How Tech in Asia forged its own path

Wow, it’s such a relief to finally be able to talk about this!

It’s been a few long, hard months in the making, but I’m so excited and grateful that we can finally announce SPH Media’s impending acquisition of Tech in Asia (TIA).

Fresh and starry-eyed, I jumped into the startup world almost five years ago. It has been an absolute roller-coaster ride to leading a digital media company through a startup boom, the rise of Southeast Asia, a global pandemic, and a tech winter. Above all, I’m thankful for the incredible experience of running Tech in Asia and continuing to grow with SPH Media.

From left: Chen Huifen, editor of Business Times; Maria Li, COO of Tech in Asia; Wong Wei Kong, editor-in-chief of English/Malay/Tamil Media Group, SPH Media; Willis Wee, CEO of Tech in Asia; Terence Lee, editor-in-chief of Tech in Asia / Image credit: SPH Media

For me, this is a massive validation of what we’ve built at TIA. Over the years, we’ve charted our own path with an unwavering (borderline obstinate) commitment to our core values.

While I know we’ve made mistakes along the way, I also believe that this refusal to compromise on values is what got us here today – the leading digital media brand in Southeast Asia’s tech community about to join forces with the flagship media brand in Singapore.

Some of our guiding principles:

Editorial integrity. Without a doubt, this is the bedrock of TIA’s brand. As we put up our paywall in 2018 and invested in investigative journalism, we faced a ton of pressure to take down stories that reflected certain people, companies, and industries in a bad light.

But we forged ahead in our belief that good journalism is neither public relations nor tabloid gossip. And in time, our goal to objectively cover what’s happening in Asia’s tech industry – good or bad, and without an agenda – would speak for itself.

We’ve found like-minded folks in the Business Times newsroom, and I’m excited to see what new heights we can achieve together. Thank you, Terence, for leading the way.

Community building. TIA’s mission has always been to build and serve Asia’s tech community. We aim to provide our community with the information and connections they need the most, and that’s true for every article we write and each event we host.

To do this, we build relationships with an eye towards mutual trust, respect, and learning. We can’t make everyone happy all the time (see above), but this principle has helped us form strong relationships with founders, investors, startups, and corporations.

By putting our community needs first, we have achieved balance in our reporting and events while also earning us the trust and support of our ecosystem.

Commercial viability. TIA was at a low point when I joined in 2019, having gone through a tough round of layoffs. Rebuilding our business model and creating financial discipline was one of my top priorities back then, and this carries through to today.

We look to create virtuous cycles – products that people love and are willing to pay for. This approach helped us build our financial independence during the startup boom and has saved us well in this tech winter. We are clear-eyed in terms of what success looks like: no vanity metrics, just laser-sharp focus on audience satisfaction and commercial viability.

Startup focus and discipline. Finally, we are ruthlessly focused on our core strengths: media and events. There have been many shiny trends and projects that we’ve chosen not to pursue because of jumbled priorities (well, we did release one NFT) or a lack of alignment.

By staying focused, we kept doubling down on our strengths instead of expending resources on wild goose chases. This might make us boring, but it also makes us the best at what we do. Shout out to Willis for forever instilling such discipline into myself and the team.

It’s possible that I’m already feeling nostalgia for our startup days, but I know that these values will continue to guide TIA as we move forward with SPH Media.

Alongside the Business Times team, our first goal is to build the leading business and tech title in Asia Pacific. As a Chinese-American, I’m extremely excited to showcase the incredible innovation in Asia, as told through the Asian lens, to a global audience.

But for now, it’s back to work. Our TIA events line-up for 2024 look stacked as we go deeper into our regional markets, and we have tons of new exciting products in the pipeline. Let’s go! 💪💪💪