and I am hopeful about its prospects for success.

The most amazing moment in Vietnam occurred this past weekend at Ha Long Bay. Sitting at night on the shore of a Castaway Island, staring up at the rare sight of stars glistening above and the silhouette of the emerald rocks looming beneath… It was a magical sight, and one I was unfortunately unable to capture on my phone due to the lighting. The island was rather loud on one end, with many visitors crowding the area where we were all staying, but I managed to find a quiet spot with a couple people I really enjoyed being with, and we had a wonderful time. Kayaking between the aforementioned rocks was another incredible event. It’s still hard to believe I was actually in that view, especially since I now only have the memories to prove it.

We’re over the hill, and barreling through the second half of our internships now. Things have definitely slowed down, at this point I’ve very comfortably settled into Vietnam. Still, challenges manage to present themselves. The greatest challenge and the greatest feature of the internship are actually one in the same – the independence. Our supervisor is present for us to ask questions to and receive new objectives from, and we have goals in mind as well as steps to accomplish them, but it’s certainly self-driven and studied. Regarding our most recent assignment, the equity research on a major company, much of the past week has been spent brushing up on accounting and learning financial modelling. A book I found on the subject, Investment Banking: Valuation, Leveraged Buyouts, and Mergers & Acquisitions, was recommended by my supervisor and has proven invaluable. But there’s still much to learn, and every new article or chapter I read brings up more questions and unknowns seemingly indefinitely. I’m taking an online course given by Harvard on EduX on financial modelling and data analysis, so that will also aid in the task at hand I feel. The freedom is also a major highlight of the internship, I really like being able to work from wherever and enjoy flexible hours. As long as the work gets done, the actual process is of our own design, but I haven’t really fully taken advantage of this so far – even in my free time, I’ve begun ordering food in and just working on classes or scheduling student organization meetings. It’s a relaxing environment, and though I’ve traditionally worked best under pressure, I’ve learned to pace myself and distribute the tasks at hand so that I’ve always got something to do but I’m never experiencing any crunch.

Revisiting the topic of lunch, I can’t say there isn’t much food I’ve eaten here that I hadn’t already tried in the United States – Gainesville is a surprisingly good location for Asian foodies – but the meal I expected to be most familiar is what ended up shocking me the most. I ordered KFC for lunch one day, and it was the most pleasant food surprise I’ve had in my time here. I remember driving back to Gainesville from South Florida with a friend, about a year back, and stopping at a rest stop for KFC. That was my first time eating it, and for whatever reason, I was so excited by the prospect of eating chicken out of a plastic bucket. When I bit into the chicken leg resting at the top of the heap, my reaction wasn’t even disappointment. I didn’t have any idea what kind of quality to expect, nor any past experiences with the brand to benchmark my experience. Only confusion washed over me. I couldn’t tell if it was bad, or good, or if it was even chicken. Dipping it in the “honey sauce” only exacerbated things, as it was recognizably not honey either. That memory lingered in my mind when I hit the “order” button on my Grab Food app, but upon digging in, I was amazed at just how good the chicken was over here. It tasted like chicken – better yet, it tasted like really good chicken. I’m trying to avoid making KFC my go-to, for the sake of my health, but it certainly is the first place my mind wanders.

One final unrelated thought: visiting Little Tokyo this last week was incredible, it has definitely become my favorite area in Ho Chi Minh City. While passing through, I saw this quaint and moody little bar next to an upscale pizza place, and I’ve decided when I celebrate my 21^st birthday next week, this will be the spot to do it.

In the last four weeks, I’ve been given increasingly larger responsibility. In my first week, we were mostly conducting market research and presenting on different competitors as a means of getting a feel for this new industry the company had just pivoted into, and to try and gain familiarity with the technology and terms ourselves. The next few weeks were spent actually helping to determine what route the company would take in its pivot, and looking at potential partners/clients as the team wrapped up development of their API. I’ve also given myself some extra duties with the permission of the CEO, including creating and managing the company’s official LinkedIn profile and designing edits to the webpage to improve readability and make it more informative. Reaching out to other companies, meeting with people in-person, writing a directory and briefing on point-of-sale system distribution in the country – my duties were varied, and often self-assigned as I believed they would benefit the company or my own work.

This past week, I received a big project I’m very excited about – a buy-side equity valuation report on a major industry player. It will aid us in figuring out whether our business model is sustainable, and allow us to take inspiration where needed and avoid mistakes concurrently. Our CEO is a graduate of NYU’s Stern School of Business with a Master’s in Finance, and the first thing he did was toss us many textbooks and articles on the subject of writing and formulating a thesis. I’m excited to tell a story through the data I discover in my research, right now it’s largely a lot of sifting through financial forms and trying to establish trends and patterns and reading up on business accounting/corporate finance. This is easily the task I’m most excited about in my time here so far, and I look forward to presenting our findings. Robert has been doing a great job of encouraging and answering questions and providing feedback on all of our work, I’m thankful to have him as a supervisor and will continue to learn from him. Right now, Robert is the only one outside of us interns working on the business end of the company. Every other employee is focused on development. Our relationship with the employees is great, we go to lunch and converse with them fairly often, but when working there is minimal interaction as everybody gets plugged in completely. These employees are all genius programmers, and I hope to refine my own programming skill while I’m here – I asked a lot of questions and was sent some valuable resources to study on my own time.

The greatest lessons I’ve learned are pertinent to my career; in my time here, I’ve drafted an outline of my future goals and picked up a ton of knowledge in my areas of interest. I’m getting some certifications while I’m here outside of work, to supplement this education, and I think I can apply these concepts when I return to my own startup in the US.

Robert, our boss at Elefos, is quite the guy. He’s the CEO and founder of the startup we’re currently working at, Parth Joint Stock Company (or Elefos, as our flagship product is called), and he definitely has the academic background to back up his title. Despite being born in Vietnam, most of his life was spent in Australia – which is where he got both his bachelor’s in computer science and his accent. After this, he attended NYU’s Stern School of Business, which is where he received a Master’s in Finance. He is a seasoned blockchain industry veteran, acting as an advisor at multiple Australian summits on the topic and having participated in the industry since its conception. Personality-wise, Robert is a very serious but polite individual. Jokes are uncommon, and when he does laugh it feels artificial, but he carries this dignified air that makes him easy to trust and listen to. He is very focused at work most of the time, so we don’t really interface with him outside of pre-scheduled feedback meetings and presentations that we post on Google Calendar and invite him to. Outside from those, he leaves us to our own devices – it’s entirely up to us to do whatever we feel the company needs at a particular time.

So what are those tasks? Our introduction to the office was punctuated with the statement that the company was just beginning to pivot to a new industry, and our only task was figuring out where we wanted to fit into this process. We were given several resources and textbooks to study, and soon, we were all waist-deep in research – learning about the industry, conducting competitor analyses, looking up conferences to attend… The lack of direction forced us to learn more about what kind of climate we were working in, and figure out exactly what Elefos was working with, to better understand what options were available to us. When we gave our first ever presentation, designed to answer a seemingly simple question of Robert’s, he did something we didn’t expect: he asked follow-up questions. Many of them, most of them rather difficult and specific. No fact went unchecked, every finding was followed with a request for the source and further detail, and when we’d use a technical term we were only half-familiar with, he would probe us for a definition. It was a death march of a presentation, us few interns struggling to maintain our posture as Robert rained down upon us with arrows of inquisition. After finally reaching the final slide, Robert told us to carry on with our studies and returned to his desk. There was a cloud of defeat hanging over us the rest of that afternoon, but the next day we came back stronger. We pried deeper, read through every source we could find, drilled ourselves on every possible question – calling ourselves industry experts would be a stretch, but we are now definitely approaching fluency in describing industry concepts and fleshing out our arguments and explanations with technical reasoning. Robert must’ve recognized this, because immediately after, the floor was opened. The previous week was spent answering more specific questions to aid in the company’s pivot, trying to prove a hypothesis that the success of the pivot is contingent upon. We’re contributing to the redesign and authoring of many company resources, including the website and white-paper. I also recently proposed the creation of a LinkedIn for the company and am now to spearhead the creation of that. It’s still early on in our internship, so I look forward to our product’s development being launched – and with that, many more opportunities being opened.

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of visiting Da Nang. Most of our class went there and traveled on a tight schedule in a race to see everything there and in Hoi An before our return on Sunday night, but I opted instead to travel with a smaller group and take things slowly. Saturday was spent mostly on the beautiful white shores of Da Nang, and while the others were attempting a tan or sleeping, I decided it was the perfect time to revisit the list of things I wanted to accomplish/learn while in Vietnam. It was then that I decided I was going to learn how to cartwheel, right there and then. I got off to a rough start, and within minutes, I was starting to look more sand than human. That’s when I noticed a bit of an audience began to form: some of the locals were cheering and reacting to my failed or slightly-more-successful attempts, and encouraging me to keep at it. A few began cartwheeling alongside me, providing feedback and walking me through the steps. Eventually, some valuable advice regarding my footing carried me to the end of my motion – cartwheel accomplished. Next up was a front-flip, but I was exhausted and physically beat so I needed to call it quits there. The locals who proved so helpful came and shook hands, told me about some of the things I absolutely needed to see while I was in Da Nang, and one of them even introduced me to his whole family. It was a special, random encounter, and it further cemented my love for the people here. People in Vietnam are so friendly, sympathetic, approachable, and eager to help. I’m glad that of all the places I could’ve picked up that useless skill, it was that particular beach in Vietnam.

“Shoes, shoes…”

“Oh, er… Sorry, it’s force of habit.”

I remove my sneakers and place them on the shelf near the glass entrance. Going barefoot at work in the United States would surely be viewed as unprofessional, so I was surprised to see this expectation flipped on its head in my workplace. In fact, many of the standards I’d been used to had been twisted, flipped, or outright eliminated from my workplace; programmers will often walk to the couch, remove a cushion, and pass out on the floor. Managers will come in late and leave early, and have encouraged us to do the same a few times. There are no arranged seats, and people float around the office drifting and settling at will. The workplace definitely has a more relaxed and youthful culture than others I’d been exposed to, but I don’t feel that these traits impede progress. In fact, I believe these sedate practices are a necessary counterbalance. The overall theme of the workplace is “as long as you get the work done, nothing else matters,” and thus the hours where the company is operating at its full capacity are very intense. By the end of this weekend, the company plans to complete and launch an API for its latest product, so the crunch in racing towards this deadline has been prevalent through much of each day. In these times, the dominant noises are the hum of the AC and the mashing of keys as the team members unflinchingly stare at their laptops and code frantically. E-mail and meetings are too slow as means of communication within the company, and instead, G-suite, Slack, and Facebook Messenger are used to send thoughts and questions at lightning speed – and responses typically arrive in the blink of an eye. Coffee and energy drinks fuel the crew during these sprints, and when the work is complete, I expect that naptime is a well-deserved and much-anticipated reward.

My first week in this kind of environment has been spent adjusting and trying to learn, and thankfully, the work we are assigned facilitates that. Us interns are largely left to our own devices, directionless, and this has proven an incredible opportunity to learn about what it is that the company does and the technologies that it works with. The company, Elefos, is a lab formed to research and develop various applications for blockchain technology. Blockchain itself is very recent, and in the United States, most people I encounter only associate the technology with cryptocurrency – of which Bitcoin is by far the most popular and well-known. But Elefos doesn’t seek to launch a coin and make quick money like numerous other short-lived businesses; instead, Elefos seeks to make use of the advantages distributed ledger technology provides – security, decentralization, and immutability – and apply them to various other fields such as education, cloud computing, and loyalty points systems.

Upon arrival, the chief developer provided us with some learning resources and then suggested we explore various other companies, competitors, applications…  We were even made aware of several upcoming tech gatherings around Ho Chi Minh City, and encouraged us to attend. It was a start, but not much more. I already had some familiarity with blockchain due to my interest in tech and my leadership in various computing organizations at the University, but neither of my fellow blockchain lab interns had any knowledge of it prior to beginning work, and even my own knowledge was only skin-deep as I soon discovered. We began flipping through the pages, scrolling through various company white papers and documentations, mining the data… Every so often, turning to each-other to confirm a belief or ask questions. In some ways it was a collaborative effort – we consulted each other quite a bit, and throughout our competitor analysis we collectively piled interesting information into a Google Doc to later present to the CEO and CTO – but not entirely, as we each let ourselves branch out into whichever application, or company, or geographical area interested us most at a particular moment. The studying and research process has been immensely enjoyable and interesting; I pore over one resource, and then questions are opened up that lead me to another resource, and then another, and then… so-on and so-forth, it’s an endlessly-flowing fountain of intrigue and I have become very deeply invested in the technology. Being an entrepreneurial mind, I often seek inspiration in discovering new things, and I have had so many consecutive flashes of inspiration this past week that I may go blind.

In the brief time I’ve been at Elefos, we have completed an in-depth and geographically-mapped competitor analysis, multiple project proposals, and participated in a local tech gathering at which I’d taken pages of notes and ideas. I’m excited to see what else I can learn and create over this next week, and I look forward to presenting all of our findings to the management on Monday.

The month of May has just ended, and with it, our first full week in Vietnam. The majority of our time was spent touring and exploring, as part of a culture week arranged by the university, and I can definitely say that I appreciated that opportunity. I don’t feel that I would’ve so quickly settled had we not been constantly moving from location to location – a contradiction, for sure, but a belief I hold firmly. Vietnam, as a location, is close to how I’d envisioned; I had pieced together a solid mental image through research in the month leading up to my departure, so very few things have left me surprised so far in regard to the area. What I didn’t at all expect was how easy it was to adjust, and the degree to which I can function in Vietnam. I expected to survive in a bubble – mostly interacting with my colleagues from work and school, living off of convenience store noodles and McDonalds – but already I am finding myself more comfortable and eager to explore. The locals are very approachable and happy to engage, I have felt of better health than ever before thanks to an active lifestyle, and the food I’ve picked hasn’t failed me yet. I’ve eaten fruits and meats of dubious origin, off of carts and boats alike, but thus far I’ve only gotten sick from a wrapped sandwich given to me by a supervisor. With each new day comes new experiences, new do’s and don’ts’, and new things to add to my “When in ‘Nam” bucket list.

Out of the structured “culture week” activities, I found the most informative to be the overnight excursion down south to the Mekong Delta and the subsequent visit to the floating market and surrounding areas. Prior to landing in Vietnam, I spent a chunk of the 14-hour plane ride reading a book by Mark Manson subtitled “A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life.” One section of the book concerns the pursuit of happiness, and the key takeaway is that many of the things we pursue in the West don’t really grant us happiness – rather, the presence of a benchmark for performance and success causes us to never fully be satisfied. The constant connectedness brought about by social media only worsens this, against what such platforms were intended for.

In the southern-most region of Vietnam, we didn’t see as many important historical or cultural landmarks as we had during our city tour, but I believe it gave us the most accurate view of what daily life was for people outside of the major developing areas in Vietnam. Small, open-air homes with time-worn exteriors, but polished tile floors, Wi-fi routers, and rows of high-tech gaming PCs visible beyond the doorway. Families passing melon and durian between ends of a boat on the open river, the youngest of the bunch sitting cross-legged and blue beneath a colorful umbrella, eyes and hands fixed on his smartphone. A yard decorated with stone and populated by roosters but punctuated by a shiny new Honda motorbike. It’s apparent that life here is much simpler, and many of Vietnam’s people don’t carry the same societal and social burdens of their peers in the West, granting them much happier and more peaceful lives. But that isn’t to say even the most rural parts of Vietnam are void of modern conveniences; quite the opposite, in these areas the presence of such technologies only seems to serve them in their happiness, instead of placing yet another burden as they do in the West.

I look forward to, in the coming weeks, continuing to explore and learn about Vietnam. One thing I would like to determine is if there’s a cultural mandate or tradition of preserving older properties, as I’ve noticed the Vietnamese are much less prone to demolition and reconstruction, instead maintaining old properties for what seems like generations. I’ve also set goals I hope to reach during my stay here, to make this period as transformative and effective as possible, but I will discuss those in a later entry. Cheers, and until next time.

We just recently wrapped up our week of pre-departure courses, and it was a fun and enlightening experience. In addition to learning some important historical, political, and economic facts about Vietnam, we were given a helpful brush-up on the social and cultural nature of the country as well. There were some similarities to the United States, especially the entrepreneurial and capitalist spirit seen in younger cities like Saigon, but I found the differences to be much more numerous. Of the differences, the one I found most surprising and interesting was the traffic law — or lack thereof. Cars, motorcycles, bicycles, and pedestrians all weave around each other in a perilous dance, moving dangerously close to one another. Motorcycles often have heaps of items, or several passengers, loaded onto their backs. Even the sidewalks, which are here considered to be a safe haven for those who walk, are free game for motorcycles. But where this effects me is in the act of crossing the street. To do so, one must simply step forwards slowly and move consistently without stopping, and the vehicles will all simply move around you — indoctrinating you into its flow. It will certainly be a bit stressful the first few times — it really does feel like the ultimate form of trust exercise, except I’m performing it with complete strangers — but I believe I’ll adjust rather quickly, and I look forward to showing others how it’s done when I visit again in the future. 

This tiny detail, however, is indicative of one larger difference between the United States and Vietnam. Here in the United States, and many other Western nations, we aren’t adequately prepared to deal with uncertainties or chance – such factors are a huge source of stress for us. Because of this, we attempt to control everything around us, in order to limit such uncertainty and mitigate that stress. A button to press,  a corresponding beeping noise, a light to signal to us that we can safely walk — even though we don’t really have control of traffic, such presences help give us the illusion that we can, and as a result, crossing the street isn’t something we need to fret much about. In Vietnam, you don’t really have control of the situation at all, and yet this is something people are comfortable dealing with.

One trait of Vietnamese culture we learned about is that it’s much more welcoming to uncertainty. People are comfortable with it, and more readily able to adapt to change as it arrives instead of expending energy preparing for such contingencies. I expect times in Vietnam when things don’t go according to plan, both in the workplace and in day to day life. There may be times where my professional role is shifted or broadened to accommodate unexpected developments in the business, for instance. But I look forward to embracing these sudden occurrences, and learning to live in the present rather than the future.