It's refreshing to hear a VC talk about the human side of entrepreneurship, like the need for founders to be good at engaging with people.

I appreciate Carmen’s honesty about the challenges in the VC sector. It’s not always about the glamour of big investments but also about strategic and sometimes tough decisions.

"The vision is to future proof global real estate. Now why real estate? One thinks that it's just one industry, right? Well, it's 300 trillion dollars. There is no asset class, no industry that is remotely as valuable. Not all the treasury bonds in the world, not all the stock exchanges in the world, and not all the real GDP of the economies of the world add up to the value of global land and property assets: 300 trillion dollars. Now, what will any of it be worth tomorrow, one year from now, five years from now, 10 years from now in different places in the world? We used to have a pretty stable answer to these questions. The truth is the valuation model is broken because it's very antiquated, and not only is the appraisal or valuation model broken, it's even more broken because it never took climate change into consideration." - Parag Khanna  

Fresh out of the studio, Parag Khanna, founder and CEO of Climate Alpha unveils the story of his new company which leverages artificial intelligence to decipher how real estate will transform amid climate adaptation. Parag offers his observations on the ongoing global issues from the potential resolution of the Ukraine-Russia war to the easing of tensions on the Taiwan straits. Last but not least, he comments on the recent COP27 conference and offers his view on what great looks like for Climate Alpha. 

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 G. Thomas Craig.

Climate Alpha with Parag Khanna

Fresh out of the studio and this is an emergency podcast, Shai Oster from The Information discusses the fallout coming from the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank over the past weekend, and what it means for the venture capitalists and startups in Asia Pacific. We dived into what happened to Silicon Valley Bank, the aftermath of the intervention of the regulators on 12 March 2023 and what would have happened to the startup ecosystem across China, India and Southeast Asia if the US regulators did not intervene. 

Podcast Information: The show is hosted and produced by Bernard 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 G Thomas Craig.

Silicon Valley Bank's collapse & its impact on the Asia startup ecosystem with Shai Oster

"You talked about the market opportunity. When you look at the landscape of the billionaire population today, statistics show that you expect that population to grow by about 34% in the years to come. And from that population, at least a third is going to come from Asia Pacific, and in the next five years time, we expect Asia Pacific to be growing by about 40%. So the market is large in relation to the space of wealth to be managed. And we look at the growth of family office space in Singapore has been exponential. So between 2017 to 2019., according to the statistics, the family office space grew by five times. In 2020 at that time they were looking at around 400 family offices. By the end of 2022, it has grown to more than 800. So if you look at today, I think it is actually a very conservative estimate to say that the number of family offices in Singapore has crossed a thousand. you can easily expect it to be much more than that. So I think it's a very exciting area to be in." - Lee Wong from Lombard Odier

Fresh out of the studio, Lee Wong, head of family services from Lombard Odier and Co, joined us to discuss the firm's footprint in the Asia Pacific and the key trends in family offices across the Asia Pacific. We began with Lee Wong's background and how she entered into the private banking sector as a lawyer, specializing in the family offices industry. From there, she provided a comprehensive background on how family offices are built in the Asia Pacific, their purpose and structure with the right governance and framework to ensure their longevity. Last, but not least, Lee Wong shared the key trends in how the family offices market is growing in the Asia Pacific and what it means for the future due to the current geopolitical volatility.

Podcast Information: The show is hosted and produced by Bernard Leong. Proper credits for the intro and end music: "Energetic Sports Drive" and the episode is mixed & edited in both video and audio format by G Thomas Craig.

Lombard Odier & Key Trends in Family Offices across the Asia Pacific with Lee Wong

"We might not have old rundown houses or shacks that are converted into brand activations, but we have boats and we have parks, and we have so many different opportunities for organizations and brands to profile themselves during South By, in interestingly different ways. When you're putting together an event like South by Southwest, I go back to what I said before about understanding what it means to different people, what industry they're from, what does success look like for them and what are their goals for the event? Right from the beginning how I've approached this and how our team has approached this and TEG, who is producing the event in Australia; We are building the stage. It's up to our creative communities to perform we're providing the platform. We're bringing everyone to Sydney. You are only limited by your imagination of what you can do or achieve." - Colin Daniels 

Fresh out of the studio, we had the pleasure of hosting Colin Daniels, the managing director of SXSW Sydney, who enthusiastically shed light on how the famous SXSW conference plans to make its debut in the Asia Pacific via Sydney. Unfolding the layers of planning and coordination involved, Colin gave us a sneak peek of what participants can look forward to - from film and music to arts, culture, technology, and innovation. Last but not least, Colin described what success would look like for the first-ever SXSW Sydney happening in October 2023. 

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.

How SXSW comes to Sydney with Colin Daniels

OLDBOY~Centipede

"Stripe isn't just payments. We actually build economic infrastructure for the global economy. And so we've got a lot more technology beyond payments. Our Stripe Tour is a cool venue where we get a chance to bring customers, partners and thought leaders together and talk about the current state of technology and future technologies - in a local Asian context. So it's been a lot of fun. And by the way, we're really enthusiastic about Asia here at Stripe. Not only because 60 per cent of the world's population is in Asia, but also because the Asian markets are very tech-forward. And you can see that by just looking at global trends, sometimes Asian markets completely leapfrog the trends like what happened to mobile. And so you got this great market that's huge, that's really tech-forward. And there's so much innovation possible." - Mike Clayville, chief revenue officer of Stripe 

Fresh out of the studio, Mike Clayville, Chief Revenue Officer of Stripe, joined us in a conversation discussing Stripe's business in the Asia Pacific and shared invaluable insights into the evolution of financial infrastructure. Mike dived deep into how Stripe is adapting and expanding while at the same time with interesting customer stories in the Asia Pacific. He delved into Stripe's current innovations specifically on online payments &amp; financial infrastructure within the dynamic Asia Pacific region. Last but not least, Mike shared the key trends in the financial infrastructure landscape and defined what great would look like for Stripe's future in APAC. 

Podcast Information: The show is hosted and produced by Bernard Leong. Proper credits for the intro and end music: "Energetic Sports Drive" and the episode is mixed &amp; edited in both video and audio format by Thomas G Craig.

Stripe and the Innovation of Financial Infrastructure in the Asia Pacific with Mike Clayville

“It is useful both to internal and external, but it's also a really great litmus test. If you sit down to write your public letter and you can't explain why you're doing something, if it doesn't fit in with your overarching strategy, it goes back to that first thing we said as PMs [product managers], which is sometimes you have to say no to it. You're like, I actually can't explain to anyone why we're spending time on this particular feature. It doesn't fit any of the four themes we said we're doing this year. Does that mean we have a fifth theme or does that mean we shouldn't be doing that? And that clarity and that kind of litmus test. Is really, really useful as a leader when few people say no to you.” - Tom Verrilli

Fresh out of the studio in SXSW Sydney, Tom Verrilli, former Chief Product Officer of Twitch joined us in a conversation to discuss the intricacies of product management. Tom shared his perspectives based on his experiences from navigating the delicate balance between feature addition and reduction in product roadmaps and managing normal and power users' expectations. With the recent advances in generative AI, Tom offered his insights on how this new wave will bring about changes in user behaviour and interfaces, and how it will bring about new thinking in product management. Last but not least, he laid out what great would look like for product managers in the next decade.

Author's note: We thanked SXSW Sydney and Sennheiser ANZ for the podcast stage and appreciated the opportunity to have our episode recorded live on 18 Oct 2023 in Podcast Stage, E3.6, ICC Sydney. 

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

Analyse Asia Podcast

The Art of Product Management with Tom Verrilli

"And so what we do at Dow Jones, very specifically, is look at - What are the regulators demanding? What do they want you to do? What are the specific data points that you require? And which workflows do you want to use them in? And, there are very different workflows, which within, for example, a financial institution. You have the onboarding of your new customers, and in those situations, you may have a little bit more time. Obviously, there's the service level in terms of opening a bank account is faster and faster. But you have a little bit more time in that regard. You want to look at potentially more data. Then once you are a customer of a bank, you're gonna be amongst millions of customers. How do banks can then adapt to check additional data points? And, today the customer may be clean and have no adverse media, may not be sanctions, but that could change." - Joel Lange 

Fresh out of the studio, Joel Lange, executive vice president &amp; general manager of risk and research from Dow Jones, discussed how the company is leveraging artificial intelligence and data analytics to help companies tackle risk and compliance and combat financial crimes and money laundering. Joel also explored generative AI's role in risk management and concluded by envisioning the future of Dow Jones Risk &amp; Compliance and what great would look like in the Asia Pacific. 

Episode Highlights: 
[0:00] Quote of the Day #QOTD from Joel Lange 
[0:50] Introduction to Joel Lange, EVP &amp; GM, Risk &amp; Research, Dow Jones 
[1:28] Support for freeing Evan Gershkovich from Wall Street Journal on his 32nd birthday. 
[2:20] How did Joel start his career and eventually end up in his role with Dow Jones&nbsp; 
[3:58] Lessons learnt in Joel's career journey 
[5:40] Introduction to Dow Jones and its global vision &amp; mission 
[8:20] Risk Management, Money Laundering and Financial Crimes 101 
[10:08] Impact on businesses and other organizations if their risk is not well managed. 
[12:00] How Dow Jones Risk & Compliance division helps businesses to navigate the challenges 
[14:50] The challenge of cross borders makes managing risk and compliance difficult on a global level 
[17:00] RiskCenter Advanced Screening and Monitoring (ASAM) solution based on AI and big data 
[19:50] What makes ASAM different from other risk management solutions out there? 
[21:00] How the AI solution tackles false positives and the tradeoffs made between the specificity and sensitivity of the data. 
[24:30] How does the diversity of APAC both economically &amp; politically impact the complex anti-money laundering processes? 
[27:00] The mental model to balance between economic recovery &amp; anti-corruption efforts 
[29:05] Perspectives on Generative AI and how it impacts combating financial crime &amp; AML 
[32:05] Advice to C-suite executives and government officials on risk management with AI 
[33:40] What does great look like for Dow Jones for market expansion and ASAM in the APAC region? 
[35:30] Closing Podcast 

Information: Bernard Leong hosts and produces the show. Proper credits for the intro and end music: "Energetic Sports Drive" and the episode is mixed &amp; edited in both video and audio format by Thomas G Craig.

Dow Jones & AI in Risk and Compliance with Joel Lange

"I think in the past, we've looked more at inclusion and access, but actually we've made so much inroads over the past years. Now again, we're talking about participation because what we're seeing is that 30% of the highest spending customers who we call high-value users (HVUs) - they make up over 70% of the digital economies' transaction value. So 30% Are leading to 70% of the digital economy. We want to make sure that we don't leave users behind and we continue to drive growth and drive their participation. So we need to make sure that we are not ignoring this very important group that presents a 1.9x growth opportunity of that of high-value users. And for this reason, it's really important for us to talk about digital participation." - Sapna Chadha 

Fresh out of the studio, Sapna Chadha, vice president of Google Southeast Asia, and Florian Hoppe, partner at Bain and Company shared the key takeaways from the Google e-Conomy SEA 2023 report. Sapna and Florian discussed how start-ups are navigating the current declines in venture capital funding and introduced how high-value users presented a new way of visualizing what goes behind the digital economy in Southeast Asia. Last but not least, they discuss what great looks like for businesses in Southeast Asia. 

Episode Highlights: 
[0:00] Quote of the Day #QOTD from Sapna Chadna 
[2:00] Welcome Message from the host 
[2:48] Introduction of Sapna Chadha, Vice President, Google Southeast Asia 
[5:02] Key Takeaways of Google e-Conomy Southeast Asia Report 2023 
[8:40] Southeast Asia's economic performance against global macroeconomic headwinds 
[10:30] The one most interesting data point that Sapna and Florian found interesting about the report 
[12:50] Does the global shift in venture capital align with Southeast Asia? 
[14:00] Will high-quality start-ups still be able to raise capital in Southeast Asia? 
[15:01] Are funding declines differentiated by funding stages or by countries? 
[16:00] Can Southeast Asian VCs return capital to their LPs? 
[17:10] Advice to Southeast Asia startups in surviving the current funding winter 
[18:20] Do we see more startups focusing on monetization accelerating across the digital economy? 
[21:43] What are the potential avenues of growth for fintech companies? [24:15] Definition and Context behind High-Value Users (HVUs) in Southeast Asia 
[26:56] Comparison between HVUs and non-HVUs across different Southeast Asia economies 
[29:50] Are smartphones and digital infrastructure in tier 3 and 4 cities bringing non-HVUs online? 
[33:23] Can Southeast Asia reach 1 trillion GMV in 2030? 
[35:35] What would success look like for businesses in Southeast Asia for the next few years? 
[39:37] Closing 

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

Decoding the e-Conomy SEA 2023 Report with Sapna Chadha and Florian Hoppe

"There are so many voices here that people can create their own unique things. And yet there is still this culture, that's still lingering from the past, that somehow the answers are in the West. And trust me, they are not. So the West is also confused and looking for their way to figure out things. And so the main inspiration for Yana TV was to create this particular platform where we can showcase the voices of Asian movers and shakers, which means people who are doing interesting things, who are standing up, who want to speak up, challenging the status quo, and the norms. People who are regional, who are thought leaders, and I also feel it is time there has to be a bigger platform where we can all go and see who are the people who are doing amazing things here." - Yana Fry 

Fresh out of the studio, Yana Fry, producer & host of Yana TV joined us in a conversation about the behind-the-scenes of her show and her perspectives on interviewing Asian change makers across the region. Our conversation kicked off with Yana's odyssey to Singapore and delving into what sparked the creation of Yana TV and its core themes. In the conversation, Yana shares the heartwarming tales featured on her show, ranging from a kidnapped diplomat to a heart-touching Singaporean Santa Claus and her perspectives as a content creator in the Asia Pacific. Last but not least, she shares what great would look like for Yana TV. 

Episode Highlights:
[00:48] Quote of the Day #QOTD by Yana Fry, Founder & Host, Yana TV.
[02:24] Introduction: Yana Fry, Founder & Host of Yana TV. 
[04:28] Perspectives on living in Singapore. [06:43] Yana shares lessons of her career journey. [08:20] Inspiration behind Yana TV. 
[10:28] Intended Audience behind Yana TV. 
[11:50] The Great Resignation and its Impact on Executives re-thinking work-life balance. 
[13:49] Main Themes and Key Takeaways from interviewing Asian change-makers in Yana TV. 
[16:18] How a seven-time convicted criminal becomes a change-maker to help prison inmates re-integrate into Singapore society. 
[17:43] The behind-the-scenes (BTS) behind Yana TV's production. 
[21:01] Different Profiles of Change-Makers on Yana TV. 
[25:14] How Asian change-makers differ from their Western counterparts. [29:35] Challenges faced by Asian Change Makers. 
[34:49] Tales of Asian Change Makers: A Diplomat. 
[36:30] Tales of Asian Change Makers: Singapore Santa Claus that moved the production crew on Yana TV. 
[41:23] How to tell stories in Asia with the digital format. 
[44:32] The challenge of distribution for Asian podcasters. 

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

Yana TV and Change Makers in the Asia Pacific with Yana Fry

"The whole of Southeast Asia has to come up as a group. Hence, my secret about what I know about the VC industry that people don't know. The secret is that you've got to be very sane when you come to investing, right? So, if you invest so high, we can't get exits. When we can't get exits, we can't return money to LPs, and then the investors will say, ‘Oh, Southeast Asia cannot find exits one.’ It cannot be, right? So to me, we must be able to show exits. That's the proof of the pudding.” - Carmen Yuen 


Fresh out of the studio, Carmen Yuen, general partner from Vertex Ventures SE Asia &amp; India, joined us to discuss the current state of venture capital in Southeast Asia &amp; India after the difficult fundraising climate in the past year. Carmen began the story of her career, moving from the government sector to venture capital. She shares the evolution of Vertex Ventures from their investment thesis to the portfolio of startups and evaluates the startup class of 2023 vs 2021. Last but not least, Carmen describes exits as the leading indicators for startup success and elucidates what great would look like for Vertex Ventures. 

Episode Highlights: 
[00:50] Quote of the Day #QOTD from Carmen Yuen. 
[01:21] Introduction: Carmen Yuen, General Partner, Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia &amp; India. 
[02:16] Carmen’s career story from the government sector to venture capital. 
[05:03] Career lessons from Carmen Yuen. 
[08:32] Introduction to Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia and India. 
[12:41] Perspectives on Markets: Southeast Asia &amp; India. 
[14:50] Finding Local champions vs Regional players in Southeast Asia. 
[16:12] The verticals that Carmen Yuen invests in Southeast Asia and India. 
[18:48] Carmen’s typical day as a VC. 
[20:22] Traits of Founders and Startup Teams that Carmen invests in. 
[22:50] The red flags that deter Carmen from investing in startups. 
[24:46] Solo Founders vs Startup Teams. 
[26:55] Interesting companies under Vertex SE Asia portfolio. 
[32:05] Advice to founders on market expansion in Southeast Asia. 
[35:44] The startup class of 2023 vs the startup class of 2021. 
[38:19] Outlook for 2024: Headwinds and Tailwinds. 
[40:00] The one thing that Carmen Yuen knows as a VC that very few do. 
[42:36] Advice to Startup Founders in a difficult fundraising climate. 
[44:42] How do you explain the Southeast Asia to LPs? 
[46:50] Exits are key to success in Southeast Asia: M&amp;A and IPOs. [47:36] What does great look like in Vertex Ventures SEA and India? 
[48:11] Closing. 

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

Vertex Ventures & Venture Capital in Southeast Asia & India with Carmen Yuen

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.

Vertex Ventures & Venture Capital in Southeast Asia & India with Carmen Yuen

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