November 2026The human story behind the startups40 journeys so far

On the cover

Grab

Anthony Tan, Tan Hooi Ling

A taxi-safety app built from a Harvard business plan became a super-app when Grab beat Uber in Southeast Asia and absorbed its regional business in 2018, then stacked food, payments and delivery on top of the same driver network.

Read the journey

No. 2 of Singapore’s top 50

Anthony Tan
Anthony Tan. Photo: Masato Kanda, CC BY 4.0

Singapore: all journeys

Sea Group

Sea Group

Forrest Li, Gang Ye, David Chen

2009 | Singapore

Anthony Tan

Grab

Anthony Tan, Tan Hooi Ling

2012 | Singapore

Min-Liang Tan

Razer

Min-Liang Tan, Robert Krakoff

2005 | Singapore

Carousell

Carousell

Quek Siu Rui, Marcus Tan, Lucas Ngoo

2012 | Singapore

Lazada company photo

Lazada

Maximilian Bittner, Pierre Poignant

2012 | Singapore

PropertyGuru

PropertyGuru

Steve Melhuish, Jani Rautiainen

2007 | Singapore

Trax

Trax

Joel Bar-El, Dror Feldheim

2010 | Singapore

Nium

Nium

Prajit Nanu, Michael Bermingham

2014 | Singapore

Advance Intelligence Group

Advance Intelligence Group

Jefferson Chen (Chen Lanjie)

2016 | Singapore

Ninja Van

Ninja Van

Lai Chang Wen, Shaun Chong, Boxian Tan

2014 | Singapore

Patsnap

Patsnap

Jeffrey Tiong, Markus Haense, Guan Dian

2007 | Singapore

Funding Societies company photo

Funding Societies

Kelvin Teo, Reynold Wijaya

2015 | Singapore

Coda Payments

Coda Payments

Neil Davidson, Paul Leishman

2011 | Singapore

Aspire

Aspire

Andrea Baronchelli, Giovanni Casinelli

2018 | Singapore

Carro

Carro

Aaron Tan, Aditya Lesmana, Kelvin Chng

2015 | Singapore

Zilingo

Zilingo

Ankiti Bose, Dhruv Kapoor

2015 | Singapore

Circles Life company photo

Circles.Life

Rameez Ansar, Abhishek Gupta, Adeel Najam

2014 | Singapore

Thunes

Thunes

Peter De Caluwe

2016 | Singapore

Homage

Homage

Gillian Tee

2016 | Singapore

ShopBack

ShopBack

Henry Chan, Joel Leong, Lai Shanru

2014 | Singapore

Zenyum

Zenyum

Julian Artopé, Frederik Krass

2018 | Singapore

Endowus

Endowus

Gregory Van, Samuel Rhee

2017 | Singapore

StashAway

StashAway

Michele Ferrario, Freddy Lim, Nino Ulsamer

2016 | Singapore

Bolttech

Bolttech

Rob Schimek

2020 | Singapore

Biofourmis

Biofourmis

Kuldeep Singh Rajput, Wendou Niu

2015 | Boston

Spenmo

Spenmo

Mohandass Kalaichelvan

2019 | Singapore

Ezbuy

Ezbuy

He Jian, Wendy Liu, Xue Bin

2010 | Singapore

Fazz

Fazz

Tianwei Liu, Hendra Kwik

2015 | Singapore

Syfe

Syfe

Dhruv Arora

2017 | Singapore

Airwallex

Airwallex

Jack Zhang, Max Li, Lucy Liu

2015 | Singapore and San Francisco

Glints

Glints

Oswald Yeo, Seah Ying Cong, Looi Qin En

2013 | Singapore

Ohmyhome

Ohmyhome

Rhonda Wong, Race Wong

2016 | Singapore

Seedly

Seedly

Tee-Ming Chew

2016 | Singapore

99.co

99.co

Darius Cheung, Yan Phun, Chong Ming Hwee

2014 | Singapore

Singlife

Singlife

Walter de Oude

2017 | Singapore

Sunseap

Sunseap

Frank Phuan, Lawrence Wu

2011 | Singapore

Ascenda

Ascenda

Kyle Armstrong

2013 | Singapore

Doctor Anywhere

Doctor Anywhere

Lim Wai Mun

2016 | Singapore

Wiz.ai

Wiz.ai

Jennifer Zhang, Jianfeng Lu, Tony Zhu

2019 | Singapore

YouTrip

YouTrip

Caecilia Chu, Arthur Mak

2017 | Singapore

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