How to start a tech startup in Cambodia

Young population is one of the key factors for Cambodia to pursue and growth so fast of tech companies. The average ages are most likely under 30 years if we compare to other developed countries that bring Cambodia to increase internet usage and developing startup ecosystem. By April 2025, according to Telecom Regulator Cambodia (TRC), there are around 19.62 million of internet subscribers in Cambodia. These figures shown that this is the rapid growth in digital connectivity. Before starting your ideas of running digital business in Cambodia, please consider as the following options:

Demonstrate your ideas to help local problem not globally

Many startups fail in Cambodia due to their copy ideas from modern countries or from tech startup regions such as Silicon Valley in USA, or Korea, China, Europe, etc. that don’t fit Cambodia. Throughout the fast development in Cambodia within the determination from the government’s policies and framework for digital development, in order to achieve the three main objectives for the government such as digital citizen, digital SMEs, and digital government, Cambodia has invested a lot of funding for public services initiatives. Social media usages is also one of the widespread for business promotion, communication, news consumption and other complaining business issues in Cambodia. As it is aiming to strengthen e-government, digital literacy, and innovation ecosystems, some ideas should be putting together for startups to work well in Cambodia:

1. FinTech or Payment Solution

Cambodia has seen explosive on mobile first digital economy which can be seen as most of the young population are using their mobile devices for internet banking and e-wallets. Even if, the number of mobile banking around 75% especially with KHQR payment, there are tremendous problems that seems not to be solved such as fraud payments, uncertainty of regulations, phishing or scamming, etc. In short, there are many significant opportunities for startup to look for particular issues and help local people in the efficiency way.

2. E-Commerce and Logistics

Driven by the internet access and smart phone usage, online shopping has increased significantly especially after the widespread of the COVID-19. The business in Cambodia is being adopted social commerce platform such as Facebook, Telegram, YouTube, and TikTok, etc. for reaching their customers. At the same time, the average of Cambodian who bought products through e-commerce platform seems to be low if we compare to the region due to the lack or inconsistent system, and the last-mile delivery is still not efficient. The main problems of the issues are language barriers, complicated ordering process, payment issues and untrust refund, risk of scams or even wrong product upon arrival, etc. In short, some solutions could have solved those existed problems such as developing an ordering platform which can help Cambodia people to take be more convenient in term of ordering and tracking their buying, cross-border payment solution, etc.

3. Agr.Tech

Cambodia’s economy still relies heavily on agriculture productions. The farming is being involved from various activities such as rice, cassava, vegetables, livestock productions and so on. However, most of the farmers are still operated withing family or traditional farming that they are facing many persistent challenges. The struggling areas are limited to market information or market accessible, unpredicted pricing and harvesting, lack of supporting in term of financing, inefficient to channel’s distribution, selling products through middlemen (low price), etc. In order to prove and allow farmers to access reliable markets and support them for crop farming or planning, Agri.Tech startup should consider on connecting farmers with their superApp or platform and also provide farmer more on data-driven farming support such weather information, crop diseases, and awareness or advisory systems.

4. SME digital tools

Brought your ideas within the supportive platforms or software that can help improve business productivities is very important for Cambodia context. Those platforms can help the business in some areas such as improve communication between consumers and business owners, marketing design or ideas, communication tools such as Google Meets, Microsoft Team, and Zoom, platform that can track customers behaviours, free accounting or business reporting, automate or AI for business workflow, emails, etc.

5. Education Technology

Cambodian government keens to promote digital literacy for their economy. Digital citizen set in the main policy “The digital economy and society policy framework of Cambodia 2021-2035“; however, some challenges are being faced through this development such as the price of the courses are still high fees, the inaccessible of internet coverage for rural areas, only 30%-32% of Cambodian teachers are tech-savvy, phishing attack or untrust contents, etc. Those kinds of issues are being improved from government funding that is the good opportunities for tech startup in Cambodia.

Choose the right business structure

In Cambodia, Ministry of Commerce is provided liabilities, personal assets are protected, and offer greater credibility and flexibility, etc. Choose the right business structure may help the business more on good decision in term of legal protection, taxes, includes sole proprietorship, partnership, and private limited company. Cambodia is mostly choosing the private limited company that will be the best balance for long term growth and safety for new startup company.

Register your company

To register your legal company through Ministry of Commerce or you can search for local districts or Khan’s center. Or can register online Registration Services – Online Business Registration. After official registration, the company will be able to open a corporate bank account with local bank such as ABA bank, Aceleda, etc. The duration of the registration process around 2 to 4 weeks and it costs around 300 to 1,000 USD depend on business size.

Build your tech team

The lack of human resources in computer engineering, or IT specialists is one of the issues for tech company in Cambodia. The best way for new startups specially from outside Cambodia country maybe the company should hire a team from their own country; however, to save more from operating cost, Cambodia also does have more computer science students fresh graduate or even less than 3 years’ experience that can support the first running of the company.

Get Funding

Funding is a good through of entrepreneurs to start their business journey in Cambodia and without funding, it is very difficult to bring the ideas to start. To get funding, you need a proposal with clear objectives to solve the tech problem in Cambodia. Most of the funding agencies in Cambodia which you can look for includes Khmer Enterprise (KE), Startup Cambodia, Techo Startup Center, Seedstars Programs, and besides that Ministry of Post and Telecommunications also provide a seed funding for technology startup and Ministry of Economic and Finance is more focusing on skill developments through SDF program