• Five leading entrepreneurs share stories of their journeys from being entrepreneurs to investors
• Partnerships and innovative solutions that go beyond the standard services in terms of  technology and providing real value for customers, are core enablers of growth
• Shifting from closed loop systems to interoperability is essential

In 2005, Min-Liang Tan and Robert Krakoff established Razer, a lifestyle brand for gamers. The company is known for its hardware, gaming credits and a massive network of online to offline points. These points led to building a fintech layer and Razer now processes billions of dollars in transactions annually. Its various entities have received payments licences or e-money licences in many markets.

Although Razer started out with a closed loop platform for the gaming industry, it now supports 80 million gamers globally on a multitude of games and has found that having an open ecosystem is very important.

Tan shared that they are now looking at additional financial services they can provide and are exploring whether to apply for a banking licence in Singapore.

“While we’ve got one of the biggest brands, we see ourselves as a platform. We want to work with other companies, to have this open ecosystem, to look for the best technology, to interoperate. Being able to interoperate is incredibly important,” Tan shared.

In his key message to other investors, he noted that this can be summarised into “two tweets”. First, millennials are underserved. “There is huge innovation we can do.” Second, he is also very enthusiastic about what’s happening in entrepreneurship in Singapore.

Going beyond the business

Tallwood Venture Capital managing partner Dado Banatao said his path to becoming an entrepreneur started in the early 1990s, when IBM released its PC system. “I opened up the box. I thought it was designed by a poor technic...

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