Tech This Way: Recent Episodes
Amran Hassan
Technology is driving a lot of changes around the world including here in Malaysia. But who's doing what ?.. where ?.. how ? This program talks to various tech leaders, shapers, observers or just the plain curious to answer these questions.
When you build a business, do you have a purpose ? Can you build it to become more by building a brand ? The dynamic duo from BrandGeeks, Manisah & Silmy returns to chat about how businesses has had to react to the impact of COVID and channel disruption. How does brand building change when everyone (almost) has digitised and it's becoming a really crowded market ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/K7II1KuLmok
Professor Yasmin was a hard core researcher in virology since the late 80s. Whilst deep in plant molecular biology and biotech research, she had a short stint in MOSTI, then wrapping up an illustriust career as the Director for UMCIC (University Malaya Centre for Innovation and Commercialisation). It was a short retirement as she's back in UM again as CEO of UMCapital, running UM startup ventures support and ecosystem.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/bRRticW2Pto
Having observed first hand the successes and failures of family businesses, he plotted his entreprenueral roadmap during his days in school. Even at 18, Arief was already trading second hand cars, and always looking for the next business to do. This is a fascinating journey of this young man who wants to flip the typical journey, instead of starting with school leading to business, but start with business and finishing with school.
YouTube https://youtu.be/h-CjIeRa_x4
Azran has had an exciting career so far, from consultancy to being an entrepreneur. From helping others build their business, to putting his foot in and building his own. Always up for a challenge, Azran has experienced plenty of highs and lows. In his latest foray, he setup Naluri to address therapies that link mental & physical health.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/QLnxojtnmjw
Hisham has worked for 18 companies before setting his own system development company. As they developed systems for others, he saw an opportunity to build a platform themselves, to service companies who needs help to do monthly billings. Being a tech heavy team, they initially started by building the best technology platform, but their philosophy has moved to what is the best for customers instead. He also wants to run the business as a group of friends, but does that work ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/cX2zjaowj6s
A lawyer by qualification (and profession briefly), Malek had a front row seat to Web 1.0 and saw first hand how Silicon Valley was changing the world. Picking up the "Loot" model from the UK, Malek decided to go into the classified business in Malaysia. His first foray into entreprenuship hit a slight snag.. the Asian Financial Crisis. But as with life, one door closes only for another to open. Follow his fascinating journey in the last few decades as he shares the genesis of our beloved business radio station BFM89.9 through to FiLife.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/4PJjmnzi6x0
After several deaths in the family whilst studying abroad, Queenie realised there seemed to be a need to support families manage funeral arrangements. But before jumpin into that, Queenie immersed herself in the startup eco-system in Brunei by setting up Startup Brunei, a startup builder. Being involved in finding funding for a company in autism education, she continued picking up experience before setting up Memori. Find out more about the startup scene in Brunei.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/Gu0EHT52zBo
Buying his bicycle bag (and only using it once) followed by realising that his other cycling buddies could have lent it to him made Indy realise that there must be a better way than always buying things. Learning from other renting platforms in UK & US, Indy decided to start Rentsmart.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/wALIlMZzLI4
Winning a hackathon with a bus scheduling app for customers, Max decided to pursue the idea. But as he delved deeper into the bus industry, and looking at it more from a bus operator standpoint, he realised there's more issues that the operators are facing. Working a fulltime job, he moonlighted the startup on the side to keep the idea going. Shout out to Professor Rofina Yasmin from University Malaya's Centre of Innovation Commercialisation for insipiring this young man to pursue his dream.
https://youtu.be/s2_WZKXqBNA
Starting his career with HP, Dato Wei saw the convergance of computing and telephony, and decided to quit and with a few friends, developed a product for voice mail. Initially bootstrapping and then backed by an angel investor, the business grew tremendously. But the path to IPO was not easy and they came close to shutting down. Follow Datuk Wei's fascinating journey and appreciate why "trust" has become one of his key tenets.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/QorE7jLKhBA
Fresh as a software engineer back from Canada, Huzaifah jumped straight into his first startup and started building the perfect solution... and kept building and building and building until he realised it's not exactly what his customers needed. He even realised he wasn't sure who his customers were. Now pinjam.co is on track to help companies rent anything digitally.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/XaZS1_GMh4g
Yik Seong was an accountant with the big four followed by a large bank and spent most of his career in the UK. Deciding to return to Malaysia, he gave himself one chance at being an entrepreneur and started Direct Lending. From only one transaction within a few months, they have grown much much more now. How has been been ? Join me to find out.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/p56Kc9Ene2Y
Yan Lim's journey to running her own PR firm was almost accidental, like most intersting journeys. From just freelancing on a big gig, to suddenly finding herself servicing government agencies, corporates and startups. But what exactly does she do, and does it make sense for a startup to engage her?
YouTube:https://youtu.be/89uNe3TRZr0
Pui Mun worked on a contruction project for a few months and immediately saw all the inefficiencies, silos and leakages in the business. What she didnt realise was that it was going to be a long journey to make people agree that there is a better way of doing things..
YouTube: https://youtu.be/uTPV9KtKQNY
Wanting to do it by himself, Clarence insisted to work his way through university in UK. How did he do that ? And why the move from UK back to Penang ? We also do a quick tour of their office in Penang.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/aKZGyfrj72E
Leaving a good job from UK, Clarence decided to come home and start selling vouchers online. Was he mad or was the need to scratch that entrepreneruship itch too strong ? With no experience, he decided to get into deliveries to support SMEs. From 5 to 400 people, find out how Easyparcel has grown.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/iZ4mnbB172c
How do you convince your parents you dont want to study anymore ? How do you conquer the tech world from Penang ? Is running a tech business from the gorgeous Pulau Pinang better than the 'usual' KL ? What next beyond hosting ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/gJy8z70jM_Y
Maran stumbled into the medicine line, whilst an ex-colleague Hazwan decided to stumble into it with him. From just a handful of doctors on the platform and trying to convince patients to get onboard, they now have millions of visitors a month to their site. What's next for this pioneering Malaysian health startup ?
YouTube: https://youtu.be/Bln7vukvLJY
Like all interesting people, Ariffin's journey has interesting twist and turns. From quitting school, going in to the music industry, becoming the group architect at Yahoo and now helping companies transform their revenue streams. And we go under the hood a little on how search engines work.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/XlIti0_nZWY
The corporate world was too slow for Nik and he picked up key lessons from several startups before venturing on his own with Moovby. As usual, it always starts with a personal experience, and then taking the leap to see if the idea works.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/-VTUFANOD6E
If you don't know Mr Karamjit Singh... you can stop here. For the rest of us, he has been giving us the tech news on our side of the world for as long as I can remember the internet through a V.34 modem. But do you know that man behind the honest, open, direct and sometime controversial articles ? Let's find out.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/uBm6JqB0MMw
Syed Ahmad Fuqaha started from taking support calls to tracking vehicles. How exciting was it to track their first stolen car in real time ? And using his vast analytics, can he finally tell us, who is the better driver ?
YouTube: https://youtu.be/sGUJgKVt9sg
Heading to Singapore with no business idea yet, Hajime decided to move to Malaysia instead thanks to MDEC. He then started building a shopping mall application which they sold to a Japanese company. He then became CEO of Tokyo based Alphaus Cloud and now looks to use Malaysia as a hub to expand to South East Asia. Beyond that, he's investing in other cloud driven start-ups around the region.
https://youtu.be/wGvmAomkoSY
As CEO, Tan Lin Nah has an exciting role to steer INTI into the digital age of education. As she looks forward, she draws experience and insight from a surprisingly non education related background..
YouTube : https://youtu.be/aJxzt0Q76Nk
Noor Shahiwan graduated in biology, but somehow it bugged him why there were still areas in Malaysia without electricity. He decided to embark on bringing solar to far flung places. Without realising it, he had setup a social entreprise. For each commercial project, they would fully subsidise solar power to needy homes within the visinity. Now they've gone as far as remote islands in Indonesia to deep into Myanmar. Can they achieve bringing light to 5000 people by 2022 ?
YouTube: https://youtu.be/RdCN0G7Ksrs
A chartered accountant, Rafiza started from the corporate finance world to strategy and innovation, and now she'll bring all that experience to Cradle. Starting in Cradle at the beginning of the COVID crisis, she's hit the ground running helping startups take opportunity, pivot and move forward.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/NAdJG9TMmZw
Peter Tam has worked with quite a few of the large tech giants who are household names, Accenture, Microsoft, IBM and Apple. Throughout, he's always used them as a platform to support entrepreneurs and SMEs. In the next part of his journey, he's dedicating himself to help coach startups navigate this crazy times.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/v0tSPxD8RsM
Ray worked in the family business even as a teenager, and saw the harsh realities of entrepreneurship early in his life. He even franchised a cafe business. Moving to the US, he used up his savings to start a remittance business from college, wanting to earn easy money.. and learned the hard way that it's not just fire and forget. Even when he did get a job in the Silicon Valley, he couldn't see himself working for someone else. Now back in the Philippines, he's revived the remittance business but found a need in the property business.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/BtiByhb2hUA
Ashran left Petronas and started on his tech entrepreneurship journey with web development and started on the video streaming idea even before YouTube ! Remember RealPlayer ? "Do Something Different" lead them to social content network Joota which almost went public. That journey was the best MBA school for him, which was the best preparation for MaGIC. How was that tightrope walk between government and entrepreneurs ? And now Dattel, an anlytics company that knows customers at a national level.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/fCHj96PvUts
How did a corporate consultant with no tech background start from the world of telexes to VCs, fund raising, creating Technopreneurs Assoc. Malaysia (TeAM) and setting up some foundational tech eco-systems in Malaysia. Remember Cocktails with 3Capital?
YouTube: https://youtu.be/hjcC14L4jd4
Twenty five years ago this Californian decided to head off to the mysterious far east and landed in Malaysia. Since then he's lived in the main cities and seen the technological growth of the region. We are not one country, so what are the stricking similarities and differences that he has seen ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/cy028EdTOFA
Shamsul Nashriq or popularly known as Shamnash kicked off his entrepreneural creative journey as a student in uni. Websites, rock videos, 3D visualiser, animation, corporate gigs, govn gigs, NGO's what does he not do ? One of the most expressive guys that I know and a truly enjoyable session.
YouTube: https://youtu.be/TZOlsHoICh4
When you learn that Michael left NUS to do a double degree in Malaysia and work part time as a lecturer, you know he's single minded and driven. Not beaten down by the 1998 crises, he knows the value of money, and through MoneyTree, wants to instill the education and awareness about money that our children seem to lack. But how can he do it by breaking the conventional classroom approach to get the children engaged ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/919nV_iSsWs
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In a Tech This Way first, I have both co-founders on the hot seat. Naturally we had to get into how they met! As for branding strategists, Silmyi & Manisah are inseparable in driving their customers to realise it's not just coming up with a pretty logo.. what does it take to make a brand legendary ?
Founded in 2011, Brand Geeks Inc is a boutique branding and marketing consultancy which believes that legendary brands come in all shapes and forms and have the potential to change the world. They provide full-stack brand development & marketing solutions. They also happen to be tech-obsessed and design divas.
To see how they have helped MyTeksi, Smart Selangor, Evenesis, Suncrox Solar, Qwork, Dattel, MedKad, Innergia Labs and ASEAN Rice Bowl Startup Awards check them out at https://brandgeeksinc.com.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/uf4JupJxJcQ
A tech and game geek at heart, Hasnul jumped straight into MDC after graduating, as employee no 9, helping drive the MSC and building awareness on what it was and trying to entice companies to come and invest. Cyberjaya was primarily a palm estate still and with his parang (figuratively), started hacking away at it... exciting times.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/4MwQFxuUajY
Yuet Kim Lim, Lee Swee Lin and Suzanne Ling are university mates who in 2013 started volunteeting in a refugee learning centre. This lead to the idea of helping them sustain themselves by cooking for a living. In this episode Kim Lim shares their journey. Here's a perfect example of how driven by a sense of purpose, these guys have created a successful business that is truly impacting lives.
OnYouTube: https://youtu.be/upy7IeH4ko0
FoxyMojo is just a platform for Mohd Atasha to pursue his next adventure. Born an entreprenuer, he then was curious about how government agencies worked, and then how businesses worked... what makes some companies excel and others fail ? What happens when co-founders are not aligned ?
OnYouTube: https://youtu.be/AOaOyNd-cic
TV Host and Actor, Nina, wants to help people & brands POP online by developing them into SEA's Business Influencers. That's a bold claim.. can just anyone become influencers ? Follow her journey from corporate to training to media and entertainment to the world of entrepreneurs and digital marketing. How much do influencers really make ? Which platform is best for who ? Find out more. She has so much energy you either ride her wave or be bowled over.. we would have talked forever if it wasnt for the building having to evacuate us !!
YouTube: https://youtu.be/ZKsizGQByDw
Siti Mariam Samin didnt realise she's an entrepreneur all her life. It came natural to her to identify a need, and fulfilling it whilst making a few bucks out of it. As her passion grew, she stumbled onto the Greek word Meraki, which means putting all of yourself into something that you really love that you leave part of yourself in it. This resonated with her, and now she'd like to help fellow entrepreneurs do the same.
On YouTube: https://youtu.be/xQLYHGff_oc
Takahara Suito doesn't so much compose music but releases them from her system like a pressure valve. In an unconventional path to being a musician, she leads The Venopian Solitude band, embraces social media and uses technology to reach directly to her fans.
https://www.patreon.com/vionavernett
https://www.instagram.com/takaharasuiko/
This episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/3GLfqXSnllg
Effon Khoo has moved from university to corporate to startup world and one might think it's just career building.. but he is driven to see how we can build a nation with sustainable deep technology skills that can drive us to the digital future.
YouTube : https://youtu.be/oxHq_tGRZD4
Joachim Sebastian is the founder of Everpeaks, an eCommerce managed services provider, Amazon Service Provider Network Member, eBay Channel Partner and Payoneer Community Partner based in Malaysia. Joachim has been in business since he was 17 years old and incorporated his first ever business in 2014. To date, Joachim has founded 3 companies that specialise in eCommerce, manufacturing and distribution of goods.
Everpeaks is a fast-growing omni-channel eCommerce solutions provider and technology platform, founded in 2016 by Joachim and his two partners Andri and Sam. Over a span of four years, Everpeaks has developed strong partnerships with eBay and Amazon, becoming the only eBay Channel Partner in Malaysia, and the only Amazon Service Provider Network in Southeast Asia. Everpeaks have also secured associative relationships with the Malaysian government as an eAggregator, and a National Ecommerce Strategic Roadmap (NESR) partner of the Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC). Everpeaks is currently fundraising and is pre-live on pitchIN.my.
Head over to the link below to learn more about their plan and offer :
https://www.equity.pitchin.my/businesses/evrpks-consulting-sdn-bhd
https://www.everpeaks.com
Interview On YouTube : https://youtu.be/oPSA2HlY0VU
Here's a Malaysian who decided to start his company in Germany in the insuretech business and now looking to expand back into our side of the world. How did he take that ride and would he recommend it ?
YouTube : https://youtu.be/H7bV8t4fnAU
Johan Ishak, former CEO of Media Prima TV Networks had his work cut out for him as he runs Malaysia's, arguably, widest TV network, against a backdrop of digital disruption from streaming shows, on demand free social media and a public that seems to only watch news on TV... are you a cord cutter or a cord never ? Is this a digital disruption or a digital opportunity ? How do you retain or grow the 22 million TV watchers out there ? Are people watchin more TV during this MCO ? And more interestingly, how did an accountant find himself in all this ?
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/9q6B9whBfSo
Shamsul Izhan is the Chief Technology and Innovation Officer of PLUS, and the CEO or Teras, its subsidiary tech company. How did an entrepreneur end up there, and how is technology changing the roads we drive on almost everyday. And of course, with the Movement Control Order, how has the reduced traffic impacted them ?
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/N1u83KpUrUU
Let's start with she's a Hungarian Chinese born in US, grew up in China and now in Malaysia.. you already know this is going to be an interesting chat already. Super energetic and super curious, she's out there to change the world, or at least your community.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/93ehGgEGQ48
Out of need, Kash became an entrepreneur early in his career. Starting from a stationary business, it evolved over time as new technologies replaced the old. Always keeping an eye out for what's coming next and where the disruption will happen, Kash evolved with the times. Today, as co-founder of Watch Tower & Friends and PitchIn, he continues to re-invent and evolve. Join me on this fascinating journey with Kash, the consummate entrepreneur.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/NeIo6pdZUVg
There are so many Filipinos working all around the world and this is a ripe market for someone to help them get their hands on items which are familiar to them. Mel Nava setup 1Export to help local flilipino SMEs to export their goods all over the world.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/Qco7znJiHco
Dr Mimi, Founder/CTO of Qwork shares how Qwork empowers businesses and talents to sustainably navigate through the gig economy, especially in this current dynamic and fluid environment.
Qwork has been nurturing a community of giggers and helping them chart their own gigging path. Powered by a digital platform, Qwork matches the skills and work preference of next-gen talent to the dynamic manpower needs of businesses.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/7jiBPEG6kXg
Shah Fariq Aizal, Co-Founder & CMO of HAUZ shares how HAUZ helps digitizing SMEs that operate in multi-location & remote workforce manually. The solution also features payroll integration.
HAUZ in its current form is a Software-as-a-Service platform that streamline companies workforce management process. Its app allow supervision and remote monitoring of employees. Besides that, it comes with assigning work schedules, digital attendance, leave management and checking real time updates of task reporting of all sites in real time. To learn more about how HAUZ can help you streamline your workforce management, head to https://www.hauz.com.my
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/cMj65IAjDl0
Izwan Zakaria from Izwan & Partners setup his law firm to specifically focus on the startup world, and dispels some myths surrounding startups and the law. Also what is disrupting his prefession, if at all.. He's also keen on supporting social entrepreneurs..
YouTube : https://youtu.be/w-qCkG8hwbE
eFM Executive Director Low Ngai Yuen and Head of Ops Hasbe Zuraiha shares their Gerai Go Digital plans where they try to digitalise gerai's. They currently have a Pasar Malam Box program during the #MCO period to help boost these stalls' sales and get them going digital in the short term.
YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yjl6bTKtK1k
Order now from eFM : https://eFMPasarMalamBox.wasap.my
Order now from eFM : https://bit.ly/eFMPasarMalamBox
Warren Leow are one of those guys who I would call a 'connector'. Through his journey from London to KL he has bumped into enough people that it gave birth to the infamous Unicroach WhatsApp groups. Also part of Inmagine and CEO of one of its businesses Designs.ai, he shares the various aspects of his adventures..
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/QwWt5EmBQGM
Farming can be a high capital industry to get into. It'd be hard for small farmers to scale, and find the right networks to strive. Co-founder Chris and his buddies may have an answer..
YouTube : https://youtu.be/5cF5qo4vaTs
Heislyc shared how he stumbled in starting up Startup Mamak, and realises his passion in building a community and getting people to be their best.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/w9vNfaLCsPQ
And also on FB : https://www.facebook.com/techthisway/
The Pitch is a program where startups share their products or services to the world..
In this episode, Farid talks about SimpanKira, a SAAS model accounting software for SMEs.
On YouTube : https://youtu.be/Ft9YOmuC8h8
Ata Plus is one of the six original companies granted the ECF (Equity Crowd Funding) license and co-founder Elaine shares her own personal journey, and what she's doing during these COVID days to help..
On YouTube: https://youtu.be/7mEmDbLXRg0
Donate NOW : maybankheart.com
Watch the recording on YouTube : https://youtu.be/7-3pwY7WQM4
Watch on YouTube : https://youtu.be/CMqvYMxMeGE
Amran, former Head of Innovation for Maybank, Accenture Partner and now poking around in Etiqa, looks back on 2019 and discusses with Sam Shafie, CEO of WatchTower&Friends Accelerator and PitchIN.
What were the key events and topics around technologies that were most impactful to them. In this episode they touch on equity crowd funding, fund raining, We Work, co working spaces in KL, the rise of movie streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney + and lament blockchains and Bitcoins.
https://www.etiqadigital.com/
https://pitchin.my/
http://watchtowerfriends.com/about_accelerator
This episode on YouTube
Amran occasionally tweets at https://twitter.com/amranhassan_my
or you can find him on https://www.linkedin.com/in/amran-hassan-2a4b8539/