Your Grit Story

In our latest podcast episode in the #Investing series, we had the privilege of hosting Alexander Piskunov, a Founding Venture Partner at KAAN Ventures. As a founder-turned-investor, Alexander is an esteemed professional with a remarkable background in investments, institutional fundraising, and portfolio development across the USA, Europe, and Southeast Asia.Alexander's expertise spans emerging markets, making him a highly sought-after mentor and adviser in prestigious acceleration programs like the Founder Institute and Techstars. Additionally, he shares his wealth of knowledge as a guest lecturer at University of Cambridge. Having founded and successfully exited his own exotic wines startup, he shares his experience in starting up from scratch.As the Founding Venture Partner at Kaan Venture Partners, Alexander brings a unique perspective on navigating the intricacies of the tech startup landscape. His experience spans investment banking, pan-European technology M&A, and cross-border tech private equity. With a background as a partner at Ruvento Ventures, a global venture capital fund specializing in early-stage deep-tech investments, Alexander has been at the forefront of shaping the future of innovative technologies.Join us on this insightful podcast episode as Alexander Piskunov, Founding Venture Partner of Kaan Venture Partners, shares invaluable insights, stories, and advice drawn from his diverse career. Whether you're an investor, entrepreneur, or simply curious about the evolving landscape of finance and technology, this episode is not to be missed.

🎙️ Podcast Spotlight: "Your Grit Story" Investor Series with Jeremy Au 🎙️In this episode, we had the honor of hosting Jeremy, a dynamic entrepreneur-turned-investor, as he unveiled his story behind BRAVE Southeast Asia Tech PodcastNo stranger to the #startup community, Jeremy Au started his journey as a founder, spearheading his ventures in the ever-evolving tech landscape. Yet, his fervor for the industry surpassed personal projects, leading him to embrace a new mission: catalyzing innovation on a grander scale. Thus began his transformation from a founder into a pivotal figure in the world of investments.We spent time unpacking brainchild, the "Brave Southeast Asia Tech Podcast." which captures the narratives of exceptional individuals and companies shaping Southeast Asia's tech realm. Through insightful dialogues, Jeremy's podcast has emerged as a valuable avenue for tech enthusiasts, entrepreneurs, and investors, offering profound insights into the region's thriving tech ecosystem.In this 52-min episode, we also spoke about - Lessons in Company Building: Disrupting the Norms: 🏗️- Balancing Family, Work, and Life ⏰- Had a good launch about countless topics 😄

We are starting another evergreen series. The #Investing series. And we are kicking off with our first guest, Yi Ming, who launched and grew #GrabRentals, the largest private-hire car rental fleet in Singapore, which is owned by Grab. With over a decade of tech start-up experience, he started Krux Asia , a #VentureBuilder to build and scale high-impact ventures. He is also an Angel Investor, always looking out for companies that uplift people and society! 💫 In this episode, Yi Ming also shared with Eric, fellow Grab junior:- Growing zero to one businesses 📈 - Helping #grabbers who were impacted by #RIF 💚- Angel investing in today’s #startup and #investment philosophy - Pitfalls for #founders to avoid 💪 - Many othersWe will be sharing highlights and more episodes to come! ➕ Follow Your Grit Story Podcast so you won't miss it!👇 Catch the full episode! Links are in the comment section below.

The 6th episode of the #Origins series has landed. 🚀In this episode, we have Jonathan Low with us to share his journey. Being a dad of two, with lots of lessons and experience gathered from his past venture Honestbee, he is now venturing again with Thomas Jiang and Cayter Goh to make #payroll simple with Ajourney (YC S22).Jonathan and host Eric met 12 years ago at Silicon Valley over NUS Overseas Colleges and the experiences at the Bay Area inspired Jonathan to take the leap into #entrepneurship.He shared in the episode about:- How experience starting Honestbee is incredibly awesome and incredibly awful as well- How he nearly missed the #YC application when his 2nd kid was just born- What Y Combinator values in the founding team- Juggling being a #parent and running an early startup ➕ Follow Your Grit Story Podcast so you won't miss it!#Ajourney #startup #founder👇 Check out the full episode links in the comment!

One day can change your whole life. #GWD2023 #10Jun23In this year's Global Wellness Day, Alex Loh, CEO and co-founder of Actxa Wellness, shared the #Origins of the wellness startup and how he started his #entrepreneurship journey even when he was a JC teacher back then!Alex unpacked with host Eric what #Integrated Wellness really means, adding the physical community and activities to the mix, on top of an app-delivered curriculum, delivering holistic employee wellbeing solutions.In this episode, he shared about being a former national Water Polo player to help Singapore win the gold medal at the 2001 SEA Games. As a passionate community builder, he also spoke about starting Kampung Collective with Andee Chua to unite people and support each other! 👐

🌹Happy Mother’s Day Special Episode! Episode 4 of the #Origins series landed with Sher-li Torrey sharing how Mums@Work (Singapore) helps mums reintegrate into the workforce. 👩‍💼Hosted by Eric, who is a fellow parent of two himself, he chatted with Sher-Li about:👉 The Day One of starting #MumsAtWork in 2010👉 How #CareerNavigators help Mummies to strike a good work-life balance 👉 Parenting challenges | Not to force fit our own expectations onto our children’s 👉 Balance is ultimately a choice.If you have a mummy-friend who is looking into reintegrating back to the workforce, you could share these links with her:🔗 Mums At Work: https://www.mumsatwork.net/about🔗 Career Navigators: https://www.cnavigators.com.sg/Check out the full episode in the comments section. 

Episode 3 of the #Origins series has launched. 🚀 In this episode, we had Kai, founder of Rocket Academy, a coding bootcamp that helps mid-career switchers land on their first tech role. 👨‍💻 👩‍💻 His journey as a founder did not start with Rocket Academy. After Kai caught the entrepreneurial bug at Silicon Valley while taking Computer Science at Stanford University and working at Nuna Inc., he started Project We Forgot in the healthcare industry before founding #RocketAcademy to help people become #SoftwareEngineers almost 4 years ago.After helping Tech folks land jobs in top tech companies in Singapore, in the likes of Grab, Circles.Life, foodpanda and Decathlon , Kai is on with the next big thing, to #expand beyond the shores of the Red Dot, to Hong Kong, his second home! 🇭🇰 He also shared with host Eric about:- Key #pivots of Rocket and how the decision was made- Importance of #teamwork, especially as a sole #founder- "It’s more important to have 100 users who love the product than 1000 users who kind of like the product." #rocketship #techjobs #learncoding #singapore #hongkong

Episode 2 of the #Origins series has landed!In this episode, we have Eugene Ng, co-founder and CRO of StaffAny, a fast-growing startup transforming the future of shift work in the blue-collar industry. As the saying goes, teamwork makes the dream work. And Eugene met fellow young co-founders Janson Seah, 👨‍💻 Jeremy Hon, and Kai Yi Lee through the NUS Overseas Colleges program and started StaffAny together about 5 years ago.Having raised US$3.4 million late last year, Eugene and the StaffAny team are ramping up development, expanding to markets, and doubling down on improving productivity for businesses. He also shared with host Eric about:- Finding channel-market fit, on top of product-market fit. - How #CustomerObsession is so important- #Trust is the key to working as a team- Building the empathy-for-customer #culture in StaffAny

Kicking off the #Origins 2023 series to uncover the Day Ones of #founders with The King of Nails. Meet Daryl, the man 👨‍🎨 behind a Nail Deck, a nail 💅 cosmetic and care startup that created more than 700 gorgeous colours!In this episode, the host Eric spoke with Daryl to find out about his passion for bringing colours to life, allowing unlimited creativity to flow to make home manicures fun and easy!Not an easy ride for sure. After multiple challenges and hiatus in between the 12 years of running the company, Daryl persevered on this journey to become Singapore’s only specialist in innovative nail cosmetics and care!