In this year’s Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia list, 300 “bright and innovative leaders”, including young entrepreneurs and change-makers, have made the cut.
Out of this long list, there are 22 outstanding Singapore individuals who hail from different industries. Here’s a breakdown of these homegrown successes and why they deserve to be on the list.
Adit Swarup, Partner of Rakuten Ventures
Category: Finance & Venture Capital
This 28-year-old is a founding member and one of two partners at Rakuten Ventures, the VC arm of Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten. At Rakuten, he leads the deployment and management of a US$ 200 million early-stage investment fund.
Since joining the firm in 2014, he has led or supported investments in more than 10 tech companies in Asia and the United States. Swarup has also served as a director on multiple boards, including Malaysian food delivery startup Dahmakan and Singaporean classifieds marketplace Carousell.
Benjamin Ang, Founder of Genesis Motion Design
Category: Media, Marketing and Advertising
At 24, Ang invested S$ 15,000 of his own savings to start his own motion design company. He named it Genesis Motion Design, which produces animated videos and graphics.
Today, the company’s portfolio includes blue-chip companies such as Facebook, McDonald’s and Disney, as well as gaming firms Riot Games and Razer.
Dongmei (Annie) An, Solutions Architect of Amazon Web Services
Category: Enterprise Technology
This computing graduate from National University of Singapore helps enterprises across Southeast Asia in a variety of industries to innovate with Amazon’s cloud computing and AI-powered voice technology.
She helped create the tech giant’s first certification programme for voice-enabled applications, which was launched in April last year. For her contributions at AWS and the industry, An was named Future CIO of the Year 2019 at the Women in IT Awards.
Jasper Yap, Logan Tan and Terence Goh, Co-founders of Eezee
Category: Retail and E-commerce
Eezee is a Singapore-based B2B marketplace for industrial supplies and hardware that aims to make procurement more efficient. The marketplace provides buyers with access to a wide range of brands and products for easy comparison across goods and suppliers.
As of 2019, Eezee had more than 30,000 products from about 700 suppliers listed on its platform. Last year, it raised seed funding from Singapore-based Insignia Ventures Partners.
Ryan Lim and Lester Leong, Co-founders of Gush
Category: Industry, Manufacturing and Energy
Since starting Gush in 2017, this young duo have grown the company into a rising star in sustainable paints and advanced building materials. Its flagship product — cair interior paint – is an odourless indoor paint that purifies the air, eliminates bacteria, regulates humidity and prevents mould.
It has been used in more than 1,300 residential and 60 commercial projects in Singapore and Southeast Asia. One client is Singaporean healthcare provider Thomson Medical, which paints its delivery rooms with cair interior paint.
The company has raised US$ 2.2 million in a pre-Series A round from property group City Developments Limited to expand into regional markets and develop new products.
Elaine Tee and Suzana Tengku, Co-founders of Have Halal, Will Travel
Category: Media, Marketing and Advertising
Have Halal, Will Travel (HHWT) is a Muslim-focused media platform that provides a global guide to food, travel, and even prayer locations.
The website receives about 1.8 million page views and 1.1 million unique visitors a month, and has secured clients such as Visa International, Singapore Tourism Board, Korea Tourism Organization, Qatar Airways and KLM.
Kai Xin Koh and Eugene Cheng, Co-founders of HighSpark
Category: Media, Marketing and Advertising
After graduating from Singapore’s Ngee Ann Polytechnic in marketing communications, this duo teamed up to help clients create high-impact presentations through visual storytelling.
From a starting capital of S$ 1,100, the business now pulls in six digits in sales and has hundreds of clients, including blue-chip companies Visa, Nike and Oracle. In terms of future plans, the duo intends to launch a book and online course.
Ivan Yeo, Co-founder of EVOS eSports
Category: Entertainment and Sports
In just three years, Ivan Yeo has built EVOS eSports into the leading professional eSports company in Southeast Asia, with a presence across five local markets. It manages 62 players across 12 competitive teams, with several representing Singapore and Indonesia at the 2019 Southeast Asia Games.
The company has raised US$ 4.4 million in a Series A round from investors such as Insignia Venture Partners. With fresh funding, Yeo plans to grow the startup’s esports entertainment arm, which currently manages 50 gaming influencers with 25 million social media followers and 34 million YouTube subscribers.
James Lim, Managing Director for Asia-Pacific, Helpling
Category: Consumer Technology
Helpling is an online platform for on-demand housekeeping services. On this platform, users can compare cleaners’ profiles, their hourly rates and reviews to find the best cleaning provider out of 4,000 cleaners.
Since Lim joined Helpling in December 2017, he grew its Asia-Pacific presence from six people in Singapore to over 1,000 employees and partners across Singapore, Malaysia and Australia. Last year, the Berlin-based company raised US$ 22 million in a funding round led by German broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1.
Jonathan Savoir, CEO of Quincus
Category: Industry, Manufacturing and Energy
Utilising natural language processing and machine learning, the Singapore-based startup helps logistics companies operate more efficiently with its integrated supply chain management platforms.
Since its launch in 2013, the startup has raised funding from strategic investors and is preparing for a large fundraising later this year. Last year, Savoir was named Executive of the Year for Logistics by Singapore Business Review.
Justin Lim, CEO of Fish & Chicks
Category: The Arts
The ‘hawkerpreneur’ founded the stall in 2016 and rose in popularity when he introduced a Salted Egg Yolk Fish & Chips dish to ride on the salted egg yolk trend at the time. Though he didn’t have any prior F&B experience, Lim constantly explores new fusion dishes that are a mix of Singaporean flavours for typical Western dishes.
With 12 outlets in Singapore, Lim is planning for further expansion in Singapore, Vietnam and Indonesia.
Lisa Tang and Chew Shian Kuah, Co-founders of Kausmo
Category: The Arts
Backed by the Les Amis Group, Kausmo is a sustainability-focused restaurant. The founding duo mainly utilise ‘aesthetically filtered foods,’ defined as ingredients that are oddly-shaped, oddly-sized, overripe or over-stocked, and are focused on starting conversations on food norms and food waste at Kausmo.
Tang in particular, was a finalist for the Rising Female Chef award at the World Gourmet Summit 2019.
Milad Mohammadzadeh and Sadaf Monajemi, Co-founders of See-Mode Technologies
Category: Healthcare and Science
This husband-and-wife team co-founded a medtech startup that aims to improve stroke diagnosis and treatment through AI. The company claims that its algorithm can better process medical scans to identify risks and alert doctors as to when a stroke might occur.
Their first product, a device called AVA (Augmented Vascular Analysis), secured regulatory approval in Singapore last year. In 2019, the team raised US$ 1 million in seed funding from investors including the Singaporean government’s SGInnovate and VC firm Cocoon Capital.
Shannon Lee Chaluangco, Director of MDI Ventures
Category: Finance & Venture Capital
Chaluangco joined MDI Ventures, a VC arm of Indonesian telecom giant Telkom Indonesia, as an investment director in August last year. She has invested US$ 50 million into startups so far, including leading investments in Hong Kong restaurant reservation app Chope and Singaporean retail data analytics startup Omnistream.
Before joining the VC world, the accounting graduate of the National University of Singapore had a short stint as an auditor at Ernst & Young.
Shavonne Wong, Director of Zhiffy Photography
Category: The Arts
Zhiffy Photography is a Singapore-based photography studio. Besides working with brands like Sephora, Lancôme and HBO, Wong has been a recurring guest photographer for Asia’s Next Top Model.
Wong has also developed a technique to produce what she calls ‘living stills,’ which are animated still images. To share her technique, she is partnering with photography platform Fstoppers in New York City to produce a tutorial. Wong has received the Gold Award for Graphis Photography Annual 2015.
Jonathan Ng and Chua Jian Yong, Co-founders of SinFooTech
Category: The Arts
SinFooTech is a Singapore-based company focused on recycling waste by-products in the food manufacturing industry.
The company’s latest patented innovation involves the bio-transformation of soy whey into an alcoholic beverage they’ve termed as Sachi. The drink, which was launched in March, is being commercialised for Singapore and other markets in Southeast Asia.
Steven Lam, Products Initiative Director of Gradiant International
Category: Industry, Manufacturing and Energy
Gradiant Corporation is a Singapore-based company that aims to resolve complex water and wastewater treatment challenges. Their flagship technology, Carrier Gas Extraction, mimics the rain cycle to produce freshwater from wastewater and saline streams.
Currently, Gradiant treats and recycles over 50 million litres of water per day and has launched more than 20 commercial projects in the United States, China and India. To date, the company has more than 200 patents. In March, Gradiant expanded into Australia with the acquisition of Sydney-based CRS Water.
Theodore Kee, Head of Clinical Trials of National University of Singapore N.1 Institute for Health
Category: Healthcare and Science
Kee’s research focuses on improving clinical trials through data and AI technologies. Instead of relying on a healthcare provider’s experience to administer drug doses during a trial, his software — CURATE.AI — sifts through a patient’s medical data and history to recommend a treatment plan.
His team is currently designing and implementing clinical trials for tumours and blood cancer therapy development.
Trang (Zean) Vo, Co-founder of Browzzin
Category: Media, Marketing & Advertising
Browzzin is an AI-powered fashion social commerce app, where users can explore outfits and gain fashion inspiration as well as shop for the looks they like. They can also upload photos of products and tag retailers — if their post leads to a sale, they earn a commission.
In 2019, Browzzin was a finalist for Drapers’ Best Digital Innovation Award. That same year, Vo was one of the few Vietnamese entrepreneurs selected for the Obama Foundation Asia-Pacific Leadership Program and appeared as a guest speaker at TEDxDakao in Ho Chi Minh City.
Jiacai Lau, Nicholas Lim and Tyler Jong, Co-founders of TreeDots
Category: Social Entrepreneurs
TreeDots is a B2B platform that redistributes surplus or imperfect food at discounted prices. While it primarily aims to tackle food loss, the platform also connects suppliers with buyers, including caterers, restaurants, cafes, cafeterias, cloud kitchens and small food stall, who are looking for cost savings.
From 2018 to 2019, TreeDots saved 913 tons of food from ending up in landfills. TreeDots was a finalist for the President’s Challenge Social Enterprise Award 2019 by the Singapore Centre For Social Enterprise.
Ryan Chew and Yi Ming Ng, Co-founders of Tribe Accelerator
Category: Finance and Venture Capital
Tribe Accelerator is the first blockchain accelerator supported by the Singaporean government. The accelerator has raised more than US$ 30 million since its launch in 2018, backed by the likes of the Monetary Authority of Singapore, Temasek, Citibank, IBM and Intel.
So far, it has invested in 19 startups from two batches with a combined value of more than US$ 300 million. Tribe also runs a blockchain academy with scholarships available to developers across Southeast Asia.
Yash Sankrityayan, Principal of Jungle Ventures
Passionate about tech startups and entrepreneurship since his engineering undergrad days at India’s BITS Pilani, Sankrityayan has been an active venture capital investor in India and Southeast Asia since 2014, first at the World Bank IFC and currently at Jungle Ventures.
He has led more than 15 early and growth stage investments worth US$ 125 million into startups such as BigBasket.com, Lenskart, Reddoorz, Moglix, and Kredivo/ Finaccel, which have subsequently raised follow-on capital of US$ 1.3 billion. As a Principal at Jungle Ventures, Sankrityayan serves as the board member or representative of four portfolio companies, where he works closely with the founders on growth strategy and fundraising.
Featured Image Credit: Forbes
