SEA of Startups

This week we are joined by Martin Perez the Founder of PetChef, which is D2C company offering a subscription service of healthy foods for your furry friend. This was a great conversation with Martin where we talk about his background in entrepreneurship and traveling the world.  We talk about the passion for healthy foods for pets and scaling his business.  We close off talking about what comes ne...

This week we are joined by Fabio Miceli the Founder of Sonno, which started as a bed in a box D2C company but has now evolved into a full sleep brand with both online and offline channels. This was a great conversation where we learn the origins of launching a sleep brand and how entrepreneurship was always part of him.  We talk about the challenges in launching a physical product and utilizing a...

This week we are joined by Suthan Mookaiah the Founder of Edar.com, which is an online to offline retail grocery chain across Malaysia, and soon to be Indonesia, that allows payment by recycling household waste. This was a great conversation with Suthan was fantastic as we go from corporate retrenchment to covid entrepreneur to business model pivot.  A recurring them to this conversation is partne...

This week we had a special collaboration with Founder Institute Malaysia as part of their relaunch and announcing they are open for applications.  In this session, we were joined by Eric Cheng the Founder of Carsome, which is Malaysia’s first and only unicorn. This was a great conversation with Eric as he walks us through the early days of launching Carsome and the pathway they have taken in scali...

This week we are joined by Top Lim of FinHero, which is a FinTech solutions provider operating a Finance as a Service platform ranging from credit scoring, KYC, collections and even supply chain financing. This was a great conversation to discuss how he transitioned from a corporate career at equipment financing entities to launching his own firm.  We talk about the particulars in leveraging techn...

This week we are joined by Goh Ai Ching of Piktochart, which is an all-in-one tool to easily create infographics, presentations, reports, posters, and videos online either from scratch or by editing a broad range of templates. This was a great conversation to discuss the pathway of a bootstrapped founder.  We talk about what led to the founding of the company, building in the early days, and how t...

This week we are joined by Henry Tye of Big Domain, which is a domain registrar that also provides web hosting, web design, SEO services, and several other related services to launch and run a website. This was a great conversation to discuss where we go through the process that led him to launch his business and the experience of a second time founder.  We talk about the rigors of making it throu...

This week we are joined by serial entrepreneur Charles Tang of Instant eStore, which is an All-In-One Ecommerce Solution serving thousands of clients. This was a great conversation with serial entrepreneur and early pioneer of ecommerce in Malaysia, Charles Tang.  We discussed how he started the business and scaled in the early days.  We touch on the evolution of ecommerce and the need to be omni-...

This week we are joined by Kelvyn Chuah of SINEGY, which is a digital asset exchange based in Malaysia, one of only 4 registered with the Securities Commission. This was a great conversation to discuss how Kelvyn launched a crypto exchange in Malaysia and navigated the regulatory process.  We touch on the market perceptions and getting broader adoption.  Inevitably, we make mentions of FTX, but ci...

This week we are joined by Howie Chang of Forward School, which is equipping aspiring students and tech professionals with industry-ready skills required for the fast-moving tech sector. This was a great conversation to discuss how Howie came to launch an education focused startup.  We talk about building a curriculum and getting accreditation.  We then move onto scaling the business. I’d love to...

We launched SEA of Startups with the intent of highlighting great entrepreneurs and their stories. In the short few months, I think we have accomplished that goal. In this episode, we highlight excerpts of lessons extracted from three episodes that give a taste of the operational insight that comes from these stories. Please take the time and go back through the prior interviews we have done over...

This week we are joined by Azran Osman-Rani of Naluri, which provides an integrated digital care solution that combines support for physical and mental health. This was a great conversation with serial entrepreneur Azran.  We talk about the localization experience at iFlix and how this combined with his own family experience with health to create the idea for Naluri. He discusses the process of va...

This week we are joined by Pennie Homa of Homa2U, which is an online to offline (O2O) building materials and interior finishes marketplace supplied from brand new items through to unused construction materials, discarded, and overstock markets. This was a great conversation where we talk about the industry background Pennie had before launching Homa2U.  We discuss the wastage problem that exists i...

This week we are joined by Alvin Yuan of HealthMetrics, which has designed a unified health benefits platform to manage, measure, and improve the employee benefits strategy. This was a great conversation where discuss the initial MVP and go to market strategy and how they navigated regulations.  We discuss how some network effects in the market aided their growth.  We wrap things up with some forw...

This week we are joined by Arif Tukiman of RunCloud, which is a leading cloud control panel that is simplifying cloud, doing away with the difficulties of cloud management, and bringing simplicity, to return focus on business performance. This was a great conversation as we go from the early days of experiencing the problem firsthand when he ran a web development agency.  Then building that produc...

This week we are joined by Derek Toh of Hiredly, which is a a leading online to offline recruitment platform for junior to mid-management talent, including both a job portal and headhunter recruiter solution. This was a great conversation where we go from Derek’s time as a headhunter to his realization of the importance of information beyond the job description and beyond the CV.  We talk about sc...

This week we are joined by Chris Fong of FeFiFo, which is a technology-first co-farming company that focuses on empowering the new generation of progressive farmers in ASEAN. This was a great conversation where we learn the origins and ambition to tackle a key issue for smallholder farmers.  We discuss extensively different areas of standardization and taking a process-oriented view.  We even disc...

This week we are joined by Wai Hong Fong of StoreHub, which started as an POS system but has evolved into an all-in-one platform for retailers and restaurants to automate and grow their businesses.  They currently have over 15,000 businesses across Southeast Asia. This was a great conversation that trace the hustle of building a product and scaling internationally.  We touch on aspects of fundrais...

This week we are joined by Jes Min Lua of Recommend Group, which is southeast Asia's #1 Home and Local Services platform, operating under Sejasa.com in Indonesia and Recommend.my in Malaysia. This was a great conversation about building a marketplace model and the hurdles they have overcome.  We cover the aspects of building trust through to tactics to drive recurrence and keep transactions on the...

This week we are joined by Mark Koh of Supa, which provides a self-service data annotation platform to enable machine learning models. This was a great conversation as we go straight into the last mile problem of data analysis in AI/ML models, data annotation.  We hear how he has built a customer base and uses thought leadership as lead generation.  We wrap up on how a data company incorporates da...

This week we are joined by Brian Tan of FutureLab, which is a mentorship platform connecting Mentors to Mentees to guide career paths, gain skills, and develop professionally from university through to Enterprise. This was a great conversation about an impactful business aiming to enable access to mentorship for university students and recent graduates to guide them along their career paths.  Incr...

This week we are joined by Wong Whei Meng of Speedhome, which is tackling the home rental market with zero deposit for tenants by combining insurance protection and tech innovation. This was a great conversation about the challenges and paint points in the home rental market.  Leveraging an insurance product to eliminate the need for high upfront deposits which can be restrictive for segments of t...

This week we are joined by Sina Meraji of Learning Loop, which is a data company specializing in learning distribution and discovery. This was a great conversation as we discussed Sina’s own personal life experiences that developed the motivation and passion to launch Learning Loop.  We uncover a number of insights in the learning experiences, the filters of knowledge and understanding users.  The...

This week we are joined by Yien Yee Soh of Avana, which is a social commerce enabler platform, providing an integrated D2C & reseller selling solution for social media channels. This was a great conversation as we went from the days of creating an aggregator for a community of blogs operating as shops through to launching an enabler platform that has since scaled.  We discuss the direction of...

This week we are joined by Ramachandran Muniandy of Asia Mobiliti, a mobility as a service company (MaaS). Through this conversation we navigate the origins and the motivation to building something to better the nation.  We discuss the evolution of public transportation and demand responsive transit (DRT) that scraps the timetables.  A number of great points made that are highly applicable to ever...