Open For Business

What does it really take to turn passion into a sustainable business?In this episode of Open For Business, we sit down with Janice Siew, founder of Petiteserie and Jan’s Gelato & Bakes, to explore the decisions behind the craft.From seven years in corporate banking to classical French pâtisserie, Janice shares how discipline, restraint, and long-term thinking shaped her journey. We look at why she started quietly as a wholesale business, how the pandemic forced a rapid pivot to direct-to-consumer sales, and what it takes to blend French technique with deeply Malaysian flavours like cendol and onde onde.This is not a conversation about chasing trends or overnight success. It’s about building deliberately, doing things properly, and understanding when growth should be slowed down rather than rushed.A story of craft, commerce, and the professionalisation of passion.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The F&B industry is often romanticised, but for Shareen Ramli, the reality is far grittier. Yet, for 23 years, she has stayed in the game, evolving from making curry puffs at 2 a.m. to running the 105-seater Siti Li Dining & Foodhall.BFM Open For Business sits down with Shareen to discuss why she compares the trade to being a "stuntwoman", full of invisible bruises, and her mission to preserve the cosmopolitan heritage of Malay cuisine.We discuss:The "Stuntwoman" Reality: Shareen opens up about the resilience needed to survive 23 years, comparing the industry to an action movie where the audience doesn't see the "invisible bruises" of evictions and financial crises.The "Lost" Heritage: Why Siti Li focuses on "Cosmopolitan Malay" cuisine, a nod to the 15th-century port cities influenced by Portuguese, Dutch, and Chinese flavors.Begging for Sugar: The desperate lengths taken during the pandemic, including pleading with police to allow couriers to source artisan Gula Melaka from Malacca.Vertical vs. Horizontal: Instead of opening more outlets, Siti Li is focusing on the supply chain and a "Malay Kitchen Pantry" line (bottled sauces, artisan Keropok, cookies).The "Third Space" Vision: Why Shareen wants Siti Li to be more than a restaurant, a community hub where customers bring their parents to share the intimacy of a meal.“Comel Cekodok” and Nasi Lemak: The story behind their signature Cekodok dish and Shareen’s criteria for what makes a "good" Nasi Lemak.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of Open For Business, we sit down with Dr Shian Lee, the aerospace engineer behind Alphaswift Industries.This is not a shiny drones conversation. It’s about what happens when machines start carrying real responsibility. We talk about why the sky might actually be easier for autonomy than the ground, why “fake it till you make it” has no place in aerospace, and how oil palm plantations became an unlikely training ground for future passenger flight.It’s a conversation about ambition, caution, physics, regulation, and what it really means to build technology that can’t afford to fail.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Founded in 2017 as a simple telemedicine app, Doctor Anywhere (DA) became a pandemic darling, raising nearly $176 million from heavyweights like IHH Healthcare and Temasek-linked Pavilion Capital. But in a surprising twist, the digital disruptor spent ~$80 million USD in late 2022 to acquire Asian Healthcare Specialists, shifting from an asset-light tech model to owning traditional brick-and-mortar clinics.Lim Wai Mun, the "accidental founder" turned CEO, joins BFM to discuss:The "Accidental Founder": How a private equity financier with zero medical background ended up building a regional healthcare giant across 6 countries.The $80M Pivot: Why DA acquired a traditional specialist group (Orthopedics, Urology, etc.) to bridge the trust gap that pure tech couldn't solve.The "Decentralised Hospital": Wai Mun explains his vision of deconstructing the hospital, moving care out of expensive central hubs into smaller, accessible modules to lower costs for everyone.The "Connector of Care": How DA manages the conflicting agendas of the three key healthcare stakeholders: the Payer (wants to save money), the Provider (wants to earn money), and the Patient (wants to get well).Financial Discipline: Why DA has never operated at a negative gross margin, and Wai Mun’s take on why the "growth at all costs" era is dead.The Future: The launch of "Soda by DA" and the 5-year ambition to become Southeast Asia’s leading "Insure-Health-Tech" company.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

How do you turn nostalgia into a scalable business in one of Malaysia’s most crowded food and beverage markets?On this episode of Open For Business, we speak with Nick Ng, Founder and CEO of Hock Kee Kopitiam, about building a modern kopitiam brand rooted in heritage, community, and made-to-order tradition.From opening a single outlet in Johor Bahru with no prior restaurant experience to growing a multi-outlet chain across Kuala Lumpur, Selangor, and Johor, Nick shares what it takes to stay relevant while scaling. We explore how Hock Kee maintains consistency across outlets, how its revenue mix has evolved, the impact of Halal certification and tourism-linked collaborations, and the operational pressures of running a fast-growing F&B business.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode of Open For Business, we look at why coworking seems to have lost its way and whether a quieter, more stripped-back model is the answer.We speak with Timothy Tiah, founder of Jerry Coworking Space, about building a business that deliberately rejects community theatre, lifestyle branding, and forced interaction. With automated, private offices across the Klang Valley and beyond, Jerry positions itself as infrastructure rather than experience.We explore coworking fatigue, automation, revenue realities, and what it says about modern work when the most attractive promise might simply be a quiet room and no one asking questions.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In late November, Costco filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the “Liberation Day tariffs", and the White House remained surprisingly silent.BFM speaks with Bryan DeAngelis of Penta Group to decode this "quiet rebellion." Corporate America is finally "unbending the knee," but they are doing it with a new playbook: filing lawsuits based strictly on business logic while avoiding the public shaming that bruises the President's ego.We discuss:The Costco Strategy: Why the retailer’s decision to sue quietly after Thanksgiving, relying on "brand math" rather than PR stunts, possibly saved them from a Truth Social firestorm.The "Business Lane": How companies are learning to push back against policies like tariffs by framing them strictly as shareholder protection rather than political opposition.Political Volatility & Populism: With the President's poll numbers sinking, Bryan explains why the administration is leaning harder into populist rhetoric (like the attack on institutional housing investors) to regain momentum.The 2026 Midterm Outlook: Why "razor-thin" margins in Congress mean Democrats could flip the House even before November, and how this gridlock will force the President to rule almost exclusively through Executive Orders.The Erosion of Authority: From GOP resignations to state-level defiance on redistricting, we analyse whether the White House is losing its grip on its own party.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Restaurants are under pressure like never before like rising costs, staff shortages, shrinking margins, and systems that were never designed for today’s pace of business. We speak with Squall Tan, CEO of FeedMe, about how a simple frustration with slow service and wrong orders led to the creation of a full F&B operating system now used across the region.Squall shares how FeedMe evolved from a homegrown POS into an integrated platform that helps restaurants automate ordering, reduce operational blind spots, and make smarter, data-driven decisions.From why most F&B businesses fail, to how AI is reshaping restaurant operations and what it takes to scale a food-tech company across Asia, this is a discussion on how technology is quietly redefining the F&B industry.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In 2015, advertising veterans Chantelle Teoh and Kelvin Long grew tired of the generic, "embarrassing" souvenirs found at Central Market. They wanted products that actually spoke the language of Malaysians, literally.Starting with a single t-shirt design complaining about cigarette prices ("Mahal Bro"), APOM (A Piece of Malaysia) has grown from a bazaar pop-up into a 7-figure retail brand with five stores, including Bangsar Village and The Campus, Ampang.The husband-and-wife duo joins BFM  to discuss the journey from "Bazaars to Bangunan." We explore how they navigate the "Dreamer vs. Integrator" dynamic as a married couple, the operational PTSD of the 2020 pandemic, and why they believe the future of retail lies in data-driven humor.We discuss:The Origin Story: Moving from the "Doof" bean bag business to APOM as a creative release from client work.Product Market Fit: How they tested witty designs like the "Mahal Bro" and "Jalan Bapak Kau" shirts at bazaars to validate the concept before committing to a lease.Retail Operations: The reality of scaling from selling single items to managing hundreds of SKUs, warehousing, and the financial "flywheel" of margins and Opex.The Co-Founder Dynamic: How a husband-and-wife team functions by respecting the split between the "Dreamer" and the "Integrator".The Cringe Filter: The difficult product development cycle of walking the fine line between witty cultural commentary and "cringey" humor.The "Blast" Campaign: How they pivoted during the pandemic lockdowns to support 14 local designers when tourism vanished overnight.Future Vision: The plan to expand beyond KL and build a "Departmental Store" concept to house top-quality Malaysian goods.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Founded in 2018, Sagtec Global Limited was a three-person operation in Kuala Lumpur, aiming to digitise Malaysia's F&B sector. Fast forward to March 2025, and Sagtec listed on the NASDAQ at an IPO price of $3.60. But the public markets have been unforgiving, the stock has since lost nearly 50% of its value.Kevin joins BFM to unpack the realities of a NASDAQ listing. We discuss why he spent $2.1 million (nearly 30% of his raised capital) on listing fees, why he chose the US over a local exchange for "branding and credibility," and how he plans to recover shareholder confidence.We discuss:The Origin Story: Why Kevin quit a stable job in 2018 to digitize an industry still relying on handwritten orders, and how the pandemic became his biggest tailwind.The NASDAQ Reality Check: Why list in the US? Kevin defends the decision as a branding play to open doors in markets like Thailand, despite the stock’s poor performance and lack of US investor understanding.The $2.1 Million Lesson: The true cost of listing and why Kevin admits he underestimated the need for Investor Relations (IR) post-IPO.From SaaS to RaaS: The shift to "Robot-as-a-Service." How Sagtec plans to deploy robotic arms for cooking and prep to generate recurring revenue from multi-chain restaurants.The AI Pivot: Is it just buzzwords? Kevin explains how they are integrating AI not for chat, but for data analytics, helping restaurant owners identify best-selling items and peak hours automatically.Risk Management: Addressing the concentration risk where 3 customers make up 60% of revenue and 2 vendors account for 60% of costs, and the plan to diversify through direct sales.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.