Womenpreneur Asia

Today’s episode is with an entrepreneur, author and book publisher from Singapore, Pearlin Siow who calls herself the Book Mama at Boss Of Me. 

Her journey is a little unusual in that she started writing her bestseller book first and her business came after when more and more entrepreneurs started asking her to write their books. 

Pearlin started as a journalist at Singapore Press Holdings upon graduation.

In 2000, she left to found an online barter site (which she talks about in this episode) and later, entered the corporate world when she became the business development manager for CNET Asia.

This journalist turned entrepreneur published her first book - a bestseller - in 2002 - when she was inspired by Tim Ferriss’s 4 Hour Work Week. 

Soon after, she wrote three more books - Sleep & Get Rich, Secrets Of Asia's Most Successful Internet Gurus and Do You Have What It Takes To Be Boss.

Before long, she was getting a steady stream of clients who wanted to get their stories told and written.

Eventually, she moved into helping them publish their books by setting up her own team, working with book production experts such as designers, printers and book distributors.

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Today’s episode is with an entrepreneur, sustainability consultant, mother and former lawyer, Jay Desan. 

She is the co-founder of BoomGrow, an agritech company that is growing clean greens in Malaysia.

This mother of two never expected she would be in the tech space but she did know a lot about sustainability.

Jay said that she spent many years in the UK  studying and understanding corporate responsibility in human rights which she later expanded to re-imagining the corporation.

(ESG refers to Environmental, Social and Governance, the three key factors that measure the sustainability and ethical impact of a business or company.)

It made her realise how shifts and changes can happen very incrementally, starting with one person but once it’s combined with multi-stakeholders, transformation can happen.

She came back to Malaysia with the idea of making a difference but with the idea of staying in academia. 

She began working in the sustainability area with companies but realized just as quickly that broken systems don’t make changes happen. Structural problems hounded her and she became frustrated at how food was grown and distributed.  

Jay explains that they grow vegetables indoors in containers with technology that is set up to control variables such as water, light and humidity to maximize their output. With this setup, they are able to produce consistent yields for the supply chain. 

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Is it a must for businesses to keep growing? Is it peculiar if someone doesn’t want to grow her business? 

Well in today’s episode, I speak to a guest who is at a crossroads of her business because she asked herself, “Do we want to keep growing and growing? Is it an inevitable path for all businesses?” What if she doesn’t want to do that and just wants to maintain what she’s doing now? 

Deepa is the founder & Innovation Director for J Gordhan & Co Ltd. in Hong Kong. She manages a business that brings fun into every child and adult’s life through her arts, craft and hobby products.

They design, manufacture and deliver products to their customers who are retailers around the world “whether it's a painting, stitching or anything hobby-related.” They supply everything from stickers to paper plates, Christmas decorations to crayons, paints and more.

Since she enjoyed marketing, her father encouraged her to start her first business, marketing a product that was seen as waste from paper mills! It is no surprise then that she is inspired by her father.

In the process, she grew her one product to 2,000 SKUs while learning about the manufacturing of products including safety compliance and quality testing in China. Later, she relocated to Hong Kong.

For more show notes and information about our guest today, visit https://womenpreneurasia.com/podcast-season-05/

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Have you ever felt that you were meant to do something more? That your life is going well but there was a feeling you couldn’t shake off? 

Today’s episode is with Jenny Toh. Jenny is a Certifed Life Coach and Founder of River Life Coaching in Singapore.

Jenny felt this strongly at one point in her life. At that juncture in her life, she was a mother of three with a legal career. Yet this former lawyer knew in her heart that she was meant to do something more. And that something more was to help introverted people find their place in this noisy world. 

Originally from Port Dickson, Malaysia, she was a practising lawyer until she relocated to Singapore due to her marriage.

We spoke about how she got the inspiration to become a coach, the differences between coaching and counselling, how she marketed herself at the beginning and the challenges she faced as she started her business right in the midst of the pandemic! 

She talks about how she marketed herself and how she managed to land coaching jobs through coaching platforms although, in the beginning, she was resistant to the idea. She also explains the differences between coaching and counselling. 

Like this episode? Check out more show notes on WomenpreneurAsia.com

Womenpreneur Asia is a podcast brought to you by Redbox Studio. The seasonal show brings you a new episode weekly on Friday, GMT+8.

The podcast is the brainchild of Krista Goon, an entrepreneur, author, marketer and communicator.

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Today’s episode is with an entrepreneur from Malaysia, Teh Wuan Xin.

She is the Founder & CEO of AI Talent, a business that develops child entrepreneurs.

At its core, it is an e-learning platform that provides a conducive environment for children to start their business journeys where they learn from entrepreneurs and corporate leaders through projects. 

According to their website, they have partnered with more than 70 corporations and trained more than 200 coaches and 150 education centres. Hers is a B2B business where they sell their entrepreneurial programmes to education centres as part of their offerings. Currently, AI Talent has grown beyond Malaysia to offer its programmes to Thailand, Japan, Taiwan, Cambodia and The Philippines. 

She candidly reveals that she failed at her first startup but took the lessons to grow her present business not just in Malaysia but throughout Asia.

She also talks about the importance of having a bucket list and how the pandemic helped her business in so many ways and the leadership lessons she learnt. 

To connect with her, check out the links in our show notes on the Womenpreneur Asia website.

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Womenpreneur Asia is brought to you by Redbox Studio. It is a seasonal podcast featuring heartwarming yet insightful interviews with Asian women entrepreneurs in Asia.

You are listening to Season 5 of the podcast. All new episodes are uploaded every Friday until the end of the season.

Welcome to Season 5 of Womenpreneur Asia and I am your host, Krista Goon. I started this podcast during the pandemic lockdown in 2020 and it's been a journey indeed! In this trailer, I talk about some exciting news and some of what I've learnt in the past 18 months.

If you are a returning listener, thank you! It means a lot to me.

If you've just found my podcast, thank you! I hope you enjoy this season (and if it intrigues you, listen to the rest of the other seasons as well).

The podcast proper starts today and for the next 14 weeks, every Friday, you'll get to listen to the stories, struggles and strategies of 14 Asian women entrepreneurs in Asia.

Please subscribe and if you like this podcast, leave me a rating or review.

See you next Friday!

Today’s episode is with a social enterprise entrepreneur from Malaysia, Yap Sook Yee. Sook Yee is the co-founder of Frienden Arts and WeCareJourney.

WeCareJourney is an association that helps parents and caregivers with children who are born with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA).

She started her social enterprise, FriendenArts, to sell the art and art merchandise that her two sons, Jaden and Branden, create. Treatments for the two boys are expensive and Sook Yee and her husband wanted to use their boys’ art and art products as a way to fund the treatments. 

Branden was diagnosed with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) at the age of one. It is a rare terminal genetic condition and Sook Yee and her husband were told that their son only had one more year to live.

Sook Yee and her husband tried looking for more positive answers from doctors and everyone told them the same thing - that Branden would not live past 2 years old.

Today, Branden is 11 years old.

Sook Yee has been tireless in bringing awareness about SMA to parents and medical professionals. She and her husband advocate for the SMA community while lobbying for SMA drugs to be made available in Malaysia. She is seeing changes in the landscape and conversations about SMA. When before there seemed to be no hope, now she advises parents to never give up. Her Branden is living proof!

We talk a lot more in this episode about living and dying, gratitude, making memories, having dreams and why it's important to talk about the elephant in the room.

If you are listening to this on your favourite podcast player, please subscribe to the podcast. And if you have enjoyed my podcast, leave me a review.

This is a bonus episode and the final episode of Season 4.

I'll be back with Season 5 in September. Until then, check out the earlier seasons of the podcast.

For other information, visit WomenpreneurAsia.com

Thank you for being a listener.

In today’s episode, I am speaking to Olivia Quah who is the co-founder of Asian Integrated Medical Sdn Bhd in Malaysia. 

Her business specialises in elderly care products and interestingly she began her business because of her own ageing parents.

Her business also complements her husband’s as he is a medical doctor and a Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner.

Olivia is also expanding her business although her main focus is on her ecommerce website.

She has many plans in store for her elderly care products and services and she reveals in this episode how she has been successful so far in her product-driven business. 

Her 20 years of working experience in business development, trade and investment promotion and operations gave her insights and a ready network when she began her own business.

Her previous career contacts became useful when it was time for her to start Asian Integrated Medical Sdn Bhd, a licensed medical supply company specialising in elderly care products such as wheelchairs, hospital beds, oxygen concentrators and more.

In addition, they run and manage their own retail outlet, clinic, Chinese medicine clinic and nursing home and sell their products online at their own website. 

For more information, visit WomenpreneurAsia.com

In today’s episode, I am speaking to Uyanga Batzogs who is the Founder and Executive Director of Quality Life from Mongolia.

Uyanga started the NGO when she discovered a 2015 survey of over 500 elderly citizens in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia revealing the need for senior social and medical care. 

Through Proliance LLC (the medical equipment distribution business that she runs), she founded one of Mongolia’s first senior recreation providers, Quality Life.

Quality Life Club is a social-based daycare that provides seniors with the opportunity to engage with peers, and their community, and exercise their bodies and minds. 

Uyanga’s company Proliance LLC and Quality Life NGO’s board are passionate about pioneering senior care service in Mongolia. In 2017, they started collaborating to support seniors to have meaningful jobs and share their extensive knowledge and experience with other businesses and community members.

When she was a teenager, Mongolia changed from being a communist country to a democracy. Prior to the change, everyone including Uyanga thought that her life and career were mapped out. She would get good grades and a job would be waiting for her when she got out of school.

With the change in the country, almost overnight she was left clueless about the next step in her life which was from having a guaranteed job to having nothing!

This is Uyanga's story as a woman entrepreneur and non-profit founder.

For more information about this episode, visit WomenpreneurAsia.com

Today’s episode is with an entrepreneur from Thailand, Kanyachat Lerttanapaiboon who is fondly known as Elle.

She is the co-founder & CEO of Her Hyness, a skincare brand that focuses on ingredients that are safe and good for your skin.

Elle had worked for well-known cosmetic and skincare brands in Singapore and China and despite being one of the rising stars in the corporate world, she left corporate to start her clean beauty skincare company in Thailand. 

If you’re a marketing person like me, you’d love this episode. Elle and I spoke about how she decided to focus on the Thai market despite her years of experience in China, how she pilot-tested her first product and how she grew her homegrown brand to rank in the top 20 beauty brands in Thailand next to global brands, a milestone she is truly proud of.

Elle says, “Never give up. Today is hard. Tomorrow will be worse but the day after tomorrow will be sunshine."  

Get more information about Elle and her business: WomenpreneurAsia.com