Under The Radar

What do you think of when you hear of the 32-year-old Sonic the Hedgehog? Well, how about Sega? Founded in 1960, Sega Corporation is a player in the games business, having been engaged in the planning, development, sales and operation of games for home video game consoles, PCs and smartphones.  The firm was a major player in the console space back in the early 1990s, having about a 65 per cent share of the 16-bit console market in North America back then, against players such as Nintendo and the Sony Playstation.  A lot has changed since, especially after a number of moves including the failed  launch of the Dreamcast in 1998. Sega stopped the production of consoles in 2001 to become a third-party video game developer. Fast forward to the present, the firm’s boasts over 12 major games titles within its console business division including the Puyo Puyo Tetris 2, the Football Manager 2022 and the Sonic Frontiers.  It is also seeing a number of exciting developments of late. In 2021, the firm said it is exploring a strategic alliance with Microsoft to develop big budget titles using its Azure cloud platform.  This April, it announced a plan to purchase Angry Bird maker Rovio Entertainment for US$776 million to bolster its mobile gaming business. But what does the road ahead look like for Sega in the billion dollar global video game market and what will be its key drivers of growth? On Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Yoshinori Akiyama, Managing Director, SEGA Singapore.

For this session, we’re going to talk about how artificial intelligence is influencing the way investment firms shape their business decisions.  Founded in 1992, our guest Saxo is an international investment firm for investors and traders under the supervision of the Danish FSA, with a reach of over 2,500 professionals around the world including in key financial hubs such as Singapore. Touted as one of the earliest fintech in the world, the firm’s platforms provide users access to global capital markets across asset classes, while its open banking technology powers over 200 financial institutions to enhance their investment experience. With the AI fever pushing US equities to new extremes this year, what will this mean for Saxo in terms of the range of investment options it provides to users, and the companies it brings on board its platform?  For one thing, the firm partnered with Jaaims Technologies in 2020 to facilitate investors to automate the management of their portfolios. But what are the reasons behind the move?  What role will wealth advisors play in the age of Generative AI then? In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Adam Reynolds, APAC CEO, Saxo.

For this session, we talk to a company whose ticker symbol only has one letter.  Bingo if you’ve guessed Visa. On that note, did you know that Visa was actually founded by the Bank of America when it launched its first consumer credit card programme in the US?  Well, a lot has happened since, with the firm expanding internationally in 1974 and the introduction of the debit card in 1975.  Fast forward to the present, Visa is a trusted network and a world leader in digital payments, facilitating transactions between consumers, merchants, financial institutions and government entities across over 200 countries and territories.  Just to give you some numbers, the company issued some 4.2 billion Visa cards as of March 2023, and oversaw 269 billion payments transactions for the 12 months ended June 2023.  The firm is also seeing a number of developments of late, working with Swift to streamline cross border B2B transactions. But what is the rationale behind the move? Meanwhile, the firm also launched its advisory service to help them better tap Generative AI and improve their payment experience. Question is – how far can Generative AI drive Visa’s business in its next bound of growth?  In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to  Adeline Kim, Country Manager for Singapore & Brunei, Visa.

Supporting financial institutions in their efforts to leverage technology and transform digitally. That’s what we are going to talk about in this session with my guest from Temus.  Established by Temasek in partnership with UST, Temus provides digital transformation solutions for the private and public sectors, and aspires to be a strategic partner in realising the Singapore Government’s Smart Nation vision.  The Singapore headquartered firm has over 200 employees across a wide range of disciplines in strategy, design, architecture, technology, data and AI.  In the field of finance specifically, Temus recently announced a transformative partnership with award-winning fintech firm Nexus FrontierTech.  The collaboration aims to revolutionise the landscape of investing with the introduction of an AI-augmented portfolio management solution tailored for asset managers seeking unparalleled efficiency and performance. But what is the rationale behind this move and how far will this benefit FIs in Singapore?  Meanwhile, the firm had in April signed a partnership with AI Singapore to catalyse digital transformation, promote AI adoption, and develop new AI technologies, solutions, and applications for firms based in Singapore. What will this mean for firms within the financial industry here? In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Marcus Loh, Director, Temus.

It has been close to four months since our earlier interview with the CEO of HSBC Singapore Kee Joo Wong.  At the time, we talked about HSBC’s new Innovation Banking Unit carved out from the UK subsidiary of SVB, and whether HSBC would move into catering services for players in the VC and startup landscape. Kee Joo told me to keep a lookout for an interesting development out of the unit that will be announced at the Singapore Fintech Festival.  The secret is now out, as HSBC Singapore announces a partnership with early-stage VC firm Antler to facilitate the growth of Southeast Asian innovation companies and entrepreneurs based in Singapore.  This collaboration aims to provide startups and founders that are a part of Antler’s network access to financial expertise and banking solutions such as preferred business banking accounts, venture debt and working capital facilities designed to support their needs and enable their growth and future expansion. But what is the rationale behind working with Antler? How will HSBC assess their risk profiles and ability to repay?  In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Jo Miyake, Chief Commercial Officer, Global Commercial Banking, HSBC.

Did you know that Poland is becoming an increasingly attractive and leading market for activities in financial innovation due to its well-developed infrastructure, quality business environment and outstanding talent?  In fact, the country boasts half a million IT professionals, the most in the Central East European region. Not only that, Poland also consistently ranks among the top three countries with the best programmers in the world.  It is home to one the biggest game studios in Europe, CD Projekt - known for the Witcher series and the futuristic Cyberpunk 2077. And you know those little chat windows on websites? Poland's LiveChat is one of the companies making that magic happen. Given these assets, the country is well positioned to tap the boom in the fintech sector and has also seen global fintech eager to enter the market. For one thing, the fintech sector grew by 32% from 2020 and by as much as 79% compared to 2018. The market is also maturing with the debut of VC funds and the opening of R&D and business service centres by international financial instructions. More Polish fintechs are also taking the chance to think internationally and put themselves on the global map.  But what are some success stories of Polish startups? And how can Poland and Singapore firms further collaborations to grow the fintech pie?  For more, I speak with The Polish Investment and Trade Agency, or PAIH. The agency supports Polish fintechs and attracts foreign investment to the country, and is the first point of contact for investors and a partner for entrepreneurs.  In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to  Lukasz Grabowski, Director at Polish Agency for Trade & Investment and Magdalena Smolak, Head of PAIH Trade Office in Singapore.

You might have heard of Stormtroopers in the Star Wars franchise. But what about YouTroopers?   Well, YouTroopers is a term used to describe globetrotters who use multi-currency mobile wallets and prepaid debit cards by fintech startup YouTrip! Launched in 2018, YouTrip is a regional financial technology startup that seeks to empower people with a smarter and more convenient way to pay in foreign currency through in-app exchange. Think of it as a money changer, but located within a mobile application.  Besides providing individuals with a hassle-free way to pay in foreign currency through in-app exchanges, the firm also provides individual and SME clients with personal and corporate cards that they can use to spend in stores.  The company raised US$50 million in its latest Series B funding round to invest in technology and innovation, as well as to hire over a hundred workers to launch in new markets across Southeast Asia. But why is the firm expanding aggressively at this time, and what kind of innovations can we expect on this front?  How will that accelerate financial inclusion in the region? In this Singapore Fintech Festival edition of Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Arthur Mak, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer, YouTrip.

Today we’re going to talk about one of the world’s largest software companies that is currently playing in the cloud technology and enterprise IT space.  Drumrolls, and bingo if you’ve guessed Oracle. Founded in 1977, Oracle provides organisations around the world with computing infrastructure and software, to help them innovate, unlock efficiencies and become more effective.  These include enterprise resource planning software, human capital management software and customer management software that companies use to streamline mundane operations like financial reporting, payrolls processing, or to better analyse customer needs.  Serving some 430,000 customers in 175 countries across industries, the firm generated US$50 billion in revenue in FY 2023. But what is the role of APAC in the bigger scheme of things?  On that note, Oracle had in April announced a plan to open a second cloud region in Singapore to meet the growing demand for its cloud services. What does it mean by a cloud region and how does it position the firm for future growth? Meanwhile, the firm also signed a multi-year partnership with Microsoft to provide computing infrastructure that supports the explosive growth of the AI-enabled Bing conversational search.  What is the rationale behind this partnership between the frenemies, and how will AI reshape the competitive landscape in the software industry? On Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Chris Chelliah, Senior Vice President, Technology and Customer Strategy, Oracle JAPAC.

Today we’re going to talk about a company that helps organisations navigate the most advanced cybersecurity threats in this day and age.  Founded in January 2022 with the merger of McAfee Enterprise and FireEye, Trellix is a global company that helps firms gain confidence in the protection and resilience of their operations through its open and native extended detection and response (XDR) platform.  The firm serves over 40,000 customers and nearly US$2 billion in revenue and touts itself as the market leader in the cybersecurity scene.  But what exactly does it mean by extended detection and response? What are the products and services provided by the firm specifically, and what is the state of the firms’ operations post-merger? Across the wider industry, Grand View Research values the global extended detection and response market at US$754.8 million in 2022 and expects it to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 20.7% from 2023 to 2030.  But what are the growth opportunities for Trellix? And what are the trends to watch out for in the evolving security landscape? On Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Vicki Batka, Senior Vice President, Asia Pacific & Japan at Trellix.

Today we’re going to talk about a gaming company that has a triple-headed snake trademark.  Does Razer come to mind? Founded in 2005 and dual headquartered in Irvine and Singapore, Razer is widely recognised as a leading brand for gamers in the US, Europe and China. With a fan base that spans every continent, the company has designed and built the world’s largest gamer-focused ecosystem of hardware, software and services. It also has 16 physical stores around the world including 11 in the US and the rest in Taipei, Hong Kong and Singapore.  Looking ahead, Razer’s CEO Min-Liang Tan outlined the firm’s plans to expand to 100 outlets with the initial focus on North America and does not rule out a public offering in the US.  But what are the drivers of growth Razer sees in the gaming space that would support such a network of physical stores? Could moving into lifestyle products be the key to extending Razer’s sphere of influence? Speaking of lifestyle products, Razer seems to be doubling down on partnerships with luxury brands, working with Italian fashion house Dolce & Gabbanna on a line of clothing, with watch brand Panerai on a new watch, and with supercar brand Automobili Lamborghini on a gaming laptop.  The move comes as non-gaming brands seek to tap the gamer demographic. Question is – how far can such partnerships boost Razer’s top and bottom lines and position it as the go-to gaming company for the affluent? On Under the Radar, The Evening Runway’s finance presenter Chua Tian Tian posed these questions to Addie Tan, Global Head of Lifestyle Division, Razer Inc.