The second playlist of Analyse Asia 2 starts from Episode 251 onwards.

Analyse Asia Playlist 2

"So at the Asia Pacific level, this study looked at several countries. But you know, we looked at a country level because that's the information that our customers and partners are interested in - whether they're in the government sector or in the private sector. So the countries include Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea, and India. In the ASEAN space, the four countries I mentioned before - are Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia. So in this case, the first takeaway was that, again, digital fluency yields massive economic benefits. For example, those with advanced digital skills raised the Asia Pacific GDP by an estimated 934 billion. So it's pretty close to a trillion." - Emmanuel Pillai from Amazon Web Services 

Fresh out of the studio, Emmanuel Pillai, Head of Training and Certification from Amazon Web Services, ASEAN, joined us to share how companies can build a tech-savvy workforce from building their startups to digital transformation with enterprises. Emmanuel began with an overview of AWS training and certification in the Asia Pacific. Then he dived deep into the recent report on building a tech-savvy workforce with Gallup and explained how economies and companies benefitted economically with the implementation of training and certification initiatives targeting to uplift the digital workers with modern technologies from AI/ML to 5G. Last but not least, Emmanuel shared what great would look like for AWS training and certification in the Asia Pacific. Podcast Information: The show is hosted and produced by Bernard Leong and Carol Yin. Proper credits for the intro and end music: "Energetic Sports Drive" and the episode is mixed & edited in both video and audio format by Thomas G Craig.

Building a Tech-Savvy Workforce and AWS Training in Asia Pacific with Emmanuel Pillai

Fresh out of the studio, Beatrice Lion, the chief executive officer and global partner from True Global Ventures, shares the remarkable story of how she became one of the youngest fund managers and the backstory to secure Singapore's Capital Markets Service license from MAS equivalent to Sequoia & Andreessen Horowitz's RIA licence in the US. Beatrice begins with her unconventional career journey from university straight into venture capital in 2017 and details TGV's investment thesis of backing only tested serial entrepreneurs across AI and blockchain applications. Beatrice offers her perspectives on the convergence of AI and crypto, the evolution of stablecoins as crypto's killer app, corporate treasury strategies such as Michael Saylor's Strategy with Bitcoin and Ethereum Digital Asset Treasuries (DATs), and why TGV maintains their performance-focused philosophy of keeping fund sizes at $100-200 million rather than chasing larger management fees. Last but not least, Beatrice shares what great would look like for TGV in the future. 

"We took a longer time, there was a bit of roundabout, but the fact that we actually made like two or three times on whatever investment amount we did in the beginning - that for me was a very pivotal moment. Just because we didn't give up. The line between success and failure is so thin. So the impact of being a VC space is that you really can influence the technology founders that you back." - Beatrice Lion

Episode Highlights:
[00:00] Quote of the Day by Beatrice Lyon 
[01:00] Introduction: Beatrice Lyon, CEO of True Global Ventures 
[04:27] Supporting portfolio companies through business development
[05:03] Successful turnaround story and investment recovery
[08:30] How she take the CEO role as operational glue among partners
[11:25] MAS approval process for Capital Markets Licence (CMS)
[13:00] TGV fund structure: four, five, six overview
[14:55] Investment thesis: AI and blockchain applications globally
[16:01] Focus on serial entrepreneurs, not first-timers
[17:39] CMS license removes 20% constraint limitations
[20:54] The rationale behind applying for broad licenses
[26:57] Secondary market opportunities and liquidation preferences
[30:18] Blockchain landscape evolving toward financial applications
[34:49] Private stock tokenization and where it is heading
[38:27] Stablecoin as killer app for crypto
[39:09] AI agents settling payments with stablecoins
[42:25] Different regulatory approaches across jurisdictions
[43:36] Corporate crypto treasury strategies beyond Bitcoin, Ethereum DATs and Solana
[48:35] 80-20 rule for portfolio company treasuries 
[50:37] Four-year crypto cycles may be extending
[54:31] What does great look like for TGV
[59:09] Closing

Profile: Beatrice Lion, Chief Executive Officer and General Partner, True Global Ventures: https://www.tgv4plus.com/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/beatricelion/

Podcast Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. The proper credits for the intro and end music are "Energetic Sports Drive." G. Thomas Craig mixed and edited the episode in both video and audio format. 

Here are the links to watch or listen to our podcast.
Analyse Asia Main Site: https://analyse.asia
Analyse Asia Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1kkRwzRZa4JCICr2vm0vGl 
Analyse Asia Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/analyse-asia-with-bernard-leong/id914868245 
Analyse Asia LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/analyse-asia/
Analyse Asia X (formerly known as Twitter): https://twitter.com/analyseasia
Sign Up for Our This Week in Asia Newsletter: https://www.analyse.asia/#/portal/signup 
Subscribe Newsletter on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7149559878934540288

Why True Global Ventures secure the CMS Licence in Singapore & the future of AI & Crypto with Beatrice Lion

Fresh out of the studio, Nick Eayrs, Vice President of Field Engineering for Asia Pacific and Japan at Databricks, and Simon Fassot, General Manager and Head of Global Data and Analytics at Hafnia, join us to explore how data intelligence is transforming enterprise AI across diverse industries in Asia. Nick explained the fundamental distinction between general intelligence and data intelligence - emphasizing how enterprises gain competitive advantage by training AI on their proprietary data rather than public knowledge. Nick showcased customer success stories including Standard Chartered Bank and TechComBank and shared his perspectives on how senior executives can take advantage of AI by moving fast rather than wait and see. Last but not least, Nick offered what great would look like for Databricks in Asia Pacific and Japan in serving their customers. Adding the lens of the customer, Simon shared Hafnia's transformation from legacy SQL Server systems to a unified Databricks architecture serving their global shipping operations and elaborated on how the company is breaking down silos with their data supermarket and "Marvis" AI copilot for maritime operations based on retrieval augmented generation. 

"I think the biggest trap to potentially fall into is, "Hey, it's moving so fast, so much is changing. Let's just wait it out." Completely the wrong approach. You just gotta get started." Nick Eayrs from Databricks

"As tech people within the shipping industry, how do we explain, how do we make it accessible to all our users? So that's where we came up with the idea of a data supermarket, with in mind really the target of enabling self-service for our business. So by giving the analogy of a supermarket, it was much easier at the beginning to explain our business." - Simon Fassot from Hafnia

Episode Highlights:
[00:00] QOTD by Nick Eayrs and Simon Fassot
[00:49] Introduction: Nick Eayrs from Databricks
[03:32] Customer obsession means deeply understanding their business context
[05:22] Data intelligence versus artificial general intelligence explanation begins
[06:42] AI trained on your data creates competitive advantage
[08:17] Only 15% of companies have correct AI infrastructure ready
[11:17] Don't wait for AI perfection, just get started now
[12:30] Agent Bricks simplify AI development using natural language
[18:32] Shared responsibility model for ethical AI deployment
[25:24] Asia Pacific psychology focuses on future, not past
[26:28] Most important question: How do you get started?
[30:18] What does great look like for Databricks?
[33:16] Introduction: Simon Fassot from Hafnia
[35:18] How Hafnia transformed to full cloud architecture centralizes data through Databricks
[36:28] Self-service access needed for 300 onshore, 4000 vessel employees
[41:32] Unity catalog controls data quality for AI cases
[42:21] Two-phase Gen AI: ingest unstructured, then consume data
[44:25] How to implement Generative AI: One bad AI answer loses all user trust
[45:31] How reports in Hafnia use RAG embedded in workflows
[46:47] Data supermarket analogy simplifies self-service for business
[48:39] Marvis AI personalizes Gen AI within company context 
[49:46] Neo4j partnership adds graph capabilities to ecosystem
[53:33] DNA Port platform unifies scattered dashboards and applications
[54:22] Databricks enables focus on business value over operations

Profiles:
Nick Eayrs, Vice President of Field Engineering, Asia Pacific & Japan at Databricks
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nick-eayrs/

Simon Fassot, General Manager and Head of Global Data and Analytics at Hafnia
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-fassot-68b95135/

Podcast Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. The proper credits for the intro and end music are "Energetic Sports Drive." G. Thomas Craig mixed and edited the episode in both video and audio format. 

#dataaiworldtour #databricks #enterpriseai #retrievalaugmentedgeneration #dataintelligence

The Truth About Enterprise AI & Why Data Matters with Nick Eayrs and Simon Fassot

Fresh out of the studio, Craig Wiley, Senior Director of Product Management at Databricks who leads Mosaic AI, joins us to discuss the forefront of enterprise AI from model development to deployment at scale. Beginning with his career journey in ML operations, Craig explained how he recognized the critical connection between data and AI layers that could deliver order-of-magnitude acceleration in development cycles. Emphasizing the transition from classical ML operations to LLM operations, he showcased how Databricks' unified platform eliminates training-serving skew through data lineage capabilities and supports both fine-tuning and RAG approaches depending on industrial use case requirements. Highlighting compelling customer success stories including Suncorp's employee productivity platform and AstraZeneca's transformation of 400,000 clinical trial documents into queryable insights, Craig revealed a striking reality about enterprise AI evaluation - that 85% of AI use cases are being evaluated only by the engineers who built them, reinforcing that proper evaluation frameworks remain foundational for trustworthy AI implementation. He concluded by introducing Agent Bricks as Databricks' evaluation-centric approach to building production agents, emphasizing that model flexibility and rigorous testing are essential for enterprises moving from experimentation to production, while sharing his vision that the industry must evolve from the "year of agents" to the "year of evaluation and quality."

"85% of AI use cases are being evaluated by the engineer who built it saying, 'yep, seemed to work pretty well.' If you're gonna build a system that's going to be critical to the business, that's going to be important that it gets it right, then you can't do that without evaluations." - Craig Wiley

Episode Highlights: 
[00:00] Quote of the Day by Craig Wiley
[01:21] How Craig Wiley started his work in ML Ops that led him to Databricks
[02:43] Data and AI layer connection creates order-of-magnitude acceleration
[03:47] Mosaic AI acquisition expanded Gen AI solution capabilities
[04:38] Classical ML statistics versus Gen AI evaluation challenges
[05:48] Mosaic AI covers end-to-end from data ingestion
[07:12] Training-serving skew eliminated through unified platform lineage
[08:51] Fine tuning versus RAG depends on use case
[10:49] Industrial agents benefit from fine-tuned smaller models
[13:52] Agent Bricks prioritizes accuracy over simplicity alone
[15:44] Model flexibility crucial for speed and accuracy optimization
[17:59] Suncorp and AstraZeneca demonstrate diverse AI applications
[19:37] Asia Pacific shows aggressive AI adoption strategies
[22:00] 85% of AI cases evaluated only by building engineer
[24:12] Industry terminology evolves rapidly from RAG to agents
[25:39] Customer creativity with governance capabilities inspires product development

Profile: Craig Wiley, Senior Director of Product Management at Databricks and Mosaic AI
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/craigwiley/

Podcast Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. The proper credits for the intro and end music are "Energetic Sports Drive." G. Thomas Craig mixed and edited the episode in both video and audio format. 

Here are the links to watch or listen to our podcast.
Analyse Asia Main Site: https://analyse.asia
Analyse Asia Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1kkRwzRZa4JCICr2vm0vGl 
Analyse Asia Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/analyse-asia-with-bernard-leong/id914868245 
Analyse Asia LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/analyse-asia/


#dataaiworldtour #databricks #enterpriseai #retrievalaugmentedgeneration #agentbricks #evalsAI #evaluationAI #MLOps

Agent Bricks and How Data-AI Integration Changes Everything with Craig Wiley

Fresh out of the studio, Jing Yang, the Asia Bureau Chief from The Information, shares her insights on ByteDance's pivotal moment, China's venture capital challenges, and the emerging U.S.-China competition in AI and robotics. Starting with ByteDance's latest financials, she revealed how the company now exceeds Meta in revenue but still lags significantly in profit margins, with its domestic business—Douyin and Toutiao—continuing to drive the lion's share of profits while TikTok remains unprofitable. Jing Yang explains how founder Zhang Yiming has entered "founder mode," dramatically increasing CapEx spending on AI development while ByteDance mysteriously went quiet on the AI leaderboard despite earlier dominance. Moving to venture capital, she unpacks why HongShan Capital has only deployed a quarter of its $9 billion fund raised in 2022, citing the collapse of exit opportunities, new overseas listing regulations from Chinese regulators, and the disappearance of big-ticket growth deals. She then explores the new wave of Chinese AI startups targeting global markets from day one, explaining how censorship and geopolitics force founders to choose between building for China or building for the world—they cannot do both. Finally, Jing Yang breaks down China's non-obvious advantage in humanoid robotics: not manufacturing prowess, but access to advanced manufacturing test beds where robots can be deployed, iterated, and refined at scale—an advantage The U.S. simply cannot match beyond Tesla.

“I think this is a sort of coming-of-age moment. When I say coming of age, I mean collectively for Chinese entrepreneurs. Many of these founders are my age, or even younger, and I’ve spoken with some of them. I can really relate to why they want to build businesses that target the global market instead of just China. In the past, you could build a company in China first and then think about expanding outward. That’s no longer possible. For any consumer-facing software company today, from day one you must decide: Do I build for China, or do I build for Global minus China? The examples of TikTok, Shein, and many others show that you cannot do both. It’s not possible to serve both markets at once.” - Jing Yang

Episode Highlights:
[00:00] Quote of the Day by Jing Yang from The Information
[02:14] ByteDance revenue exceeds Meta, profit lags
[05:01] Zhang Yiming goes founder mode with AI 
[08:24] TikTok's significance to ByteDance's future
[10:18] China signals willingness on TikTok deal
[13:02] Chinese tech giants pivots to semiconductors, hard tech
[14:27] ByteDance's quiet AI strategy and leadership
[19:11] Why HongShan, formerly Sequoia China deploys only quarter of $9B fund
[21:00] China VC market lacks big growth deals
[24:20] New overseas listing regulations hinder exits
[26:15] Chinese VCs struggle with US investments
[29:53] Chinese founders target global markets from day one
[32:20] What forces global versus China product split
[38:28] Chinese apps feel holistic but culturally distinct
[43:00] ChatGPT arrival sparked physical AI revolution
[47:23] Chinese AI companies prioritize commercial use cases over AGI
[50:13] China's manufacturing provides crucial test beds advantage
[53:42] Redefining what constitutes a Chinese startup
[54:55] AI race between Chinese in China vs US
[58:00] Closing

Profile: Jing Yang, Asia Bureau Chief from The Information
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jing-yang-33548123/

Podcast Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. The proper credits for the intro and end music are "Energetic Sports Drive." G. Thomas Craig mixed and edited the episode in both video and audio format. 


Why Startups in China Are Going Global with Jing Yang

Fresh out of the studio, Jing Yang, the Asia Bureau Chief from The Information, shares her insights on ByteDance's pivotal moment, China's venture capital challenges, and the emerging U.S.-China competition in AI and robotics. Starting with ByteDance's latest financials, she revealed how the company now exceeds Meta in revenue but still lags significantly in profit margins, with its domestic business—Douyin and Toutiao—continuing to drive the lion's share of profits while TikTok remains unprofitable. Jing Yang explains how founder Zhang Yiming has entered "founder mode," dramatically increasing CapEx spending on AI development while ByteDance mysteriously went quiet on the AI leaderboard despite earlier dominance. Moving to venture capital, she unpacks why HongShan Capital has only deployed a quarter of its $9 billion fund raised in 2022, citing the collapse of exit opportunities, new overseas listing regulations from Chinese regulators, and the disappearance of big-ticket growth deals. She then explores the new wave of Chinese AI startups targeting global markets from day one, explaining how censorship and geopolitics force founders to choose between building for China or building for the world—they cannot do both. Finally, Jing Yang breaks down China's non-obvious advantage in humanoid robotics: not manufacturing prowess, but access to advanced manufacturing test beds where robots can be deployed, iterated, and refined at scale—an advantage The U.S. simply cannot match beyond Tesla.

“I think this is a sort of coming-of-age moment. When I say coming of age, I mean collectively for Chinese entrepreneurs. Many of these founders are my age, or even younger, and I’ve spoken with some of them. I can really relate to why they want to build businesses that target the global market instead of just China. In the past, you could build a company in China first and then think about expanding outward. That’s no longer possible. For any consumer-facing software company today, from day one you must decide: Do I build for China, or do I build for Global minus China? The examples of TikTok, Shein, and many others show that you cannot do both. It’s not possible to serve both markets at once.” - Jing Yang

Episode Highlights:
[00:00] Quote of the Day by Jing Yang from The Information
[02:14] ByteDance revenue exceeds Meta, profit lags
[05:01] Zhang Yiming goes founder mode with AI 
[08:24] TikTok's significance to ByteDance's future
[10:18] China signals willingness on TikTok deal
[13:02] Chinese tech giants pivots to semiconductors, hard tech
[14:27] ByteDance's quiet AI strategy and leadership
[19:11] Why HongShan, formerly Sequoia China deploys only quarter of $9B fund
[21:00] China VC market lacks big growth deals
[24:20] New overseas listing regulations hinder exits
[26:15] Chinese VCs struggle with US investments
[29:53] Chinese founders target global markets from day one
[32:20] What forces global versus China product split
[38:28] Chinese apps feel holistic but culturally distinct
[43:00] ChatGPT arrival sparked physical AI revolution
[47:23] Chinese AI companies prioritize commercial use cases over AGI
[50:13] China's manufacturing provides crucial test beds advantage
[53:42] Redefining what constitutes a Chinese startup
[54:55] AI race between Chinese in China vs US
[58:00] Closing

Profile: Jing Yang, Asia Bureau Chief from The Information
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jing-yang-33548123/

Podcast Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. The proper credits for the intro and end music are "Energetic Sports Drive." G. Thomas Craig mixed and edited the episode in both video and audio format. 

Why Data Streaming Is the Secret Weapon for AI Success with Kamal Brar

A weekly podcast dissecting the pulse of business, technology & media in Asia. Hear our host interviewing leading journalists, senior executives, respectable authors & thinkers, entrepreneurs & thought leaders to discuss the most important issues that move and shake the business landscape in the Asia Pacific. The show is originally created and hosted by Bernard Leong.