S PACs : WA L L S T R E E T ’ S M O N E Y T R E E

DECEMBER 2020

Chairul Tanjung
Arini Subianto

Eddy Kusnadi
Sariaatmadja

Irwan Hidayat

INDONESIA’S 50 RICHEST

PANDEMIC
W W W. F O R B E S .C O M

DISPLAY UNTIL MI D-FEBRUARY

HEADWINDS
AUSTRALIA....................A $12.00 INDIA.................................RS 475 KOREA...........................W 10,500 PAKISTAN........................RS 900 TAIWAN..........................NT $275
CHINA.......................RMB 85.00 INDONESIA................RP 90,000 MALAYSIA...................RM 26.00 PHILIPPINES.......................P 300 THAILAND..........................B 300
HONG KONG..................HK $90 JAPAN......................¥1238 + TAX NEW ZEALAND...........NZ $13.00 SINGAPORE....................S $12.50 UNITED STATES..........US $10.00
Only 1 in 4 Indonesian
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early childhood education
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Learn more about what we do in ECED and become part of the journey to see how we harness the transformative
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www.tanotofoundation.org
 December 2020 Volume 16 • Number 10

4
INSIDE
CONTENTS

Muktar
Widjaja

Alexander
Tedja

Asia-Pacific’s
Most Influential
Celebrities on
Social Media
100 DIGITAL STARS INDONESIA’S 50 RICHEST

26 | Asia-Pacific’s Most Influential Celebrities 52 | Pandemic Headwinds

Forbes Asia’s inaugural 100 Digital Stars list highlights singers, bands, In Southeast Asia’s worst-hit country,
and film and TV stars from across the Asia-Pacific region who have taken over half of its 50 richest saw their
the digital world by storm. wealth decline.
Edited by Rana Wehbe Watson By Naazneen Karmali

COVER PHOTOGRAPHS: SUBIANTO, HIDAYAT, SARIAATMADJA: AHMAD ZAMRONI/HKV/FORBES INDONESIA; TANJUNG: COURTESY OF CT CORP

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 December 2020 Volume 16 • Number 10

THE INVESTIGATION
20
20 | How SPACs Became
Wall Street’s Money Tree
What’s driving SPAC mania on
Wall Street? Not the billionaires and
6 bankers making headlines daily, but
a mob of little-known hedge fund
investors, the “SPAC Mafia.”
CONTENTS

By Antoine Gara, Eliza Haverstock

and Sergei Klebnikov

FORBES ASIA WEBINARS

44 | The Way Forward

This year’s annual CEO event was
convened virtually in a two-day
webinar. This summary highlights
insights into the new normal, emerging
opportunities and the way forward.
By Shu-Ching Jean Chen, Jeanhee Kim
and Jessica Tan

60 | Tapping Opportunity
To honor Best Under A Billion
companies, Forbes Asia held a virtual
forum and awards ceremony in late
November for those on this year’s list
and last year’s.
By Jeanhee Kim

FEATURES

69 | The Great Retail Reinvention

Amid the Covid carnage, a handful of
innovators have finally figured out how
to compete against Amazon and sell in INNOVATION FORBES LIFE
the 21st century. Investors and consum-
ers—and workers—are all winning.
74 | Virus Fighter 91 | Killing It
Alice Zhang’s “garbage chute” cellular Ryan Hogan and Derrick Smith are cash-
By Steven Bertoni
research might soon help humans ing in on pandemic-induced boredom
fight off viral infections of all kinds, with their immersive murder mysteries.
including—well, you know. By Elisabeth Brier
By Alex Knapp

82 | Health vs. Wealth 12 | Fact & Comment

Steve Forbes
The world is awash in cheap antibiotics.
So why is biotech billionaire Bob Duggan Stop being uncivil to civics.
trying to make a new one—and how can
he possibly make money from it? 17 | Tech Connector
By Leah Rosenbaum Rich Karlgaard
We are where we’ve been.

84 | Your Flying Car Is Finally Here 100 | Thoughts

Joby Aviation, with funding from Toyota On conviction.
and Laurene Powell Jobs, promises to
have its air taxis aloft by 2023.
84
By Jeremy Bogaisky

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

8 BUSINESS EDITORIAL
Chief Executive Officer William Adamopoulos Editor Justin Doebele
Senior Vice President Tina Wee Executive Editor Wayne Arnold
Executive Directors Eugene Wong, Aarin Chan, Janelle Kuah Asia Wealth Editor & India Editor Naazneen Karmali
Director, Circulation Eunice Soo Senior Editors Robert Olsen, Rana Wehbe Watson, Grace Chung
Sales Directors Michelle Ong, Janice Ang Art Director Mirna Aprilla
Deputy Director, Circulation Pavan Kumar Assistant Editor John Kang
Deputy Director, Events & Communications Audra Ruyters Contributing Editors Jennifer Wells, Jeanhee Kim
Deputy Director, Conferences Jolynn Chua Multimedia Producer Atika Lim
Senior Manager/Assistant to the CEO Jennifer Chung Office Manager, Editorial Cathy Yip
Senior Manager, Events & Communications Melissa Ng
Senior Manager, Ad Services – Digital Keiko Wong ASIA CONTRIBUTOR NETWORK
Ad Services Manager Fiona Carvalho Bangkok Suzanne Nam
Conference Managers Clarabelle Chaw, Dorinn Chin Beijing Yue Wang
Manager, Marketing & Research Gwynneth Chan Chennai Anuradha Raghunathan
Assistant Manager, Conferences Peh Ying Si Delhi Megha Bahree
Office Manager, Hong Kong Megan Cheung Ho Chi Minh Lan Anh Nguyen
Advertising Executive Sharon Joseph Hong Kong Shu-Ching Jean Chen
Marketing and Research Executive Goh Yu Zhen Jakarta Joseph Cochrane
Circulation Services Taynmoli Karuppiah Sannassy, Jennifer Yim Manila Roel Landingin
Perth Tim Treadgold
Shanghai Jane Ho
Taipei Joyce Huang
Tokyo James Simms

CHAIRMAN AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: STEVE FORBES

FORBES MEDIA EDITORIAL

Chief Executive Officer and President Michael Federle Chief Content Officer Randall Lane
Chief Financial Officer Michael York Director, Editorial Operations Caroline Howard
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Assistant General Counsel Nikki Koval Assistant Managing Editors Kerry A. Dolan, Alice Jackson-
Editor-at-Large/Global Futurist Rich Karlgaard Jolley, Brett Knight, Rob LaFranco, Rashaad Lambert (Culture &
EVP, ForbesWoman Moira Forbes Community), Janet Novack, Michael Ozanian, Jennifer Rooney,
Matt Schifrin, Michael Solomon
FOUNDED IN 1917 Editorial Counsel Jessica Bohrer
Editor-in-Chief (1917-54) B.C. Forbes DIGITAL
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DECEMBER 2020 — VOLUME 16 • NUMBER 10

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 Sidelines

10
Annus Horribilis

I
t’s a small comfort to know there’s a specific Latin term that aptly summarizes 2020:
annus horribilis. Normally it would seem unfair to brand an entire year as horrible,
but in this year’s case, there are few better descriptions. To be sure, it was a good year
for a fortunate few (cue SEA’s Forrest Li, among others), but overall it was decidedly
awful for most and on many levels. Now thoughts turn to 2021, and whether any rea-
sons can be found to be cheerful.
A common guessing game these days is predicting when there might be a meaningful end to the
pandemic and a resumption of the old—rather than new—normal. Bill Gates, who famously fore-
warned of the dangers of a global virus, recently forecast that the U.S. by next summer would be
“starting to go back to normal” if a vaccine is available. However, he cautioned that for the rest of the
world, normalcy may not come until 2022, presuming global vaccine distribution. Others are more
optimistic, such as Goldman Sachs, whose 2021 macro outlook report is entitled A V(accine)-Shaped
Recovery, with predictions of 6% global growth, fueled by widespread vaccinations.
Another speculative pastime is what the world will look like post-Covid. Will it just go back to
something that looks like B.C. (before Covid)? Or will there be permanent changes in the global com-
munity, altering basic activities such as how we all live, interact, travel and work?
One of the safest assumptions is that digital disruption will continue to transform almost every
aspect of life and business. The digitalization process was already underway in the B.C. era, and has
only accelerated now. Thus it seems appropriate that this month’s issue features a new list: the 100
Digital Stars of the Asia-Pacific region.
These celebrities have not only made a name for themselves on stage and screen, but have also built
a significant digital presence across a variety of social media. Many
this year have graciously chosen to give back, leveraging their influ-
ence and online followers to help a number of causes, especially those
with a Covid-19 focus.
The other feature is Indonesia’s 50 Richest list, the final rich list of
the year. Indonesia is also moving fast down the path of digitaliza-
tion. It boasts Southeast Asia’s largest internet economy, as measured
by total national gross merchandise value (GMV) sold online. At $44
billion estimated for this year’s GMV, Indonesia’s internet economy is
bigger than the combined total for Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam,
and nearly five times bigger than that of developed Singapore.
So aside from more digitalization, what will the future hold? As the
American baseball star Yogi Berra notably quipped: “The future ain’t
what it used to be.” Given the past year we’ve all gone through, let’s JUSTIN DOEBELE
fervently hope the future ain’t going to be another annus horribilis. EDITOR, FORBES ASIA

EDITOR@FORBESASIA.COM

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 “With all thy getting, get understanding”
FACT & COMMENT
By Steve Forbes, Editor-in-Chief
12
Stop Being Uncivil to Civics
Knowing the fundamentals of our gov-
ernment and history is essential to being
an informed and effective citizen. Yet few
Americans today know the basics about their
country—that is, its history and how its gov-
ernment works. Having an elementary knowl-
edge of what makes the United States tick, so
to speak, and why the U.S. has been a magnet
and an inspiring example to countless num-
bers of people around the world for more than
two centuries, are important for Americans to
understand, and that’s why we require those
immigrants who want to become citizens to
study for and pass a test on these crucial elements.
For years, however, most of our schools have been der-
elict in teaching kids what used to be called “civics,” the fun-
damentals of U.S. history and our system of government.
This abysmal ignorance is shocking.
There is a simple solution: Have our schools teach civ-
ics based on the naturalization test given to immigrants
who want to become citizens. Before being granted citizen-
ship, an immigrant must learn the essentials of the United
States’ form of government and critical events in the coun-
try’s history. In the latest version of the exam, a candidate
must study and absorb answers to 128 questions, 20 of
The Right Bonds to Fund Covid Relief
Given the gargantuan, Covid-19-caused increase in the
national debt, the new administration should finance a big
portion of it by issuing 100-year Treasury bonds with a cou-
pon of, say, 2%. The duration would be fitting for this once-
in-a-century pandemic.
The appetite for such securities in the current almost
0% interest-rate environment would be huge, attracting
enormous amounts of money here at home and around the
world. Insurers, pension funds and others with long-term
liabilities would be especially keen on super-safe bonds
with a real yield. So would foreign institutions, including
central banks, as well as individual investors.
We could raise literally trillions of dollars to help pay for
coronavirus relief packages, as well as that much-talked-
about-but-yet-to-see-the-light-of-day infrastructure bill.
The bonds would lock in a rate that by historic standards
is ultralow. When interest rates go up—as someday they
will—we won’t have to worry about refinancing this debt at
FORBES ASIA
which could be asked on the test. One must
get at least 12 answers correct to pass.
Areas of study on the naturalization test
include American government, U.S. history
and American symbols and holidays. Ques-
tions can include: Name one thing the U.S.
Constitution does. What does the Bill of
Rights protect? Why is the Declaration of In-
dependence important? Why are there three
branches of government? What are the two
parts of the U.S. Congress? Describe one of
the four amendments to the U.S. Constitution
that concern voting rights.
There are history questions as well: What is one thing
Benjamin Franklin is famous for? Name one reason that
the Americans declared independence from Britain. Why
did the U.S. enter World War II? Why is Martin Luther
King Jr. famous?
The questions about symbols and holidays are varied:
Why does the flag have 13 stripes? Where is the Statue of
Liberty? What is Veterans Day?
It’s shameful that newly minted Americans know far
more about their new country than most of us who are born
citizens. The civics test for naturalization should be made a
core course in our schools.
twice or triple the cost. Future Treasury chiefs will be grate-
ful for the existence of these Biden-era bonds.
The only obstacles would be Treasury Department bureau-
crats who won’t want to deal with anything new, and Wall
Street bankers who would falsely claim—as they always do—
that there would be no demand for such securities, despite the
fact that Austria, Ireland, Belgium and our neighbor Mexico
have successfully floated 100-year bonds in recent years.
Foreign governments may howl that we’re sucking capital
away from them, but they could counter with similar long-term
bonds, which would be a boon for their own holders of debt.
These bonds would help quell inflation fears, which are
reflected in the higher price of gold. By mobilizing existing
capital, we need not fear the Federal Reserve’s printing too
much money. To that end, we could specify that the Fed not
be allowed to buy these securities for a long period of time.
To secure presidential support, these bonds could be
dubbed Biden bonds.
DECEMBER 2020

The Forbes 2020 All-Star
Eateries in New York
During the pandemic, no part of the economy has
taken a harder hit than restaurants. A high-casualty,
customarily thin-margin industry in the best of times,
eateries were devastated by the nationwide lockdowns.
Making things worse for many were the unreasonably
slow steps to reopen taken in parts of the country.
Unbelievably, the worst offender was New York City.
This is shocking because the Big Apple has long been the
center for outstanding, stunningly creative restaurants.
Pre-Covid, the industry employed more than 300,000
people in New York. The prospect of fine dining was a
critical attraction for tourists, whose visits were a key
part of the city’s economy.
Yet New York’s nasty and indescribably incompetent
mayor, Bill de Blasio, took sadistic delight in unjustifi-
ably delaying any meaningful reopening of traditional
restaurants. He made it known that he thought fine din-
ing was an unnecessary luxury for the “rich.” Only under
intense pressure did His Dishonor allow sidewalk and
roadway dining (permits now at 10,000-plus). Governor
Andrew Cuomo eventually bypassed the mayor and per-
mitted indoor dining—but only at a pitiful 25% capacity.
That so many of these places are still breathing is a
tribute to the innovative, never-say-die grit of their pro-
prietors and teams. The pictures here reflect the fes-
tive, bustling nighttime atmosphere of the new side-
walk structures. How well restaurants will fare in winter
weather is questionable.
This year we have taken our 2019 All-Stars, a list put
together by our team of discerning tasters—Forbes’ chief
content officer, Randall Lane; Forbes contributor Rich-
ard Nalley; and preeminent media maven and special
helper for this year’s section Monie Begley; as well as
brothers Bob, Kip and Tim—and run those that are open
(at reduced capacity or for delivery and takeout) in green
type, those temporarily closed in yellow and those per-
manently lost in red.
We urge you to buy gift certificates during this holi-
day season from some of your favorite places. Patrons
can also call their favorite spots to see if they still have
relief funds for employees, many of whom have not been
rehired. Danny Meyer’s USHG HUGS (ushgnyc.com/
ushghugs) is still functioning. Patrons can also send con-
tributions to Relief Opportunities for All Restaurants
GABBY JONES FOR FORBES
(ROAR), which is working with the Robin Hood Foun-
dation (roarnewyork.org).
With vaccines coming, this wonderful industry may
begin reverting at last to its deliciously exciting former
self.
DECEMBER 2020
Second
Avenue
street
scene
13
FACT & COMMENT
++++
Atera • Bâtard • Blue Hill • Bouley at Home • Daniel • Del Posto •
Eleven Madison Park • Gramercy Tavern • The Grill •
Jean-Georges • La Grenouille • Le Bernardin • Majorelle •
Manhatta • Marea • The Modern • Momofuku Ko • Per Se • Shun
Classics
Aquavit Keens • Steakhouse • Nippon • Nobu Downtown /
Nobu 57 • Peter Luger Steak House • The River Café •
Shun Lee West • ‘21’ Club
+++
ABC Kitchen • Ai Fiori • Antonucci Cafe • Aretsky’s Patroon •
Avra Madison • Café Boulud • Carbone • Crown Shy • Frenchette •
Gabriel Kreuther • Gem • Hutong • JoJo • Junoon • La Goulue •
L’Artusi • Le Coucou • Leonti • Maialino • The Mark Restaurant •
Michael’s • Misi • NoMad • Nur • Pastis • Perry St • Portale •
Porter House Bar and Grill • The Simone • Union Square Cafe •
Vaucluse • Wayan
Special
abcV with Jean-Georges • Al Vaporetto
BEAUTIFUL BURGERS: Au Cheval / BK Jani / Café Altro Paradiso
/ Corner Bistro / 4 Charles Prime Rib / The Happiest Hour /
Jeepney / J.G. Melon / Minetta Tavern / Shake Shack
BEST BBQ: Fette Sau / Hill Country / Hometown Bar-B-Que /
John Brown Smokehouse / Mighty Quinn’s
Bistrot Leo • Brasserie Cognac East • Café Centro •
Canal Street Oysters • Cote • Donahue’s Steak House • E.A.T. •
The Fulton • GupShup • Lamalo • L’Amico • La Vara •
L’Avenue • Le Jardinier • Llama San • Luke’s Bar & Grill •
Lusardi’s • Marc Forgione • Milk Bar
PIZZA PERFECTION: Bleecker Street Pizza / Di Fara / Emily /
Joe’s / John’s of Bleecker Street / Kesté Fulton / Lions & Tigers &
Squares / Numero 28 Pizzeria / Prince Street Pizza / Roberta’s /
Rubirosa / San Matteo / Scarr’s Pizza
The Polo Bar • Sojourn • Tribeca Grill • Uncle Boons • Uva • Wayla
HUDSON YARDS: Hudson Yards Grill / Mercado Little Spain /
Momofuku Kāwi / Wild ink
FORBES ASIA

SEOUL'S STARTUP
ECOSYSTEM THRIVES
The city government is fueling Seoul’s emergence as a global innovation hub through its
support of young firms tackling today’s biggest challenges.
South Korea’s decisive, science-led response
to the coronavirus pandemic offers insight
into another successful partnership. Seoul is
working with Korean entrepreneurs and their
fledging companies to develop one of the
world’s most promising startup ecosystems
in line with the nation’s growth as a global
economic center.
Across the South Korean capital, start-
ups are harnessing government investment
and services to make significant advances
in industries engaged in the most crucial
challenges of our time, notably finance, bio-
medical, manufacturing and social enterprise.
Seoul is providing intensive support to 300
PROMOTION
companies to prepare for global demand for
banking and health services in the wake of
the Covid-19 pandemic.
The city’s startup ecosystem already
has a value of US$39 billion, according to
the research firm Startup Genome’s Global
Startup Ecosystem Report 2020. Driving that
success has been the emergence of 13 Korean
unicorns—privately held companies valued
at US$1 billion or more. The near future prom-
ises more game-changing developments by
a bevy of new Korean companies.
Kim Eui-Seung, Deputy Mayor for Eco-
nomic Policy at Seoul Metropolitan Govern-
ment (SMG), said at a news conference in
Seoul in June, “Startups are drawing more
attention amid global challenges such as
the Covid-19 outbreak, and are becoming
increasingly more influential in a technology-
and innovation-dependent global economy.
He added, "The city of Seoul will focus
on the scale-up of promising startups amid
a prolonged pandemic, as we have steadily
invested over the past few years to fos-
ter future industries such as AI, fintech and
biomedicine."
To support innovation in the financial ser-
vices sector, Seoul Fintech Lab offers acceler-
ate programs, mentorship and investment to
fintech startups in Seoul. “We want to be a
 PROMOTION

π-Ville, Korea University’s office space for startups ©PENTA PRESS Seoul Startup Hub Seongsu ©PENTA PRESS Seoul Fintech Lab ©PENTA PRESS

driving force to change the fundamentals of universities and six hospitals in the north of from the medical device, pharma and digital
the existing financial industry and ultimately the city, provides a space for companies to healthcare sectors. The pandemic has made
serve as an edge for international competi- operate in an ecosystem while seeking to the hub’s activities particularly timely and
tion,” says Im Gug-hyun, Team Leader of the deliver valued-added health services in South relevant.
Financial Industry Team at SMG. Korea and beyond. “Our key role is to recognize potential.
At the lab’s gleaming offices in Yeouido, The sprawling green campus, which This year, Covid provides opportunities for
Seoul’s financial district in the heart of the opened in 2017, features separate buildings overseas expansion,” says Kim Ji-seung, a
city, companies are provided workspaces as for laboratories, education and events, as researcher at Seoul BioHub.
well as common areas to network and hold well as offices. From 2018 to 2022, the gov- In one brightly lit office is Palogen, a
meetings to promote idea sharing and sup- ernment will build a Seoul Bio Fund valued startup that leveraged semiconductor tech-
port. “There are many stages of business at 300 billion won (US$262.3 million) and nology to build the diagnostics industry’s
development, and Seoul city would like to allocate 24 billion won (US$21 million) for a first “Genomic Biosensor,” which provides
encourage growth to generate synergy,” Im R&D fund. It also will ease some government fast, accurate testing for diseases includ-
says. regulations to facilitate research. Sixty-six ing early-stage cancers and Covid-19. “Our
Down one hallway sits Tanker Fund, an AI companies now operate in the hub, drawn goal is to harness the speed and efficiency
platform that provides real-time information
on real estate. Its technology also can help
determine terms of a property transaction,
such as the optimal amount of a loan. Tanker
Fund CEO Lim Hyun-seo says, “The centraliza-
tion of data collection and sorting on a daily
basis is challenging. Our competitive advan-
tage is in the accuracy of our platform’s sort-
ing and processing of data.”
Along with the office space offered by
Seoul Fintech Lab to get his startup off the
ground, Lim says, Tanker Fund has benefited
from the ability to network with other start-
ups while having a foothold in South Korea’s
financial epicenter. “Being in a lab gives us
access to the companies that can most bene-
fit from our services,” he says, and its Yeouido
address gives the firm additional clout.
Along with modernizing key industries
such as finance, Seoul startups are also work-
ing on today’s most pressing health issues.
Seoul BioHub, located at a nexus of ten Seoul BioHub ©PENTA PRESS

of semiconductors to provide real-time test-
ing,” says Palogen CEO Han Kyung Joon. “The
workspace and support from Seoul BioHub
have made it possible for us to pursue that.”
The fledgling ecosystem of the campus
is also an attractive destination for global
investors. U.S. healthcare giant Johnson &
Johnson’s pharmaceutical division operates
an office at Seoul BioHub, recognizing the
opportunity for growth and development.
“We came here to form a network, to get
expertise and ideas. We need innovation to
meet challenges in the bioscience field, and
we want to help mature all of these ideas,”
says Lee Joon-youp, Manager, Janssen Korea.
“We’re all striving to meet challenges that are
more important than at any other time.”
Seoul’s startups are using a diverse range
of ideas, locations and technologies to find
solutions. Throughout a maze of alleys in
northeastern Seoul, disused university prop-
erties and converted shipping containers
now serve as office space for startups, and a
former underground parking lot is a hub for
cutting-edge 3D printing technology.
The initiative was launched by Campus
Town Startup at Korea University—a broad
effort to merge technology innovation with
the revitalization of the local community
through collaboration between the govern-
ment, the university, entrepreneurs and local
residents.
With a 10 billion won (US$8.7 million)
investment from the Seoul government, the
project provides office space and equipment,
including desks, printers and Wi-Fi, to fledg-
ling companies along with facilities for the
community, such as library space and public
work stations. Campus Town organizers also
hold local events and forums for dialogue
between students and residents. “We focus
on more than supporting startups. We also
find ways to link them with the local com-
munity and make those connections sustain-
able,” says Kong Jung-sik, a Professor at Korea
University’s School of Civil, Environmental
and Architectural Engineering. “Creating a
good living environment is our ultimate goal.”
One of the most promising startups to
come out of Campus Town is AEOL Korea,
which makes next-generation, energy-effi-
cient heating and cooling ventilation sys-
tems. The company is in talks to supply its
products to two large public companies in
South Korea, and plans to continue devel-
oping energy-saving materials that can be
applied across industries. Baek Jae-hyun,
CEO of AEOL Korea, says, “Our technology
PROMOTION
can change the world and be part of a more
sustainable future.”
In Seoul’s Seongsu area, in the east of the
city, old challenges and new solutions come
together. The neighborhood was once a
buzzing ecosystem of auto repair shops and
publishing houses. Lee Tae-hoon, Head of
the Startup Division of the Seoul Business
Agency, saw the now-struggling industrial
area as the perfect location for Seoul Startup
Hub Seongsu, which is focused on fostering
social impact ventures.
Established in 1998, the Seoul Business
Agency added the startup division in 2009,
selecting 1,000 entrepreneurs for compre-
hensive early-stage support. The group has
prioritized not just the firms’ rate of return but
also the development of a startup culture in
Korea and inspiring young entrepreneurs.
Another aim is to establish a space for shared
economies to address social issues.
Its annual 5 billion won (US$4.4 million)
investment in the program is paying off with
participating startups posting an average
annualized rate of return of 160%. “Our goal
was to create a culture where socially minded
startups could pursue their vision without
having to worry about money, and then pro-
vide direct investment when they advance to
company form,” Lee says.
Ted Kwon, CEO of Coolidge Corner Invest-
ment, a Seoul-based venture capital fund,
says Seoul Startup Hub Seongsu is a constant
source of the kind of startups to which he is
most drawn. “Before, questions of investment
Seoul Fintech Lab
only focused on the financial aspects. Nowa-
days consumers, especially young people, are
more interested in who made the product
and why,” Kwon says. “The first question we
ask is, 'Did the founder start this company to
solve a particular problem?'”
One par ticularly exciting star tup to
emerge from Seongsu that has enormous
potential for social impact is The Wave Talk,
whose core product measures the quality of
drinking water with easy-to-use, inexpensive
laser technology.
The Wave Talk CEO Kim Youngdug says he
was motivated to find a solution since it can
be difficult to tell the difference between safe
and unsafe water with the naked eye. The
Wave Talk has raised more than US$10 million
in funding and plans to launch portable sen-
sors that can be installed in homes around
the world to potentially prevent millions of
people from drinking tainted tap water and
save lives.
“The technology measures bacteria, plas-
tic, heavy metal and viral impurities and gives
a numerical reading,” Kim says. “It currently
takes 10 seconds, and we will get that down
to five.”
http://english.seoul.go.kr/
 TECH CONNECTOR
By Rich Karlgaard
We Are Where We’ve Been
Mohit Aron (right) receives a Citation of the Distinguished Alumni Award from
ISRO chief Kailasavadivoo Sivan at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT).
Physical place is often a powerful influence on entrepre-
neurs. One thinks of Steve Jobs growing up in the suburbs
south of San Francisco. The unique mashup of cultural reb-
els and computer geeks inspired Jobs to locate Apple at the
intersection of science and art. It’s still the Apple address.
The influence of place can also be seen in Mohit Aron, the
founder and CEO of Cohesity, a Silicon Valley data-manage-
ment firm and, with a valuation of $2.5 billion in its latest
round of funding—a unicorn. Aron, 47, grew up in Chandi-
garh, India’s most modern and affluent city, 250 kilometers
north of Delhi. Chandigarh is young, its birth the result of
the India-Pakistan partition of 1947. Suddenly the ancient
and beautiful Punjabi city of Lahore found itself on the Paki-
stan side of the border. The Indian Punjab region needed its
own state capital. Chandigarh was chosen, then built out by
cosmopolitan Indian, American and European architects.
VIPIN KUMAR/HINDUSTAN TIMES/GETTY IMAGES
Aron grew up in a city built from a vision, which taught
him that anything is possible when you dream and execute.
Aron’s college-educated father (a government forester) re-
flected this ethos. He encouraged his son to study at the In-
dian Institutes of Technology in Delhi. Then, in the spirit
of new and possible, he encouraged his son to continue his
studies in the U.S. Aron landed in Houston (“even hotter
and more humid than Punjabi summers”) and earned a
Ph.D. in computer science at Rice University. Once more,
the magic of place interceded. Aron moved to Silicon Valley
and joined a growing company with fewer than 600 people
called Google.
DECEMBER 2020
17
At Google, Aron displayed his talents as a
lead engineer on the company’s file system
technology. In 2009 Aron cofounded his first
data management startup, Nutanix, and served
as its chief technology officer. In 2013 he started
Cohesity. The company has an estimated $300
million in revenues growing at 70% a year. Its
backers include Qualcomm Ventures, Sequoia
Capital, SoftBank and Wing Ventures.
Aron says the reason for Cohesity is simple.
Data growth is exploding, but it is also becom-
ing more fragmented. Aron wants Cohesity to
become a single platform that makes managing
all forms of data easy. Cohesity’s customers in-
clude the Hyatt hotel chain, big pharma’s No-
vartis, and a major smartphone manufacturer.
Cohesity recently announced a partnership with
Amazon Web Services to manage cloud data as
a service.
After a successful career as an engineer, what is like to
be a CEO? “I’m the first to admit, when I started Cohesity,
I was not ready to be a CEO,” Aron says in an exclusive, vir-
tual interview with Forbes Asia. “I had to learn that the CEO
role is an inspection job. A technologist likes to go deep. A
CEO can’t go deep on any one thing for long.”
“I was also very naïve when it came to hiring business-
people,” he continues. “Technology people are easy. You give
them a puzzle. Hiring businesspeople is so much different.
You must use back-channel references. Don’t just talk to
the ex-bosses. Talk to people who worked for the candidate
or were peers of the candidate. Otherwise, you might miss
possible problems.”
Back to place. “I lived a few hours away from Pakistan. Not
much terrorism, but there was some, and it shaped my life,”
Aron says. “It taught my father resiliency. Always get up from
defeat. Aside from my father, I was influenced by my adviser
at Rice. He told me, ‘It’s one thing to acquire knowledge. It’s
another to generate knowledge. That’s growth.’”
Rich Karlgaard is editor at large at Forbes.
As an author and global futurist, he has
published several books, the latest of
which is Late Bloomers, a groundbreaking
exploration of what it means to be a late
bloomer in a culture obsessed with SAT
scores and early success. For his past
columns and blogs visit our website at
www.forbes.com/sites/richkarlgaard.
FORBES ASIA
 T H E I N V E S T I G AT I O N

20

HOW SPACS
BECAME
W h a t ’s d r i v i n g S PAC m a n i a o n Wa l l St re e t ?
Not the billionaires and bankers making
h e a d l i n e s d a i l y, b u t a m o b o f l i t t l e - k n o w n
h e d g e f u n d i n v e s t o r s , t h e “ S P A C M a f i a ,” w h o
are incentivized to gobble up these opaque
public offerings with little concern over
whether they ultimately succeed or fail.

WALL STREET’S
MONEY TREE
BY A N TO I N E GA R A , E L I Z A H AV E R STO C K A N D S E RG E I K L E B N I KOV • P H OTO G R A P H BY DA N S A E L I N G E R

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 if
22
T H E I N V E S T I GAT I O N
you want to see the future of so many of the special purpose
acquisition companies currently flooding the market, look to
the recent past. Nearly five years ago, Landry’s Seafood billion-
aire Tillman Fertitta took Landcadia Holdings public to the
tune of $345 million. No matter that, true to the SPAC “blank
check” model, there was not yet any operating business—doz-
ens of hedge funds piled into its $10-per-unit IPO.
In May 2018, Landcadia finally located its target: a bud-
ding online restaurant delivery service called Waitr that would
merge with the SPAC in exchange for $252 million in cash. Fer-
titta touted the fact that the Louisiana startup, with $65 million
in revenue, would now have access to 4 million loyalty mem-
bers of his restaurant and casino businesses, and a new partner-
ship with his Houston Rockets NBA franchise. Two years later,
though, you very likely have never heard of Waitr. As such, its
stock recently traded at $2.62, down more than 70% from its
IPO price (the S&P 500 has climbed 76% over the same period).
Waitr was a disaster for pretty much anyone who bought the
stock early. But the hedge funds that purchased Landcadia’s
IPO units did just fine. Virtually all recouped their initial in-
vestment, with interest, and many profited by exercising war-
rants in the aftermarket. “SPACs are a phenomenal yield alter-
native,” says David Sultan, chief investment officer at Fir Tree
Partners, a $3 billion hedge fund that bought into Fertitta’s
Landcadia SPAC IPO—and pretty much any other it could get
its hands on.
The SPAC boom of 2020 is probably the biggest Wall Street
story of the year, but almost no one has noticed the quiet force
driving this speculative bubble: a couple dozen obscure hedge
funds like Polar Asset Management and Davidson Kempner,
known by insiders as the “SPAC Mafia.” It’s an offer they can’t
refuse. Some 97% of these hedge funds redeem or sell their IPO
stock before target mergers are consummated, according to a
recent study of 47 SPACs by New York University Law School
professor Michael Ohlrogge and Stanford Law professor Mi-
chael Klausner. Though they’re loath to talk specifics, SPAC
Mafia hedge funds say returns currently run around 20%. “The
optionality to the upside is unlimited,” gushes Patrick Galley, a
portfolio manager at Chicago-based RiverNorth, who manages
a $200 million portfolio of SPAC investments. Adds Roy Beh-
ren of Westchester Capital Management, a fund with a $470
FORBES ASIA
million portfolio of at least 40 SPACs, in clearer Eng-
lish: “We love the risk/reward of it.”
What’s not to love when “risk” is all but risk-free?
There’s only one loser in this equation. As always, it’s
the retail investor, the Robinhood novice, the good-
intentions fund company like Fidelity. They all bring
their pickaxes to the SPAC gold rush, failing to un-
derstand that the opportunities were mined long be-
fore they got there—by the sponsors who see an easy
score, the entrepreneurs who get fat exits when their
companies are acquired and the SPAC Mafia hedge
funds that lubricate it all.
It’s about to get far worse for the little guy. Giant
quant firms—Izzy Englander’s Millennium Manage-
ment, Louis Bacon’s Moore Capital, Michael Platt’s
BlueCrest Capital—have recently jumped in. Sure,
they all raised billions based on algorithmic trading
strategies, not by buying speculative IPOs in com-
panies that don’t even have a product yet. But you
don’t need AI to tell you the benefits of a sure thing.
And that means torrents of easy cash for ever more
specious acquisitions. Says NYU’s Ohlrogge: “It’s go-
ing to be a disaster for investors that hold through
the merger.”
I
n the first 10 months or so of 2020,
178 SPACs went public, to the tune of
$65 billion, according to SPACInsider
—more than the last ten years’ worth
of such deals combined. That’s just
one indication that the current wave of blank-check
companies is different from previous generations.
In the 1980s, SPACs were known as “blind pools”
and were the domain of bucket-shop brokerage
firms infamous for fleecing gullible investors un-
der banners such as First Jersey Securities and The
Wolf of Wall Street’s Stratton Oakmont. Blind pools
circumvented regulatory scrutiny and tended to fo-
cus on seemingly promising operating companies—
those whose prospects sounded amazing during a
cold-calling broker’s telephone pitch. The stockbro-
kers, who typically owned big blocks of the shares
and warrants, would “pump” prices up, trading
shares among clients, and then “dump” their hold-
ings at a profit before the stocks inevitably collapsed.
Shares traded in the shadows of Wall Street for pen-
nies, and the deal amounts were tiny, typically less
than $10 million.
In 1992, a Long Island lawyer named David Nuss-
baum, CEO of brokerage GKN Securities, structured
a new type of blank-check company with greater in-
JACOB LEWKOW FOR FORBES
vestor protections, including segregating IPO cash in
an escrow account. He even came up with the gussied-
up “special purpose acquisition company” moniker.
The basics of the new SPACs were as follows:
A sponsor would pay for the underwriting and le-
gal costs of an initial public offering in a new shell
company and have two years to use the proceeds
DECEMBER 2020
to buy an acquisition target. To entice IPO investors to park
their money in these new SPACs as the sponsors hunted for
a deal, the units of the IPO, which are usually priced at $10
each, included one share of common stock plus warrants to
buy more shares at $11.50. Sometimes unit holders would also
receive free stock in the form of “rights” convertible into com-
mon stock. If a deal wasn’t identified within two years, or the
IPO investor voted no, holders could redeem their initial in-
vestment—but often only 85% of it.
GKN underwrote 13 blank-check deals in the 1990s, but ran
into regulatory trouble with the National Association of Secu-
rities Dealers, which fined the brokerage $725,000 and forced
it to return $1.4 million for overcharging 1,300 investors. GKN
closed in 2001, but Nussbaum reemerged in 2003 running
EarlyBirdCapital, which remains a big SPAC underwriter today.
SPACs fell out of favor during the dot-com bubble years, when
traditional IPO issuance was booming. In the early 2000s, in-
terest in SPACs returned with the bull market, and the deals
started getting bigger. Leading up to the 2008 crisis, dealma-
kers Nelson Peltz and Martin Franklin both turned to SPACs
for financing, raising hundreds of millions of dollars each.
Around 2015, SPACs began to offer IPO investors 100%
money-back guarantees, with interest; the holder would also
be entitled to keep any warrants or special rights, even if they
voted against the merger and tendered their shares. Even more
In 2000, United Wholesale Mortgage’s Mat Ishbia won a national basketball
championship with Michigan State University but missed his only shot in the
finals. His first attempt at the SPAC game could be a slam dunk.
significantly, they could vote yes to the merger and
still redeem their shares. In effect, this gave spon-
sors a green light on any merger partner they chose.
It also made SPAC IPOs a no-lose proposition, ef-
fectively giving buyers a free call option on rising
equity prices. As the Fed’s low-rate, easy-money
policy propelled the stock market higher for over a
decade, it was just a matter of time before SPACs
came back into vogue. And so they have, with un-
precedented force. 23
SPAC
H
edge funders may be the enablers
of the SPAC boom, but they certain-
ly aren’t the only ones getting rich. In
September, a billionaire-sponsored
SPAC called Gores Holdings IV said
it would give Pontiac, Michigan–based entrepre-
neur Mat Ishbia, owner of mortgage lender United
Wholesale Mortgage, a $925 million capital infu-
sion, which would value his company at $16 billion.
If the deal is completed, Ishbia’s net worth will rise
to $11 billion, making him one of the 50 richest peo-
ple in America. “I never knew what a SPAC was,” Ish-
bia admits. “I felt like it was a more efficient process.”
There are also the sponsors, underwriters and
lawyers who create SPACs, each taking their pound
of flesh from the deals. Sponsors, who pay under-
writing and legal fees to set up and merge SPACs,
A HANDFUL OF BILLIONAIRES
ARE STRUCTURING FAIRER
DEALS WITH THEIR SPACS.
BUT MOST SPAC DEALS DON’T
COME WITH BENEVOLENT
BILLIONAIRES ATTACHED.
normally wind up with a generous shareholder gift
known as the “promote”—roughly 20% of the SPAC’s
common equity after the IPO.
Alec Gores, the private equity billionaire who
helped take United Wholesale public, has listed
five SPACs and raised over $2 billion. In the United
Wholesale deal, Gores and his partners are entitled
to purchase $106 million worth of “founder shares”
for $25,000, or $0.002 a share. Gores’ private equi-
ty firm hasn’t raised a new fund since 2012. With
easy scores like this, why would he?
Among SPAC sponsors, few can match Chamath
Palihapitiya’s frenetic pace. Palihapitiya, 44, is a for-
mer Facebook executive who founded Silicon Valley
venture capital firm Social Capital in 2011. With his
FORBES ASIA
 venture business slowing down, Palihapitiya has recently turned
to the public markets. In the span of 37 months, he has raised
$4.3 billion in six New York Stock Exchange–listed SPACs that
go by the tickers IPOA, IPOB, IPOC, IPOD, IPOE and IPOF.
The founder’s stock he has received for his “promote” will
amount to no less than $1 billion, by Forbes estimates. In late
2019, Palihapitiya used one of his SPACs to take Virgin Galactic
public. Two other deals have already been announced: mergers
with home-buying platform Opendoor at a $5 billion valuation
24 and with medical-insurance company Clover Health at $3.7 bil-
lion. Palihapitiya and Gores point out that they intend to invest
hundreds of millions via private placements in their deals.
T H E I N V E S T I GAT I O N
Of the $65 billion raised in SPAC IPOs so far in 2020, Forbes
estimates that, all told, sponsors like Gores and Palihapitiya
should net more than $10 billion in free equity. Great for them,
but terrible for the rest of the shareholders. In fact, by the time
the average SPAC enters into a merger agreement, warrants
afforded to hedge funds, underwriting fees and the generous
sponsor’s promote eat up more than 30% of IPO proceeds.
According to the study of recent SPACs by Ohlrogge and
Klausner, a typical SPAC holds just $6.67 a share in cash of
its original $10 IPO price by the time it enters into a merger
agreement with its target company.
“The problem with the typical founder-shares arrangement
is not just the outsized nature of the compensation or the in-
herent misalignment of incentives, but also the fact that the
massively dilutive nature of founder stock makes it difficult to
complete a deal on attractive terms,” says billionaire Bill Ack-
man. A handful of billionaires like Ackman are structuring
fairer deals with their SPACs. In July, Ackman raised a record
$4 billion SPAC called Pershing Square Tontine Holdings. He’s
shopping for deals, but his shareholders will face much less di-
lution because his SPAC has no promote.
Billionaire hedge fund mogul Daniel Och, backer of unicorn
startups Coinbase, Github and Stripe via his family office, re-
cently raised $750 million in a SPAC IPO called Ajax I but re-
duced its promote to 10%. His investing partner in Ajax, Glenn
Fuhrman, made billions in profits running Michael Dell’s fami-
ly office; the SPAC’s board includes an all-star lineup of innova-
tors: Kevin Systrom of Instagram, Anne Wojcicki of 23andMe,
Jim McKelvey of Square and Steve Ells of Chipotle. The group
has pledged their personal capital into Ajax’s future deal.
“We’re lowering the sponsor economics to make clear that
this is not about promoting someone’s capital,” Och says. “It’s
about investing our own capital, and then finding a great com-
pany that we can hold for a long period of time.”
M
ost SPAC deals don’t come with benevolent
billionaires attached. In fact, if history is any
guide, the average post-merger SPAC investor
is in for a fleecing not unlike the ones dealt out
in the shoddy blind-pool deals peddled by those
bucket shops of the 1980s and ’90s.
According to NYU’s Ohlrogge, six months after a deal is an-
nounced, median returns for SPACs amount to a loss of 12.3%.
A year after the announcement, most SPACs are down 35%. The
returns are likely to get worse as the hundreds of SPACs current-
ly searching for viable merger partners become more desperate.
FORBES ASIA
S U S P I C I O U S S PAC S
MORE THAN 180 SPACS ARE NOW RACING
THE CLOCK TO FIND MERGER PARTNERS.
BELOW ARE FIVE OF THE MORE DUBIOUS
DEALS, RANKED BY IPO FUNDING.
SPAC : Orisun Acquisition
IP O F U NDI NG : $700 million
ME RG E R PA RT NER: Ucommune
VALUATI O N: $769 million
P ROB L EM : Red flag. The “Chinese WeWork,” with 211 office
locations in mainland China and Singapore, is going the
SPAC route after underwriters Citigroup and Credit Suisse
abandoned a traditional IPO effort, citing an unrealistic
IPO valuation for the money-losing company.
SPAC : Landcadia Holdings II
IP O F U NDI NG : $300 million
ME RG E R PA RT NER: Golden Nugget
Online Gaming
VALUATI O N: $745 million
P ROB L EM : Blatant conflicts of interest. Debt-laden Till-
man Fertitta is selling his Golden Nugget Online Gaming
operation to his own SPAC (his second). When the dust
settles he will own 11% of the new company and his debt
load will be reduced by $150 million. (Despite this, and a
dismal performance on his first SPAC, Fertitta raised $500
million in Landcadia Holdings III in October.)
SPAC : Forum Merger II
IP O F U NDI NG : $200 million
ME RG E R PA RT NER: Ittella International
VA LUATI ON : $482 million
P ROB L EM : Hype. Shares doubled to $20 as day traders
and Robinhood speculators flocked to the maker of
Tattooed Chef frozen vegan and gluten-free meals. Retail
ownership is so high that the SPAC had difficulty finding
enough voters to approve its merger—bullish holders used
Twitter, Reddit and message boards to solicit votes during
a month-long delay.
SPAC : HL Acquisition
IP O F U NDI NG : $55 million
ME RG E R PA RT NER: Fusion Fuel
VALUATI O N: $96.7 million
P ROB L EM : Wallflower. A merger with a Singaporean hydro-
carbon logistics company fell apart in March. In June, the
SPAC committed to Fusion Fuel, a Portuguese company
that claims it has “proprietary” technologies to produce
emissions-free renewable hydrogen. Yet as time runs out,
its merger vote has already been extended twice.
SPAC : Mountain Crest Acquisition
IP O F U NDI NG : $50 million
ME RG E R PA RT NER: Playboy Enterprises
VALUATI O N: $381 million
P ROB L EM : Debt. Three years after the death of founder
Hugh Hefner, the once iconic nudie-magazine company
is being resuscitated with a focus on “sexual wellness”—
think hair-loss treatments and erectile dysfunction pills—
and more bunny-ear licensing. Buzzkill: perennial losses
and heavy debt.
DECEMBER 2020
 Problems are already surfacing in the great SPAC gold rush
of 2020. Healthcare company MultiPlan, one of the most
prominent recent deals, may already be in trouble. Acquired
by a SPAC called Churchill Capital Corp. III in a $1.3 billion
deal, its shares plunged 25% in November after a short seller
published a report questioning whether its business was dete-
riorating more than it let on.
The Churchill SPAC is one of five brought to market by former
Citigroup banker Michael Klein, which have raised nearly $5
billion. Klein and his partners now sit on stock holdings worth
hundreds of millions, thanks largely to the lucrative promotes.
Klein’s investment bank, M. Klein & Co., has made tens of mil-
have traded down 36% from where they stood
when the SPAC merger was completed.
Electric vehicles aren’t the only overhyped
SPAC sector. So far 11 cannabis SPACs have ei-
ther announced a deal or are searching for one.
And in online gaming, there are no fewer than 10
SPACs in the works. It wasn’t long ago that frack-
ing was all the rage on Wall Street, too, and SPAC
IPOs provided quick and easy capital infusions.
Energy private equity firm Riverstone Holdings 25
issued three large SPACs—one in March 2016,
for $450 million; then two more IPO’d in 2017,

lions of dollars in fees advising his own SPACs on their deals. In
the case of MultiPlan, Klein’s bank earned $30 million in fees to
advise Churchill to inject SPAC capital into MultiPlan. IPO pro-
ceeds, however, are now worth only 70 cents on the dollar.
“Coming out of the financial crisis there was all this talk
about the expected outcomes when you have all these traders
who have heads-they-win-tails-they-don’t-lose incentives, be-
cause it’s somebody else’s money,” says Carson Block, the short
seller who called out MultiPlan. “Those incentive structures
are alive and well on Wall Street in the form of SPACs.”
Nikola Motor, the SPAC that broke the dam on electric-ve-
hicle speculations, now faces probes from the U.S. Depart-
ment of Justice over whether it misled investors when rais-
ing money. Its founder, Trevor Milton, is gone, and a much-
hyped partnership with General Motors is in doubt. Shares
SPAC
raising $1.7 billion—all intent on profiting from
shale oil-and-gas investments.
Riverstone’s Silver Run II SPAC acquired Alta
Mesa Resources in 2018, but the company quick-
ly went bankrupt, incinerating $3.8 billion of
market capitalization on oil fields in Oklahoma.
Its other two SPACs completed mergers, and now
both are trading below $3 per share.
Despite its dismal track record, Riverstone
had no trouble raising $200 million in October
for its fourth SPAC IPO, “Decarbonization Plus
Acquisition.” Shale fracking is yesterday’s game,
so Riverstone has moved on to clean tech. Hope
springs eternal—especially when you can count
on hedge fund money to back you up.

B L A N K C H EC KS FO R B I L L I O N A I R E S
SPACS WERE ONCE SHUNNED BY SAVVY INVESTORS. TODAY THEY’RE BELOVED BY THE WEALTHIEST.

BI L L ION AIR E SPAC TI C K ER I PO P RO C EEDS TA RGE T

Bill Ackman Pershing Square PSTH $4 bil Largest SPAC ever is hunting a megadeal. Rumors are
Tontine Holdings swirling around Bloomberg and Airbnb.
Daniel Och Ajax 1 AJAX-UN $750 mil Star-studded group of strategic advisors. Pledge to cut the
“promote” by 50%. In search of market leaders in software,
internet or fintech.
Barry Sternlicht Jaws Acquisition JWS $690 mil In November, the SPAC struck a $4.4 billion deal to take senior-
care provider Cano Health public.
Richard Branson VG Acquisition VGAC-UN $509 mil According to the filing, Branson is looking for a pandemic bargain.
Think travel and leisure, financial services and renewable energy.
Sam Zell Equity Distribution EQD $414 mil The legendary investor is hunting for a big industrial company.
Acquisition Perhaps replacing Anixter International, which Zell sold in January.
Leon Black Spartan Energy SPAQ $552 mil Apollo is working to close a $1 billion investment in electric-car
Acquisition company Fisker Automotive.
Tony Tamer and H.I.G. Acquisition HIGA-UN $325 mil Instead of a traditional “2 and 20” PE fund, this public financing
Sami Manaymneh will let the buyout superstars take their 20% promote up front.
Alec Gores and Gores Metropoulos GMHI $400 mil Struck a $2.9 billion deal with autonomous-vehicle startup
Dean Metropoulos Luminar Technologies that will make its 25-year-old founder
America’s youngest billionaire.
Ron Burkle Yucaipa Acquisition YAC $345 mil Grocery-store billionaire’s SPAC has given scant details about
the industries in which it’s looking.
Wes Edens Fortress Value FVAC $345 mil In October, made a $1.5 billion bet on a company producing
Acquisition rare-earth materials used to make batteries for electric vehicles.
Howard Marks Oaktree Acquisition OAC $201 mil Will take telehealth company Hims & Hers public at a
and Bruce Karsh $1.6 billion valuation.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 THE LIST 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S

26

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 Asia-Pacific’s Most Influential Celebrities on Social Media
Forbes Asia’s inaugural 100 Digital Stars list highlights 100 singers, bands, and film and TV
stars from across the Asia-Pacific region who have taken the digital world by storm. With their
CINDY ORD/GETTY IMAGES FOR SIRIUSXM

powerful social media presence, these trailblazers have garnered millions of loyal followers
across popular platforms, making them as famous online as they are on stage and screen.
This list, which is unranked, comes at an exceptional time. Much of the region’s population is 27
spending time isolated at home, where people are relying on their screens for communication
and entertainment. We’ve given special focus to celebrities who, despite cancelled physical

T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
events and activities, managed to remain active and relevant, largely by using social media
to interact with their fans, raise awareness and inspire optimism. Many also used their
influence to help worthy causes, especially those with a Covid-19 focus.

E D I T E D BY R A N A W E H B E WAT S O N
With reporting by John Kang, Khong Loan,
Jeanhee Kim, Emma Chi Wei Lee, Yue Wang
and Jennifer Wells.

BTS
Band • SOUTH KOREA

The seven-member band is one of the

world’s most successful musical groups
ever, with over 33 million Instagram
followers. This year, BTS ranked 47th
on the Celebrity 100 list, with earnings
of $50 million. Last year, BTS grossed
$170 million on the road, more than any
American band except Metallica. The
band in early 2020 topped the Billboard
200 album chart four times in less than
two years—which only the Beatles have
done faster, back in 1968. In October,
BTS became the first group since the
Black Eyed Peas in 2009 to clinch the
top two spots on Billboard’s Hot 100
chart. The band’s song “Dynamite”
reportedly made YouTube history as the
first video to get over 100 million views
within 24 hours of being posted.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA


30
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Jay Chou
Known as the king of Mandopop, Chou is the
most-followed artist from Taiwan on Instagram,
with over 6 million followers. The singer has
won more awards at Taiwan’s Golden Melody
Awards—15—than any other artist, in addition to
AGE: 41 two MTV Asia Awards. This year, Chou launched
Actor and singer • TAIWAN his own Netflix travel show J-Style Trip and, in
June, the release of his single “Mojito” caused
music streaming service QQ Music to crash due
to high demand. In January, Chou and his wife
donated 3 million yuan ($455,000) to support
frontline medical workers in Wuhan. The singer
is a global brand ambassador for Tudor watches.
FORBES ASIA
ANGELABABY • AGE: 31
Actress and model • HONG KONG
Angelababy, whose real name is Angela
Yeung, has over 100 million Weibo fans.
This year she earned the title Weibo God-
dess of the Year and has endorsements
deals with Adidas, Dior and UGG. In Feb-
ruary, she performed “With You by My
Side” with three other singers, paying trib-
ute to frontline Covid-19 medical workers.
KJ APA • AGE: 23
Actor and singer • NEW ZEALAND
The actor, whose real name is Keneti J.F.
Apa, has been the most-followed Kiwi
on Instagram for two years, with nearly
19 million followers. His upcoming film
Songbird is a thriller about a virus called
Covid-23. He teamed with dating app
Bumble last year to raise funds for an
animal rescue group.
ARASHI
Band • JAPAN
Arashi’s 5x20 All the Best!! was the world’s
bestselling album last year, selling 3.3 mil-
lion copies. In September, the band re-
leased their first English song, “Whenever
You Call,” written and produced by Bruno
Mars. The group, which started its Insta-
gram page in November 2019 and gained
4.2 million followers in just one year, will
take an indefinite break starting next year.
ATIF ASLAM • AGE: 37
Actor and singer • PAKISTAN
Released in May, his song “Asma-ul-Husna,”
recites Allah’s 99 names to encourage hope
during the pandemic, and has over 22 mil-
lion views on YouTube. Aslam urged his
20 million Facebook followers to stay home
to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
AMITABH BACHCHAN • AGE: 78
Actor • INDIA
A veteran of over 200 movies, Bachchan in
May used his star power and 105 million
social media followers to help raise $7
million for Covid-19 relief. Over his long
CHOU: VISUAL CHINA GROUP/GETTY IMAGES
career he has held elected office and been
the subject of at least 11 biographies.
BAE SUZY • AGE: 26
Actress • SOUTH KOREA
Bae, whose real name is Bae Su-ji, is the
second-most popular Korean actress on
Instagram, with 13.5 million followers, af-
ter fellow Digital Star IU. In December,
she starred in the hit film Ashfall. Often
seen in TV commercials, Bae has endorse-
ment deals with Dior, Guess and Lancôme.
DECEMBER 2020
 Chi Pu
KATHRYN BERNARDO • AGE: 24
Actress • PHILIPPINES
Bernardo starred in the Philippines’ two
highest grossing films: 2018’s The Hows Of
Us and 2019’s Hello, Love, Goodbye, gross-
ing roughly $20 million. For her perfor-
mance in the latter, she was named both
Film Actress of the Year and Phenomenal
Star of Philippine Cinema at October’s Box
Office Entertainment Awards in Manila.
ALIA BHATT • AGE: 27
Actress • INDIA
Part of a Bollywood family dynasty, Bhatt
has appeared in 24 films and is one of India’s
highest-paid actresses. With 74 million so-
cial media followers, this U.K. citizen endor-
ses at least 18 brands including Coca-Cola,
Garnier and UberEats, and has started Co-
exist, an eco- and animal-focused website.
BLACKPINK
Band • SOUTH KOREA
FERNANDEZ: SUJIT JAISWAL/AFP/GETTY IMAGES; CHI PU: COURTESY OF CHI PU
Blackpink’s members—Lisa (23), Jennie
(24), Rosé (23), and Jisoo (25)—are Korea’s
most-followed celebrities on Instagram.
Lisa has over 42 million followers and is
the global brand ambassador for Celine,
while Jennie is the face of Chanel, Jisoo
Dior and Rosé for Saint Laurent. In Octo-
ber, Blackpink became the first girl group
to top the Billboard Artist 100 chart.
EASON CHAN • AGE: 46
Singer • HONG KONG
Chan’s 2017 album C’mon In earned him
Best Male Vocalist (Mandarin) and Album
of the Year at Taiwan’s Golden Melody
Awards in 2018. This year he released a
duet with fellow Digital Star Jolin Tsai hon-
oring those fighting Covid-19, and joined
April’s “One World: Together At Home,”
a global broadcast supporting frontline
healthcare workers and the WHO.
DECEMBER 2020
CHI PU • AGE: 27
Actress, model, producer, singer and TV host
• VIETNAM
With over 19 million social media follow-
ers, Chi, whose real name is Nguyen Thuy
Chi, is one of Vietnam’s most popular fe-
male celebrities. A model-turned-actress
and singer, her music video “Anh oi o lai”
has over 92 million views on YouTube.
She donated $50,000 this year to local
Covid-19 relief efforts.
KIM CHIU • AGE: 30
Actress and singer • PHILIPPINES
Chiu used a viral video gaffe during a live
stream in May as the basis for The Class-
room Song. A live performance of the hit
has over 9 million views on YouTube. Chiu
then sold The Classroom Song branded
T-shirts to raise money for pandemic relief.
ANNE CURTIS • AGE: 35
Actress and TV host • PHILIPPINES
Curtis starred in last year’s hit The Mall, The
Merrier with fellow Digital Star Vice Ganda,
and won Best Female TV Host at the Philip-
pine Movie Press Club Star Awards for Tele-
vision. As the Philippines’ most popular In-
stagram celebrity, the actress has roughly
16 million followers and endorsement deals
with Jollibee, Louis Vuitton and Pantene.
DILRABA DILMURAT • AGE: 28
Actress, model and singer • CHINA
Xinjiang-born Dilmurat has starred in
many popular TV series, with her perfor-
mance in Eternal Love of Dream helping
the romance drama rack up over 100 mil-
lion online views an episode since its Janu-
ary launch. Dilmurat, who has 70 million
Weibo followers, endorses Audi, Louis
Vuitton, Mikimoto and Saint Laurent.
MADHURI DIXIT • AGE: 53
Actress • INDIA
Dixit hosted an online dance class in April
to teach fans new moves during lockdown,
and has a subscription-based dance app
that she launched with her husband in
2013. Dixit was nominated for Best Sup-
porting Actress at India’s 2020 Filmfare
Awards for her role in the film Kalank.
EXO
Band • SOUTH KOREA
Exo members Baekhyun, 28, Chanyeol,
28, and Sehun, 26, are among Korea’s 10
most-followed celebrities on Instagram.
The title song of the band’s sixth album
Obsession topped Billboard’s 2019 list of
the 25 best K-pop tunes.
JACQUELINE FERNANDEZ • AGE: 35
Actress • SRI LANKA
A former Miss Universe Sri Lanka, Fernan-
dez is now a Bollywood star, with her latest
role in the Netflix series Mrs. Serial Killer.
With over 46 million Instagram followers,
her July endorsement of Pizza Hut’s meal-
in-a-box collaboration with Pepsi garnered
31
3 million views.
Jacqueline
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Fernandez
VICE GANDA • AGE: 44
Comedian and TV host • PHILIPPINES
Ganda starred with fellow Digital Star
Anne Curtis in the 2019 hit film The Mall,
The Merrier. Ganda also won Best Male
TV Host for Television at last year’s Philip-
pine Movie Press Club Star Awards event.
He is one of the most popular male celeb-
rities in the Philippines, with 17 million
Facebook followers.
G.E.M. • AGE: 29
Singer • HONG KONG
G.E.M.’s latest album City Zoo won the jury
prize at Taiwan’s Golden Melody Awards
this year, and she was also nominated for
Best Mandarin Album and Best Mandarin
Female Singer. G.E.M., whose real name is
Gloria Tang Tsz-kei, has almost 35 million
Weibo followers and endorsement deals
with Cartier and Dior.
SARAH GERONIMO • AGE: 32
Actress and singer • PHILIPPINES
Geronimo starred in the 2018 hit film
Miss Granny, earning her a Best Actress
award for Movies (along fellow Digital Star
Kathryn Bernardo) at last year’s Philip-
pine Movie Press Club Star Awards event.
In March, Geronimo and husband Matteo
Guidicelli sang a duet at a Covid-19 benefit
concert that raised roughly $5 million.
FORBES ASIA

Akshay
Bollywood’s highest-paid actor, Kumar is also
one of the most-followed Indian stars, with over
131 million followers on Facebook, Instagram
Kumar
and Twitter. He was nominated as Best Actor
at India’s Filmfare Awards 2020 for his role as
a soldier in the 2019 historical action-war film
Kesari. Kumar also starred in Mission Mangal
32
and Good Newwz, which were among the top
AGE: 53 10 highest-grossing Indian films of 2019. As a
Actor • INDIA philanthropist, Kumar donated $4 million to
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Covid-19 relief in India and took part in the
“I For India” fundraising concert on Facebook
Live in May, which raised 520 million rupees
($7 million) for GiveIndia’s Covid-19 fund.
FORBES ASIA
SHREYA GHOSHAL • AGE: 36
Singer • INDIA
Named Female Vocalist of the Year in 2020
at India’s Mirchi Music Awards, her song
“Apni Maati” has over 1.5 million views on
YouTube since its August release. Ghoshal
took part in a virtual concert in Septem-
ber to support Indian musicians hit by the
pandemic, with her Instagram post pro-
moting the event drawing 95,000 likes.
CHRIS HEMSWORTH • AGE: 37
Actor • AUSTRALIA
Hemsworth starred in the 2020 action-
thriller Extraction, which became Netflix’s
most-watched original film. In January,
he shared on Instagram that he was giving
A$1 million ($705,000) to Australia’s
bushfire relief, urging his 45 million
followers to donate as well. He will star in
the upcoming Thor: Love and Thunder,
slated for release in 2022.
DAVIKA HOORNE • AGE: 28
Actress • THAILAND
This Belgian-Thai, also known as Mai Da-
vika, earned a Best Actress nomination at
Thailand’s Nataraja Awards for her role in
the TV series My Ambulance. She is Thai-
land’s second-most popular Instagram ce-
lebrity, with 12 million followers, after
fellow Digital Star Aum Patchrapa. Her en-
dorsement deals include Gucci and L’Oreal.
HUA CHENYU • AGE: 30
Singer • CHINA
Hua’s latest album New World has raked in
over $15 million since its release earlier this
year. He counts almost 40 million Weibo fol-
lowers—and his posts endorsing brands such
as Gentle Monster, Helena Rubenstein and
Volvo have been shared millions of times.
HYUNA • AGE: 28
Singer • SOUTH KOREA
With 15 million Instagram followers,
HyunA, whose real name is Kim Hyun-ah,
is known for co-starring in PSY’s Gang-
nam Style, one of the most-watched videos
of all time. HyunA has been managed by
PSY’s P Nation label since 2018.
KUMAR: VIKAS KHOT/FORBES INDIA
IU • AGE: 27
Singer and actress • SOUTH KOREA
IU, whose real name is Lee Ji-eun, is the
most-followed solo singer in Korea on
Instagram, with over 16 million followers.
In May, her single “Eight,” featuring BTS’s
Suga, topped Billboard’s World Digital
Song Sales chart and has 100 million
YouTube views.
DECEMBER 2020
 HUGH JACKMAN • AGE: 52
Actor • AUSTRALIA
Jackman played Wolverine in the X-Men
series for 16 years, earning him a record
for the longest career as a live-action
superhero and 23 million likes on his
Facebook page. He cofounded Laughing
Man Coffee, which donates his profits to 33
local farming communities.

JI CHANG-WOOK • AGE: 33

T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Actor • SOUTH KOREA
One of Korea’s romantic leading men, Ji
won Best Actor and Best Celebrity (Actor)
in 2019 at Korea’s Asia Artist Awards. Ji,
who has 177 million social media followers,
donated this year to the Korea Red Cross.
An Instagram campaign supporting the
disabled also received 1.6 million likes.

KRYSTAL JUNG • AGE: 26

Actress and singer • SOUTH KOREA
Jung, an American whose given name
is Chrystal Soo Jung, spent a decade in
the K-pop band f(x). She now stars in
Korean TV series Search. With 12 million
Instagram and Weibo followers, Jung is a
brand ambassador for Audi Korea.

NEHA KAKKAR • AGE: 32

Actress and singer • INDIA
For her wedding in October to actor Rohan
Preet Singh, Kakkar posted thanks for her
wedding gown, a gift from the designer,
that got over 4 million likes from her over
49 million Instagram followers. A related
plug for Tissot drew 2.5 million views. She
won the Listeners Choice Song of the Year
at India’s Mirchi Music Awards 2020.

SHAHID KAPOOR • AGE: 39

Actor • INDIA
The son of Bollywood actors, Kapoor
starred in Kabir Singh, the second-highest
grossing film of 2019. That year he earned
LOCSIN: COURTESY OF GEE PLAMENCO JR. AND METRO.STYLE

nominations for Best Actor and won

Entertainer of the Year at India’s Screen

Angel
Awards 2020. With over 67 million social With over 19 million followers, Locsin is the
media followers, his endorsements include second-most popular Filipina celebrity on
Colgate and Fanta. Facebook after fellow Digital Star Marian

AIMAN KHAN • AGE: 21
Actress • PAKISTAN
With nearly 8 million followers, Khan
is the most-followed Pakistani celebrity
on Instagram. She and twin sister Minal
run the clothing site Aiman Minal Closet,
with 249,000 Instagram followers. Last
year she was nominated for Best Actress
at Pakistan’s Hum Awards for roles in TV
shows Ishq Tamasha and Baandi.
Locsin
Rivera-Dantes. She starred in last year’s hit
Philippine TV series The General’s Daughter,
earning Best Drama Actress for Television at the
2019 Philippine Movie Press Club Star Awards
ceremony. Locsin has donated about 15 million
AGE: 35 pesos ($310,000) over the past decade to various
Actress • PHILIPPINES causes, earning her a spot on last year’s Heroes of
Philanthropy list. Recently, Locsin helped raise
11.3 million pesos for the purchase of 246 hospital
tents for medical workers fighting the pandemic.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 MAHIRA KHAN • AGE: 35
Actress • PAKISTAN
The star of Pakistani musical Superstar
will return to the screen this year in
action drama The Legend of Maula Jatt,
Pakistan’s most expensive film to date.
Khan uses her social media presence—
34 nearly 7 million Instagram followers and
over 4 million on Facebook—to raise
awareness about mental health issues,
violence against women and breast cancer.
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Mahira
Khan
SHAH RUKH KHAN • AGE: 55
Actor • INDIA
One of India’s best-known movie stars,
Khan has appeared in about 80 films.
While his last starring role was in 2018,
Khan continues to do voice work for films
and documentaries and has 106 million so-
cial media followers. The World Economic
Forum honored him in 2018 for champion-
ing women’s and children’s rights.
CINTA LAURA KIEHL • AGE: 27
Actress and singer • INDONESIA
Kiehl’s two singles “Vida and “Caliente,” re-
leased last year, have almost 5 million views
on YouTube. The German-Indonesian
actress also starred in two Indonesian
horror films in 2019. With nearly 8 million
Instagram followers, Kiehl’s endorsement
deals include Bulgari, Oppo and Uniqlo.
KIM SO-HYUN • AGE: 21
Actress • SOUTH KOREA
A former child actress, Kim has grown up to
star in top-rated series including The Tale of
Nokdu and Netflix’s Love Alarm. With 11.5
million social media followers, she has many
endorsement deals. In April, Samsung de-
buted Kim’s voice as a celebrity choice for its
smartphones’ voice assistant Bixby.
FORBES ASIA
KUN • AGE: 22
Actor and singer • CHINA
The singer, whose real name is Cai Xukun,
saw his latest album Young top streaming
service QQ Music’s sales chart in Febru-
ary, selling over 110,000 copies in a single
week. With almost 34 million Weibo fol-
lowers, Cai is China brand ambassador for
Givenchy and Prada. In January, he donat-
ed $90,000 to help Wuhan fight Covid-19.
KATHERINE LANGFORD • AGE: 24
Actress • AUSTRALIA
With 18 million Instagram followers, Lang-
ford’s endorsements include L’Oréal. Her
posts in June supporting LGBTQ+ inclu-
sion and Black Lives Matter have a million
views. Since her breakout role in the Net-
flix series 13 Reasons Why, Langford has
made three films, including the 2019 Gold-
en Globes-nominated mystery Knives Out.
LEE DONG-WOOK • AGE: 39
Actor • SOUTH KOREA
With a string of dramatic leads under his
belt, Lee now stars in Tale of the Nine-
Tailed and last year hosted his own talk
show, Wook Talk. With over 11 million
followers on Instagram and Weibo, Lee
was an honorary ambassador to the 2018
PyeongChang Olympics and Paralympics.
LEE MIN-HO • AGE: 33
Actor • SOUTH KOREA
One of Korea’s leading men, he starred this
year in the Korean TV series The King: Eter-
nal Monarch. He recently became Lazada’s
first regional brand ambassador. In 2014
Lee founded Promiz, a site where his over
70 million social media followers can give to
charity. In March he donated $252,000 to
eight pandemic-focused causes.
LEE SUNG-KYUNG • AGE: 30
Actress • SOUTH KOREA
A star of 2019 Korean crime comedy Miss
and Mrs. Cops and hit Korean TV drama
Dr. Romantic 2, Lee has 14 million social
media followers. She is brand ambassador
for Laneige and typically draws over 5 mil-
lion views to her Instagram endorsements
for Daniel Wellington watches.
SAI SAI KHAM LENG • AGE: 41
Actor and singer • MYANMAR
The artist is the most-followed celebrity on
Facebook in Myanmar, with over 9 million
followers. In 2020, he collaborated with
uab bank and launched the SaiSai Pay app,
which supports Covid-19 relief and the lo-
cal film and music industry.
LI XIAN • AGE: 29
Actor • CHINA
Li rose to stardom last year with roles in
the Chinese TV comedy Go Go Squid! and
web series Sword Dynasty. He was among
Baidu’s ten most-searched celebrities in
2019, and has over 22 million Weibo fol-
lowers. Li is a brand ambassador for Ten-
cent’s mobile battle game Honor of Kings.
JJ LIN • AGE: 39
Singer • SINGAPORE
In October, Lin, whose full name is Wayne
Lim Jun Jie, launched his fourteenth album
Drifter • Like You Do with a livestream
concert on his YouTube channel. The three-
time winner of Taiwan’s Golden Melody
Awards has over 54 million Weibo followers,
and has the most-followed celebrity Face-
book page in Singapore with 3 million likes.
JJ Lin
LU HAN • AGE: 30
Singer and actor • CHINA
This former member of group Exo is be-
coming known for playing a serial killer
in the web series Sisyphus. With over
60 million Weibo followers, Lu was tapped
in September by Gucci as a brand ambas-
sador in China.
KHAN: JOE MAHER/GETTY IMAGES; LIN: EDWARD BERTHELOT/GETTY IMAGES
MARIO MAURER • AGE: 32
Actor • THAILAND
Maurer won Best Actor at Thailand’s TV
Gold Awards in February for his role in
the Thai TV series The Pharmacist Of
Chaloang. The German-Thai star has
11 million Facebook followers, which he
uses to support charities and sponsors
including King Power.
MAYDAY
Band • TAIWAN
The five-piece band is one of the most popu-
lar musical groups in the region. Lead vocal-
ist Ashin has Taiwan’s most-liked Facebook
page, with nearly 4 million followers. In
May, the four-time winner of Taiwan’s Gold-
en Melody Awards held a virtual concert
that received 42 million views on YouTube.
DECEMBER 2020
 KIKO MIZUHARA • AGE: 30
Actress and model • JAPAN
Mizuhara, whose real name is Audrie Kiko
Daniel, starred in 2019 in the Japanese TV
drama The Good Wife and Netflix’s Queer
Eye: We’re in Japan! In 2018, she became
brand ambassador for Coach and Dior.
Mizuhara is one of the Japan’s most popu- 35
lar celebrities on Instagram with nearly
6 million followers.

T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
PORI MONI • AGE: 28
Actress • BANGLADESH
With nearly 10 million Facebook followers,
Moni, whose real name is Shamsunnahar
Smrity, won Best Actress (Critics) at the
country’s 2019 CJFB Performance Awards
for her role in Amar Prem Amar Priya.
Her current projects include a film about
Bangladesh’s war for independence, while
the release of her drama Bishwoshundori
was postponed due to the pandemic.

NAM JOO-HYUK • AGE: 26

Actor • SOUTH KOREA
The star of The Light in Your Eyes, one
of the country’s highest-rated TV series,
Nam in April 2019 became the first
Korean brand ambassador for Dior Men.
He has 13 million Instagram followers
and this year donated $45,000 to support
healthcare workers fighting Covid-19.

NEELOFA • AGE: 31
NEELOFA: JAMIE MCCARTHY/GETTY IMAGES FOR MARC JACOBS; AGNEZ: WONG SIM /TATLER INDONESIA

Actress and TV host • MALAYSIA

A Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia alumni, Nee-
lofa, whose full name is Noor Neelofa
Mohd Noor, is the most-followed Malay-
sian celebrity on Instagram. In October,
the actress got a mostly positive response
from her 8 million followers when she
said she would start wearing a niqab.
Neelofa runs Naelofar, a modest-wear
business, which she launched in 2014.

Agnez
Neelofa Agnez Mo, whose full name is Agnes Monica
Muljoto, has been performing for 28 years,
including collaborations with U.S. artists Steve
Aoki, Chris Brown and Timbaland. With 47

Mo
million social media followers, Mo campaigns
against drugs and human trafficking. In May
she joined in a charity concert that raised over
$100,000 for the United Way Worldwide’s
AGE: 34 Covid-19 relief efforts. When accepting the
Singer • INDONESIA Top Social Artist award at the Year 2020
Billboard Indonesia Music Awards, she said:
“Let’s focus on using social media to be a better
person.” Mo also has a fashion line, a paid-
subscription app, and is a brand ambassador in
Indonesia for Vivo mobile phones and Lazada.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA


36
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Aum Patchrapa
The star of Thai TV drama From Enemy To The
AGE: 41
Heart, Aum, whose real name is Patcharapa
Actress • THAILAND
Chaichua, is Thailand’s most popular Instagram
celebrity, with over 12 million followers. She was
nominated for Best Actress at Thailand’s Nataraja
Awards 2018 for her role in A Lady’s Flames,
which was 2017’s highest-rated Thai soap opera.
Aum uses her popularity on social media to sup-
port charities such as the Queen Sirikit Centre
for Breast Cancer Foundation. A former beauty
queen, she endorses many brands on Instagram,
including Furla and Thai brand Chame.
FORBES ASIA
DONG NHI • AGE: 32
Singer • VIETNAM
Nhi is one of Vietnam’s most beloved
stars, with 2.3 million followers on
Instagram, 8.4 million on Facebook and
858,000 on TikTok. After failing an
audition for Vietnam Idol in 2007, Nhi,
whose real name is Mai Hong Ngoc,
started posting songs to social media
platforms until her boyfriend and now
husband Ong Cao Thang became her
manager and helped propel her to stardom.
SITI NURHALIZA • AGE: 41
Singer • MALAYSIA
Earlier this year, the singer posted
food reviews of restaurants affected by
Covid-19, hoping to boost their business
among her 8 million Instagram followers.
In July, she released her 18th solo album
ManifestaSITI 2020 and continues to run
her successful halal-certified beauty brand
SimplySiti, launched in 2009.
PARK SHIN-HYE • AGE: 30
Actress • SOUTH KOREA
Star of many films and TV shows, Park
appears in the zombie thriller #Alive,
which in September was No. 1 on Netflix’s
daily chart in 35 countries. The “Park
Shin-Hye effect” reportedly boosts sales
of lipsticks she’s worn onscreen. With
11 million Instagram followers, she has a
dozen endorsement deals, including with
Bruno Magli, Swarovski and Visa.
EDDIE PENG • AGE: 38
Actor • TAIWAN
With 33 million followers on Weibo and
almost 5 million on Instagram, Peng is
one of the most-recognizable actors in the
Mandarin language film industry. In 2018,
he starred as the lead actor in Hidden
Man. He is the global brand ambassador
for LVMH’s menswear label Berluti.
RAISA • AGE: 30
Singer and songwriter • INDONESIA
After selling 10,000 tickets in just 14 hours
PATCHARAPA: COURTESY OF CHANNEL 7 HD
for a concert planned for June in Jakarta,
Raisa Andriana, who goes by her first
name, had to cancel due to the pandemic.
With 40 million social media followers,
Raisa’s music video “Bahasa Kalbu” has
9.5 million views on YouTube and 9 million
on Spotify since its release in August.
RED VELVET
Band • SOUTH KOREA
The group’s single “Psycho,” released late
last year, has almost 200 million views
DECEMBER 2020
 on YouTube and earned band members a
nomination for best K-pop music video

Troye
When Sivan released his single “Take Yourself
at this year’s MTV Video Music Awards.
Home” during lockdown, he crowdsourced
Members Irene and Seulgi’s duo “Monster,”
artists over Instagram for its music video
released in July, has 70 million views

on YouTube.
MARIAN RIVERA-DANTES • AGE: 36
Actress • PHILIPPINES
Rivera-Dantes is the Philippines’ most
popular celebrity on Facebook, with 23
Sivan
along with designers for related T-shirts, with
proceeds going to Covid-19 relief. The video
clocked 5 million views on YouTube, with his
more recent single “Easy” getting 9 million views
since July. Other collaborations this year include 37
AGE: 25 “Louder than Bombs,” which Sivan cowrote for
Singer and songwriter • BTS’ album Map of the Soul: 7. Sivan played a

million followers. While not appearing
on screen since the birth of her second
child in 2019, she has been busy on social
media, endorsing brands that include
Nestlé Nido, Philippine National Bank
and appliance maker Tough Mama.
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
AUSTRALIA young Wolverine in X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
He also had a supporting role in Boy Erased,
from which his song “Revelation” received a
Golden Globe nomination.

MARGOT ROBBIE • AGE: 30

Actress • AUSTRALIA
Robbie appealed in January to her 22
million Instagram followers to donate to
Australian bushfire relief. The Academy
Award-nominated actress this year
reprised her role as Harley Quinn in
Suicide Squad spinoff Birds of Prey, which
she also produced. She ranks among the
world’s highest-paid actresses.

ROLA • AGE: 30
Actress and model • JAPAN
An advocate for the environment and
animal welfare, Rola (real name Eri
Sato) is one of Japan’s most-followed
personalities on Instagram and Twitter.
Rola launched her lifestyle brand,
Studio R330, earlier this year, while
her endorsements include YSL Beauty
and Puma. Sato appeared in Netflix’s
Japanese drama Followers, which
premiered in February.

HRITHIK ROSHAN • AGE: 46

Actor • INDIA
With 33 million Instagram followers, the
star appeared in May’s “I for India” concert
SIVAN: JAMES BRICKWOOD/FAIRFAX MEDIA/GETTY IMAGES

to raise funds for Covid-19 workers; his

Instagram post of the event drew over
2 million views. Roshan, whose real name
is Hrithik Rakesh Nagrath, was nominated
for Best Actor at India’s 2019 Star Screen
Awards for his role in War, the year’s
highest-grossing Indian film.

RUBY ROSE • AGE: 34

Actress • AUSTRALIA
Her short film Break Free has 53 million
views on YouTube and in May, Rose live-
streamed a reading of Shakespeare’s
Twelfth Night to raise funds for Covid-19.
In June, she helped Crocs footwear design
the Just Love shoe for its Pride collection.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA


Jackson
Wang’s album Mirrors was named most popular
album of the year by NetEase Cloud Music in
2019. A member of Korean band GOT7 and a
Wang
fencing champion, Wang also has a booming
career in China, attracting 25 million Weibo
followers. Last year he won “Male God of the
38 Year” at the Weibo awards in Beijing—given
to a star who combines talent, popularity and
AGE: 26 style. In the same year he was a guest on James
Singer • HONG KONG Corden’s U.S. talk show Late Late Show. He is also
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
China brand ambassador for Fendi, and this year
launched his own label, Team Wang Design. His
song “Hundred Ways” has racked up 48 million
views on YouTube since its release in March.
FORBES ASIA
SEVENTEEN
Band • SOUTH KOREA
This year, the group released two mini-al-
bums that each sold over a million copies:
Heng:garæ in June and Semicolon in October.
Despite its name, the band has thirteen mem-
bers, all between 21 and 25 years old. Last
year, Seventeen was ranked No. 6 on Bill-
board’s Social 50 chart, just after Billie Eilish.
ANUSHKA SHARMA • AGE: 32
Actress and producer • INDIA
With 84 million social media followers,
Sharma recently turned to producing,
and is an advocate for women’s and
environmental causes. Sharma is a brand
ambassador for Google Duo and Standard
Chartered Bank.
RANVEER SINGH • AGE: 35
Actor and singer • INDIA
With multiple best actor awards, Singh
starred in 2018 drama Padmaavat, the
10th-highest grossing Bollywood film
ever. He has three new films in the works
and last year launched his own record
label. With over 62 million social media
followers, he endorses everything from
condoms to Swiss tourism.
RICH BRIAN • AGE: 21
Rapper • INDONESIA
Brian, whose real name is Brian Imanuel
Soewarno, worked on his latest album,
1999, while in quarantine. In April he
released the first of two versions of his
music video “Bali,” which has over 8 million
views on YouTube. Brian was 17 when his
debut single “Dat $tick” went viral.
VICTORIA SONG • AGE: 33
Actress and singer • CHINA
WANG: GARETH CATTERMOLE/MTV EMAS 2017/GETTY IMAGES FOR MTV
Song was voted this year’s Golden Eagle
Goddess in China, a national award for
excellence in the TV industry. Starting her
career in Korea as leader of girl group f(x),
she returned to China to appear in films,
TV series and variety shows. Song has
almost 50 million Weibo followers, where
she has campaigned for Cartier.
URASSAYA SPERBUND • AGE: 27
Actress • THAILAND
The star of hit 2018 TV series The Crown
Princess, Sperbund is Thailand’s most pop-
ular actress, according to a recent Bangkok
University survey. The Norwegian-Thai
has over 10 million Instagram followers,
the third-highest in the country. Among
the brands she endorses are Louis Vuitton,
Pantene and Uniqlo.
DECEMBER 2020
 39

Naomi Watanabe
One of Japan’s leading comedians, Watanabe is the
AGE: 33
most-followed Japanese celebrity on Instagram
Actress and comedian • JAPAN
with over 9 million followers. The Taiwan-born star
shot to fame with her impersonations of celebrities
such as Beyoncé. Her latest parody music video of
Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga’s “Rain On Me” gar-
nered over 19 million views on YouTube in just
three months. In 2014 she launched Punyus, a fash-
ion label that caters to plus-sized women. A brand
ambassador for Coca-Cola, Gap, Kate Spade, Shu
Uemura and Toyota, Watanabe in 2018 was named
one of the “25 most influential people on the inter-
net” by Time magazine.
WATANABE: SHUNICHI ODA/FORBES JAPAN
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
TRAN THANH • AGE: 33
Actor, emcee and comedian • VIETNAM
With 29 million followers on Facebook,
Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, Thanh is
Vietnam’s best known TV host. Known for
his impersonations of other Vietnamese
celebrities, he was named Outstanding
Celebrity Star in the 2019 Metub WebTV-
Asia Awards in Ho Chi Minh City.
PHOEBE TONKIN • AGE: 31
Actress • AUSTRALIA
Tonkin, whose endorsement deals include
Chanel and Tod’s, launched her own
clothing line Lesjour! via Instagram in
October. The actress told her 6 million
followers that Lesjour! is suited for those
working from home. Her first short film
Furlough, which she wrote and directed,

STEFANIE SUN • AGE: 42
Singer • SINGAPORE
This year, the five-time MTV Asia Awards
winner celebrated the 20th anniversary of
her musical career with two impromptu
Facebook Live concerts. In January, Sun,
whose real name is Sun Yanzi, collaborated
with Singaporean singer JJ Lin on “Stay
With You.” Paying tribute to frontline
Covid-19 workers, the pair performed it at
Singapore’s National Day show in August.
SUNMI • AGE: 28
Singer • SOUTH KOREA
Lee Sun-mi, who goes by her first name, per-
formed last year in 18 cities for her first world
tour “Warning.” Her new single, “Pporappip-
pam,” has 12 million YouTube views, while
her duet with J.Y. Park, “When We Disco,”
has 28 million views. Both works led to mul-
tiple nominations for Korea’s Mnet Asian
Music Awards 2020, with winners due to be
announced as Forbes Asia went to press.
was screened worldwide this year.
JOLIN TSAI • AGE: 40
Singer • TAIWAN
Tsai has over 43 million followers on Weibo
and 4 million on Instagram. The singer has
won six awards from Taiwan’s Golden Mel-
ody Awards, the latest for Ugly Beauty, the
bestselling album in Taiwan in 2019. She
resumed her fifth world tour in November
after it was postponed due to Covid-19.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA


40
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Yang Mi
With almost 110 million Weibo fans, Yang has
multiple endorsement deals that include Crocs,
Estée Lauder, Stuart Weitzman and Victoria’s
Secret. Since 2018, Yang has been among
China’s top three most-commercially powerful
AGE: 34 celebrities according to rankings by Shanghai
Actress and singer • CHINA research firm CBNData. After making her screen
debut at age 6, Yang has starred in dozens of
films and TV shows, notably the 2018 TV series
Legend of Fuyao. In 2019, Yang was named
Super IP Actress at the China Literature Awards
and in January was crowned Weibo Goddess at
the annual Weibo Awards. In 2013, she started
her entertainment agency, Jay Walk Studio.
FORBES ASIA
KATRINA KAIF • AGE: 37
Actress • INDIA
Kaif ’s Instagram posts endorsing Reebok
have scored over 15 million likes. Kaif,
whose real name is Katrina Turquotte, also
shares news about her cosmetics line Kay
Beauty with her 45 million Instagram fol-
lowers. Kaif starred in Bharat, the fourth-
highest grossing Bollywood film in 2019.
TWICE
Band • SOUTH KOREA
The nine-member band Twice has 15 mil-
lion Instagram followers. Earlier this year,
it won in the music category at the U.S.
Shorty Awards for social media and, in
June, released its single “More & More,”
with over 200 million views on YouTube.
KEITH URBAN • AGE: 53
Singer and songwriter • AUSTRALIA
Urban’s duet with singer Pink from his
new album The Speed of Now has racked
up over 10 million views on YouTube since
September, while his music channel has
drawn 765 million views. He performed
an impromptu concert via Instagram
in March and gave a free concert for
healthcare workers in Nashville in May.
KARRY WANG • AGE: 21
Actor and singer • CHINA
A member of the band TFBoys, Wang,
whose real name is Wang Junkai, has
almost 80 million Weibo followers, where
he endorses brands including Dior and
Swatch. Known for his hits “KarryOn”
and “Beautiful,” Wang is also a goodwill
ambassador for the United Nations
Environment Programme in China.
WANG YIBO • AGE: 23
Actor and singer • CHINA
This member of band UNIQ shot to fame
for his role in the China TV series The Un-
tamed. With 36 million Weibo followers
and 12 million on video app Douyin, Wang
is also a professional motorcycle racer. In
2019 he joined the Yamaha China Racing
Team to compete in the Asia Road Racing
Championship.
JANNINE WEIGEL • AGE: 20
MI: IMAGINE CHINA/NEWSCOM
Actress and singer • THAILAND
This German-Thai starred in last year’s
horror-comedy Pee Nak, which, though
widely panned by critics, was a box-office
smash. Her single “Passcode” has had 4
million YouTube views since its September
release, while her YouTube channel has
almost 4 million subscribers.
DECEMBER 2020

REBEL WILSON • AGE: 40
Actress • AUSTRALIA
Wilson declared 2020 her “Year of Health”
and kept her 9 million Instagram followers
updated on her fitness and weight-loss
journey. An October post captioned “Just
call me: Fit Amy” attracted 545,000 likes.
Last year was busy: Wilson starred in four
films, including Isn’t It Romantic, which
she also produced.
YANG ZI • AGE: 28
Actress • CHINA
A former child actress, Yang has performed
in dozens of films and TV series, and was
named Popular Artist of the Year at this
year’s Weibo Awards. With 56 million
Weibo followers, she starred in campaigns
for Chopard and in January donated
$75,000 to support the fight against
Covid-19 in Wuhan.
subscribed. In August, he released his fifth
studio album Stray Sheep, performing it
in a virtual concert on Fortnite—the first
Asian to do so in the popular online game.
ZHAO LIYING • AGE: 33
Actress • CHINA
Zhao has in the past decade starred in
41
over two dozen Chinese TV series and won
multiple awards, including Influential
Actor of the Year at the annual Weibo

KRIS WU • AGE: 30
Actor and singer • CHINA
Commanding over 50 million fans on
Weibo and 7 million on Instagram, this
Chinese-Canadian has endorsement deals
with brands including Bulgari, Burberry
and Louis Vuitton. Wu’s 2019 rap song
“Big Bowl, Thick Noodle” has almost 180
million views on streaming site Miaopai.
WUTT HMONE SHWE YI • AGE: 32
Actress • MYANMAR
Last year, the two-time Myanmar Acade-
my Award-winning actress starred in the
YEE: JAMIE MCCARTHY/GETTY IMAGES; YEN: JULIE EDWARDS/LFI/AVALON/NEWSCOM; YI: U AUNG XINHUA NEWS AGENCY/NEWSCOM
T H E L I S T • 1 0 0 D I G I TA L S TA R S
Awards in January. She has 88 million
Jackson Weibo followers and 20 million on video
Yee
app Douyin, and has endorsement deals
with Dior and Longines, among others.
ZHOU DONGYU • AGE: 28
Actress • CHINA
Zhou has starred in over two dozen
movies, including 2019’s Better Days,
for which she won Best Actress this year
at both the Hong Kong Film Awards
and China’s Hundred Flower Awards.
She has 31 million Weibo followers, and
endorsement deals with brands such as
Burberry and Victoria’s Secret.

Myanmar horror film The Only Mom, the

highest-grossing film in Myanmar that
year. For her role, she was also nominated
in 2019 for Best Actress by Singapore’s
Asian Academy Creative Awards. She is
Myanmar’s most-followed Facebook fe-
male celebrity, with 6 million followers.
Wutt Hmone
Shwe Yi
JACKSON YEE • AGE: 20 ZHU YILONG • AGE: 32
Actor and singer • CHINA Actor • CHINA
A member of the band TFBoys, Yee, whose Known for his roles in the drama The Story
real name is Yi Yangqianxi, starred in the of Minglan and the web series Guardian,
2019 film Better Days, for which he won Zhu has almost 30 million Weibo followers
Best New Performer award at the 39th and is a brand ambassador in China for
annual Hong Kong Film Awards event. Chopard and Tom Ford. He donated
With over 86 million Weibo followers, $150,000 in January to fight Covid-19 in
Yee’s posts endorsing Emporio Armani and his hometown of Wuhan.
Tiffany & Co. have had millions of shares.
Donnie
DONNIE YEN • AGE: 57 Yen
Actor • HONG KONG
Yen last year released his final installment
on martial arts master Ip Man with Ip Man
4, which won awards for film editing, sound
design and action choreography at the
2020 Hong Kong Film Awards. Yen donat-
ed $130,000 in February to frontline medi-
cal workers fighting Covid-19 in Wuhan.

KENSHI YONEZU • AGE: 29

KENTO YAMAZAKI • AGE: 26
Actor • JAPAN
Yamazaki is due to star in Netflix’s Alice In
Borderland, set to premiere December 10.
With 4 million followers, Yamazaki is al-
ready among the 10 most-followed celebri-
ties on Instagram in Japan. Yamazaki last
year became the first Japanese actor
to model for Armani Exchange.
Singer and songwriter • JAPAN
In July, Yonezu became Japan’s first artist
to reach 5 million YouTube subscribers and
his channel ranks among Japan’s 10 most-
M E T H O D O L O G Y: To determine the finalists, Forbes Asia evaluated the candidates’ combined
social media reach and engagement. We also considered their recent work, impact and advocacy,
brand endorsements and business endeavors, and their recognition profile on a local, regional and
global level. Only those active in film, music, and TV were eligible. Entries use the name of the person
or band most widely known, while real names are provided in most cases for individual celebrities, and
names of prominent members are included in some of the band entries. For more information go to
forbes.com/asiadigitalstars.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA


A LUXURIOUS ESCAPE FROM REALITY
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 FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR
By Shu-Ching Jean Chen, Jeanhee Kim and Jessica Tan

44

The Way Forward

The Forbes Asia CEO Webinar, this year’s digital alternative to the annual Forbes Global
CEO Conference, convened virtually on Dec. 1 and Dec. 2. Business leaders from around Asia
delved into the long journey back from the pandemic, the opportunities created by the new normal,
and the way forward. Here are some key insights from those discussions.

Webinar

In Conversation with Steve Forbes,

chairman and editor-in-chief, Forbes Media

In a wide-ranging conversation, Steve Forbes, chairman

and editor-in-chief of Forbes Media, shared his views
on geopolitical and economic issues, including his pre-
dictions for the administration of U.S. President-elect
Joseph Biden and a possible economic aftermath of the
global pandemic.
For Asia, Biden’s presidency will likely be a “very mixed
bag,” Forbes said. “The good news is no new tariffs, but
a lot of work is going to be done to try to have a smooth
relationship with our allies, and coming up with a modus
vivendi with Beijing.” He predicted that U.S.-Japan ties
would remain close and that relations with India would
continue to deepen. “The problem on trade, though, which
is not good news for anybody, is that the Democrats are
even more protectionist than Donald Trump was,” he said.
Forbes expressed optimism that potential new vaccines
could help ease the immediate effects of the pandemic.
“The worst of the Covid-19 overhang will be over but that
still leads to the question of economic policies and the af-
termath,” he said. “But at least this nightmare will be be-
hind us within the very foreseeable future.”
Governments will need to resist the temptation, Forbes
said, to use higher taxes to pay down the growing debts
now being incurred to support the global economy. Doing
so, he said, would hinder recovery. Instead, “we should
treat it like we have just fought a major war,” he said.
“When you fight a major war, debt levels go up to levels
that were inconceivable during peacetime. And so the
question is, ‘What do we do about the debt?’ We put in
policies that allow for economic growth and realize that
government spending really doesn’t stimulate an econo-
my long-term.”
“A government does not create resources, it is the pri-
vate sector that creates resources,” Forbes said. “What
kind of environment will we have to allow the private sec-
tor, entrepreneurs to get back and do the things that they
do so well: create and come up with new ideas, new busi-
nesses, new ways of doing things, more productive ways
of doing things. That is how you create the resources to
make sure that, in the future, assets grow faster than our
liabilities.” —J.T.

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 Dec. 1 - First Panel
E C O N O M Y & T R A D E : W H AT D O E S N ’ T K I L L U S

Just weeks after announcements by three major phar- Ho Kwon Ping, founder and executive chairman of Sin- 45
maceutical companies that their Covid-19 vaccines had gapore-based resort operator Banyan Tree Holdings. The
achieved protection rates of at least 90%, four panelists new trend will be “purposeful” travel, he said, travel that

FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR

focused on how widespread vaccinations might impact the
global economy and geopolitics.
The successful development of vaccines “will lead to a
much more secure environment for economic rebound,”
said Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, founder of Biocon, a leading
biotech firm in India. “We are likely to see the green shoots
coming back” by the first quarter of next year and a return
to pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2021. “Vaccine-in-
duced herd immunity is extremely important to economic
revival,” she said.
But vaccines must be accessible, Mazumdar-Shaw
warned. “The pandemic shows one thing: there are no
boundaries,” she said. “We all have to be immunized. One
part of the world immunized doesn’t protect the other.”
Aloke Lohia, group CEO of global petrochemical maker
Indorama Ventures, also saw “a very positive outcome,
post-Covid,” but he pegged it to government policies.
“Stimulus will drive the economy,” he said. “I see a good
deal of corporate activity coming back.”
The panelists predicted long-term changes to the belea-
guered travel industry. Goodwin Gaw, chairman of Hong
Kong-based private equity firm Gaw Capital Partners, said
leisure travel would be first to rebound. Business travel, on
the other hand, is unlikely to revive completely as people
may no longer see the need for short business trips, said
has a special purpose, either for business or leisure.
Lohia said his Bangkok-based company would cut its own
business trips in half now that Zoom is so widely used. “I
personally find it hard to believe people will travel,” he said.
Domestic travel, on the other hand, is likely to dominate
the sector, panelists agreed. People will stay closer to home,
Lohia predicted, which will require infrastructure spend-
ing to handle rising demand on roads and mass transit.
Panelists concurred that Biden presidency would bring
greater geopolitical calm. “I expect Biden will undo the
confusion and chaos,” said Mazumdar-Shaw. But the dam-
age to the U.S. influence has been extensive and irrevo-
cable, panelists said. “In the Trump chaos, the U.S. gave up
the technological lead,” said Gaw. The U.S. forced China to
develop its own tech standards, he said, “bifurcating the
world.” Ho cautioned that, even without Trump, the U.S.-
China rift would not heal unless Americans accept China
as an equal competitor. “America has to recognize it is no
longer exceptional, as the Brits had to.”
Ho called Covid-19 a “creeping disaster” that would trig-
ger a paradigm shift. “Covid has opened the eyes of Asia to
Western exceptionalism,” he said. “The fact that Western
economies performed so badly doesn’t mean Asia will be
superior, but does mean Asia will have to find its own way
forward.” —J.K.

From top left to bottom right: Goodwin Gaw, managing principal and chairman of Gaw Capital Partners; Ho Kwon Ping, executive chairman of Banyan
Tree Holdings; Aloke Lohia, group CEO of Indorama Ventures; Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw, executive chairperson of Biocon; Wayne Arnold, executive editor,
Forbes Asia (moderator).

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 Dec. 1 - Second Panel
FA M I LY B U S I N E S S : E X P E D I T I O N I N T O T H E U N K N O W N

46 Digitalization amid the pandemic dominated this discus- house with just a video viewing?’ But, hey, it works. Sales
sion, with panelists sharing how their family businesses have kept on going, even during the lockdown.”
are pivoting to the new normal. “I think the keyword this Damen Shipyards in the Netherlands has managed to
FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR

year has been acceleration,” said Roshni Nadar Malhotra,
chairperson of India’s IT services giant HCL Technologies.
“For a lot of businesses, industries and clients that we ser-
vice, as well as our own, initiatives and strategies that were
to be played out over the next two to three years are now
all of a sudden pushed forward.”
While HCL was able to quickly transition its
150,000-strong workforce to working from home, Nadar
Malhotra said she expected more shifts as vaccines restore
confidence. “Employees would want to come back to work
because it’s also a sort of a break from the personal issues,
psychological issues, that they could have been feeling at
home,” said Nadar Malhotra. Offices and other workplaces
provide space for a “certain level of collaboration and
creativity,” she said.
GSH Corporation COO Kenneth Goi said his business,
founded by his billionaire father Sam Goi and which has
interests in property, hospitality and food, was tested by
the sudden drop in occupancies, construction shutdowns
and supply-chain disruptions. He emphasized the impor-
tance of being “fluid enough to make changes so that we
can adapt to the new situation.”
The pandemic has pushed GSH to think outside the
box, Goi said, citing his sales teams’ use of WeChat and
Skype to conduct virtual showroom tours. “Prior to this
pandemic, we always wondered: ‘Why would people buy a
remain fully operational. “We had a rapid-test facility at
the shipyards to test our employees,” said Rose Damen,
family shareholder of the group and managing director of
Damen Yachting. “Shipbuilding is not something you can
do from home.”
Damen said initial concerns about dwindling orders as
the pandemic unfolded in March were swiftly dispelled.
“Actually, our order intake for 2020 has been very strong
because families still want to get away, and yachting is a
way for them to do that in a safe way,” she said.
Damen said the pandemic “has opened our eyes” to a lot
of opportunities in the digital space. “We used to fly our
subcontractors all over the world, for example, to do com-
missioning work. But for now we’ve figured that actually a
lot of that can also be done virtually,” she said, adding that
some of that virtual commissioning would likely continue
post-Covid.
Axton Salim, executive director of Indonesia’s diversified
Salim Group, said that “digital transformation in the coun-
try is starting to develop very quickly.” Yet, with opportu-
nities come challenges. “If we look at the whole Covid-19
situation, it further highlights the gaps and inequalities,
and different sets of problems for consumers who are in
the outer islands and in the lower income households, who
now have to face digital obstacles and afford internet ser-
vices,” he said. —J.T.

From top left to bottom right: Rose Damen, family shareholder of Damen Shipyards Group, managing director of Damen Yachting; Kenneth Goi, COO
and executive director of GSH Corporation; Roshni Nadar Malhotra, executive director and CEO of HCL Corporation, chairperson of HCL Technologies;
Axton Salim, executive director of Salim Group; Rana Wehbe Watson, senior editor-special projects, Forbes Asia (moderator).

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 47

FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR

From top left to bottom right: Cheah Cheng Hye, co-chairman and co-CIO of Value Partners Group; JP Gan, founding partner of INCE Capital;
Janet Henry, global chief economist of HSBC; Jean Eric Salata, chief executive and founding partner of Baring Private Equity Asia; Wayne Arnold,
executive editor, Forbes Asia (moderator).

Dec. 1 - Third Panel

M O N E Y & I N V E ST I N G : WAS H I N G T H E ‘ I N V I S I B L E H A N D ’

This discussion brought together some leading finan-
cial experts, who offered insights on how to invest in the
coming months. The waves of liquidity unleashed by
global central banks are here to stay, panelists said. “You
cannot go on forever, but in the next few years, that seems
to be where we are,” said Janet Henry, global chief econo-
mist at HSBC. As a result, expectations for a long period
of low interest rates have been priced into valuations of
companies, yielding both sky-high stock prices and ever-
pricier deals, according to Jean Eric Salata, founding part-
ner of Hong Kong’s Baring Private Equity Asia.
While today’s low rates may seem mind-boggling com-
pared with those 20 years ago, said Salata, the market’s
seemingly “irrational exuberance, if you would call it that,
is not necessarily a bad thing if it is funded by equities
rather than debt.” Often, equity investments go straight
into the locomotive of businesses, he said, feeding innova-
tion and creativity along the way. But Cheah Cheng Hye,
co-chairman at Hong Kong investment firm Value Part-
ners, sounded a note of caution: “Sooner or later, the real
world will catch up with us.”
Hopefully, the pandemic represents only a temporary
disruption in earnings, Salata said, as opposed to perma-
nent destruction of value. And the loss of one year’s earn-
ings isn’t enough to ruin a good company. Overall, the pros-
pects for much of Asia remain bright, Henry said. “Asia will
continue to outperform quite significantly,” she said.
China remains on everyone’s radar as well. “The ele-
phant in the room right now is the opening and devel-
opment of China's capital market,” said Cheah. The po-
tential is huge: while China may already be home to the
world’s most-traded stock market and its second-largest
by market cap (after New York), he said, 80% of national
savings are still tied up in real estate, or in money market
funds and cash.
Meanwhile, the pandemic hasn’t slowed down the deal
flow, said JP Gan, founding partner of INCE Capital.
Serious money is still being raised through digital road-
shows and Zoom calls. “This is going to change the finan-
cial industry. Maybe in the future, there will be no more
roadshows. Just Zoom calls all day. That’s all,” Gan said.
“We can have robots for the presentation and switch to
humans for Q&A.”
Digitalization and the relentless rise of technology will
continue post-pandemic, and tech remains one of the
best investment opportunities. The panelists all liked
tech as an investment, and, in an instant online poll of
attendees, 33% of them also picked tech stocks as the
asset class most likely to perform best over the next year,
beating Asian stocks, bonds, crypto-assets, gold, private
investments and property. The likeliest laggard? Trea-
sury bonds. —J.C.

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 From top left to bottom right: Jane Sun, CEO of Trip.com Group; Hendra Soetjipto Tan, group CEO of
Star Energy Geothermal Group; David Yeung, founder and CEO of Green Monday Group; Wayne Arnold,
executive editor, Forbes Asia (moderator).

48
FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR

Dec. 2 - First Panel

I N N O VAT I O N : G E R M O F A N I D E A

What do food, online travel, and green energy have in
common? A relentless pursuit of innovation, according
to three top executives in their respective fields. After a
long and painful slump, travel is now one of the industries
spearheading China’s economic revival, said Jane Sun,
CEO of China’s leading online travel agency Trip.com.
To make up ground lost to the pandemic, the company
started 3D online streaming of tourist attractions—from
museums to hotels, inside and outside China. It has also
launched a service for online sales of luxury items. “When
our customers want to buy luxury products such as Rolex
watches, our finance arm helps them to do it,” Sun said.
Green Monday, a Hong Kong-based company, is develop-
ing plant-based food alternatives for various Asian cuisines,
said David Yeung, founder and CEO. Green Monday’s lat-
est product is designed to taste and cook just like luncheon
meat. Demand is soaring, Yeung said, as the pandemic
awakens people to the fragility of the planet and food sup-
ply chains. “Even today, not many people realize that we can
simply reduce our meat consumption to create an impact,”
Yeung said. Green Monday’s name comes from eating a
plant-based diet at least one day a week—on Monday.
Investors are also becoming increasingly aware of the
climate-change imperative. In Indonesia, Star Energy
Geothermal, the largest local geothermal energy producer
and among the world’s top three, was able to raise $1.1 bil-
lion in October selling green bonds that were the first is-
sued by an Indonesian firm to win an investment-grade
rating, said Hendra Soetjipto Tan, Star Energy Geother-
mal’s group CEO.
Star Energy Geothermal is working to transform Indo-
nesia into the world’s largest producer of clean power from
the earth’s volcanic heat, Tan said. “Geothermal energy is
very reliable and stable, unlike wind and solar, which de-
pend on the weather, and certainly can reduce carbon emis-
sions.” Star Energy Geothermal already produces enough
electricity to power up 900,000 homes, and has 875 mega-
watts in gross capacity. Geothermal power also stands to
reduce Indonesia’s oil import bill. The shift in attitudes, he
said, is unmistakable. “The benefit is very, very clear,” Tan
said. “Young people want to see bluer skies. It’s a trend, and
I would say, a one-way street going forward.” —J.C.

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 Dec. 2 - Second Panel
LEADERSHIP: MAKING THE CALL
The event’s final panel focused on leadership, and how
the panelists led their companies to survive and even
thrive during the pandemic. Their strategies ranged wide-
ly—at one end was Adrian Cheng, CEO of Hong Kong-
based property giant New World Development, who fo-
cused on increasing market share. “The pandemic forced
us to see the crisis as an opportunity,” said Cheng. “We are
grabbing market share, being socially innovative, more
creative and ambitious.”
On the other was Tony Fernandes, CEO of Malaysia-
based AirAsia Group, who focused on survival. “I probably
win the prize for most affected,” said Fernandes. “I’m cer-
tainly not buying shopping malls like Adrian.” Fernandes’
focus was on restructuring to turn any now underutilized
part of his company—aircraft, meals, or customer data—
into a revenue-generating business of its own. AirAsia has
spawned 24 restaurant concepts, for instance, and launched
a new business that capitalizes on its customer database.
Arif P. Rachmat, cofounder and executive chairman of
Indonesia’s diversified TAP group, and Enrique K. Razon
Jr., chairman of Manila-based port management firm In-
ternational Container Terminal Services, Inc., pivoted into
pandemic-fighting causes. Rachmat repurposed auto-parts
factories to make ventilators, and Razon built quarantine
centers where infected people could isolate until they re-
covered. “We can build faster than the government, so we
decided to do it,” said Razon. “We built the first two centers
in a week.”
Rachmat pledged no layoffs, no pay cuts and—to his
company’s lenders—no defaults. “Loyalty works both ways,”
From top left to bottom right: Adrian Cheng, CEO of New World Development, founder of K11 Group; Tony Fernandes, CEO of AirAsia Group; Arif P. Rachmat,
cofounder and executive chairman of TAP Group; Enrique K. Razon Jr., chairman and president of International Container Terminal Services, Inc.;
Rana Wehbe Watson, senior editor-special projects, Forbes Asia (moderator).
DECEMBER 2020
he said. “Covid-19 gave us a rare opportunity to prove our
loyalty to them.” But Fernandes was forced to make pain- 49
ful cuts. “We’ve let people go who haven’t done anything
wrong,” he said. “That was very tough. My number one role
FORBES ASIA CEO WEBINAR
now is to protect as many jobs as possible.”
Vaccines remain essential to economy recovery, the
panelists said. “The virus will wear out at some point on
its own,” said Razon. “But the vaccine gives confidence to
travel, gather and more.” Even with vaccines available, Fer-
nandes said, it will remain important to focus on testing
and therapeutics. “If Donald Trump can recover, all of us
have a chance to recover as well,” he said.
There are likely to be challenges when it comes to dis-
tributing vaccines, panelists warned, so caring for essen-
tial workers until they can be immunized remains para-
mount. In Indonesia, Rachmat advocated making cash
transfers to the poor, and for leaders to act with compas-
sion and humility.
Covid-19 has sparked sharper focus on the community,
said Cheng. He said he had donated 3 million square feet
of land to build affordable housing for low-income fami-
lies with small children. More broadly, he said, the crisis
had pushed his company to accelerate its efforts to pro-
mote sustainability and social entrepreneurship. Farming,
climate change and food sustainability are among the top
priorities for his company’s target demographic, he said.
Cheng cited a Hong Kong residential development New
World is developing that will enable residents to farm on
site. “An entire farm [is] in the middle of the complex,” he
said. “People can farm after work.” —J.K.
FORBES ASIA
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views of 109 limited partners on the attrac- Capital India, 500 Startups and Wavemaker in firm consistently evaluates a high number of
tiveness of current conditions and outlook for providing great liquidity to the market. But startups—it assessed over 800 in 2019 alone.
private capital in emerging markets, saw South- while ASEAN is gradually coalescing into an While Indonesia is home to many of South-
east Asia maintain its pole position. integrated market, it is not homogenous. Firms east Asia’s tech stars, others in the region are
and investors must have boots on the ground also producing winners. The Philippine and
Poised for Regional Growth to leverage strategic local networks for success. Thai markets have large youthful popula-
Singapore-based Openspace Ventures, an Openspace is built for purpose. Its team of tions, an emerging middle class, and rising
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Founding Partners Shane Chesson (left) and Hian Goh met at INSEAD. Openspace’s team members at their Singapore office.

TaniHub with Teten Masduki (centre), Indonesia’s
Minister of Cooperatives and SMEs.
Resilient business models with strong revenue growth
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Openspace’s strategy is clearly paying
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For more information: www.openspace.vc
 THE LIST I N D O N E S I A’ S 5 0 R I C H E S T

52
PANDEMIC HEADWINDS
In Southeast Asia’s worst-hit country, over half of its 50 richest saw their wealth decline.
BY N A A Z N E E N K A R M A L I

A
s Indonesia’s Covid-19 cases crossed the
Muktar Widjaja,
half-million mark—the biggest outbreak CEO and executive
among Southeast Asian countries—the director of
Sinarmas Land
country slipped into its first recession since
the 1997 Asian financial crisis. The economy
contracted 5.3% and 3.5% (year-on-year) in the second
and third quarters, respectively. The benchmark stock
index fell more than 10% in the past 12 months. Conse-
quently, over half of the nation’s 50 richest saw their for-
tunes decline from a year ago. Despite these downdrafts,
the collective wealth of Indonesia’s super wealthy was
down only 1.2% from last year’s list to $133 billion.
R. Budi and Michael Hartono, who were among the mi-
nority that saw an uptick in their fortunes, are now worth
$38.8 billion. They remain at No. 1, a spot they have held
for a dozen years. The Widjaja family of the Sinar Mas
conglomerate added $2.3 billion, the most in dollar terms,
to retain their status as the country’s second richest. A
weak petrochemicals market impacted Prajogo Pangestu’s
wealth, which declined 21% to $6 billion, though he re-
mains at No. 3 for the second year.
The pandemic, a challenge for many, provided a boost
to a few. Media tycoon Eddy Kusnadi Sariaatmadja saw
his wealth, which he shares with his family, jump nearly
80% to $1.4 billion—the biggest gain in percentage terms
this year. Shares of his company, Elang Mahkota Teknologi Another pandemic beneficiary was Irwan Hidayat,
(Emtek), soared as those housebound used more of its e- whose family’s Sido Muncul is Indonesia’s largest maker
commerce and streaming services. of herbal medicines. Shares of the company rose on higher
Emtek’s rising shares propelled cofounder Susanto Su- sales of its products, such as popular cold remedy Tolak
warto into the ranks for the first time at No. 50 with $475 Angin, boosting his family’s wealth 41% to $1.55 billion.
million. The Jakarta-born electronics and telecom engi- Four from 2019 didn’t make it to this year’s list. Notable
neer is one of three newcomers to the list. Siblings Wijono among them are siblings Kusnan and Rusdi Kirana, whose
and Hermanto Tanoko, who control privately held paint airline Lion Air suffered as air travel nosedived.
company Avia Avian, make their debut with $700 million.
The third new face is that of veteran banker Jerry Ng. He Reporting by Megha Bahree, Shintya Felicitas, Pudji Les-
acquired a stake last year in Bank Jago, then called Bank tari, Marella Putri, Anuradha Raghunathan, Elisa Valenta
Artos, which he plans to transform into a digital bank. and Ardian Wibisono.

METHODOLOGY
SINARMAS LAND

This list was compiled using shareholding and financial information obtained from the families and individuals, stock exchanges, annual
reports and analysts. The ranking lists both individual and family fortunes, including those shared among relatives. Private companies were
valued based on similar companies that are publicly traded. Public fortunes were calculated based on stock prices and exchange rates as
of November 16, 2020, and adjustments may have been made for some stocks that are thinly traded or have a low public float.

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 SINGAPORE’S
TALLEST ADDRESS
Find out more:
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DISCLAIMER: THE INFORMATION AND CONTENTS HEREIN ARE CURRENT AT THE TIME OF PRINTING AND ARE PROVIDED ON AN “AS IS” AND “AS AVAILABLE” BASIS. WHILE
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BY THE DEVELOPER OR ITS AGENTS.
54
THE LIST
Health is Wealth
IRWAN HIDAYAT
Indonesia’s largest herbal products maker is
feeling fit as health-conscious consumers snapped
up its products during the pandemic. Net profit
at Industri Jamu dan Farmasi Sido Muncul rose
11% to 641 billion rupiah ($41 million) in the third
quarter from a year ago on a 6% sales gain to 2.3
trillion rupiah. “We just tried hard to keep good
stock available,” says Irwan Hidayat, head of Sido
Muncul, who is the third generation to head the
business started by his grandmother. He ranks No.
17 with a fortune of $1.55 billion.
Sido Muncul’s full-year earnings are forecast to
increase 9% year on year, according to analyst Na-
talia Sutanto at Jakarta-based Danareksa Sekuri-
FORBES ASIA
tas. Shares have climbed by a third in the past year
and in September the company split its stock two-
for-one to increase liquidity.
Hidayat has had a busy year. To boost its e-com-
AHMAD ZAMRONI/HKV/FORBES INDONESIA
merce, Sido Muncul has introduced 14 new products
since January and set up online shops on sites like
Tokopedia and Shopee and sold products directly
on social media. In August, the company officially
opened the 2-trillion-rupiah Tentrem complex in
Semarang in central Java, which encompasses a 211-
room hotel, apartments and mall. —Ulisari Eslita
This article was adapted from Forbes Indonesia,
a licensee edition of Forbes Media.
DECEMBER 2020
 IN D ONE S IA’S
50 RIC H E ST

1. R. BUDI & MICHAEL

HARTONO
$38.8 BILLION
BANK CENTRAL ASIA 55
AGES: 80, 81

INDONESIA’S 50 RICHEST
2. WIDJAJA FAMILY
$11.9 BILLION
SINAR MAS

3. PRAJOGO PANGESTU
$6 BILLION
BARITO PACIFIC
AGE: 76

4. ANTHONI SALIM
$5.9 BILLION
SALIM GROUP
AGE: 71

5. SRI PRAKASH LOHIA

$5.6 BILLION
INDORAMA CORP
AGE: 68

6. SUSILO WONOWIDJOJO
$5.3 BILLION
GUDANG GARAM
AGE: 64

7. JOGI HENDRA ATMADJA

$4.3 BILLION
MAYORA INDAH
Prime Time AGE: 74
EDDY KUSNADI SARIAATMADJA

8. BOENJAMIN SETIAWAN
Rising digital consumption during the pandemic benefited media firm
Elang Mahkota Teknologi (Emtek), lifting the wealth of cofounder Eddy $4.1 BILLION
KALBE FARMA
Sariaatmadja by roughly 80% to $1.4 billion. Emtek’s shares have surged AGE: 87
nearly 70% since January as the company returned to profitability after
AHMAD ZAMRONI/HKV/FORBES INDONESIA

a year in the red. For the first three quarters, it posted a 477 billion ru-
piah ($34 million) profit as its streaming service Vidio proved popular 9. CHAIRUL TANJUNG
with those housebound. Emtek also benefited from exclusive Indonesian $3.9 BILLION
broadcast rights to Liga 1 and UEFA Champions League soccer matches. CT CORP
AGE: 58
The share surge also propelled Emtek cofounder Susanto Suwarto into
the ranks for the first time. In November, Emtek’s e-commerce subsidiary
Bukalapak raised $100 million from Microsoft and existing shareholders 10. TAHIR
to support its online services. $3.3 BILLION
MAYAPADA GROUP
AGE: 68
CHANGE IN WEALTH KEY: UP DOWN UNCHANGED NEW TO THE LIST RETURNEE

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 I NDONE SI A’S Wealth Creation
50 RIC HE ST
Fighting Chance
11. BACHTIAR KARIM
Indonesia, the largest economy in Southeast Asia, is facing some challenges. Covid-19
$3.1 BILLION
MUSIM MAS GROUP
cases continue to rise and the economy has entered a recession for the first time in over two
AGE: 63 decades. The stock market is down more than 10% since Dec. 31. One positive note: new
car sales, an indicator of domestic spending, have rebounded from a May low, but still have
56 not returned to pre-Covid levels. —Jeanhee Kim
12. MARTUA SITORUS
$2 BILLION
THE LIST

KPN CORP Spiking Up

AGE: 60
Indonesia is seeing a big rise in new cases.
(JAN. 1 TO NOV. 16)
13. PUTERA SAMPOERNA Daily new cases Total deaths

$1.8 BILLION 16,000

SAMPOERNA STRATEGIC
AGE: 73

12,000
14. KUNCORO WIBOWO
$1.75 BILLION
ACE HARDWARE INDONESIA
AGE: 63 8,000

15. GARIBALDI THOHIR

4,000
$1.65 BILLION
ADARO ENERGY
AGE: 55
0
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sept Oct Nov
16. THEODORE RACHMAT
SOURCE: EUROPEAN CENTRE FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION
$1.6 BILLION
ADARO ENERGY
AGE: 76

17. IRWAN HIDAYAT Ready, Steady, Oh!

After steady GDP growth around 5%, Indonesia officially entered a recession in April.
$1.55 BILLION
INDUSTRI JAMU DAN FARMASI (QUARTERLY REAL GDP % GROWTH, YEAR-ON-YEAR, NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED)
SIDO MUNCUL
AGE: 73
2018 2019 2020

18. PETER SONDAKH 5.1 5.3 5.2 5.2 5.1 5.1 5.0 5.0
Rp
Rp Rp

$1.5 BILLION
Rp Rp Rp
Rp Rp

RAJAWALI CORPORA 3.1

AGE: 70 Rp

19. DJOKO SUSANTO Q2 Q3

$1.45 BILLION Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1
ALFAMART
AGE: 70
Rp

20. EDDY KUSNADI -3.5

SARIAATMADJA
Rp

SOURCE: FACTSET

-5.3
$1.4 BILLION
EMTEK
AGE: 67 CHANGE IN WEALTH KEY: UP DOWN UNCHANGED NEW TO THE LIST RETURNEE

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 8,000
Rising Trend
5,335 21. MOCHTAR RIADY
While the benchmark stock market 7,000
index dipped this year, it is still up $1.38 BILLION
over tenfold since 2000. LIPPO GROUP
6,000
AGE: 91
(ANNUAL CLOSING PRICE OF THE JAKARTA
COMPOSITE INDEX ON THE LAST DAY OF 5,000
TRADING, IN RUPIAH) 22. SUKANTO TANOTO
4,000 $1.35 BILLION
ROYAL GOLDEN EAGLE 57
3,000 AGE: 70

416

INDONESIA’S 50 RICHEST
2,000 23. HUSAIN DJOJONEGORO
$1.32 BILLION
1,000
ORANG TUA GROUP
AGE: 71
0
2000 2005 2010 2015 Nov 2020
24. CIPUTRA FAMILY
SOURCE: BLOOMBERG
$1.28 BILLION
CIPUTRA GROUP

Logging In
25. LOW TUCK KWONG
Indonesia has the largest internet economy in Southeast Asia.
Despite the pandemic, it has grown an estimated 10% this year. $1.22 BILLION
BAYAN RESOURCES
(GROSS MERCHANDISE VALUE, IN $ BILLIONS) AGE: 72

7 2019 2020*
Philippines
8
*ESTIMATE
26. HUSODO
Singapore 12 ANGKOSUBROTO
9
$1.2 BILLION
Malaysia 11 GUNUNG SEWU GROUP
11
AGE: 65
Vietnam 12
14
Thailand 16 27. ALEXANDER TEDJA
18 $1.19 BILLION
Indonesia 40 PAKUWON JATI
44 AGE: 75

SOURCE: GOOGLE, TEMASEK AND BAIN & CO. E-CONOMY SEA 2020
28. WINARKO SULISTYO
$1.15 BILLION
Quick Shift FAJAR SURYA WISESA
AGE: 74
New car sales in September revved up from a May low,
though they remain below their long-term trendline.
(NEW CAR REGISTRATIONS BY MONTHLY TOTALS, IN THOUSANDS)
29. MURDAYA POO
$1.14 BILLION
INFOGRAPHICS: CANNY SUTANTO FOR FORBES ASIA

CENTRAL CIPTA MURDAYA

100 AGE: 79

80
30. CILIANDRA FANGIONO
60
$1.05 BILLION
FIRST RESOURCES
40
AGE: 44

20

0
31. EDDY KATUARI
2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 Oct $1 BILLION
WINGS
SOURCE: BLOOMBERG AGE: 69

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 I NDONE SI A’S
50 RIC HE ST Pakuwon Mall Superblock
in Surabaya

32. LIM HARIYANTO

WIJAYA SARWONO
$960 MILLION
58 HARITA GROUP
AGE: 92
THE LIST

33. HARY TANOESOEDIBJO

$950 MILLION
MNC LAND
AGE: 55

34. SABANA
PRAWIRAWIDJAJA
$885 MILLION
ULTRA JAYA MILK INDUSTRY
AGE: 80

35. SJAMSUL NURSALIM

$755 MILLION
MITRA ADIPERKASA
AGE: 78

36. OSBERT LYMAN

$750 MILLION
LYMAN GROUP
AGE: 70 Keep Building
ALEXANDER TEDJA

37. HAMAMI FAMILY

Property tycoon Alexander Tedja’s net
$745 MILLION
TIARA MARGA TRAKINDO
worth dropped 18% to $1.19 billion due
to a roughly 21% drop in the stock price
of his developer Pakuwon Jati. With de-
38. HANDOJO SANTOSA mand eroded by the pandemic, the com-
$735 MILLION pany reported a 42% decline in sales that
JAPFA dragged net profits down 72% in the first
AGE: 56 nine months of 2020.
Until the Covid-19 outbreak, Paku-
won Jati enjoyed strong growth, which
39. WIJONO & HERMANTO earned it a spot on the 2020 Best Under
TANOKO A Billion list. Despite recent setbacks,
$700 MILLION Tedja is still working to build his com-
AVIA AVIAN pany’s diversified portfolio that includes
AGES: 68, 58
hospitals, hotels and offices. Already
big in malls, the company has commit-
40. HASHIM ted 336 billion rupiah ($24 million)
DJOJOHADIKUSUMO this year to building more mixed-use
PAKUWON JATI

$685 MILLION developments.

ARSARI GROUP
AGE: 66
CHANGE IN WEALTH KEY: UP DOWN UNCHANGED NEW TO THE LIST RETURNEE

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 41. SUDHAMEK AGOENG
WASPODO SOENJOTO
$635 MILLION
GARUDAFOOD PUTRA PUTRI JAYA
AGE: 64
59
42. KARTINI MULJADI
$620 MILLION

INDONESIA’S 50 RICHEST
TEMPO SCAN PACIFIC
AGE: 90

43. ARINI SUBIANTO

$610 MILLION
ADARO ENERGY
AGE: 49

44. JERRY NG
$600 MILLION
BANK JAGO
AGE: 55

45. EDWIN SOERYADJAYA

$580 MILLION
SARATOGA INVESTAMA SEDAYA
AGE: 71

46. SOEGIARTO
ADIKOESOEMO
$555 MILLION
AKR CORPORINDO
Mitra Adiperkasa AGE: 82
owns the license for
Starbucks in Indonesia.
The Starbucks Reserve
Dewata in Bali 47. ARIFIN PANIGORO
(pictured) is the largest
Starbucks by size in $550 MILLION
Southeast Asia. MEDCO ENERGI INTERNASIONAL
AGE: 75

48. HARJO SUTANTO

$530 MILLION
STARBUCKS RESERVE: PUTU SAYOGA FOR FORBES ASIA

Bumpy Road WINGS

AGE: 94
SJAMSUL NURSALIM

Covid-19 dragged down Sjamsul Nursalim’s wealth by 24% to $755 mil- 49. IWAN LUKMINTO
lion. Shares of his tire maker Gajah Tunggal and lifestyle retailer Mitra $515 MILLION
Adiperkasa plummeted in March and have struggled to return to pre- SRI REJEKI ISMAN
AGE: 45
pandemic levels. Both firms say they were hurt by falling demand. Gajah
Tunggal posted a 20% drop in third-quarter revenue to 9.6 trillion rupiah
($680 million) from a year earlier. Mitra Adiperkasa said net sales fell 50. SUSANTO SUWARTO
over a third in the nine months to September. —Shintya Felicitas $475 MILLION
EMTEK
AGE: 64
FOR MORE INFO, GO TO FORBES.COM/INDONESIA

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 FORBES ASIA WEBINAR
By Jeanhee Kim

60 Tapping Opportunity
On Nov. 23, Forbes Asia held its Best Under A Billion Virtual Forum and Awards Ceremony.
The event was tied to the Best Under A Billion list published in August, and included two panels
of leading CEOs sharing their experiences on navigating the pandemic. After the discussion,
a virtual awards ceremony hosted by Forbes vice chairman Christopher Forbes was held for the
members of the list from this year and last year, which were selected from 18,000 publicly listed
companies in the Asia-Pacific region with sales under $1 billion.

The New Normal panel

From top left to

bottom right: Chartsiri
Sophonpanich, president
of Bangkok Bank; Panote
Sirivadhanabhakdi, group
CEO of Frasers Property;
and Lim Wee Chai, founder
and executive chairman
of Top Glove Corporation;
Wayne Arnold, executive
editor, Forbes Asia
(moderator).

First Panel:
THE NEW NORMAL

A recurring theme during the webinar was the positive out-

look of Asia’s corporate leaders as they recalibrate amid new
realities. Bangkok Bank president Chartsiri Sophonpanich de-
scribed how his bank is providing working capital to custom-
ers to help them restructure and adapt to recent disruptions.
“This is the new normal,” he said.
Sophonpanich predicted the Thai economy may not recover
to pre-pandemic levels until the end of 2022. He believes the
incoming U.S. president should be aware of changes in the
global community. “A new world order will arrive in the next
few years,” he said. “Asia will continue to grow, especially China
and India.”

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020


With the property sector hit hard by the pandem-
ic, group CEO Panote Sirivadhanabhakdi of Frasers
Property, which is based in Singapore, said he was
focusing on adjusting to the new realities. “We are
looking at the way people are talking about Covid-19
as being most effective at digitizing organizations and
the big thing is the future of work,” he said. “Those
changes will project into new business processes.”
Malaysia’s Top Glove is one company that has
thrived during the pandemic. The world’s largest
maker of rubber and nitrile latex gloves used in
healthcare and sanitation saw demand and its stock
price skyrocket in 2020. Executive chairman Lim
Wee Chai said one had to be nimble in a fast-mov-
ing environment as he rushed to fill orders despite
a struggle to get raw materials and extra labor. “In
business, sometimes it’s difficult to predict what will
happen,” he said. (That prognosis seemed to come
true, as Top Glove announced on the day of the we-
binar that it was temporarily closing 28 factories in
Malaysia after over 2,000 employees tested positive
for Covid-19.)
Second Panel:
BEST PRACTICES
A trio of company founders recognized in previous
Best Under A Billion lists shared their advice on
handling crises. They highlighted their agility as
smaller players to survive, even thrive, in the face of
adversity and their drive to be sustainable and digi-
tal. Wendy Yap, CEO of Nippon Indosari Corpindo,
DECEMBER 2020
61
FORBES ASIA WEBINAR
Best Practices panel
From top left to bottom
right: Wendy Yap, founder,
president director and CEO
of Nippon Indosari Corpindo;
Goh Peng Ooi, founder
and chairman of Silverlake
Group; and Cheah Cheng
Hye, co-chairman and co-
CIO of Value Partners Group;
Rana Wehbe Watson, senior
editor-special projects,
Forbes Asia (moderator).
the largest bread company in Indonesia, cautioned that business
owners should avoid too much debt. She also emphasized how
mercurial consumer behavior had been during the pandemic, not-
ing that consumers were no longer going out to minimarts and
convenience stores to buy her company's ready-to-eat bread prod-
ucts popular before the pandemic; her company’s distribution
channels were completely upended. “When a crisis hits, you have
to be so nimble, so flexible, and your foundation already has to be
in place,” Yap said. “If you don’t have the foundation, you are shot.”
As a leading supplier of financial software, Malaysia’s Silverlake
Group has long prized flexibility. “We learn from everyone and al-
ways have to correct ourselves,” said Chairman Goh Peng Ooi. “If
we are wrong, nobody works with us so we look back, forward, left
and right all day. We are a checking-ourselves business.” That said,
he described the group’s operations as somewhat insulated from
the pandemic. “Digital businesses are crisis neutral, we do not de-
pend on business being up or down.”
Hong Kong asset-management company Value Partners Group
saw opportunity in mainland China as it returns to normalcy
ahead of other countries, said co-chairman Cheah Cheng Hye. He
described a “historic opportunity” that came in April when China
fully opened its doors to international and Hong Kong-based
securities and fund-management firms. “We are allowed to own
100% of our business in China,” Cheah said. “This is going to be
the biggest growth driver in the world’s asset management indus-
try in the next decade.”
Overall the business leaders attending the webinar had a san-
guine outlook. In an online poll, attendees were asked how far the
pandemic had set them back. Almost 60% said they hadn’t expe-
rienced any fallout, or if they had, expected to recover within a
year—evidence of how solid these companies can be under pres-
sure. As Yap said: “A crisis accelerates what was brewing before. It
just propels you to run faster.”
FORBES ASIA
62
FORBES ASIA WEBINAR

The resilience of the Best Under A Bil-

lion companies was noted by Forbes
vice chairman Christopher Forbes,
who has attended nearly every Best
Under A Billion awards ceremony
since 2002. This year, he joined (vir-
tually) to congratulate the winners. In
opening remarks, he said: “This event
is a celebration of what Forbes is re-
ally all about—entrepreneurs who are
building great companies. It is never
easy to get on the Best Under A Bil-
lion list—running a small or midsized
company is a big job.”

Christopher "Kip" Forbes

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020


THE PHILIPPINES:
REVVING UP FOR RECOVERY
The country is on track to regain its momentum as its industry leaders ready their businesses for further growth.
The Philippine central bank governor, Ben-
jamin Diokno, in a recent speech affirmed
that the countr y’s economy remains
robust, characterized by strong funda-
mentals that include low interest rates, a
strong currency, record gross international
reserves, low debt ratios, stable inflation
and improving employment figures.
Public infrastructure projects, agricul-
ture and high technology are driving the
economic recovery. Among the services
sector, domestic tourism is poised for a
rebound, led by the Department of Tour-
ism’s efforts to ensure the careful reopen-
ing of top local destinations. “We hope
that this will soon make way for greater
inter-regional travel,” says Tourism Secre-
tary Bernadette Romulo-Puyat. “But visi-
tors from all over the Philippines can now
enjoy some of the world’s best islands at
their safest and most tranquil.”
A diverse range of industries, from food
manufacturing to financial services, continue
to stay buoyant. The business process out-
sourcing sector (BPO) also remains optimis-
tic, with increased demand for outsourced
health-related services encouraging some
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
BPO companies to expand. The pandemic
has prompted greater work flexibility in the
sector, with almost 70% of its labor force
now working from home, according to the
Information Technology and Business Pro-
cess Association of the Philippines. This
means multi-use developments, such as
those offered by Alveo Land, remain attrac-
tive for both tenants and investors. “Our
projects offer dynamic configurations that
balance residential, lifestyle options and
workspaces,” explains Alveo Land President
Robert Lao. “They can easily adapt to the
demands of the new normal, where conve-
nience and innovation are key.”
With crises also come opportunities, as
seen in the dramatic rise in digital banking
during the quarantine period. Increased
financial digitalization has enabled greater
access to financial services and quicker cap-
ital turnaround, thus accelerating income
growth. By strengthening their e-com-
merce operations, companies such as SM
Investments Corporation are evolving with
the circumstances while positioning them-
selves for a post-recovery future. “Even
across different platforms, we’ve managed
Skyline of Bonifacio Global City
to keep our brand front and center,” says
SM President and CEO Frederic DyBuncio.
“This assures our customers that they can
count on us, whatever the situation.”
The Philippine central bank expects GDP
to bounce back and grow by 6.5% to 7.5%
in 2021 and 2022. The Asian Development
Bank also expects growth to accelerate in
2021 with effective fiscal support and mon-
etary policies keeping the economy on
track. JPMorgan Chase is even more bullish
on the country. In August, it increased its
2021 growth forecast to 9.5%, which would
be among the strongest in the region.
Southeast A sia may have seen a
decrease in foreign direc t investment
(FDI) in the first half of this year, but the
Philippines managed to buck this trend.
The central bank reported FDI net inflows
increased for the four th consecutive
month in August, expanding 47% from
a year earlier, while net equity capital
investments rose by 33%. This show of
confidence by investors demonstrates the
country’s sound financial management,
effective pandemic control efforts and
unshakeable resilience.
Philippines 1
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

SM INVESTMENTS
CORPORATION:
ADAPTING TO THE NEW REALITY
The group rolls out initiatives to help local businesses bounce back from the pandemic
while prioritizing the safety of its employees.

SM stores offer safe and convenient ways of shopping with options for pickup at designated counters or home delivery.

As Covid-19 hit businesses across the micro, small and medium enterprises said when the company released third-
Philippines, SM Investments Corporation [MSME] across the group such as through quarter earnings in November.
(SMIC) and its companies acted swiftly to marketing campaign suppor t and by By the end of June, SM malls waived
strengthen resilience among its partners waiving fees to help our MSMEs sustain 11 billion pesos (US$221 million) in rent
and communities to boost their response their operations as well as credit support for tenants af fec ted by the economic
to the crisis. and improved cash access to our many downturn. In July, it launched “Kasama
“In aid of reviving economic activity, banking clients across the country,” SMIC ng SM,” an initiative to help businesses
SM has undertaken many programs for President and CEO Frederic DyBuncio impacted by the pandemic to recover.
It also teamed up with the Department
of Trade and Industry and the Associa-
“We continue to adapt, innovate and build our tion of the Filipino Franchisers to roll out
capabilities to respond to the new realities. It is “BUYANIHAN” a nationwide campaign
crucial for us to continue to be here to serve our encouraging shoppers to buy local.
To help meet the demand s of the
customers and stakeholders with new and enhanced country’s healthcare sector and support
solutions for their convenience and safety.” families affected by the coronavirus, SM
— FREDERIC DYBUNCIO, PRESIDENT AND CEO,
contributed more than 300 million pesos
SM INVESTMENTS CORPORATION
(US$6 million) to equip Philippine hospi-
tals with ventilators, medical supplies and

2 Philippines
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
r e a c t i o n) C o v i d -19 te s t-
ing for its employees and
agency workers across its
businesses.
Finding Solutions
SM has moved quickly to
adapt its businesses to the
new reality with innovative
solutions to better serve its
stakeholders.
I t w id e n e d i t s d i ve r s e
range of essential and non-
essential products available
SM responded to the Covid-19 crisis with donations of online through its shopping
essential medical supplies, equipment and PCR tests to site, ShopSM, and The SM
hospitals nationwide. STORE, which can be found
on popular ecommerce plat-
personal protective equipment. It also forms. SM also tapped communities on
built emergency quarantine facilities for Viber to provide content and shopping
Covid-19 patients and transformed the options for its retail products and ser-
SM Mall of Asia Arena in Metro Manila vices through the instant messaging app.
into a mega swabbing facility to support SM introduced mall fulfillment services
the government’s efforts to expand test- such as “Take Out and Deliver y” and
ing capacity. “Personal Shopper” to deliver takeaway
To ensure the safety of its workforce and other products to customers. “Call to
a n d c u s to m e r s , SM h a s c o n d u c te d Deliver”—The SM STORE’s branded ser-
R a p i d a n d P C R ( p o l y m e r a s e c h a i n vice—allows customers to order essential
SM expanded its customer access channels this year, offering innovative solutions to better serve
the needs of its stakeholders.
items by telephone from select stores.
Through these services, SM promotes
store and restaurants located in its malls.
Meanwhile, SM Supermalls has part-
nered with local governments to launch
Wheels-On-The-Go and SM Riders Pro-
gram across Luzon island. The programs
tap job-seeking construction workers,
repatriated overseas Filipinos and tricy-
cle and jeepney drivers as delivery drivers
and personal shoppers.
“We continue to adapt, innovate and
build our capabilities to respond to the
new realities. It is crucial for us to con-
tinue to be here to serve our customers
and stakeholders with new and enhanced
solu tions for their convenience and
safety,” DyBuncio says.
For more information:
www.sminvestments.com
Philippines 3
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

THE PHILIPPINES:
TURNING TOURISM AROUND
Covid-19 may have hit the tourism industry hard, but the Philippine Department of Tourism (DOT), through its marketing and
promotions arm Tourism Promotions Board (TPB) Philippines, has a plan to help the industry recover.

The Philippines’ natural beauty and diverse

points of interest have driven its tourism
industry to be one of the strongest con-
tributors to the country’s economic prog-
ress. In 2019, tourism contributed 12.7% of
the country’s GDP and employed 13.5% of
its total workforce, providing 5.7 million
jobs. However, with global and local travel
crippled by the pandemic, the sector has
been facing unprecedented challenges.

Staggered for Safety

There is cause for cautious optimism
though, with the number of new cases
and infection rate steadily decreasing
over recent months, approaching that of
other Asian destinations such as Japan and
Malaysia. DOT and TPB are thus planning
ahead for the country’s gradual and safe
reopening to both domestic and foreign
tourists. Several major tourist destinations
are already welcoming local visitors, albeit
under strict health and safety protocols.
The current roster includes Anilao in Batan-
gas, Baguio, Bohol, Boracay, Ilocos Sur and Chocolate Hills, Bohol (Photo by Beautiful Destinations)
Ilocos Norte. These locations have dem-
onstrated both effective control of local approach allows local government units to of contagion within their borders. Health
transmission and adequate infrastructure learn from successful examples and develop checks are rigorously performed on all
to handle the influx of tourists under the effective travel schemes tailored to their sit- visitors seeking entry, and local govern-
new normal. It is the DOT’s hope that uation, while prioritizing health and safety. ments are ensuring that protocols such
they can lead the way for other destinations These reopened destinations continue as the wearing of masks and personal
to eventually follow suit. This staggered to be vigilant to prevent the possibility sanitation measures are consistently
followed. Small steps, to be sure, but
instrumental to reviving tourism. In Sep-
tember this year, the Philippines became
the 10 0 th destination to receive the
World Travel and Tourism Council’s Safe
Travels Stamp, proof to travelers that the
country has adopted and implemented
internationally recognized protocols for
health and hygiene.

Inspiration for Recovery

Boracay Island (Photo by Eric Beltran)
DOT and TPB’s plan is centered on eco-
nomic recovery and taking care of tourism
stakeholders. It is geared towards four key
goals. The first is to secure livelihoods and
provide adequate social services, which
not only involves protection and capacity-
building for tourism professionals but also
adequate assistance for affected travelers

4 Philippines

and the dissemination of vital information
to prevent the spread of the virus. The
second is to sustain business operations
by extending financial support to tour-
ism-related businesses. This also calls for
policies supporting financial and corporate
solvency and encouraging investments in
the tourism sector. The third is to develop
appropriate infrastructure and policies to
establish quality standards and protocols
relevant to the new normal. The fourth is to
enhance marketing and product develop-
ment. The launch of tourism bubbles and
green corridors will help kick-start local tour-
ism and create useful products for the new
Baguio Burnham Park (Photo by Dakila Angeles)
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
Diving in Anilao, Batangas (Photo by Robert Yin)
normal as well as promotional campaigns
reflecting changes in the industry.
“The DOT and the TPB continue to
look for safer and more accessible ways to
encourage more people to travel. As we
coexist with the virus, we need to strike
a balance between ensuring the safety
and wellness of everyone, and reviving
our tourism industry for the benefit of
those relying on tourism to survive,” says
Philippines Tourism Secretary Bernadette
Romulo-Puyat.
For now, most travel in the Philippines
will remain domestic. But the DOT and TPB
are preparing to promote numerous local
destinations internationally in the coming
year. On top of these, another reason to be
upbeat about Philippine tourism’s recov-
ery is the country’s recent accolades at the
Asia leg of the 27th World Travel Awards
in November. The award-giving body cited
the Walled City of Intramuros in Manila as
Asia’s leading tourist attraction, with the
Philippines also bringing home citations as
Asia’s leading destination for beaches and
diving, while the DOT was recognized as
Asia’s leading tourist board.
The Meetings, Incentive Travel, Con-
ventions, and Exhibitions/Events (MICE)
sector of tourism was especially affected
this year, with most large events cancelled,
postponed or shifted online. But it is antic-
ipated that hybrid events, or contained,
limited-scale gatherings can safely be held
at several local destinations with low risk of
transmission. Health checks and protocols
are proving to be effective so far, boding
well for carefully organized incentive tours
and engagements. With a continuously
improving pandemic response, promis-
ing medical breakthroughs and a rejuve-
nated economy, prospects are bright for
a Philippines tourism renaissance in the
coming year.
For more information:
app.philippines.travel
www.tpb.gov.ph
#ItsMoreFunInThePhilippines
#tpbgovph
Philippines 5
 SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION

ALVEO LAND:
STANDING STRONG
The innovative property developer reimagines business hubs across Metro Manila and beyond
with first-in-class projects that blend residential, commercial and lifestyle concepts.

For close to a century, Ayala Land has

been at the forefront of real estate devel-
opment in the Philippines, skillfully navi-
gating both economic highs and lows. As
its subsidiary, Alveo Land has blazed trails
into key markets and locations with inno-
vative projects targeting savvy investors
and rising companies.
Stiles Enterprise Plaza is Alveo’s flag-
ship office-for-sale project in Circuit Makati.
The 29-story building serves as a focal
point for Ayala’s thriving new central busi-
ness district (CBD) with its exclusive river-
side location and views. Stiles Enterprise
Plaza’s dynamic setup appeals to startups,
creative professionals and entrepreneurs
by offering inspiring workspaces that are
adaptable for various pursuits.
Gentry Corporate Plaza is a landmark
two-tower development in Makati’s Sal-
cedo Village. Located at one of the coun-
try’s most prestigious and cosmopolitan
addresses, the project merges residential,
business and lifestyle concepts into one
dynamic multi-use structure.
Alveo Financial Tower is Alveo’s flag-
ship office development in the Makati
CBD. Its location on Ayala Avenue, the
CBD’s main artery, offers seamless con-
nectivity to key areas throughout the city.
The 49-story tower is adjacent to Ayala’s
established City Gate development, a
bustling mixed-use hub.
Rising at an auspicious corner of Boni-
facio Global City, the 28-story Alveo Park
Triangle Tower is expected to stand as
another iconic landmark in this world-class
CBD. The tower completes the Park Trian-
gle District, a mixed-use development that
integrates premium residential with retail,
Broadfield Estate and dining outlets. With commercial
Alveo Financial Tower, Alveo Park Triangle Tower and Gentry Corporate Plaza
and complements its progressive work-
spaces with appealing lifestyle options.
Strategically positioned where key
transport corridors and economic hubs
converge, Ayala Land’s Arca South in
Taguig City is an up-and-coming central
business distric t that could soon rival
other CBDs for accessibility and stature.
Tryne Enterprise Plaza is a three-tower
office development that will underpin the
emerging district. Offering choice office
spaces for sale, the flexible configurations
appeal to businesses with an eye on future
expansion or reinvention.
Further afield, Ayala Land is opening up
a new economic hub with Broadfield, an
expansive estate in the Calabarzon region
just south of Metro Manila that is easily
reached via the Metro Luzon Urban Beltway.
This emerging growth center is sur-
rounded by burgeoning communi-
ties and industries and boasts some
of the fastest-appreciating land val-
ues in the country.
Broadfield’s masterplan reflects
a careful focus on sustainability and
quality of life. Verdant spaces are
interwoven with walkable and bike-
friendly streets lined with hip retail
lots for ownership on offer, Broadfield easily
attracts investors and entrepreneurs looking
for a healthy environment amid abundant
business opportunities in the South.
Alveo’s office and commercial properties
have the distinct advantage of being man-
aged by Ayala Property Management Cor-
poration (APMC). APMC’s commitment to
the highest standards of building manage-
ment has been proven across generations
as its expert property maintenance and ser-
vices adhere to the strictest building guide-
lines. This ensures peace of mind for inves-
tors and efficient operations for tenants.
“Beyond just the physical structure, design
and amenities, we have always been aware
of the value of first-rate management and
maintenance teams to uphold the value of
our developments,” says Robert Lao, Alveo
Land President. “Even during extraordinary
circumstances, Alveo makes sure that our
communities enjoy the utmost safety and
convenience under our care.”
www.alveoland.com.ph

6 Philippines
 F E AT U R E S

69

THE GREAT
RETAIL BY S T E V E N B E R T O N I
P H OTO G R A P H S BY J A M E L T O P P I N F O R F O R B E S

REINVENTION Amid the Covid carnage, a handful of innovators have finally figured out
how to compete against Amazon and sell in the 21st century.
Investors and consumers—and workers—are all winning.

Target CEO Brian Cornell

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

70

IN
F E AT U R E S

late February, Target CEO Brian Cornell was sipping cof-

fee in a Manhattan deli—one eye on the keynote address he
was soon to give at an investor conference, the other on his
phone as news alerts of America’s first confirmed Covid-19
death buzzed in.
Target’s communications, investor relations and special-
events teams had spent months agonizing over every detail
of the speech, given to 200 Wall Street analysts and jour-
nalists and able, in a matter of minutes, to send Target’s
stock price climbing—or crashing. Three years ago, Cornell,
61, who took over Target’s top spot in 2014 after running
Pepsi’s food business, had caused the company’s shares to
plunge 12% after analysts scoffed at his bid to counter Ama-
zon by investing $7 billion to upgrade Target’s then-1,800-
plus stores and raise worker wages.
Cornell’s contrarian moves had been paying off. Target’s
stock had nearly doubled since early 2017, but the Covid
news had him on edge. In early January, he had created a
task force to monitor the virus. Now it had come to Ameri-
ca. Cornell shelved the in-person conference and threw to-
gether a virtual one in 48 hours. “I’ll always remember how
I got only one question about the virus during the confer-
ence,” Cornell says, shaking his head. “And it was whether
Chinese production delays would impact our spring line.”
Within a few days, America started locking down, and the
retail landscape underwent a seismic shift. Panicked shop-
pers stripped stores of toilet paper, sanitizer, bleach and bot-
tled water. Amazon, overwhelmed by an enormous increase
in orders, floundered: Deliveries were delayed; shipments
of nonessential items became, well, nonessential. Negative
customer reviews went up 50%. So did allegations of price the second quarter, Target sales jumped by nearly 25% year-
gouging, with six-packs of Bounty paper towels going for over-year, to $23 billion, as online sales tripled, adding 10
nearly $60 and a tub of 75 Clorox wipes offered for $40. (An million new customers. Home Depot also grew about 25%,
Amazon spokesperson says, “Our systems are designed to to $38 billion, as its online sales doubled. Even at mighty
meet or beat the best available price amongst our competi- Walmart, where getting revenue to go up significantly is
tors, and if we see an error, we work quickly to fix it.”) akin to turning an aircraft carrier, online sales doubled and
With supply chains seizing up and Amazon temporarily drove a 6% year-over-year increase, to $140 billion.
stumbling, millions of customers gave other online stores a While no one foresaw the coronavirus, these sudden win-
shot. Smaller, savvy web retailers such as Wayfair and organ- ners had already been girding for the industry pandemic
ic food peddler Thrive Market saw business boom. Millions known as Amazon by embracing the one resource the
of mom-and-pop operations were finally compelled to move digital giant lacked—their thousands of physical stores. By
from storefront-heavy strategies to digital ones. Ditto luxury hardwiring digital shopping into their locations, Target,
retail, including brands such as Prada and Tory Burch. Walmart, Best Buy, Home Depot and Lowe’s transformed
No one took greater advantage than big-box retailers. In their stores, long viewed as expensive and fast-aging liabili-

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

Target CEO Brian Cornell at a new curbside pickup station in Sarasota,
Florida. “You can place an order, drive into over 1,500 parking lots and
our team member will walk out and put it in your trunk, contact-free.”
ties, into hyperlocal distribution hubs that are now power-
ing in-person and digital shopping alike. Early results were
looking good. In the wake of the Covid-19 outbreak, they
became great.
“We are within [16 kilometers] of most Americans,” says
Cornell, who saw same-day delivery demand nearly triple
and curbside pickup service soar 700%. For years, the re-
tail sector had been losing its way with customer service.
Yet this shift was an undeniable consumer benefit. “Target
has become truly convenient,” says Paul Trussell, Deutsche
Bank’s retail analyst. “It’s taken years of investment, but now
you can buy online, pick up in store or use their app to have
someone put the product right in the trunk of your car.”
So shoppers and shareholders have benefited. But some-
DECEMBER 2020
71
thing even more profound has occurred with a third set of TA RG E T
winners: workers. To say that high-stress, low-pay retail gigs
have lived at the bottom of the economic food chain is an
insult to plankton. In 2019, the median annual wage for a
retail worker was $25,250, with little upward mobility and
turnover rates running about 60% a year. All this dysfunc-
tion was subsidized by you, the taxpayer—the Economic Pol-
icy Institute estimates that more than 35% of retail workers
receive public assistance. Little wonder that no brick-and-
mortar retail company has ever before appeared on our Just
100 list, created in partnership with nonprofit Just Capital,
which spotlights America’s best corporate citizens.
But something happens when clerks and salespeople sud-
denly become essential frontline workers. In July, Target ac-
FORBES ASIA
 celerated a plan to raise its minimum wage by two dollars
to $15 an hour. Best Buy and Walmart soon followed—and
upped the ante, with Walmart pledging to pay some store
managers up to $30 an hour. Bonuses, paid sick days and
stricter safety measures came next. Yes, respect and con-
sumer demand prompted the wage hikes. More critically,
though, the stores of the 21st century need better-trained,
72 multitasking employees to make them run. “Our workforce
will need to evolve in a way that meets the needs of custom-
ers,” says Best Buy CEO Corie Barry.
F E AT U R E S
The result: Five brick-and-mortar retailers debut on the
2021 Just 100, led by Target at number 15. “As an essential
business, if we were going to take care of America,” CEO
Cornell says, “we had to take care of our team first.”
A
s in any pandemic, there have been vic-
tims. Long-suffering companies like JCPen-
ney, J.Crew, Bed Bath & Beyond and Pier 1,
none of whom shifted fast enough, have filed
for bankruptcy. At the same time, Target
shares are up 97% since their late-March low. Lowe’s is up
136%, Home Depot 82% and Best Buy 115%—all trouncing
the S&P 500’s 64% gain. Allowed to stay open while most
businesses were shuttered, these megamerchants absorbed
demand from millions of bored shoppers flush with nearly
$300 billion in stimulus checks and few places to spend it.
“All those dollars have to go somewhere,” says Citi analyst
Paul Lejuez.
FORBES ASIA
The victors, in this case, actually shared the spoils amid
something of an arms race for workers. Walmart, the
world’s largest private employer, raised wages, paid more
than $1 billion in bonuses and added 14 more annual paid
sick days. “Our emergency-leave policy has safeguarded up-
ward of hundreds of thousands of associates who knew that
they could take time off and be secure with their job,” says
Donna Morris, Walmart’s Chief People Officer.
Home Depot, too, has paid out $1 billion–plus in bonuses
and extended paid leave. “Spring is our Christmas season,
but we canceled all our promotions because we didn’t want
a traffic surge in our stores. Safety came before sales,” says
CEO Craig Menear. “We let our team know Home Depot
had their back. Take care of your workers, they take care of
your customers and the rest takes care of itself.”
In addition to Covid pay, corporations are investing re-
sources to promote racial equality and increase diversity. In
June, Walmart’s foundation pledged $100 million for a cen-
ter to promote health, education and training for underrep-
resented groups. People of color make up 47% of Walmart’s
1.4 million U.S. employees. Women represent 55% of its
workforce, including about half of store managers.
Target, whose Minneapolis headquarters sit less than six
kilometers from where George Floyd died, pledged to in-
crease the number of Black employees across the company
by 20%. Black staffers currently make up 15% of its work-
force. Among Target’s 350,000 employees, 50% are people
of color; 58% are women, accounting for nearly half of its
executives. “It’s important that our team, leaders and board
“If we were going to take care of
America, we had to take care of
our team first,” says Cornell.
DECEMBER 2020
reflect the 30 million–plus families we serve
each week,” Cornell says. “Diversity is critical to
bring that to life.”
Going all in on physical stores requires in-
vesting billions in employees. “You can be dig-
ital, but you’ve got to deliver digitally with a
human,” says Walmart’s Morris.
As stores become more digital and jobs
more complex, companies must increase pay
and perks to attract and keep employees. The
5 B I G - B OX L E S S O N S
FO R S M A L L R E TA I L E R S
FALL ONLINE: Use digital tech America,” Cornell says. “They
to turn your store into a local shop for you and bring the order
fulfillment center. “A vast major- right to your doorstep.” 73
ity of online orders are picked,
CHOICE PRODUCT: Curate or
prepped and packed at our
create high-quality and trendy

latter is extremely tricky (and expensive) in
an industry with such high job churn. “Your
employees must feel as much differentiation
working at Target as customers feel shopping
at Target,” says Brandon Fletcher, a retail ana-
lyst at Sanford C. Bernstein.
stores,” says Target CEO Brian
Cornell. “FedEx and UPS sweep
by to deliver it the last mile.”
PICKUP ARTISTS: Takeout isn’t
only for food anymore. “We had
high demand but had to limit in-
store traffic,” says Home Depot
CEO Craig Menear. “We started
curbside, which let us serve more
TA RG E T
things to help people shop with
speed and confidence. “Target
has one of the top product
teams in retail,” says Bernstein
analyst Brandon Fletcher. “They
have four brands that do around
$1 billion in sales that they built
from scratch.”

F
ew felt good about Target in SAFETY FIRST: Put customers at
customers without having them
2014 when Brian Cornell was ease by ensuring that everything
come into the building.”
is sparkling and sanitized. “Long
named CEO. At the company,
NEED FOR SPEED: Outpace before the CDC was talking
which traditionally promoted
Amazon with same-day delivery. about PPE, we were looking at
from within, he was an outsider During the pandemic, Target suppliers,” says Donna Morris,
in more ways than one. He grew up in Queens, has seen sales through Shipt, a Walmart’s Chief People Officer.
New York, under tough conditions. His fa- startup it bought in 2017, jump “We needed masks. We needed
ther died when he was in elementary school. 350%. “We have over 200,000 gloves. We needed an opera-
Heart disease put his mother out of work and Shipt personal shoppers across tional protocol.”
his family on welfare. Grandparents pitched
in; school and sports offered salvation. Cor-
nell graduated from UCLA in 1981 and spent
the next 30 years as retail’s version of a career
military officer, relocating 15 times as he climbed the corpo- is to hold the ground it has won during the pandemic. Big-
rate ladder at Tropicana, Gallo Wines, craft store Michaels, box retailers have found a formula that works—for now—
Sam’s Club and two different tours at PepsiCo. with lessons for smaller retailers and other industries.
He took over a Target in tatters. The previous year, a The challenge: what happens when government stimulus
data breach had exposed the credit-card numbers of 40 recedes and a stir-crazy country can return in full force to
million customers. Meanwhile, a poorly executed launch restaurants, bars, hotels and travel.
of 124 stores in Canada was racking up hundreds of mil- And then, of course, there’s Amazon, which remains the
lions in losses. Target, which had earned the upscale nick- elephant in every CEO’s home office. After its initial pan-
name “Tarjay” thanks to its high-quality products, was demic stumble, Amazon quickly hired more than 175,000
now saddled with shabby stores and stale brands. “They new employees and fortified its logistics network to get
were quickly going the way of Kmart,” says Barclays ana- back on track. Second-quarter sales (which include large
lyst Karen Short. “The stores were messy and out of stock. non-retail divisions like AWS and advertising) exploded
Employees were unhappy.” 40%. Even as these big-box retailers enjoy a stock boost,
Cornell acted quickly, jettisoning the Canadian business Amazon’s soaring valuation of $1.5 trillion is double the size
and selling a chain of pharmacies to CVS to focus on fixing of their market caps—combined. That gives it more than
the U.S. operation. The $7 billion plan that had sunk the enough firepower to compete and disrupt on every front.
stock in 2017 refreshed stores, gave customers new digital The pandemic and its impact on consumer habits have only
buying options and turned locations into warehouses for increased Amazon’s power and reach.
online orders. Target also launched dozens of fresh brands Cornell sees his edge both in his Tarjay cachet—and his
like clothing lines Goodfellow & Co. and Universal Thread. arsenal of thousands of upgraded stores. “A few years ago,
“Target’s whole existence is to sell stuff that wasn’t Walmart everyone said stores were obsolete. We took the other path,
fall-apart, but Target Tarjay,” Fletcher says. “Cornell went not because it was our opinion—it was what consumers
back to Target making really good stuff—good enough that were telling us,” he says. “Even during the pandemic, about
people again call it Tarjay.” 85% of all retail spending happened in stores. And now,
Whatever you call it, Target’s ability to sell high-quality I have 1,900 fulfillment centers across the country. That
stuff via a high-quality experience is crucial if the company speed is essential.”

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 INNOVATION
By Alex Knapp Photograph by Jamel Toppin for Forbes

74
Virus Fighter
AL IC E Z H A N G ’s “garbage chute” cellular research might soon help humans fight off
viral infections of all kinds, including—well, you know.

S
ome dispiriting news: For vi-
ruses that cause diseases like
Ebola, SARS and Covid-19, we
have nothing at all that works
like penicillin, a broad-spectrum
antibiotic that can combat dozens of bacterial
strains—even ones we haven’t discovered yet.
Finding something similar for viruses has been
the Holy Grail of drug research for decades.
That could all change soon, though, thanks to
the work of Alice Zhang, a member of the Forbes
30 Under 30 for Science in 2017. Her company,
San Francisco-based Verge Genomics, has spent
years working on a treatment for ALS, the dev-
astating neurological ailment also known as Lou
Gehrig’s disease. As it turns out, variations of her
ALS drug might be effective against Covid-19—
and other viruses as well.
“That’s important,” Zhang says, “because we
really need drugs that we can stockpile to prevent
the exact situation we’re in right now.” Several
varieties of Verge’s drug candidate “were quite
highly effective” against the novel coronavirus
in tests run by the Massachusetts Consortium
on Pathogen Readiness, according to Dr. Mark
Namchuk, one of the group’s research leads.
The big caveat: What works in the lab doesn’t
always work in the human body. Fewer than 10%
of promising drug candidates make it to market,
and the success rate for repurposing drugs is
roughly the same. Verge’s drug repairs a “garbage
chute” within cells that recycle waste. With a dis-
ease like ALS, this process “goes haywire” in the
nervous system, Zhang says. But viruses also use
it to invade and infect cells. Targeting the “gar-
bage chute” stops viruses from getting in, thereby
halting infection.
Zhang’s next step is to partner with a larger
pharmaceutical company to start clinical trials,
which will likely begin in early 2021. If it pans
out, she says, it could be “a frontline defense
against future viral outbreaks.”

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020


MALAYSIA:
Faced with the greatest economic challenge to the country since gaining independence in 1957,
Malaysia is firmly focused on recovery.
In its latest report on Malaysia’s economy,
the central bank noted GDP improved sig-
nificantly, marking a smaller contraction of
2.7% in the third quarter compared with the
17.1% dip the previous quarter. The govern-
ment expects the rebound will continue,
projecting the economy will grow up to
7.5% next year.
According to the Ministry of Finance
(MoF), production and trade picked up
over July to September, combined with a
rise in private consumption, while unem-
ployment fell over the same period. Mean-
while, stimulus packages unveiled by the
government to ease the economic fallout
from Covid-19 are expected to contribute
over four percentage points to the nation’s
GDP growth.
Malaysia has moved quickly to acceler-
ate digital adoption by businesses, educa-
tion and society. This will help the nation’s
industries, from manufacturing, healthcare,
electrical and electronics to e-commerce,
support the country’s recovery.
Amid a global call for more medical pro-
tective gear, which increases competition
PROMOTION
PUSHING AHEAD
in the market, Top Glove, the world’s larg-
est rubber glove maker, believes it can stay
ahead of the game. Not content to rest on
its laurels, Top Glove’s goal is to continue to
dominate global market share—solidifying
its No. 1 status in the rubber glove indus-
try—and become one of the world’s top
500 companies by 2035.
Silverlake Group is another homegrown
company that intends to push ahead
with expansion plans. Its revenue rose to
US$161 million in the year ended in June,
with a compound annual growth rate of
8% since 2011.
Math is the basis for its latest cloud com-
puting solutions as the company helps its
customers detect, manage and combat
fraud in the banking, finance and insurance
industries. Silverlake Group is poised for
further growth in 2021 on the back of its
partnership with an institutional investor.
Going regional is also on the cards
for BookDoc. The five-year-old medtech
star tup is ramping up its business to
expand its footprint by complementing its
patient-doctor booking system and health-
metrics monitoring system with chat-based
medical teleconsultations.
The company has tied up with China’s
WeDoctor, a global healthcare platform
that boasts 700 million users. BookDoc uses
WeDoctor’s AI technology to screen calls and
offer teleconsultation services to patients in
its ecosystem seeking advice for a range of
medical concerns, including Covid-19.
Moving forward, the central bank believes
the economy will improve in tandem with
stronger global demand and domestic
policy support that includes government-
targeted wage subsidies, public projects
and low interest rates. It also anticipates the
economic impact of Covid-19 containment
measures reintroduced in October will be
less severe compared with earlier restric-
tions as businesses have been allowed to
continue to operate.
Noting that Malaysia’s economic funda-
mentals are still strong and its economic
base is sufficiently diversified to weather
the storm, the MoF says it will continue to
closely work with the private sector and the
public to foster sustainable growth in 2021.
Malaysia 1
 PROMOTION

TOP GLOVE:
ACCELERATED GROWTH AMID THE PANDEMIC
The world’s largest rubber glove manufacturer sets bigger goals as it steps up production
to meet rising global demand.

Since the beginning of the year 2020, Top

Glove, the world’s largest manufacturer of
rubber, nitrile and surgical gloves, has seen
its shares increase more than fourfold on
Malaysia’s main stock exchange thanks to
a surge in global demand for personal pro-
tective equipment following the coronavi-
rus outbreak.
Some investors, however, may question
whether there is still room for growth given
that a vaccine is expected to be available for
distribution by 2021, according to the World
Health Organization.

Share Value
“Our share value is nowhere near its peak,”
says Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai, Executive
Chairman and Founder of Top Glove. “For
this year and 2021, we expect demand to
increase by 20% to 25%. Post-pandemic,
it should stabilise at around 15%, which is
higher than pre-pandemic. There is a lot of
potential for growth as rubber gloves are an
essential item in the healthcare industry.”
“For the financial year ending 2021, ana-
lysts have projected our company’s aftertax
profit to be around US$2 billion, compared
with this year’s profit of US$500 million,”
he adds.
Hong Kong Listing
Already listed in Malaysia and Singapore,
the Malaysia-based company is eyeing the
Hong Kong stock exchange next.
“Our track record is proven. Investors
who bought our shares back in 2001 when
we listed in Malaysia would have seen the
value increase by 400 times to date,” Lim
says. “Similarly, those who bought our
shares when we listed in Singapore four
years ago would have seen the value grow
by 10 times.
“Our annual compound growth rate
in terms of revenue is about 23%, which
is more than double the overall [industry]
market growth of 10%.”
“We are confident that we will per-
form even bet ter on the Hong Kong
stock exchange, which has a market capi-
talization of US$5.36 trillion. We hope
to raise US$2 billion to fuel the com-
pany’s organic growth, which includes
Tan Sri Dr Lim Wee Chai, Executive Chairman and Founder of Top Glove
bu y ing more f ac tor ie s and mac hin -
er y to cope with growing demand for
our products.”
As the call for protective wear increases,
more companies are moving into the rub-
ber glove business. Shrugging it off, Lim
says, “We would be more worried if there
are no competitors. However, the glove
business is both challenging and competi-
tive. When we started 20 years ago, there
were 200 glove manufacturing companies,
but only about 50 are still around today.”
Labor Issues
Commenting on allegations of forced
labor by the U.S. Customs and Border
Protec tion (CBP), Lim says, “We have
submitted an independent audit report
to the CBP and will be making remedia-
tion payment of about US$32 million to
more than 11,000 migrant workers. We
hope to work with the CBP to clear the
matter soon.”
He adds, “We take employee well-
being seriously and there is a team of full-
time professionals within the company,
including doc tors, nurses, nutrition-
ists and counsellors, who look after our
21,000 employees.
The Future
“Moving forward, our goal is to grow the
company twentyfold and be on the list of
the world’s top 500 companies by 2035.
To do that, we need to continually source
for talents, especially for our research and
development unit, and increase invest-
ment in automation and robotics to boost
production capacity. Currently, we are
diversifying with more product offerings
like face masks and other medical protec-
tion devices, and are looking out for merg-
ers, acquisitions or joint ventures that sync
well with our current operations,” Lim says.
www.topglove.com

2 Malaysia
 PROMOTION

SILVERLAKE GROUP:
OPPORTUNITIES IN A CHALLENGING YEAR
Founder Goh Peng Ooi shares his thoughts on how Covid-19 will impact the company and the financial industry,
and the plans he has in place to make his business more competitive.

The coronavirus pandemic has taken the

spotlight for most of this year, and the
global economy is facing one of the worst
economic downturns in decades.
Most businesses—from multibillion-
dollar airlines to mom-and-pop establish-
ments—have been hard hit, and many
employees lost their jobs as a result of
the crisis. There have been over 58 million
cases of Covid-19 confirmed worldwide,
and more than 1.3 million deaths.
The financial sector has not been spared
from the pandemic, with many Asian banks
posting lower earnings due to reduced
loan volumes amid slower business activ-
ity. Silverlake Group, whose clients com-
prise many of the top banks in Asia, also
registered a drop in revenue.

A Silver Lining
However, Goh Peng Ooi, Founder and
Group Executive Chairman of Silverlake
Group, a company that is known for pro-
viding core banking software and other
solutions to banks, insurance, fintech,
retail companies and governments, sees a
silver lining during the pandemic.
Its core banking solution, which is a
key building block of infrastructure in the
financial economy, is essential in helping
banks to adjust to the new normal, he says.
Simply put, banks in the region, which are
largely still profitable despite weaker earn-
ings, will likely continue to need Silverlake
Axis’s core banking solutions.
“Covid-19 is not going to kill banking.
In fact, it is going to accelerate banking
transformation,” Goh says.
There’s a saying that behind every cri-
sis, lies an opportunity, and Goh believes
Silverlake Group can be a beneficiary of
“Covid-19 is not going to kill banking. In fact, it is
going to accelerate banking transformation.”
— GOH PENG OOI, FOUNDER AND GROUP EXECUTIVE CHAIRMAN,
SILVERLAKE GROUP
Goh Peng Ooi, Founder and Group Executive Chairman of Silverlake Group
when the going gets tough for the bank-
ing industry. “If the banks are compelled
to merge, this will also be very good for
us,” Goh says. “We are very good at inte-
grating core systems when banks com-
bine. It is a very complex exercise, and it
requires the right resources, the know-
how, and the ability to do it on time.”
Goh adds that the year has allowed
Silverlake Group to focus on reorganiz-
ing and consolidation.
Before the pandemic hit, Silverlake
Group’s por t folio of 13 0 com panie s
repor ted direc tly to the head of fice,
including Silverlake Axis, which is listed
on the Singapore E xchange. Under a
reorganization carried out earlier this
year, these companies were consoli-
dated into one of three units: banking
and finance, insurance, and Mathemati-
cal Intelligence (MI) Cloud.
Mathematics-Driven Future
Two years before Goh founded Silverlake
Group in 1990, he worked on a math-
ematical proposition that banking and
finance was an example of group the-
or y. Since then, Goh has applied that
and other mathematic al theorie s to
grow the group’s operations, including
category theory, specifically topoi.
Goh, a pas sionate mathematical
thinker, believes the key behind Silverlake
Group’s success is mathematics, and it
will remain so in the future.
“If you want to run a good company,
the right thing to do is to use math-
ematics and struc ture it in such a way
that it can respond to any type of situa-
tion,” Goh says.
O ve r t h e p a s t d e c a d e, S il ve r la ke
Group has grown significantly. Its listed
entity Silverlake A xis saw revenue rise
to US$161 million in the financial year
ended in June, with a compound annual

4 Malaysia
 PROMOTION

APPLICATIONS AND SOLUTIONS ENABLED BY MI CLOUD

An illustration on the possible applications and solutions that are enabled by MI Cloud, such as Data Management, Boundary
Management and Dynamic Artificial Intelligence. End users who can benefit from MI Cloud include those in banking and finance,
healthcare and insurance, retail and e-commerce, and education.

growth rate of 8% since 2011. Net profit
was US$45 million with earnings increas-
ing 4% over the same period.
This grow th was due in par t to the
group’s evolving business model; more
than two-thirds of its annual revenue is
recurring revenue, with high profit margins.
One of the areas that Goh sees strong
growth potential is the group’s new MI
Cloud division.
Using mathematics, the company is
able to build MI Cloud solutions to help
banks and businesses analyze operational
data efficiently and accurately, detect
fraud, manage risks, understand custom-
ers better, and even predict future trends.
“You can use mathematics to predict
what is going to happen but mathemat-
ic s c annot predic t exac tly when it is
going to happen,” Goh says.
Although Silverlake Group’s MI Cloud
solutions were introduced this year, Goh
says the platform is the result of more
than two decades of work and invest-
ment. “A substantial portion of the divi-
dends I received from Silverlake A xis
were used to construct the MI Cloud that
we have today,” says Goh, who indirectly
owns over 68% of Silverlake Axis.
He adds the company did not rush
into launching MI Cloud, as he wanted
to wait for the right time to be certain
that it could pass the necessary “stress
tests.” It has offered MI Cloud solutions
to end users in the banking and educa-
tion sectors for free since 2008, so that
the company could ensure the platform
was secure, scalable and simple to use.
“ W hy s t a r t w i t h ba n k ing [w i t h MI
Cloud]? It is because we wanted to start
with the toughest and most mission crit-
ical applications first,” he says.
Ushering In a New Era
This year will also be the year when Silverlake
Group begins to transform itself from a
single-leader organization to institutional
leadership. “We are signing up with a
fund, and they are coming in to invest [in
Silverlake Group],” Goh says.
The participation of the fund is impor-
tant, Goh says, as it will help Silverlake
Group to be more competitive globally.
T he group has prod uced ver y good
technology over the years, but that in
itself will not take the company to the
next level, he explains.
“With the fund coming in, we are try-
ing to create a group that is very good
in technology, and at the same time
have deep pockets,” he says. “Also, the
fund will not view Silverlake Group as a
Goh Peng Ooi company, but instead it
will look at it as an investment and will
manage it from an institution or invest-
ment point of view.”
Moving forward, Goh says Silverlake
Group will o per ate muc h more ef fi-
c ie ntl y, w i t h eac h of t he t hre e c ore
groups (banking and finance, insurance
and MI Cloud) to be run by people spe-
cialized in their particular field.
“Essentially, what this means is that our
people will be able to serve our custom-
ers better, come up with products much
faster, and be more focused,” he says.
Public: www.silverlakeaxis.com
Private: www.silverlakegroup.com

Malaysia 5
 PROMOTION

BOOKDOC:
EXPANDING INTO TELEHEALTH CARE
The medtech startup has pivoted to adapt to the challenges brought by Covid-19 through
new partnerships at home and abroad.

It may be cliché to say there’s never a bet-

ter time to be in healthcare, but it is true
when it comes to healthcare platform
BookDoc and its Founder and CEO, Dato’
Chevy Beh.
“No one in the world was prepared for
what has taken place in 2020,” says Beh.
“Healthcare around the world, and espe-
cially for us here in Southeast Asia, has
been changed forever. While I take no joy
in what has happened, I see BookDoc as
a part of the broader cog in the wheel to
help people take control of their health
during this unprecedented period.”
The healthcare platform began its jour-
ney five years ago in Malaysia, connect-
ing individual patients with medical care
professionals of their choice. Through its
namesake app, the company created a
sustainable ecosystem between doctors,
individual and corporate patients, and the
insurance industry.
Since then, BookDoc has expanded Dato’ Chevy Beh, Founder and CEO, BookDoc
its presence to Hong Kong, Thailand,
Singapore and Indonesia. In Malaysia, it to monitor patients around the clock and Beh. “By partnering with WeDoctor, our
continues to grow its portfolio of partner help them make better decisions through patients on the BookDoc platform can text
organizations that include the Ministry of regular updates about their health. chat with doctors and get expert opinions
Education, the Royal Malaysia Police and from the WeDoctor platform.”
the Malaysian Army. The WeDoctor Advantage The arrival of Covid-19 pushed the
It also has promoted advances in wear- In a timely pivot, BookDoc added tele- companies to tweak their plans, he says.
able technology, such as smart watches, health consultation services to its expand- As the coronavirus spread worldwide, the
ing portfolio of services this two companies discussed how they could
year. The company partnered serve the greater good and agreed to
with WeDoctor Holdings in add Covid-19 to their list of consultative
May, a Hangzhou, China- services.
based, healthtech platform Beh notes that in the early days of the
found e d in 2 010 by L iao pandemic, not much was known about
Jieyuan. The Tencent-backed the disease and many healthcare systems
company has more than 700 were overwhelmed with new Covid-19
million users and of fers a cases. The collaboration between the two
range of services including companies has helped lessen the burden
online consultations with of healthcare providers in the region by
medical professionals. providing real-time telehealth consulta-
“ We had b e e n in c on - tions to patients.
ver sation with WeDoc tor “The par tnership was beneficial for
for some time to offer tele- both companies as WeDoctor wanted to
health consultation services enter Southeast Asia and BookDoc was
for a range of areas such as able to provide these services in the five
mental and reproduc tive countries we operate in,” he says. “What’s
health, issues that may be great about partnering with WeDoctor
BookDoc ties up with WeDoctor to offer uncomfortable for some to is that its platform has built-in, advanced
teleconsultation services. talk about in person,” says machine learning algorithms that can help

6 Malaysia

with initial queries and answer them with-
out human intervention.
“The plat form is also multilingual,
user-friendly to navigate, and free of
charge to use. Only when patients have
more complicated questions will they
be directed to actual doctors for further
follow-up advice.”
Home Care Responsibility
Over the years, BookDoc has continued
to expand its partnership ecosystem and
widened its service offerings with a num-
ber of healthcare entities, including gov-
ernment agencies. For example, during
the height of the Covid-19 national move-
ment restrictions, BookDoc partnered
with Malaysia’s Ministr y of Youth and
Sports to help competitive athletes stay fit
by integrating their exercise routines onto
the BookDoc platform. Coaches were
able to get automatic updates of athletes’
at-home workouts through the BookDoc
app, Beh explains.
He adds that BookDoc has expanded
its ongoing collaboration with the Min-
istry of Health by providing new services
available to Malaysians. “We began host-
ing webinars on BookDoc every day from
9:00 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. on topics pertaining
to Covid-19. We started virtual telehealth
consultations, where patients can seek a
quick consultation should they suspect
any symptom of Covid-19. The doctors
can screen the affected patients quickly
and appropriate measures can be taken
to limit further contamination.
“We also developed a queue-manage-
ment system, where patients are asked
to register on BookDoc to schedule their
next appointment, which helped govern-
ment hospitals manage queues and prac-
tice social distancing, Beh says.
Through BookDoc, patients can book to get a Covid-19 test at home.
PROMOTION
Malaysian athletes use BookDoc’s app to stay fit when Covid-19 restrictions
was enforced.
The Ministry of Health selected BookDoc staff and enable them to work from home.
as the booking platform through which At the same time, BookDoc is an essential
users could set up appointments for con- service and it needed to keep its business
venient, at-home Covid-19 testing instead running smoothly by ensuring its call cen-
of having to visit a hospital, he adds. ters were optimally staffed.
“Some companies cut their
losses during tough economic
“Some companies cut their times but not us, as we decided
to turn our headwind to become
losses during tough economic a tailwind,” he says. “We had to
times but not us, as we decided work ex tra hour s to embrace
and change with the times and
to turn our headwind to capitalize on our resources to
become a tailwind.” reach out to bigger markets to
— DATO’ CHEVY BEH, FOUNDER AND CHIEF increase our penetration and
EXECUTIVE OFFICER, BOOKDOC product offerings.”
Beh says hard work has led to
the firm’s successes. Last year it
Upcoming Plans was included on CNBC Upstart 100, a list
As a startup in the medtech space, the showcasing the brightest, most intriguing,
35 -year-old says his company wasn’t young startups.
immune to the impact of Covid-19. BookDoc “We are very proud of this as we were
had to comply with Malaysia’s movement the only Asia-based medical technology
restriction order, set up standard operat- company included on the list, and this
ing procedures to ensure the safety of its validates the plans and directions we’ve
taken,” Beh says. “In 2021, we plan to go
even further with WeDoctor as we lever-
age its expertise more. We also plan to
expand our ecosystem further by part-
nering with any healthcare-based entities
that see us as the one-stop shop of digital
healthcare services in Southeast Asia.”
www.bookdoc.com
Malaysia 7
 INNOVATION
By Leah Rosenbaum Photograph by Christian Peacock for Forbes

82
Health vs. Wealth
The world is awash in cheap antibiotics. So why is biotech billionaire
BOB D U GGAN trying to make a new one—and how can he possibly make money from it?

B Bob Duggan could easily have

called it a career in 2015, after he sold Pharma-
cyclics, his cancer-drug biotech, to AbbVie. He
was 71 years old and worth some $3 billion. He
might well have retreated to his house in Costa
Rica, with its giant mural of a green-eyed jag-
uar cub, and lived out the rest of his life on the
beach, surfing and reading books about Scien-
tology. But Duggan, now 76, rejects the idea of
retirement. “It’s indigenous in every human to
want to make a difference, to exercise their abil-
ity and capability,” he says. “It has nothing to do
with age.”
Summit Therapeutics
CEO Bob Duggan has
given more than $500
million to Scientology
over the years but
says he doesn’t “in-
troduce religion into
business.”

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

 In April, Duggan became the CEO of Summit Thera-
peutics by buying more than 60% of the Nasdaq-traded
company for about $63 million. Summit, which was
founded in 2003 but has yet to post any meaningful rev-
enue, is developing a new antibiotic for the common but
deadly infection Clostridioides difficile (C. diff), which is
spread by fecal matter and is often acquired in hospitals
and nursing homes. C. diff itself causes extreme diarrhea
and, in severe cases, organ failure and death. Every year
almost a quarter-million Americans are infected with C.
diff, and 13,000 die.
It’s a noble place for Duggan to try to make a difference,
but it’s also a difficult one. Nobody disputes that antibiot-
ics are one of the great success stories of the 20th century.
Before penicillin was discovered in 1928, infectious dis-
eases were the leading cause of death in America, and life
expectancy at birth was just 58 years. Antibiotics changed
everything. With cheap treatments widely available for
everything from tuberculosis to pneumonia, a child born
in Cleveland yesterday can expect to live to be nearly 80.
But there are two main problems with antibiotics today.
First, the economics: There are a lot of different antibiot-
ics already on the market, almost all inexpensive generics.
Amoxicillin, for instance, was introduced in 1973 and is
one of the most commonly prescribed antibiotics in the
world. Off-patent for decades, it now costs less than a dol-
lar per pill and is highly effective. Given that it takes about
$1.3 billion to develop a new drug, hardly anyone is even
trying to make novel antibiotics anymore. There’s no easy
way to recoup the expense.
Compounding the difficulty is a scientific problem. Bac-
teria mutate and evolve quickly. That means the bacte-
rial strains that are resistant to being killed by a specific
antibiotic survive and spread. To treat patients infected
with bacteria resistant to a certain antibiotic, a different
one needs to be administered. Therefore, when a new an-
tibiotic is finally developed, “doctors reserve it for very se-
vere cases because of resistance,” says Samir Devani, the
ANTIBIOTIC DEVELOPMENT
IS USUALLY NOT WORTH IT
FOR BIG PHARMA COMPANIES,
AND THE SMALL FIRMS THAT
STILL DEVELOP THEM ARE
STRUGGLING.
DECEMBER 2020
founder of Rx Securities, a life sciences–oriented invest-
ment bank based in London. “What that means commer-
cially is that these new antibiotics get put in the cupboard,
and they’re not used.” 83
The result: Antibiotic development is usually not
worth it for big pharma companies, and the small firms
that still develop them are struggling. Two of Summit’s
I N N OVAT I O N
peers, Achaogen (of which Duggan owned a 15% stake)
and Melinta Therapeutics, filed for bankruptcy in the
past 18 months. Only 25 new antibiotics have been ap-
proved over the last 20 years, most of which are deriva-
tives of existing drugs.
None of this deters Duggan, a committed Scientolo-
gist with a history of investing in underdogs and coming
out on top. He started investing in his early 20s while
studying business administration at UCLA. “I started
my investment career with about $5,000,” he says, “and
within a year and a half I had half a million dollars.” One
of the first companies he invested in was Sunset Designs,
the maker of Jiffy Stitchery needlepoint kits, which was
sold to British consumer-goods giant Reckitt Benckiser
Group for $15 million in the mid-1980s. Next came in-
vestments in a bakery chain, an ethernet firm and a busi-
ness that designed robotic surgical instruments. In 2008,
Duggan became the CEO at Pharmacyclics, a penny-
stock biotech.
Then, finally, the billion-dollar break. A drug in Phar-
macyclics’ pipeline, Imbruvica, turned out to be a block-
buster treatment for B-cell cancers, including chronic
lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), one of the most common
forms of leukemia in adults. That led directly to the $21
billion acquisition by AbbVie.
As at Pharmacyclics, the fate of Summit lies in one
drug: ridinilazole, a new antibiotic for treating C. diff
which is being tested head-to-head against the generic
gold standard, vancomycin. In a recent Phase 2 clinical
trial, ridinilazole was found to be not only superior to
vancomycin in treating C. diff, but also possibly able to
prevent recurrence of disease. If Summit can prove that
ridinilazole not only treats but also prevents illness bet-
ter than the best current option, hospitals could charge a
premium for the drug.
Alan Carr, a biotech analyst at Needham, thinks that if
any new antibiotic has a shot at success, ridinilazole may
be it. “There is a fairly attractive market opportunity for
C. diff,” Carr says, noting that the price for ridinilazole
will likely be higher because it is a pill, not an intravenous
drug, which means it can also be prescribed to patients
outside a hospital. But “I don’t think it’s a billion-dollar
drug. I think it can be a few hundred million, but I don’t
think it’s a blockbuster.” For Duggan, it all boils down to
the simplest wisdom: “How can you not make money if
you deliver what patients need?”
FORBES ASIA
84

Joby Aviation founder

JoeBen Bevirt with the final
prototype of his electric
tiltrotor aircraft, the
product of 11 years of work,
nearly all of which was
engineered in-house.
 INNOVATION
By Jeremy Bogaisky
Your Flying Car Is
Finally Here
With nearly a billion dollars in funding, J OBY AVI AT I O N promises
to have its air taxis aloft by 2023.
J
JoeBen Bevirt first thought
about building an airplane that could take off and land
like a helicopter in second grade while trudging up the
7km road to his family’s home in an off-grid hippie settle-
ment among the redwoods in Northern California. “It was
a lonnnnng hill,” Bevirt says, laughing. “It made me dream
about a better way.”
Four decades later, Bevirt is closing in on that goal. On
a ranch outside Santa Cruz, California, the surfing mag-
net near where he grew up, Bevirt has secretively devel-
oped an electric airplane with six tilting propellers that he
says can carry a pilot and four passengers almost 400 ki-
lometers at up to 320 km/h, while being quiet enough to
disappear among the hum of city life. He envisions the as-
yet-unnamed aircraft, which experts speculate could cost
$400,000 to $1.5 million to manufacture, as the founda-
tion for a massive rooftop-to-rooftop air-taxi network—
one he plans to build and run himself. His aspiration is to
free urbanites from snarled roads and save a billion people
an hour a day at a cost (he hopes) on par with booking an
UberX, or about $1.60 per kilometer.
It sounds crazy, but Bevirt, 47, has some powerful be-
lievers. Toyota pumped roughly $400 million into his Joby
Aviation in January, joining investors including Laurene
Powell Jobs and Jeff Skoll’s Capricorn Investment Group,
which was also an early Tesla backer. In all, Joby has raised
DECEMBER 2020
Photograph by Ethan Pines for Forbes
85
$745 million, most recently at a valuation of $2.6 billion.
Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda told Bevirt he hopes, through
Joby, to realize the flying-car dreams of his grandfather
Kiichiro, Toyota Motors’ founder, who developed aircraft
before World War II.
Joby is the best-funded and most valuable of an explo-
sion of startups leveraging advances in batteries and elec-
tric motors to try to wean aviation off fossil fuels and cre-
ate new types of aircraft, including autonomous ones, to
serve as air taxis. No one knows how big the industry could
get—or if it will get off the ground at all—but Wall Street
is spitballing some big numbers. One report from Morgan
Stanley estimates the category could generate $674 billion
a year in fares worldwide by 2040.
“If we can fly, we can turn our streets into parks and fun-
damentally make our cities much nicer places to live in,”
Bevirt says.
Dreamers have been trying (and failing) to build flying
cars for 100 years. Skeptics think Joby and its competitors
are still at least a decade too early: Today’s best batteries
pack 14 times less usable energy by weight than jet fuel.
Given how much brute power is needed to propel an air-
craft straight up, they say, until batteries improve, electric
air taxis will have too little range and carrying capacity to
make business sense. Then there’s the tough task of con-
vincing regulators they’ll be safe to fly.
Bevirt says he can produce a viable, safe aircraft now
with the top-of-the-line lithium-ion battery cells that cur-
rently power electric cars. And Joby is the only startup to
commit to Uber’s ambitious timeline of launching an ur-
ban air-taxi service in 2023. Bevirt says he’s on track to
win safety certification from the Federal Aviation Admin-
istration that year, which would likely make Joby the first
electric air-taxi maker to clear that daunting hurdle.
Bevirt was raised in a back-to-the-land community in
which he got an early education in engineering, helping
fix farm equipment and building homes alongside his fa-
ther, Ron Bevirt, who was one of the LSD-tripping Mer-
ry Pranksters back in the 1960s. (JoeBen is named after a
FORBES ASIA
 character in Sometimes a Great Notion, written by Prank-
sters ringleader Ken Kesey, famous for One Flew Over the
Cuckoo’s Nest.)
As an adult, Bevirt re-created that community with a
decidedly capitalistic twist on his secluded 178 hectares of
woodlands and meadows overlooking the Pacific. The prop-
86 erty, which he purchased with the proceeds from selling
earlier businesses—such as Velocity11, which built liquid-
handling robots used for testing potential drugs, and the
company behind GorillaPod, a flexible camera tripod—in-
cludes a former quarry where Bevirt conducted test flights.
Employees have lived in small cottages on the property and
built houses nearby. Before locking in on developing an
aircraft, he incubated other startups there, with everyone
working together in a cavernous barn. Bevirt started an or-
ganic farm to feed them, with chickens and bees yielding
eggs and honey, and hired a chef to prepare it all.
“It’s a high-fiving, hugging culture, and that really flows
from JoeBen,” says Jim Adler, managing director at Toyo-
ta AI Ventures, who convinced his colleagues to invest in
Joby in 2017. “He’s high-energy, and it’s contagious.”
While Joby is participating in Uber’s aerial ride-sharing
plans, a big part of Bevirt’s business model involves run-
ning his own ride-sharing network. That helped attract
investors. “If it was just a vehicle, I would not have been
moved to invest if there wasn’t a service wrapped around
it,” Adler says.
Building the required landing pads, booking software
and other infrastructure, though, will require a lot more
FORBES ASIA
cash—and patience—from investors. Joby has no plans to
sell its aircraft outside of building its own fleet, further de-
laying the day when investors can recoup the billions re-
quired to scale up.
Joby’s five-seat design boosts its revenue potential for
ride sharing compared to the smaller, more mechanical-
ly simple two-seat multicopters being developed by Ger-
many’s Volocopter and China’s EHang. The downside of
Joby’s size: weight. A big part of that heft comes from the
batteries, and it’s unclear if they’ll have enough juice to do
the job, according to modeling by the lab of Carnegie Mel-
lon battery expert Venkat Viswanathan, based on aircraft
specs Bevirt shared with Forbes.
For Joby to achieve the 240km range it says the 2,180kg
gross weight aircraft is capable of (but has yet to achieve in
flight testing), plus FAA-required reserves, Viswanathan’s
team estimates it needs a 1,000kg battery pack. Subtract-
ing roughly 450 kilograms for five passengers leaves only
about 730 kilograms for the airframe, seats and avion-
ics—a slim 33% of gross weight. That’s 35% lower than
any certified production airplane. The upshot: Either Joby
has built an unprecedentedly light and efficient airframe,
as Bevirt maintains, or its range will turn out to be lower.
Another concern: Getting approval from the FAA might
require safety tweaks that weigh it down.
“What we’re doing, it’s an insanely hard undertaking,”
Bevirt says. “Not only the technical challenge of the air-
craft [but] then changing the way everyone on Earth
moves around on a daily basis.”
Joby’s aircraft has six propulsion units that enable it to stay aloft
even if a motor fails. The propeller blades are shaped to make it
quieter than a helicopter when taking off or landing vertically, and
virtually silent when tilted forward in flight.
TREVOR JOLIN
DECEMBER 2020

INDONESIA:
POSITIONED FOR RECOVERY
The government is putting in place measures to combat the pandemic as well as boost
the country’s long-term growth.
In the face of a once-in-a-generation crisis,
Indonesia is proactively taking steps to miti-
gate the impact of the coronavirus on its
people and economy.
Among other steps, the government has
rolled out a series of measures to support
hard-hit businesses and industries. These
include 35.3 trillion rupiah (US$2.26 billion)
in new tax incentives for 18 sectors such as
tourism, food and beverage, and healthcare.
The authorities have also expanded social
assistance programs for low-income citizens
across the country to help them meet their
basic needs and maintain their purchasing
power.
Meanwhile, the recently approved Omni-
bus Law on Job Creation is expected to make
it easier to do business in Indonesia by cut-
ting red tape, easing restrictions on foreign
investment and providing more incentives to
free-trade zones. According to Fitch Ratings,
the new law should significantly enhance the
business climate and improve the country’s
international competitiveness over time if the
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
changes are fully realized.
In particular, the reforms will help Indone-
sia capitalize on shifts in global manufactur-
ing supply chains. Many multinationals are
looking to diversify their supply chains in
response to uncertainties created by ongo-
ing U.S.-China trade tensions. Some have
relocated operations to Indonesia in recent
years, and the new measures introduced by
the government are aimed at accelerating
this trend.
“We believe that the law will bolster Indo-
nesia’s long-term economic growth pros-
pects. All else being equal, faster growth
would have a positive effect on the sover-
eign’s public debt metrics, boosting fiscal
inflows and reducing debt-to-GDP ratios,” said
Fitch in its October report.
“Perhaps more importantly, the potential
boost in Indonesia’s manufacturing exports
and FDI inflows could make the country less
dependent on commodity exports and on
portfolio flows to finance its current-account
deficit.”
State-owned enterprises such as Pertamina
continue to play their part in supporting eco-
nomic growth. The energy giant has a key
role in developing Indonesia’s energy secu-
rity and self-sufficiency. According to Nicke
Widyawati, President Director and CEO of
Pertamina, the company not only seeks
profit, but also to serve as an engine of eco-
nomic expansion and a driving force for the
growth of the country’s small and midsized
businesses.
On the manufacturing front, Indonesian
corporates such as apparel maker Pan Broth-
ers continue to keep their production lines
running to meet global demand. The com-
pany’s targeted production capacity in 2021
is 130 million garment pieces annually.
Over the longer term, Indonesia’s plans to
focus on infrastructure—including new air-
ports, power plants and transportation proj-
ects—and the booming digital economy will
help fuel the country’s growth in the post-
crisis period and lead to new opportunities
for businesses and investors.
Indonesia 1

PERTAMINA:
ENERGIZING THE NATION
Indonesia’s national energy company is a driving force for the country’s economic prosperity.
Pertamina is an Indonesian state-owned inte-
grated energy company engaged in the pro-
duction and distribution of oil, gas and renew-
able energy. The company plays an important
role as the guardian of Indonesia’s energy
security, self-sufficiency and sovereignty. With
millions of people affected by its wide range
activities, Petamina has become a national
economic locomotive: It not only significantly
contributes to the country’s growth but it also
underpins an integrated business ecosystem.
“As a state-owned enterprise, Pertamina
not only seeks profit, but also serves as an
engine of national economic growth and a
driving force for the growth of the country’s
small and medium-sized enterprises,” says
Nicke Widyawati, President Director and CEO
of Pertamina. The company also supports the
development of Indonesia’s frontier, remote
and outermost regions, known as 3T.
2 Indonesia
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
Pertamina Hulu Energi's offshore operations in the North Java Sea.
Pertamina aims to become a US$ 100 bil-
lion company and a global energy leader by
2026. To achieve this, it underwent a corporate
restructuring this year and formed six busi-
ness groups: upstream, gas, refining and pet-
rochemical, commercial and trading, power
and new and renewable energy, and shipping.
“This pandemic has accelerated business
change and the future energy transition.
Pertamina needs to quickly respond to the
new global megatrend. Restructuring is a
strategic step to be more adaptive, agile and
more aggressive for business development. By
integrating synergy within Pertamina Group,
we are optimistic the target in 2026 will be
achieved,” says Widyawati.
Optimizing Business
Pertamina has set a crude oil production tar-
get of 1 million barrels of oil per day(bpd),
which will be achieved in stages up to 2026. It
is also increasing production in its domestic oil
and gas blocks, while conducting exploration
activities to discover new oil reserves. As part
of these efforts, the company is carrying out
onshore and offshore seismic surveys across
Indonesia, and has acquired oil and gas fields
at home and overseas to boost its reserves.
In its downstream business, Pertamina
manages six processing refineries in Indone-
sia that have a total capacity of about 1 mil-
lion bpd. The company is upgrading some of
these facilities to optimize their performance
under its Refinery Development Master Plan.
It is also developing new refineries under the
Grass Root Refinery program.
These efforts are aimed at enhancing over-
all production capacity to help Indonesia
achieve energy self-sufficiency. If Pertamina’s
refineries can reach a capacity of 1.8 million

Pertamina's Dumai refinery processes palm oil for green diesel.
bpd by 2026, the country will be able to pro-
duce enough fuel to meet domestic demand
and lessen its reliance on overseas supply.
Pertamina also is preparing to expand the
petrochemical business in Indonesia, with an
eye on growing its presence in the industry
across the Asia-Pacific. Its plans include inte-
grating petrochemical operations at its refin-
eries, with petrochemical production set to
reach 8,600 kilo-tons per annum by 2026.
Besides helping Indonesia reach energy
self-sufficiency, these development and revi-
talization initiatives will boost other sectors,
such as manufacturing. The construction
and operation of the refineries is expected to
require more than 140,000 workers and create
an additional 3 million jobs.
Pertamina will continue to absorb domes-
tic crude from foreign oil and gas contract
holders that operate in Indonesia. The aim
is for crude oil produced in Indonesia to be
processed by domestic refineries and reduce
crude imports.
Equal Access to Energy
To ensure equal and easy access to fuels,
Pertamina was tasked by the Indonesian gov-
ernment to implement the one-price fuel
policy in the 3T regions. In addition to its 7,000
gas stations found nationwide, Pertamina
also distributes fuel to rural areas through its
retail chain Pertashop. Its fuel pumps play an
important role in realizing the government’s
strategic program for developing villages. The
company expects to have more than 4,500
Pertashop pumps operating by the end of
the year.
Reflecting its commitment to an energy
security strategy that prioritizes availability,
accessibility, affordability and sustainability
for all people across Indonesia, Pertamina has
set up more than 180,000 LPG retailers in over
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
Pertamina plans to launch a biorefinery in Cilacap, Central Java, next year.
5,000 villages while increasing natural gas
deliveries to household customers in more
than 23 cities nationwide.
Commitment to Sustainability
Pertamina remains committed to Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs) through its collab-
oration with all business units and subsidiaries,
its implementation of corporate governance
and its stakeholder engagement. Priority
goals to support SDGs are tailored for various
company programs to achieve targets that are
in line with the company’s overall strategies in
the upstream and downstream sectors.
To adapt its business for changes in the
global environment, Pertamina remains
focused on developing greener and cleaner
energy. A number of innovative technology
solutions have been developed to take advan-
tage of sources of new and renewable energy
in Indonesia.
“We put high priority on and hold the
commitment to sustainability. We are ensur-
ing the development of green energy in line
with the government's vision to enhance
national energy security and independence,
while responding to the challenges of
Pertamina operates 7,000 gas stations nationwide.
transitioning to clean and renewable energy,”
says Widyawati.
The company has accelerated domestic
production of B30 biofuel, which will allow
Indonesia to slash its fuel imports and pro-
tect the country’s foreign exchange reserves.
Pertamina is also trialing environmentally
friendly green diesel, green gasoline and
green aviation fuel. These green fuels use
palm oil—widely available in Indonesia—as
the primary raw material, helping to support
local workers and industry. In line with these
plans, Pertamina established the Biogas Power
Plant Project to process palm oil waste and
added solar power to several of its facilities.
Pertamina is also tapping the potential of
the country’s geothermal reserves. The com-
pany, which has realized 1,877 megawatts in
power generation from geothermal sources,
will continue to develop this renewable
source for energy production.
Recognizing its role as a responsible corpo-
rate citizen, Pertamina is actively implement-
ing corporate social responsibility (CSR) and
environmental protection programs. In Sep-
tember, Pertamina was recognized with the
International Global CSR Award at the 12th
Global CSR Awards 2020 for its dedication to
sustainable business and environmental pro-
tection programs.
Through these programs, the company
has channeled more than 3.5 trillion rupiah
(US$250 million) to help more than 1 million
people, which includes funding to build hos-
pitals for Covid-19 patients and to provide
medical equipment. The company has also
continued to support Indonesia’s small and
midsized firms as they navigate the Covid-
19 crisis, such as offering training programs
focused on digitalization.
www.pertamina.com
Indonesia 3
 FORBES LIFE
By Elisabeth Brier Photograph by Taylor Castle for Forbes

Killing It 91

RYAN HO GA N and DE R R IC K S M IT H are cashing in on pandemic-induced

I
boredom with their immersive murder mysteries.

It’s Saturday night

Hunt A Killer cofounder and CEO Ryan Hogan
in Uxbridge, Massachusetts, and
Heather Nicoll, a 31-year-old graphic
designer, is investigating a murder.
Along with a close friend, she rummag-
es through a box of old newspaper clip-
pings, financial records and police re-
ports as she attempts to solve the grisly
death of Jake Morgan, the lead singer
of Just4fun, a fictitious boy band. Ev-
ery month Nicoll, along with 100,000
others, pays around $30 to Baltimore-
based startup Hunt A Killer to receive
a new installment of the game. It will
take a full “season” of six boxes, cost-
ing $180, to get to the bottom of Mor-
gan’s death. “I don’t mess around when
it comes to cracking these cases,” says
Nicoll, who tracks her results with a
pencil in a binder. “I’m fully addicted
to investigating things now.”
Hunt A Killer is played almost en-
tirely offline—and that’s largely the
point. “There is not a better time that’s
needed to put your phone down, get
off Twitter and get off all these other
devices,” says CEO Ryan Hogan, 36, a
former active duty U.S. Navy officer.
“We’re going crazy right now. We all
need to be able to detox.”

DECEMBER 2020 FORBES ASIA

 MALCOLM’S
MONOPOLY

92
FORBES LIFE

Malcolm Forbes
flew hot-air
balloons, rode
Harleys—and
spent decades
collecting toy
soldiers, miniature
boats and board
games. In 2010,
20 years after his
death, his 214-lot
treasure trove hit
the auction block.
Among the gems
was a perfectly
staged replica of
the Sack of Troy
(which sold for
$21,250), a meter-
long model of the
Inside the box for Hunt A Killer’s eighth installment, “Curtain Call,” are rehearsal schedules, to-do lists and Lusitania ocean
handwritten letters from the game’s victim, a famous 1930s actress. liner ($194,500)
and four vintage
Monopoly sets,
including one of
Last year, Hogan’s company, which he co- Warwear that Hogan started with his wife while the earliest known.
founded with his childhood friend Derrick he was still in the Navy. Stuck with $100,000 That circular
oilcloth version,
Smith, 37, generated $27 million in revenue worth of unsold T-shirts, in 2011 Hogan teamed handmade in 1933
by selling subscriptions, premium “all-in-one” up with Smith to stage a series of horror-themed by Charles Darrow,
editions and collections of previous install- 5K races called “Run for Your Lives” (partici- fetched what’s
believed to be the
ments (starting at $140 for six boxes). The pan- pants fled zombies planted around the course). highest price ever
demic is providing a big boost: This year Hunt That company went bankrupt, but the experi- paid at auction
for a board game:
A Killer should book about $50 million in reve- ence started the duo down an entrepreneurial $146,500.
nue and hopes to turn a profit for the first time. path that by 2016 had morphed into the first in-
The two founders own 85%, worth just over stallments of Hunt A Killer.
$65 million. Working from Smith’s basement, the cofound-
The duo is the latest beneficiary of a board- ers did everything themselves, from designing
game boomlet that dates to the mid-1990s, when the games to packing and shipping them. By
a complex German strategy game called Settlers 2017, the company had 25,000 subscribers and a
of Catan first became popular on American col- cult following on Facebook. “Covid certainly ac-
lege campuses. Catan has sold more than 30 mil- celerated our path,” Hogan says, “but we aren’t a
TOP LEFT: GABBY JONES FOR FORBES ; THE STRONG

lion copies worldwide and still generates north of Covid-based company.”

$100 million in revenue annually some 25 years
after its initial release. Overall, Euromonitor ex-
pects sales of board games in North America to
increase from $3.4 billion in 2019 to about $4.1
billion in 2024.
“Growth was explosive for games the first half
of this year,” says Stephanie Wissink, who tracks
the industry for Jefferies. “The category was up
37% this year. I’ve worked in this space for two
decades and have never seen that.” Hunt A Killer
dates back to a failed apparel company called
Next up: retail. In September, Hunt A Killer
debuted a version of its flagship game for $30 on
Amazon. The same product also became avail-
able at Target in October. A brand collaboration
with Lionsgate, based on the Blair Witch movies,
is newly available on the company’s website and
a similar collaboration with Simon & Schuster
(Nancy Drew books) is in the works.
“If we can make these amazing experiences
that provide escapism and immerse you in a sto-
ry,” Hogan says, “there’s just nothing greater.”

FORBES ASIA DECEMBER 2020

SAUDI LEADERS’ INSIGHT REPORT
A Historic
Year for G20
The world’s financial leaders mark an
unprecedented year as Saudi Arabia
marks another page in its history.
www.forbesmiddleeast.com | info@forbesmiddleeast.com
T
he Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
is busy working toward
its mission to diversify its
economy as part of its Vision
2030. Tourism plays a major role in its
development plans. As an example of
one of many projects, in November,
Saudi’s Ministry of Culture announced
an initiative to establish a world-class
center dedicated to the management,
restoration and protection of
underwater cultural heritage in the Red
Sea and the Arabian Gulf. The center
will be affiliated with the Ministry’s
Heritage Commission and will be
responsible for developing the tourism
sector in Saudi Arabia and the region.
Saudi is also seeking to play a
main role in strengthening the global
economy. In November, Saudi hosted the
G20 Leaders’ Summit for the first time
in its history, chaired by His Majesty King
Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
The G20 Leaders’ Summit,
which was kicked off in the wake
of the 2008 global financial crisis,
occurred this year amid exceptional
circumstances as world leaders urged
solidarity against the backdrop of the
Covid-19 pandemic. G20 economies
are expected to contract by about
4% to reach US$65.8 trillion in 2020,
down from US$68.6 trillion a year
ago. Members of the group represent
around 80% of the world’s economic
output, which is projected to be worth
US$83.8 trillion in 2020, two-thirds
of the global population, and 75% of
international trade. They represent the
voices of 4.6 billion people around
the world.
The pandemic crisis, healthcare
plans and the recovery of the global
economy were at the top of the G20
agenda this year. Saudi hosted an
exceptional virtual meeting to discuss
the Covid-19 outbreak. “At this
critical time, with the world facing the
coronavirus pandemic, which affects
humans, health systems and the global
economy, we meet with the G20 in
an exceptional summit; to come up
with initiatives that fulfill the hopes of
our people, strengthen the role of our
governments, and unite our efforts
to confront this pandemic,” said His
Majesty King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al
Saud on Twitter in March.
The G20 meetings also touched
on enhancing trading ties. “In these
challenging times, the need for an
open, fair and rules-based multilateral
trading system is critical to support
global economic recovery,” said Majid
bin Abdullah Al-Qassabi, Minister of
Commerce and Investment of the
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia at an earlier
virtual G20 trade and investment
ministerial meeting.
So far G20 countries have
contributed over US$21 billion to
support the production, distribution
and access to diagnostics, therapeutics,
and vaccines; injected over US$11
trillion into safeguarding the global
economy; and launched a debt
suspension initiative for the least
developed countries that allowed
beneficiary countries to defer US$14
billion in debt payments due this year
and use the funds instead for financing
their health systems and social
programs. As 2020 comes to a close,
the world will be watching and waiting
to see what further help is coming.
In this report exploring the future of
Saudi Arabia, some of its key influential
business leaders share their insights on
the impact of Vision 2030 and Saudi’s
ambitious plans.
SAUDI LEADERS’ INSIGHT REPORT

Prudent Ethical Investing

Samer Abu Aker, CEO of SEDCO Capital, reveals how the firm has
maintained its strong performance with investment solutions to create
value today with a focus on sustainability for tomorrow.
What does SEDCO Capital do?
SEDCO Capital is a global Shariah-
compliant and ethically led multi-asset
manager. We are headquartered in
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, with offices
in Riyadh, London and Luxembourg.
We invest in Saudi Arabia, the GCC,
the U.S., Europe, Latin America
and Asia and our total assets under
management (AUM) currently
exceed US$5 billion. We provide
our sophisticated clients with
comprehensive investment solutions
across diversified asset classes all over
the world. Our clients consist of high
net worth individuals, family offices,
endowments and financial institutions.
Our primary asset classes are public
equity, private equity, real estate
and fixed income. We have our full
asset class suite exposure in the U.S.,
Europe, the U.K. and Asia, and we
also have interests of private equity
in Latin America and public equity in
Brazil. Our Luxembourg platform is
one of the largest of its kind in the
world in terms of Shariah-compliant
funds and AUM, and provides our
investors with access to European
opportunities.

How has SEDCO Capital’s Prudent

Ethical Investment approach helped
it outperform the market?
SEDCO Capital’s proprietary Prudent
Ethical Investment (or PEI) approach
is characterized by the sophisticated
fusion of Shariah-compliant principles
with responsible investment (RI)
principles, particularly as they relate to
environmental, social, and governance
(ESG) adherence.
Responsible investment has been
growing in significance for years among
regional and international investors. In
terms of investor segments, financial
institutions and endowments have been
increasingly pivoting toward RI, and,
demographically, millennials have also
demonstrated an accelerated propensity
in the same direction. Importantly, RI
represents an enormous market size,
with current AUM at US$89.7 trillion.
Notably, US$29.5 trillion covers listed
equities and fixed income and US$30.7
trillion represents RI strategies.

Shariah-compliance requires the
additional screening of balance sheet
ratios such as leverage, cash and
interest-bearing securities, and/or the
ratio of accounts receivable to market
cap or total assets (whichever is greater).
Lower financial leverage and better cash
conversion result in a bias toward quality
and growth, thereby underscoring the
significance of the “prudence” element
in the PEI approach. We believe the
tactful merging of both schools of
thought has enabled us to outperform
purely conventional investment
approaches over many years on a risk-
adjusted basis.
For example, the SC Europe Equities
Fund, which follows a PEI approach
including negative screening, active
ownership/proxy voting and ESG
screening, outperformed on annual
return basis for the past five years the
Dow Jones Islamic Market Europe index
by 1.21% and MSCI Europe Index
by 7.18%. Similarly, the SC Global
Sustainable Equity Fund outperformed
on annual return basis for the past five
years the Dow Jones Islamic Market
World index by 0.64% and MSCI World
Index by 4.74%.This means our clients
benefit from greater return with lower
volatility when investing within a multi-
asset class framework, while adhering
to the pillars of ethical investing.
What factors do you look at
when you consider exiting an
investment?
We invest in attractive real estate
opportunities, which we term Core and
Core Plus, in locations across Europe,
the U.K. and the U.S. We look primarily
at the office, logistics, education and
healthcare subsectors. The average
internal rate of return of our real estate
portfolio is approximately 7%.
We ensure that every decision
taken over the course of a real estate
investment is value-enhancing for
potential buyers. The most successful
exit strategy requires a well-tailored
business plan prior to any investment
decision. An exhaustive scrutiny of all
possible scenarios helps allay concerns
and mitigate potential obstacles that
may arise during the exit phase. We
evaluate each potential investment
with the end in mind. This means
paying special attention to all aspects
that a buyer will consider prior
to making the purchase decision,
including the suitability of the asset
location, asset quality, tenant credibility
and financial position, and lease type.
How has Saudi’s Vision 2030
impacted your investment
decisions?
Vision 2030 has created several
benefits for global multi-asset
managers. Firstly, it created a roadmap
by highlighting certain economic
growth sectors within the kingdom
that are expected to flourish in the
future, and around which we can
expect to see increased investment
activity. As a result, this has provided
greater visibility for long-term planning
and increased confidence in our
investment-decision making. Another
factor is the increased transparency
in reporting macrostatistics, which
is always a good thing for global
investors who could be keen to invest
with us in-kingdom. Thirdly, we believe
putting Saudi Arabia on the map will
be a boon for these Shariah-compliant
investments going forward, and
therefore we feel very well positioned
to create value for existing and
potential clients.
Which asset classes do you think
will outperform in 2021, and why?
Clearly the ongoing pandemic has
created unexpected risks, which
are inherently difficult to control.
However, it has also opened several
new opportunities. We believe public
and private equity markets will benefit
from a continued quest for growth,
albeit at the cost of lower returns
than in the past decade for as long as
Covid-19-related uncertainty remains.
www.forbesmiddleeast.com
Thanks to the unprecedented support
from policymakers all across the
globe, the current low interest rate
environment is expected to persist for
the next few years without posing any
short-term threat to financial stability
before inflation starts to raise its head.
Against this backdrop, we believe that
some exposure to higher-income asset
classes, such as real estate (including
global REITs) and both listed and
private infrastructure is warranted in
order to both provide superior income
streams and a longer-term hedge
against higher inflationary pressures.
What effect will the G20 resolutions
have on assets in Saudi and globally?
It is difficult to comment on the impact
of G20 resolutions without knowing
the content of such resolutions. It
is a privilege for all kingdom-based
business organizations that Saudi
Arabia is presiding over such a
prestigious economic forum.
The critical issues that will be
discussed will be around ensuring
the sustainability of our planet and
the people who inhabit it through
empowerment, innovation and
cooperation. SEDCO Capital has
been recognized internationally for its
commitment to responsible investment.
As the first Saudi Arabian and Shariah-
compliant asset manager to be a
signatory of the UN-supported Principles
for Responsible Investment (PRI), we are
well positioned to be active participants
in shaping the type of future that this
year’s G20 meeting envisions.
In 2020, SEDCO Capital was
awarded the highest possible rating by
the PRI in recognition of our approach
to responsible investing and integrating
ESG factors into the investment
solutions that we create for our clients.
www.sedcocapital.com
SAUDI LEADERS’ INSIGHT REPORT
The value of environmental, social,
and governance assets in investing
has grown to US$40.5 trillion
globally. How has this impacted the
strategy of Tamer Group?
Companies around the globe have
to act on their purpose, which now
includes not only making profit but
adhering to environmental, social,
governance and data stewardship
(ESGD). ESGD considerations are
increasing in importance today. Such
investment in the ecosystem opens the
eyes of all industries to the need to
build more sustainable business models
with all stakeholders.
Tamer is a family business
preparing today to introduce the
fourth generation to be part of the
management team. For the past 98
years serving the market in Saudi
Arabia, Tamer has taken many
initiatives to ensure the sustainability
of the business. We have always kept
the 3Ps in our strategy: people, planet
and profit.
Investing
in Ethics
Ayman Maamoun Tamer, Chairman
of Tamer Group, discusses how the
98-year-old family business continues
to innovate and keep ethics at its core.
What changes have patients and consumers through
you made to make normal and tough periods. We
Tamer Group more gained the trust of our customers by
sustainable? being committed to serving them by
We are working to adopt providing the best quality products
common metrics and to at the right time. We established
eventually have clear and our corporate social responsibility
transparent reporting arm, SA’AID, to give forward and
on the impact that we are having on contribute to the community through
the planet and society, in addition to various projects.
our other stakeholders. We need to
look at climate change, nature loss and How does your SA’AID program tie
fresh water availability, among other in to the Sustainable Development
things. And for people, we need to Goals?
look at their well-being, dignity and SA’AID in Arabic means “forearm,”
equality, and of course their skills and which symbolizes the part of the
development for the future. body that connects the body (the
Although it sounds simple, I have community) and the hand (the
realized that adopting good governance company). In English, “SA” is an
and focusing on sustainable value
creation for all stakeholders is the
only way forward. This should, of
course, include our planet. Examples
of such metrics under governance
include having a clear purpose for the
company and having clear stakeholder
engagement as well as ethical
behaviors, such as anticorruption.
We introduced corporate
governance, segregation of duties
and separation of ownership from
management. This journey took
almost two years to complete. We
adopted a new strategy to serve Saudi

abbreviation of Saudi Arabia, while
“AID” represents reaching out and
collaborating.
The Sustainable Development Goals
are a complete mission that will require
further focus and resources in order to
achieve transparent reporting and real
progress in this domain. SA’AID is just
one arm managing our social community
services, which include supporting
different projects that focus on health,
education, women empowerment, art
and culture, workplace wellness and
community development.
Where do you think growth in
Saudi’s pharma sector will come
from over the next 10 years?
Saudi’s pharma sector grew from
US$7 billion in 2015 to US$8.6 billion
in 2019. Growth drivers for the
total market were mainly oncology,
diabetes and rheumatological diseases
(immunotherapy). Vaccines and
other biological drugs will also grow
substantially in this market.
The government sector will
remain the main driver for growth.
The healthcare system in Saudi is,
and will continue to be, supported by
government services. Private sector
contribution is increasing with a range
of privatization initiatives supported by
Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, but still the
government will have the larger share
of contribution.
We adopted a new strategy to serve Saudi patients
and consumers through normal and tough periods.
We gained the trust of our customers by being
committed to serving them by providing the best
quality products at the right time.
How has Tamer Group’s governance
evolved over the years?
Family businesses are often precariously
short-lived and are vulnerable when it
comes to handing down the business,
especially from one generation to
another. However, such a predicament
can be overcome if there is transparency,
accountability, family trust, healthy
discussion and good leadership. Tamer
Group has been governed according
to an implicit agreement based on
these principles, rules and values
among the members of both the
second and third generations.
We have established a more
formalized and structured governance
within the family through a family
constitution, and within the business
by implementing the best corporate
governance practices whether those
practices are mandatorily required or not.
How has Saudi’s Vision 2030
changed the way you do business?
Digital transformation plays a major
role in Saudi’s Vision 2030. Tamer
www.forbesmiddleeast.com
Group has started to sync with the
Ministry of Health in many initiatives,
such as through its national screening
program and the national VNA
and teleradiology platforms. These
initiatives help to share resources from
Ministry of Health hospitals with other
hospitals to reach more patients and
provide the best healthcare service for
the Saudi community.
The localization of all industrial
sectors is a central tenet of Vision
2030. Tamer Group is on a mission
to develop the organization and the
healthcare industry to help increase
the income of the kingdom, generate
job opportunities and brighten the
future for younger generations.
The group has invested in global
and local startups. What are the
factors that you consider before
investing in a startup?
The first thing we consider in
investments are the ethics of the
industry that we are entering. We
often look at investments that have
a holistic advantage for both the
family office and regionally for the
holding operating group. These
investments include healthcare,
pharmaceuticals, medical devices,
manufacturing pharmaceuticals and
vaccines, consumer nutrition products,
consumer goods and beauty products.
www.tamergroup.com
SAUDI LEADERS’ INSIGHT REPORT

Power in Communication
Nasser Sulaiman Al Nasser, Group CEO of Saudi Telephone Co. (stc), discusses
how the company has developed this year to meet new challenges while
continuing to focus on equality and technological advancement.
What has been your biggest challenge
this year and what has been your
biggest success?
Undoubtedly, the Covid-19 pandemic was
the biggest challenge that we have faced
this year. Yet, this terrible situation also
represented an opportunity for stc to live up
to its expectations as a national champion,
not only from an infrastructure and customer
experience perspective, but also from a
corporate social responsibility perspective.
The lockdown resulted in the need for
remote work, health and education, which
in turn dramatically increased traffic in
our network. Thanks to our technological
leadership and agility, stc was able to
enhance capacity rapidly to maintain the
required levels of speed and reliability to
support the country’s needs. Customers
were able to continue operating as normal
as possible and enable the accelerated
adoption of new digital ways of working and
accessing services.
Our large investments in the digital
transformation of our customer touchpoints
allowed us to seamlessly shift our interactions
to safe digital channels without compromising
on the high level of experience and speed
that our customers have come to expect
from stc. Most importantly, stc was able to
contribute to ease the financial challenges
that the pandemic represented to families and
small businesses by providing more capacity
and services for the same price and extending
financial facilities.
Finally, stc was able to do well by
its employees, its most important asset,
by quickly adopting new digital ways
of working, developing and strictly
implementing health protocols to ensure
the safety of all employees, and creating
new working-from-home policies that will
allow us not only to face this crisis but the

post-Covid-19 world that is coming. All
of this was achieved while stc was still
able to deliver strong financial results
and value to its shareholders.
How do you balance cost controls
with maintaining high levels of
innovation during these tough times?
We believe that it is precisely at these
times that innovation, dynamism and
agility are required to be able to face the
challenges. Innovation is the only way
forward because simple cost-cutting
initiatives will not allow us to continue
having a sustainable business. Our
DARE strategy, which we have revised
during this period, reflects our view that
innovation will have to be at the center
of our future business. Specifically, we
will focus on innovating in the way that
we extract value from assets on our
balance sheet today.
We need to continue innovating so
that we digitalize our operations and
ways of working, so that we transform
our cost in a more structural manner,
drive efficiencies and gain operational
agility. And we will also continue
innovating in new digital products
and services for our customers to
complement our revenue streams, as
exemplified by our successful incursions
into digital financial services and digital
media. We will also have to innovate in
the way that we invest and enter into
new opportunities, with partnerships,
co-creation and new revenue models
becoming more prominent, enabling us
to share investments and benefits as is
prevalent in the new digital economy.
Saudi Arabia has held the rotating
presidency of G20 member states
this year. What impact is the
kingdom’s growing prominence
on the global stage having on stc’s
operations?
Our DARE strategy was developed
with the objective of contributing to
the ambitions of Vision 2030 and our
shareholders. The kingdom’s presidency
of the G20 has simply reinforced and
made more prominent our commitment
to deliver on our objectives of
transforming our company into a leading
digital and telecommunications player
by expanding both our scale as well as
our scope and venturing into new digital
services like digital media and digital
financial services. This prominence has
also accelerated and enhanced other
commitments that stc already had in the
corporate social responsibility arena.
While sustainability and strong
corporate governance were already
part of stc’s DNA, our objective is to
become a role model of corporate
social responsibility and sustainability
and follow the country’s leadership in
contributing to the UN’s Sustainable
Development Goals. To achieve this, we
have clearly established this as a strategic
objective in our refreshed DARE strategy
and created a special top management
committee to drive the implementation
of our corporate responsibility and
sustainability strategy.
An integral part of Saudi Arabia’s
transformation process has been to
open up employment opportunities
for women. What is stc doing in this
regard?
We are committed to having a diverse
workforce across business areas and
support units, simply because we believe
that a diverse staff allows us to effectively
draw on different perspectives to
enhance the quality of our ICT services,
deepen the relevance of our digital
services and enhance our efficiency and
effectiveness in delivering those services
to our clients.
An inclusive work environment
encourages different perspectives, and stc
welcomes the wide range of experiences
and viewpoints that both male and
female employees bring to the table.
In our inclusive workplace, all stc
employees at every level are valued
members of the stc family. Regardless
of their gender, everyone is assured the
right of equitable, fair and respectful,
gender-neutral treatment.
www.forbesmiddleeast.com
Empowering women is part of stc
core values. This makes good business
sense. We have a number of highly
professional and skilled women leading
functions at the middle and executive
management level, and we aim to have
highly talented women among our top-
level management. In fact, our hiring
curve of women has increased by 23%
during 2020 from last year, and more
than 18% of people in our leadership
development program, and 33% from
our specialized development program,
are women.
We are committed to upholding
our zero-tolerance policy for any form
of discrimination, ensuring a productive
work environment where differences are
respected, and where opportunities and
equitable treatment are afforded to all.
What can we expect from stc with
regards to 5G in 2021?
We are working to deploy the largest
advanced 5G network in the Middle
East and North Africa. The next stage
will witness an expansion of 5G in
more than 71 cities across Saudi Arabia.
These developments are the result of
a continuous effort to enhance our
network’s infrastructure and provide stc
customers with connectivity diversity,
coverage and reach. The expansion
of the FTTH fiber optic network
has delivered the highest possible
broadband speed and services to home
and business users. The company has
also been expanding its global Internet
Gateway, progressively growing the
capacity of the network. We have
recently signed global agreements
with leading international content
companies such as Google, Facebook
and Akamai. The ultimate objective
for stc is to deliver the best and fastest
possible service to stc customers.
www.stc.com

100
“Unless you believe, you will
not understand.”
—Augustine of Hippo
“As I get older I seem to
believe less and less, and yet
to believe what I do believe
more and more.”
—David Jenkins
“Credulity is the man’s
weakness, but the child’s
strength.”
—Charles Lamb
“Clouds come floating into my
life—no longer to carry rain
or usher storm, but to add
color to my sunset sky.”
—Rabindranath Tagore
“I meant what I said, and
I said what I meant.”
—Dr. Seuss
“The best lack all conviction,
while the worst are full of
passionate intensity.”
—William Butler Yeats
“Have ultimate belief in
yourself. Why is someone
going to believe in you if you
can’t believe in yourself?”
—Mindy Grossman
“The relationship between
commitment and doubt is by
no means an antagonistic one.”
—Rollo May
“Conviction is worthless unless
it is converted into conduct.”
—Thomas Carlyle
“If it’s your passion and it’s
from the heart, you just
keep playing, playing and
playing, and eventually
somebody’s gonna notice.”
—Eddie Van Halen
FORBES ASIA
THOUGHTS ON
Conviction
“ The highest court is in the
end one’s own conscience
and conviction.”
—Max Planck
“ ‘My conviction,’ says the
mystic, ‘gains infinitely the
moment another soul will
believe in it.’ ”
—E.M. Forster
“He who thinks a great deal
is not suited to be a party
man: He thinks his way
through the party and out the
other side too soon.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche
“ The fact is that my appetite
for risk was far greater than
that of other people, and my
courage in my own conviction
was unshakable.”
—Sheldon Adelson
“Half of getting there is having
the confidence to show up—
Ek-traordinary and keep showing up.”
—Sophia Amoruso
January 16, 2012
“Now faith is the assurance
Daniel Ek is an intense fellow: a six-cups-of-coffee of things hoped for, the
guy who eight years ago was setting his sights on what conviction of things not seen.”
—Hebrews 11:1
seemed an insurmountable challenge. Ek wanted to save
the music industry, and he thought his upstart stream-
ing service, Spotify, could offer something more alluring
to fans than piracy while ensuring that artists and record
companies got paid. “We bet our personal fortunes,
and sometimes we bet the entire company,” said Ek, the
cover star of our debut 30 Under 30 issue. “We led with
our conviction rather than [being] rational, because
rational said it was impossible.” It worked: Spotify today
is a $47 billion (market cap) company. As for Ek, his
personal fortune has ballooned alongside the value of
his company, to $4 billion. Music to his ears.
FINAL THOUGHT
SOURCES: DE LIBERO ARBITRIO, BY AUGUSTINE OF HIPPO; ESSAYS OF ELIA, BY CHARLES “To advance, stand fast
LAMB; STRAY BIRDS, BY RABINDRANATH TAGORE; HORTON HATCHES THE EGG, BY under all circumstances.”
DR. SEUSS; “THE SECOND COMING,” BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS; THE COURAGE TO
CREATE, BY ROLLO MAY; THE DILEMMAS OF AN UPRIGHT MAN, BY J.L. HEILBRON; —B.C. Forbes
HOWARDS END, BY E.M. FORSTER; HUMAN, ALL TOO HUMAN, BY FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE.
DECEMBER 2020
Restore guest confidence
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