Hello Mentor

In this episode of the Hello Mentor podcast, we sit down with Eddie Tan, the founder behind the popular bakery brands Cake Tella (known for its alcoholic cakes) and Keto Cakes. Eddie’s culinary journey began unconventionally, a self-described poor student who found his passion in a culinary arts program , he initially trained as a hot cooking chef, even securing a spot on a competition team and wo...

In this episode of Hello Mentor, we sit down with Adam Izzy, the content creator and musical storyteller who has spent the last ten years building a unique online presence that blends comedy with high-quality music production. Long before his videos started going viral on TikTok, Adam’s career path took him from hosting weddings for just RM100 a night, to producing music, and eventually becoming a...

Bryan Low, a content entrepreneur and creative agency founder who turned his early financial struggles into a massive online presence. Originally from the small town of Kuala Kangsar, Perak, Bryan's business journey started back in university when he urgently needed to repay a debt, leading him to discover e-commerce and dropshipping. Fast forward to 2022, a severe knee injury left him stuck in a...

He grew up on a rubber estate in Tawau, Sabah, a place often called the final frontier where the roads weren’t even paved, the dial-up internet cut out every twenty minutes, and the nearest big city felt further away than Bali. Yet, from that quiet corner of the country, Richard Ker taught himself how to build websites, accidentally started a one-man global e-commerce business fixing iPhones out o...

What does it actually take to walk away from a comfortable life and build a business from scratch? At 33, Derek Toh did exactly that—abandoning a highly stable corporate accounting career in London to return to Malaysia and dive into the unpredictable world of recruitment. When he eventually decided to launch the job platform Hiredly, he didn't wait for massive funding or perfect software; instead...

If you ever feel pressured to stick to just one career path, Dr. Soo Wincci’s journey will completely change your perspective. Best known initially as Miss Malaysia World , she quickly refused to let the industry label her as just a "vase" or a one-hit wonder. Instead, she submerged herself into entirely different worlds, capturing hearts on MasterChef Celebrity Malaysia , becoming a recording art...

Before Malaysia had a comedy industry, there was one man, a borrowed stage, and ten minutes of material scribbled on the palm of his hand. On the 31st of August 1990, Merdeka Day, of all days, a young Harith Iskander walked into the lobby lounge of the Subang Airport Hotel and made a handful of hotel waiters and two tourists laugh, and in doing so, quietly planted the seed of an entire art form in...

Sometimes the idea that changes everything doesn't arrive in a boardroom, it arrives in a vet clinic, staring at a broken fixed deposit and the creeping realisation that the financial system was never really designed with ordinary people in mind. Teoh Wei Xiang is the co-founder and CEO of Versa Asia, Malaysia's first online platform licensed to distribute investment products digitally and the sto...

It started the way so many great Malaysian things do, over a late-night mamak conversation, two young people complaining that nobody was telling their generation's stories the way they deserved to be told. Chris Khristie and Michelle Tan are the co-founders of Influasia, the digital media powerhouse behind World of Buzz, Lobak Merah, Noodou, and In Real Life, a network of publications that collect...

Before the boardroom meetings with Samsung and Maybank, before the award-winning TVCs and the production house with its own creative directors, there was just a young Malaysian with a camera, a sense of humour, and an unshakeable belief that local stories deserved to be told beautifully. Jin Lim, known to a generation of Malaysians as Jinnyboy, is one of the country's pioneer YouTube creators, the...

Before she became Malaysia’s most iconic supermodel, Amber Chia’s reality was defined by extreme financial hardship. Raised in a fishing village in Tawau, Sabah, she dropped out of school at 15 to juggle three grueling jobs including selling fish at a 3 a.m. morning market, just to help her family survive. Defying the odds, a 17-year-old Amber bought a one-way ticket to Kuala Lumpur with exactly R...

In 2013, civil engineering graduate Tai Hau took a backpacking trip across Europe and noticed a huge difference in culture. While Europeans wore glasses as fun fashion accessories, Malaysians only wore them as a medical necessity. He also realized a major daily problem that big international brands were ignoring: standard Western frames just didn't fit Asian faces well, causing the annoying issue...

Joan Low’s journey is a testament to the power of breaking past limiting beliefs. Growing up in an average, middle-class Malaysian family as the child of a factory overseer and a government servant, Joan became a first-generation graduate. Encouraged by her parents to dream big, she left Malaysia at age 17 after securing a life-changing scholarship to a boarding school in Canada, followed by anoth...

The Engineer Who Quit His "Iron Rice Bowl" Before he became famous on TikTok, Chris MJ (Christopher Mathews Jacob) had the life every Asian parent dreams of. He had a Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering and a steady job at Sony. But deep down, sitting in the office wasn't making him happy. He wanted to tell stories and make people laugh. So, he did something shocking: he quit his stable job...

In 2016, Jake Yap and his brother Chris launched Lifely (originally E-Living) with a singular mission: to democratize interior design for the "renter generation." Identifying a massive gap between cheap, disposable furniture and unaffordable designer pieces, Yap built what he calls the "Zara of Furniture"—a fast-moving supply chain that delivers on-trend aesthetics at accessible price points. Star...

Long before she became the face of a modern Batik revolution, Dayang Syafiqah was a musician at heart. She didn’t study fashion, she studied music and she brought that same soulfulness to the world of textiles. When she looked at the Batik industry, she didn't see heritage, she saw boundaries. To her, Batik felt trapped, stuck in the realm of stiff formal wear and government uniforms that didn't r...

Before Minimalist Lab became a staple in Malaysia’s jewelry scene, Nicole Chia was already navigating the retail world with her first venture, Vintage 1988. While that brand celebrated the charm of the past, Nicole noticed a quiet but powerful shift in what modern women actually wanted. They weren’t just looking for accessories; they were seeking clarity, quality, and pieces that could survive the...

Abang Brian’s journey into the culinary world began with a deeply personal and emotional catalyst. Originally trained in accounting and finance, his life took a drastic turn in 2012 when his father was diagnosed with cancer. Faced with his father’s specific and strict dietary needs, Brian stepped into the kitchen for the first time, not as a chef, but as a caregiver. This period of selfless servic...

Sarah Chen-Spellings is a Malaysian-born investor based in America, working at the intersection of women, wealth, and innovation. She works with family offices and institutional investors globally on capital allocation, portfolio construction, and long-term value creation. She is the co-founder of Beyond The Billion, which mobilized over $1 billion into women-founded companies through a global con...

Kim May Chee’s journey with COCOdry began long before the brand existed, in her father’s small hair salon in Penang. As a child, she swept floors, helped customers, and quietly observed the beauty industry from the inside out. She saw how meaningful a simple service could be, but also how intimidating, inconsistent, and underserved the experience felt for many Malaysians. Years later, after hearin...

Before she became known across LinkedIn as “Aunty HR,” Sim Ling Ku never planned a career in Human Resources. She didn’t study HR, she learned people. Growing up as the middle child in a humble family, she naturally stepped into the mediator role, the listener, the one everyone turned to. When she entered the working world in admin and support roles, the same thing happened: colleagues came to her...

Before becoming the founder of Sabai Health, Rohit Nambiar spent more than 21 years in the insurance industry, rising through the ranks across six countries and eventually becoming one of the youngest CEOs in Malaysia. He built his reputation at AXA, where he led regional strategy, M&A, digital transformation, and later helmed AXA Affin Life Insurance before taking on leadership roles with Tun...

Before she became the founder of The Flow Studio, Malaysia’s leading yoga and Pilates brand, Tiffany Yow was crunching numbers in Melbourne’s banking world. After seven years in finance, she decided to take a leap few would, leaving a stable career in Australia to move home and open a Pilates studio. “It wasn’t burnout,” she says. “I just wanted to do something meaningful.” What began as a persona...

Joshua and Joel Lim didn’t plan to become startup founders straight out of university but the pandemic had other ideas. What began as a simple university project to reduce plastic waste soon evolved into a full-fledged tech startup. The twins’ first idea, BeeBag, encouraged people to bring reusable bags by rewarding them with points. It was a clever concept that landed early partnerships with Sunw...

Tho Leng-Lei took the “safe” road, LSE accounting, a Big Four desk, then private equity. It looked like success: stability, prestige, predictability. But behind spreadsheets and 2 a.m. audits, she felt herself slipping. The camaraderie was real, the exhaustion even more so, and the unspoken rule was simple: if you were still in the office at dawn, you were doing something right. When the pressure...