Recently, we published our third paper on the Southeast Asia Exit Landscape alongside our partners at INSEAD. Over the past decade, we have witnessed the Southeast Asian ecosystem mature, and have been documenting its growth since our first regional landscape report (the Bamboo report) dating back to 2015.

An estimated US$52B of Venture Capital has been invested into Southeast Asia in the last 10 years. The potential of the ecosystem is clear, and its resilience has only persisted. In 2020, the total investment stood at US$8.2B — a narrow contraction from 2019 compared to other regions. …

…..I tried and failed miserably (more about this later).

A good friend of mine who is now in the US asked me when my next blog post was due. I noticed that I write irregularly. Probably due to the personal nature of my posts. It takes effort to share raw thoughts and feelings. Whenever I write, the articles tend to revolve around, for me, life-changing moments. The past 9 months have been life-changing, but I noticed it was hard to put these feelings under words.

The lines between being right and letting your ego take the overhand can become very…

It was a question I often received after writing I am exhausted and I want you to know why. . A few people even reached out to me and asked if they could get on a call. They were trying to understand the impact of institutional racism, how it affected me and my environment. I was appreciative of the sincere interest and discussions that followed. That being said, not all conversations were easy. Discussing racism is uncomfortable for a lot of people. It’s confrontational. The phone calls, meetings, text messages gave me a new feeling of exhaustion. Talking to my…

A few friends asked me what my 2021 New Year’s resolutions were. I couldn’t give a proper answer. Still feeling 2020 drained all my energy. It didn’t feel like it would make any sense to have New Year’s resolutions. In an attempt to understand why I wasn’t all cheery about 2021, I looked back at 2020. The year going down in history as lockdown year was supposed to be a year to get my sh*t together. No travel and working from home should have led to more downtime with the family, more exercising, reflection, writing, reading, and being more productive.

…

Hi Dad, it’s been a while since we talked. I hope you’re doing well. When I think of you, I can only smile because I imagine you and uncle Julius having one of your late-night disagreements after a few whiskeys. You guys argued about everything under the sun. In the end, you always dragged me into the discussion, hoping I would pick your side and reinforce the point you were trying to make. Thinking back, this must have been the root cause why I like presenting so much. I also remember the weekend barbeque sessions. You only needed one ray…

I was having coffee with a good friend in the venture industry as we were talking about corporate innovation. Wondering what hindered real corporate innovation or large-scale change, I concluded that some large corporations have become incapable of discovering the unknown. It’s not only large corporations that have this “problem.” It can easily manifest itself in our own lives. After this talk with my friend, I tried to piece together what the cause is. Why aren’t we in general capable of discovering the unknown?

You need to look up and confirm you’re running in the right direction every now and…

I can still remember Thursday, May 21st, 2020 like it was yesterday. My colleague and friend Oliver Wood asked our Saturday running crew if we would be keen to join the 4x4x48 challenge. The challenge meant we had to run for 4 miles, every 4 hours, for 48 hours. When it comes to sports, I always get over-excited, so I immediately said yes. Jamaur Bronner, one of my good friends in Singapore who was keen on the run as well, said we should add a fundraising goal to run. There were only 2 days to prepare since the challenge started…

Every morning I wake up and turn on CNN International to watch the news in the US because I want to stay in touch with how my fellow black men and women are holding up. I have received heartwarming texts from my friends asking if I’m okay and how I’m coping. The current events in the US may be happening far away but it is incredibly close to me.

In the past week, I have been paying close attention to posts on Facebook and IG. I was and still am surprised and deeply hurt to see numerous responses on Black…