Freshworks rides Asia’s digital wave

Freshworks, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company specialising in customer experience (CX) and enterprise service management (ESM) software, is riding the wave of digital transformation sweeping across Asia.

Speaking to Computer Weekly in a recent interview, Simon Ma, Freshworks’ managing director for Asia, said the company is seeing exponential growth in the region, fuelled by a surge in demand for tools to improve customer and employee experiences.

“The whole concept of employee experience was becoming a very hot topic,” said Ma, who spearheaded the establishment of the company’s ASEAN and Asia headquarters in Singapore in 2019. “The economies are also getting a lot more digital post-Covid, and the wave will continue.”

This trend is especially evident in Southeast Asia, with its young, digitally native population. The region’s under-40 demographic and the rise of hybrid work have created a need for platforms that integrate multiple systems and facilitate collaboration across dispersed teams, he said.

Freshworks has positioned itself as a cost-effective alternative to legacy players, focusing on ease of use and rapid return on investment. The company’s sweet spot is in the mid-market segment – companies with 1,000 to 10,000 employees – where its software addresses specific needs without unnecessary features.

The focus also applies to Freshworks’ AI services, which have 7,000 early adopters globally. According to Ma, these customers have seen a 32% to 36% improvement in customer and employee satisfaction. “Because the AI is embedded in the software, it’s very easy for customers to start using it,” he said. “There’s very little training to do.”

In CX, Freshworks is leveraging AI to help companies consolidate different point applications into a single platform with AI-powered chat and automation capabilities. “In the CX space, it’s about hyper-personalisation and whether you can solve customer issues fast at the chat level,” said Ma, adding that Freshworks is gaining new customers and migrating users from other platforms.

Freshworks’ ESM offerings, similar to those offered by ServiceNow, are designed to streamline internal processes and improve employee experience. Ma cited a large logistics company in Singapore that’s using Freshworks as the core of its employee portal, integrating various HR, finance, and payroll systems for seamless access and automation.

Ma said the company’s approach to implementation ensures its customers can quickly realise the benefits of its platform. He outlined a process of aligning with customer business goals, crafting deliverables, and breaking down implementation into phases with regular check-ins.

For AI deployments, Freshworks uses pre-built processes and packages, allowing customers to configure the software to suit their needs. “Unless the customer already has a lot of processes that are already well-defined, we tackle easier problems first and then expand,” said Ma.

On the competitive landscape, he said that while there are companies offering similar products, Freshworks differentiates itself with quick implementations and a lower total cost of ownership (TCO). “Our TCO against legacy players is usually about half,” said Ma, citing this as a key growth driver. “We also reduce implementation time,” he added.

Ma remains bullish about business opportunities in Asia-Pacific, particularly in Australia, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Hong Kong. Freshworks has also established local partnerships to navigate the region’s diverse and fragmented markets.

Despite these opportunities, Ma acknowledged the challenges of localisation, particularly in a language and cultural context. He noted the limitations of English-centric AI models and underscored the need for partnerships to address these nuances. “We partner with strong local players, integrate their models and evolve as we go,” said Ma.