When you build a business, do you have a purpose ? Can you build it to become more by building a brand ? The dynamic duo from BrandGeeks, Manisah & Silmy returns to chat about how businesses has had to react to the impact of COVID and channel disruption. How does brand building change when everyone (almost) has digitised and it's becoming a really crowded market ?

YouTube : https://youtu.be/K7II1KuLmok

Professor Yasmin was a hard core researcher in virology since the late 80s. Whilst deep in plant molecular biology and biotech research, she had a short stint in MOSTI, then wrapping up an illustriust career as the Director for UMCIC (University Malaya Centre for Innovation and Commercialisation). It was a short retirement as she's back in UM again as CEO of UMCapital, running UM startup ventures support and  ecosystem.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/bRRticW2Pto

Having observed first hand the successes and failures of family businesses, he  plotted his entreprenueral roadmap during his days in school. Even at 18, Arief was already trading second hand cars, and always looking for the next business to do. This is a fascinating journey of this young man who wants to flip the typical journey, instead of starting with school leading to business, but start with business and finishing with school.

YouTube: https://youtu.be/h-CjIeRa_x4

Azran has had an exciting career so far, from consultancy to being an entrepreneur. From helping others build their business, to putting his foot in and building his own. Always up for a challenge, Azran has experienced plenty of highs and lows. In his latest foray, he setup Naluri to address therapies that link mental & physical health.

YouTube: https://youtu.be/QLnxojtnmjw

Hisham has worked for 18 companies before setting his own system development company. As they developed systems for others, he saw an opportunity to build a platform themselves, to service companies who needs help to do monthly billings. Being a tech heavy team, they initially started by building the best technology platform, but their philosophy has moved to what is the best for customers instead. He also wants to run the business as a group of friends, but does that work ?

YouTube : https://youtu.be/cX2zjaowj6s

Buying his bicycle bag (and only using it once) followed by realising that his other cycling buddies could have lent it to him made Indy realise that there must be a better way than always buying things. Learning from other renting platforms in UK & US, Indy decided to start Rentsmart.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/wALIlMZzLI4

A lawyer by qualification (and profession briefly), Malek had a front row seat to Web 1.0 and saw first hand how Silicon Valley was changing the world. Picking up the "Loot" model from the UK, Malek decided to go into the classified business in Malaysia. His first foray into entreprenuship hit a slight snag.. the Asian Financial Crisis. But as with life, one door closes only for another to open. Follow his fascinating journey in the last few decades as he shares the genesis of our beloved business radio station BFM89.9 through to FiLife.

After several deaths in the family whilst studying abroad, Queenie realised there seemed to be a need to support families manage funeral arrangements. But before jumpin into that, Queenie immersed herself in the startup eco-system in Brunei by setting up Startup Brunei, a startup builder. Being involved in finding funding for a company in autism education, she continued picking up experience before setting up Memori. Find out more about the startup scene in Brunei.

YouTube : https://youtu.be/Gu0EHT52zBo

Winning a hackathon with a bus scheduling app for customers, Max decided to pursue the idea. But as he delved deeper into the bus industry, and looking at it more from a bus operator standpoint, he realised there's more issues that the operators are facing. Working a fulltime job, he moonlighted the startup on the side to keep the idea going. Shout out to Professor Rofina Yasmin from University Malaya's Centre of Innovation Commercialisation for insipiring this young man to pursue his dream.

https://youtu.be/s2_WZKXqBNA

Starting his career with HP, Dato Wei saw the convergance of computing and telephony, and decided to quit and with a few friends, developed a product for voice mail. Initially bootstrapping and then backed by an angel investor, the business grew tremendously. But the path to IPO was not easy and they came close to shutting down. Follow Datuk Wei's fascinating journey and appreciate why "trust" has become one of his key tenets.

YouTube: https://youtu.be/QorE7jLKhBA