“So I went to McKinsey. It had always been my dream to see what was behind the curtain. I heard many people ask why I made the jump. At Uber, we worked with many consultants, and their ability to synthesize issues quickly and communicate clearly was remarkable. It felt like watching magic. I wanted to understand that skill and the secret behind it. The fastest way was to join McKinsey and learn directly from the best.” - Aik Chuan (A.C.) Goh, Founder of Singapore’s First Traditional Search Fund


“I fully expected consulting to mean heavy travel and tough problems. What surprised me was that even as the most junior person in Singapore, you could call a 20-year social media veteran or an automotive procurement expert in the US, and a partner would pick up and tell you everything you needed to know about the industry. That level of access was unexpected.” - Aik Chuan (A.C.) Goh, Founder of Singapore’s First Traditional Search Fund


“The number one thing I took away was the ability to make decisions quickly by building assumptions and running an iterative loop to reach a conclusion, testing whether it holds, adjusting the assumptions, and flipping again. I learned to be comfortable that decisions are made this way even at the most senior level. You never have enough data. No one does. The skill is bringing in enough data to iterate and keep moving. That was one of the biggest takeaways.” - Aik Chuan (A.C.) Goh, Founder of Singapore’s First Traditional Search Fund

Aik Chuan (A.C.) Goh, Founder of Singapore’s first traditional search fund, joins Jeremy Au to unpack how operators evolve from startup builders into long-term business stewards. They explore lessons from Uber’s Southeast Asia expansion, why localization determines platform winners, and how consulting shaped A.C.’s decision-making framework. The conversation covers the limits of venture capital in personalized industries like education, the hidden succession crisis inside Singapore SMEs, and how search funds bridge retiring founders with new leadership. Aik Chuan also shares why disciplined capital structures matter, how growth still exists in mature markets, and why conviction requires respecting experience without surrendering belief in your thesis.

07:00 Uber proved that small autonomous teams can build cities: Three strong generalists with a mission can launch operations faster than large centralized structures.

10:30 Uber lost Indonesia because localization came too late: Missing cash payments and motorcycles allowed competitors to lock in the market.

11:45 Regional winners depend on profit hub cities: Control of Singapore, KL, Bangkok, and Jakarta determines who funds expansion.

19:32 Consulting builds structured decision discipline: Senior leaders iterate assumptions just like junior consultants, only faster.

29:53 Venture capital struggles in personalized education: Edtech exposed the limits of scale when every student needs different content.

34:22 Search funds solve SME succession gaps: Retiring founders need both liquidity and leadership, which the model combines.

53:15 Conviction requires reframing criticism: Aik Chuan learns to respect experience while still backing his thesis.

Jeremy Au: Hey AC, excited to have you on the show. We've known each other for what? A crazy number of years now.

Aik Chuan Goh: More than 10 years.

Jeremy Au: More than 10 years, I think getting up to 15 years. Yeah. And we'll start from the origin story where we know each other from volunteering together, social enterprise together. But first, AC, introduce yourself.

Aik Chuan Goh: Sure. So I'm AC. I'm the founder of the first traditional search fund in Singapore. We are backed by a group of investors to find one really high-quality small-to-medium enterprise in this part of the world, and hopefully acquire it with the intention of operating it and growing it over time. So, but before that, I mean, I spent some time with you at Conjunct Consulting. That was when Jeremy met his wife, and I met my wife. Subsequently, I went over to Uber, spent some time in the "mad years," you know, between 2014 and 2018 where you really drove at all costs. And then also lived that crazy pivot, that move away from that side of the business. Where then subsequently I went to INSEAD. I joined consulting for a bit and then went back to startup land. I was with a Sequoia-backed EdTech startup. Spent some time there, rode the full COVID wave from, you know, 2021 to 2022 to 2024 when Byju's was just going crazy. Every single EdTech startup was fundraising left, right, and center. But then coming off that in 2024, I launched the first traditional search fund in Singapore. And since then, we are working on deals and hopefully, we have something that's coming up quite soon that we would love to announce. Some good news coming up quite soon. I would love to announce.

Jeremy Au: And so, you know, let's talk about your origin story. So when we were hanging out after, I guess, university, you were an analyst at UBS. You chose for some reason to volunteer at the social enterprise Conjunct Consulting with me. Yeah. So thank you for supporting me in those early years.

Aik Chuan Goh: Pleasure.

Jeremy Au: And we had a good time working our asses off. For some reason, I was at Bain as well in parallel. So what was going through your mind? What was your life like? Because you are an investment analyst at UBS, you are volunteering at this, you know, social impact consulting platform. But what were you thinking? Did you think you were going to stay at UBS for a long time? Did you think you were going to be staying in banking? What did you think you were going to be doing at that time?

Aik Chuan Goh: Hmm, I think so, Conjunct Consulting, I mean, at the core of it is a really good idea, right? Which is you have students who want to get the consulting toolkit together. You have working adults who are passionate about volunteering, are passionate about mentoring, and passionate about adding value in a way that leverages their skillset. So for me, it was a no-brainer. I mean, the social aspect side of meeting our partners, that was a bonus, right? But being able to just get involved and, I mean, what we were working on back then was also quite interesting, right? Because you know, you guys had the student consulting side running like a train, you know, year on year. We were graduating students who were equipped with the consulting toolkit, right? But when I think myself, having had the opportunity, obviously with the blessing of you and Jia Chuan, having had the opportunity to then start to explore various business models—can we bring a part of that learning over to the corporate world? Start doing like single volunteer days. That ties in CSR, ties in social enterprise. Bring a charity into a world where you have like, you know, 50 VPs from one of the big banks in Singapore and then exposing them the entire day to the issues that a charity faces and then get them thinking about problems together. I mean, that was so much fun. It was just a no-brainer to be involved really.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I mean, I have to say that it just jogged my memory about how crazy it felt at that point in time. Yeah. Because at that time everybody was volunteering at CSR by painting school houses. Yeah. And packing goodie bags.

Aik Chuan Goh: Yeah.

Jeremy Au: And so having to explain to CSRs like, "Hey, we can do something for your senior management to work with a charity" was something they both wanted, but also felt it was very confusing for us to navigate that early product-market fit. Yes. You know. And what were you thinking at that time? But did you think you were going to stay at UBS or did you think you were going to go into consulting eventually? How did you, thinking about your career, about that time?

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, don't get me wrong. UBS was a great place to be. I was under the graduate program, so we were well taken care of. But I guess why I volunteered in the first place was because I was looking for something more, looking for ownership, looking for a chance to build something with a group of cool people. Yeah. And I think that theme actually followed throughout most of my career, where I was always constantly thinking about how do I get myself set up in such an opportunity, right? Right. And I think the Conjunct experience actually also taught me a lot because then you start to see when you put a group of like-minded folks together, you tend to be able to accomplish a lot. I think it set... maybe the experience of building that social enterprise taught me that I could build something. Yeah. Right? If I set my mind to it.

Jeremy Au: Right. Yeah. And I think that's something that I also appreciated was that I think the passion and talent density was so high. That, you know, people felt really comfortable iterating, pushing. I guess this was how we found our wives as well.

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, as a talent scout. Yeah. We found Conjunct had a product-market fit. If you talk about product-market fit as a talent niche, you really had a product-market fit. Yeah. Because we drew in... I mean, today the leaders of their organization, everyone has gone off to do even more amazing things.

Jeremy Au: Right? Yeah. I've seen them usually at Temasek, you know, they're on the other side of the table and I see Conjunct alumni, I see people in the foundations and at the, you know, kind of like charity boards already. Yeah. You know, so it's been interesting to see the alumni really go there. And otherwise, I just think is that... okay, you know? There you are. And then you went to do your next stint, which was the Uber, yeah, Associate GM role, you know, growth. So what was that like?

Aik Chuan Goh: So going in, I mean, hindsight is a completely different story, but when I walked in, it was 2014. When I explained to my dad what I was doing, he thought I was going to a taxi company. Right? That's all he thought about. And in the early days, I was one of, I think, within the first 10 employees in Singapore, right? Malaysia, we had maybe three employees. So this was a very small outfit. Even the interviews were done in a cafe because we couldn't get a proper meeting room within the office. So early days going in, learning how to launch a business, how to grow a business for the first time. Seeing what, you know, coming from a big bank kind of environment where everything needs to be triple-checked and going up the chain and coming down the chain into a truly federated model where you had... I mean, the Uber model, the famous model was if you have three guys, you then put them in the city, they'll build a business for you. Right? And three smart guys put in the city. And I think the Uber model, well, that was when I truly see that small team, small squad team almost—that you have a group of passionate, you know, generalists who had complementary skillsets, and then just setting them loose into a city and letting them just think about how to create a business together. That was my takeaway in the initial days. But of course, eventually, you know, so I joined first as a launcher. We launched two cities in Malaysia, first in JB and then Penang. But I subsequently moved back to Singapore. I ran Lion City Rentals, which is a fully owned subsidiary of Uber. We owned and operated vehicles for Uber drivers and going into that business, I think I had a personal mission, right? That: how can we drop the operating costs of Uber drivers in a meaningful way across the market, right? And I think that for me was my driving force—it was how I communicated to my team and being able to then catalyze a whole team to think in that lens and just keep growing. When I was there, we grew the team from about 40 people to, we were about 250 people, right? We were doing, you know, at peak, we were about 14,000 vehicles, which is around more than a billion dollars under management. We were generating a hundred million dollars in revenue. Those were just very exciting times that again, you know, you think about: how do you create that small team structure, catalyze, give them mission, set them loose, then how do you apply it to a team of 250 people? Right? I think that just got me so interested in this idea about building something, growing something, and then seeing it flourish after that.

Jeremy Au: So I think what's interesting is, you know, we now know the ending of that story, which is that Grab out-competed Uber in Southeast Asia. And I think there's a lot of ink spilled at that point in time about why Uber lost to Grab et cetera, et cetera. But I'm just kind of curious, like with the, you know, benefit of additional more years of hindsight. We've seen a few more technology cycles of, you know, incumbents and fast followers. And also I think with the benefit of, you know, nobody having talked about this for a long time, you know, I just kind of curious. Are there any reflections you have about, you know, the Uber versus Grab battle, and also now we're seeing Gojek, you know, potentially getting acquired by Grab as well? The ending of the full stories is in sight. Yeah. So I'm just kind of curious, like, any thoughts about some lessons from that?

Aik Chuan Goh: Wow. I haven't thought about this for a while, but I think if I had to crystallize it to three points, right? I think the first thing about the whole Uber Grab story back then, I would say that it crystallizes to: Uber did not introduce cash payment until months after Grab and Gojek had both done that in Indonesia. At first, it was almost neck-to-neck or almost equal between Uber and Grab, between the third player within the market, because we just did not have the appreciation for the need for localized execution in Indonesia earlier than the other two parties, right? Mm-hmm. And very quickly we lost Indonesia just because of that. One. Two, I think for Southeast Asia in general. I mean, Kevin, the ex-Gojek co-founder, right? Talked about this—what we all think Southeast Asia is like, you know, was it 800 million population yada yada. The truth is that there are only a few urban areas that you need to win in order for you to win in this market. Right? It's Singapore, it's KL, it's Bangkok, it's Jakarta, right? Guess what? Uber was 50-50 with Grab in Singapore. Gojek was maybe 50-50 with Grab in Jakarta, but Grab had Bangkok and KL pretty much locked out. Mm-hmm. And I think that inability for both Gojek and Uber to maybe bring the fight to Grab in the locations that they were strong... We now know, right? Grab is generating so much cash from Singapore, from KL, from Bangkok that they can afford to burn in Jakarta that maybe Gojek just doesn't have that advantage, right? So I will say that maybe is the second takeaway. The third takeaway, it's also an interesting takeaway. So, I mean, this is not as discussed much in terms of the ink spilled right? Back then was that the Grab-Uber merger happened immediately after the Uber-Comfort deal was struck, right? I don't know if you remember Uber and ComfortDelGro had a strategic alliance. And as part of that, Lion City Rentals was actually supposed to be sold to Comfort. And that deal was such a good deal for everyone involved. Comfort and Uber both benefited greatly. There were countless number of man-hours that were put into that deal to get the deal together, and the early signs of the deal were very successful. We think that could have catalyzed the negotiation between Grab and Uber. In other words, maybe certain things you shouldn't succeed at when you are trying to set out the strategic chess pieces, right? You know, I think when the Singapore team fought really hard to get the Comfort-Uber deal together, we really did not foresee that this was the consequence of that—yeah, of the Uber-Comfort deal was then the Uber-Grab deal happening.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. Oof. Wow. That's actually very crisp three points and probably more crisp than anything that has ever been written.

Aik Chuan Goh: Oh, man. No.

Jeremy Au: Between then and now, no, because... but I think this is probably the most crisp with the benefit of hindsight and lots of time.

Aik Chuan Goh: Benefit of hindsight and lots of time and lots of introspection as well. I mean, as you mature as a business leader you kind of see how the game is played and then you start to reflect and think about it more, right?

Jeremy Au: Yeah.

Aik Chuan Goh: So that's it.

Jeremy Au: Yeah, no, I'd like to quickly touch on that. So I think, first of all, cash. Secondly, urban areas to win, and thirdly, of course, is the enterprise value of strategic alliances. I think cash is such a big piece. Totally agree with you. I think most of the media today is really focused on the fact that Gojek's or motorcycles is a formal localization, but suggesting that you're identifying the cash payments was the real localization for the Indonesia market. Yeah. Rather than the motorcycles.

Aik Chuan Goh: I would say actually, I would say both come hand-in-hand. Yeah. Because if you didn't have cash, you couldn't do motorcycles, and if you didn't do motorcycles, there's no point in having cash, right? Both things are almost hand-in-hand. Yeah.

Jeremy Au: So I think that's really helpful. Great encapsulation. Then two, I like the part about what you said—and I actually feel like that insight only emerged maybe in the past one year because even Kevin Aluwi at Gojek only announced that at LightSpeed Conference one year ago where he felt like: "Hey, why did we let Grab run away with Singapore as a market when it makes so much money compared to Jakarta?" Which is, you know, the dollar price is so much less in terms of profitability and contribution margin.

Aik Chuan Goh: And, you know, the whole world... I mean, okay, we're sitting in Singapore, so maybe it's a bit egotistical for us to say this. Yeah. But everyone thinks that Singapore is a six, seven million population. Mind you, when Uber was running... so Uber had two days free in Singapore. I know once upon a time they said all taxi rides in Singapore were free. Those two days in Singapore crashed the Uber global system because there were so many rides that were happening over those two days—we burned through a ton of cash and generated a ton of value that people just don't realize that such a small country actually generates a lot of commerce.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I think there's an under-appreciation of the enterprise value that flows through in terms of like GDP per capita, in terms of willingness to spend, and willingness to try new technology is unappreciated. And of course, I love your last point, which is I think the value of strategic alliances. I think that is something... I feel like it's relatively more valuable in Asia compared to the US markets. I feel like in the US, there is a very strong mentality of like, "We can build it and we can disrupt it," you know? If that makes sense. Yeah.

Aik Chuan Goh: You remember, once upon a time there were businesses like... I don't say this as a derogatory statement, right? Once upon a time FJ Benjamin was like the "it" business, right? Yeah. Once FJ Benjamin's business, it was just bringing in brands and helping them localize, right? And once upon a time that was, you know, a huge part of the economy in Southeast Asia. And why? Because local language requirements, local regulatory requirements. I think over the last 20, 30 years, this whole importation of this idea—this is almost an Americanized idea, or now we can call it a Chinese idea—of "let's just build everything ourselves," right? And think that we can win because we built everything ourselves in this part of the world. I think that idea is starting to show its limitations. And I think Grab really demonstrated that you can't win just by doing that forever. Yeah, right. Of course, I wouldn't apply it across the board to say that every single time a tech business localizes, it wins. Yeah. Because clearly, you know, Shopee is winning in Indonesia, right? I think the local federalized kind of mode of business where you talk about franchisees, licensing... there are certain product categories and certain service categories that do well when you have a local team on the ground executing that way.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I think it's such a good insight because like I said, I think the American approach has really been about the fact that there's so much venture capital willing to disrupt and eat the incumbent, or the mentality... so that there's almost, to some extent, the shadow of that is you don't respect the localization. Yes. Or the talent that's needed. And so you want to reinvent everything from first principles from their perspective. Yes. And then I think that can be done in the US to some extent because that creative destruction is allowed to happen.

Aik Chuan Goh: Mm-hmm.

Jeremy Au: And I think in the China side it's because in the new build areas, there's so little existing competition. Yeah, absolutely. Or incumbents at all. Yes. So it is not even about eating an incumbent. There's no incumbent. Yeah. It's just rebuild it from scratch and you have to do it from scratch because nobody else is doing it. Yeah. So, makes total sense for Chinese to build something from scratch. But in Southeast Asia, if you are bringing stuff over, are you going to be allowed to do creative destruction on the whole service vehicle that the government and the local unions care about on one end? And two, is there really nobody here doing it already? Yeah. You know, and so if those things are like, you know, 50-50, then that's why you have to be quite thoughtful about whether you partner or collaborate. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. But you know, I think what's interesting is that you had that crazy ride, Uber, then there's the acquisition and so and so forth, and then you went into McKinsey.

Aik Chuan Goh: So, went to McKinsey. It's always been my dream to see what's behind the curtain.

Jeremy Au: So most people go the other way around, right? Most people go to consulting first, and then they go to technology. I think you're like, "Oh, I was in technology, I was running like crazy, I was staying on the market, and now I want to see what consulting is like," you know.

Aik Chuan Goh: I don't know, man. I mean, I hear so many people tell me this feedback saying that, "Why do you make this jump?" And I just... you know, within Uber, we had a ton of consultants and just their ability to so quickly synthesize a certain issue, come out with a communication and a way to communicate—it's just a skillset that was amazing. It was almost like watching magic, right? And I think I really wanted to know what it is... what's the secret sauce. So the fastest way was just to join McKinsey and figure out from the greats, I guess. The greats. Don't get me wrong, Bain is great too.

Jeremy Au: Well, my wife worked at McKinsey and BCG, so I also have to acknowledge that they are also greats alongside Bain. So let's talk about it, right? What do you think you learned versus things that you felt like were different from what you thought?

Aik Chuan Goh: I think the number one thing that I took away from it was the ability to very quickly make decisions and build assumptions, and then going through that very iterative process of arriving at a conclusion, test it out—whether it does hold water in terms of the assumptions—going back, adjusting assumptions, flipping again. Yeah. And just be very comfortable that decisions get made like that even at the most senior level. That is the decision-making cycle. And then of course you then having the ability to bring in data, but you never have enough data. No one makes decisions with enough data, but being able to quickly just bring some data in, iterate, some data in, iterate. I think that for me was probably one of the biggest takeaways from my experience there.

Jeremy Au: I love what you just said because I think that's so true, right? Which is, I think being clear about what decision has been made and working backwards to find the data to support the argument or break the argument is such a valuable toolkit. You know, one big difference is that a lot of people join consulting straight from university. Were there differences about what you thought consulting would be as a lifestyle or career compared to what you thought going in as well?

Aik Chuan Goh: Difference between what I thought a consulting lifestyle... I think I fully expected the consulting lifestyle to be that, right? A lot of travel, a lot of tough problems. I think this is the first time I experienced that whole abundance idea, right? Because McKinsey and to a large extent MBB operates on this "one firm" P&L concept, right? You, as the most junior person in Singapore, can call a 20-year social media veteran or, I don't know, procurement for automotive vehicles in the US, and the partner picks up the call and tells you everything you need to know about the industry, right? That was something very unexpected. If you ask me, that was probably the other takeaway—being able to be comfortable just calling someone and saying, "Hey, can you give me a download about this topic?" Both being able to ask for information and appreciate the person reciprocating when needed was a very valuable and unexpected part of the journey.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I think that's such a lovely sentiment as well. Actually, I'm quite curious because I think I might have missed the INSEAD MBA that was before the McKinsey and after Uber. So let's talk about that. Okay. Yeah, because I realized I glossed over that very quickly, which is you also chose to do your MBA. So what were you thinking at that point in time? Or like, "I need to study more business?"

Aik Chuan Goh: So, I like the journey of... obviously on hindsight, I love the journey that I went on. I think that in the Uber days, what we did and learned a lot on is how to operate, right? How to iteratively get to the answer on a day-to-day basis. Coming out of that, I always felt what I was missing was the ability to think from the answer first. Yeah. Also I have encountered so many things during my Uber days where I just felt like, "Hey, I understand the practical elements of this. What was the theoretical foundation around it?" Right? I mean, very simple topic you talked about a few years ago—you know, your accounting standards change on the right-of-use recognition, right? Of use policies. I saw that happening in Uber. We were doing our own books. So I knew that was how the accounting was done. I could not understand what was the underpinning for that. Right. I didn't understand how do you get different financing structures, why, you know, a bunch of, at that point, late 30-year-olds could run, convince a bunch of VCs to give them a lot of money to build Uber. There were a lot of these things that I felt like... I mean, of course everyone writes something about it to death, but I just found myself not being able to understand the underpinning knowledge to it, right? And I think MBA and to a large degree McKinsey gave me the underpinning. I mean, today it's very easy for me to register off, "Oh, it's WACC," and you can trace it back to the base recipes for that. Yeah. So I went in with that thinking that I want to understand: what is the most fundamental ingredient to this business decision that we are making? Yeah. And I don't believe that the way to learn this was to do more operations, but I needed to understand the theoretical backing.

Jeremy Au: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I think that's such an interesting piece. And for those who are waiting to do an MBA... yes or no? Oh, well,

Aik Chuan Goh: coming from... Do you have any advice? I mean, coming from two MBA students or... yeah. This is as unbiased as you ever get. Okay, so don't get me wrong. You know, I feel that off-quoted thing that everyone talks about was you go in for the network, the knowledge, you know... so you can pick it up from ChatGPT now. I don't agree with that statement. Yeah. I do think that, yes, you can GPT away into knowledge, but the knowledge that you get are little nuggets, right? Mm-hmm. But how do you start to string that together into a cohesive body of knowledge? I think that is where the MBA program does offer something different. And I also think that there are certain very esoteric topics that are really tough to get just by reading the Bloomberg or whatnot, right? That an MBA does teach. And you know, esoteric topics are: "How does a funding structure for a turnaround business come about?" You have case studies—HBS does a lot of those case studies, right? Mm-hmm. You pick up so much just from going really deep into one of these topics. And they're proprietary. These things are... they won't get published in Bloomberg. You have to be in the class with the prof, then walking you through the decisions. And they're not walking you through from bullshit, right? A lot of the time the cases get written because they've spoken to the CEO, the VPs who were in that moment making the decision, their considerations, and they bring those things to life. I think that's so valuable. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I definitely agree about that. I mean, I think where I want to add onto that and chime in is that I think exactly like you said: I think the knowledge has become commoditized with ChatGPT especially, and that basis about really being able to apply that in the narrative context, simulation, and network perspective is a really powerful lesson there. And what was interesting is that, you know, you've done the MBA, you've done the McKinsey, and then you went back to technology startup land. So what was that decision? Were you like, "You know what, consulting's not for me?"

Aik Chuan Goh: Oh, wow.

Jeremy Au: I've learned everything behind the Wizard

Aik Chuan Goh: of Oz. That was... you know, on hindsight, that was the craziest decision I've ever made. Yeah. Sometimes I swear my people around me probably really wonder why we... So just set things in context. My son was getting born in May, right? And as you guys know, McKinsey and MBB offer great paternity benefits, medical, everything covered. You know, take leave, whatever was great. I was approached to join a Chinese EdTech company for K-[00:26:00]12 teaching Chinese. And in my mind, just... it's like so many different things are starting to click together. I felt like this is my destiny. You know, this is how it manifests itself because I grew up, you know, really loving Chinese novels. I used to read a lot of Chinese—

Jeremy Au: Martial arts? Yeah. Like little stories, but fairytales sort of.

Aik Chuan Goh: Yeah. It's something like that, right? I love those things. Yeah. I read so much about it. This was 2021, right? Mm-hmm. This was before the Sino-American relationship started turning sour. Mm-hmm. Almost like coming off the boom. This was like post-Beijing Olympics, you remember? Mm-hmm. There was a time when the world was just like: the world is going to be China and the US hand-in-hand solving the tougher problems in the world. And in my mind was: this is my contribution to the world. If we can get X million more kids to speak both good English, which is already provided, yeah, and good Chinese, yeah, we can create world peace. No, it was literally my mind, right? So it was kind of with that in mind when the recruiter called me and they said, "You know, it's an EdTech company teaching Chinese." I was like, "Yes, tell me more." And then I rushed and... you know, McKinsey offers a lot of packages to retain you. I just said, "No, I don't want any of it. Let me leave ASAP. I want to join this company." So I jumped over and started building what was... I think then on hindsight, there were so many learnings from this particular business, but started to really push the business in the midst of COVID when, you know, there were a lot of uncertainties from home. Business models were changing all the time. At the same time, we were also operating, you know, on the Byju's high, right? Remember? Yeah. 2021. Byju's was raising money on stock. Everyone was talking about us. Our CFO went on Bloomberg, the who's who of the VC world had a direct line to the founder, or the founder had a direct line to them. It was just a crazy ride through the first one and a half, two years.

Jeremy Au: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So interesting because, you know, this is also like a Chinese company as well, and I'm starting to notice you're always like the early adopter, right? I mean, people think I'm an early adopter, but actually, career-wise, I'm like a little bit one step safer than you actually. Because, you know, you are one of the first in American tech companies like Uber, and I think you were pretty much with one of the first Chinese companies to come to Southeast Asia.

Aik Chuan Goh: In all fairness, they were HQ'd in Singapore, and the founder himself was Chinese. So the culture was an interesting mix of both American, or rather the Western culture, and Chinese culture.

Jeremy Au: Yeah, exactly. So what were some of the learnings you had from growing this new adventure of high growth?

Aik Chuan Goh: Well, on hindsight, I think that the biggest takeaway—and mind you, this is coming off Uber, when you saw the Uber flywheel and you just think that, "Oh, any venture-backed business could conquer the world and solve all the world's problems," right? And I had that going into, again, solving venture-backed Chinese world peace.

Jeremy Au: Yeah.

Aik Chuan Goh: Right? But going into it, I think a few realities started to hit me and I started to realize some of these. One is that when you're dealing with any product that I think touches K-12, right? Immediately the complexity changes quite significantly because your term is... it's, you know, the whole discussion about personalized learning just accelerates so much. You have a child in Indonesia who's seven years old, and a child in Singapore that was seven years old, a child in Thailand that was seven years old—they're completely different starting points in terms of, you know, math, English, Chinese, whatever thing that you want to teach. It's completely different. Then a child that was seven years old in Singapore and a child eight years old in Singapore has a completely different program. A child of eight years old in a public school system and a child of eight years old in an international school system in Singapore requires a different set of content. So you can imagine the complexity that stacks one on top of another and mind you this was the days before ChatGPT and I think the jury is still out whether AI will be able to solve this question of personalization for education. But if you start to look at the world in that lens, you start to realize how difficult it is for venture to come in. Because you see, the idea here is: what is venture funding's biggest advantage? You come in, you take a really good product, you pump it with marketing, sales, distribution channels, and then suddenly the whole world adopts your product. When we talk about education... you might have a good program for a bunch of seven-year-olds in the middle of the US and Silicon Valley area, but no matter how much money you push to scale that product globally, there's only one Silicon Valley and there's only a bunch of kids with that syllabus who will take up your program and yeah. You know, you can even talk about, "Yeah, let's get it localized, let's get people to come in to adjust the content." That is true, it is not easy to do. It requires very deliberate, almost like day one, thinking about how to create very modularized content to achieve that. We actually did a lot of that in Singapore to some degree of success. But that is not an easy thing to do at scale.

Jeremy Au: Not easy at all. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I totally empathize with that and I think education tech as a result tends to have like a bit of a passion subsidy, which is people are passionate.

Aik Chuan Goh: Oh yes, absolutely. Yeah.

Jeremy Au: Yourself included.

Aik Chuan Goh: Myself included. Yeah. You know, you know, the joke within the EdTech sector was... why did EdTech start to become like the big... you know, EdTech wasn't part of a VC team at all until like 2017, 2018. Yep. The joke within the industry was why? Because all the founders of the Googles, of the Chinese, you know, the Alibabas—they were all flush with cash in 2017 and started having children, so they all brought the money back and said: "Me, I want to invest in tech companies and I'm passionate about education." Boom. Boom. You know, all the EdTech startups came up during that period of time.

Jeremy Au: I mean, it's true. I did build my education tech caregiving startup in 2017.

Aik Chuan Goh: And I'm sure your investors, a lot of them were at the age where their kids... they empathized with the issue.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. They could empathize with the issue. They could find childcare or education and caregiving. And so, you know, and now it's elder care, right? Because all the founders and everything realized that they don't want to take care of their parents. Yeah. You know, so now it's elder care as well. So yeah, I think there's definitely a huge, you know, set of issues and discovery there. And then after you decided to leave and start search funds—

Aik Chuan Goh: So I left... I was with... I mean, we were going through a VC downcycle. And obviously, as I kind of alluded to, we started to see the limitations of a venture-backed model. It really, I think to some degree, helped me to question as well as crystallize the role of capital in growing businesses. I was reaching a point where I was then really thinking about: what can capital do realistically, right? What kind of issues can it solve? That was when I think I got pulled back into this idea of a search fund—an idea that I learned during my MBA, right? And there are a few things. So one was that I started to really question the role of capital in businesses. When is it beneficial? When is it not beneficial, right? And I felt very passionate that the next thing that I want to do is go into a place or a space where the role of capital is a bit more defined and the role of capital is trying to solve a real problem statement, right? Then I think the second part was that, growing up, my father and my grandfather were both entrepreneurs, and as they were retiring, I saw firsthand the challenges that they faced, which was: as you are retiring, as you get older, you actually try to solve two things. You try to solve talent, right? You're retiring, there's no one to fill your shoes. You need a good talent to step in to operate the business. Two, you are looking for capital. You're looking for someone to buy all your shares so that you can step away and retire, right? Yeah. Finding those two things in one package, it's a really difficult challenge. I think, you know, search funds really solve that... that question of capital and the talent side. You know, if you're lucky, you have a good GM who kind of can step into your shoes, great. If you don't, challenging. So I then started thinking about, "Okay, then can we bring all these things together?" Right? One is that we have a succession problem—you have retiring owners. Two is that there just wasn't enough liquidity within the SME space in terms of talent and capital. And the third thing was that I wanted a structure, a capital structure, right? That is less about growth for growth's sake almost, right? And ensure that capital can play a much better role in terms of growing good high-quality businesses or products. And to some degree also ensure that the growth isn't as disruptive, that it kind of, to some respect, respects what came before, right? Can you pump capital into a business and yet respect what that business was before the capital came in? I think those three things were maybe three things that are also top of mind, and they all crystallized to this idea of: can we bring in search funds in these parts of the world. I mean, it's really successful in the US and Europe. I mean, we can talk more about that, but it's been proven to be successful and I felt really passionate about, "Hey, can we bring this model into Southeast Asia, into APAC where, you know, the issue of succession is really just a few years away from where we are today."

Jeremy Au: Yeah. I think that what's interesting is that, you know, I remember us hanging out double dates—your wife, you, my wife, me, kids—and I always remember that we were like, you know, having dinner and that your wife is like, "Ah, you know, my husband's doing a search fund," and then you are like, "Mumble, mumble, mumble." Oh, but that was also two years ago. Today where you're like, I am on the news talking about search funds representing Garlic Capital. And you know, like that big visionary—

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, it's fear, right? It's: you have no idea if it's going to work. But this asset class has, I think, really captured the zeitgeist, if you may. Yeah. Of where we are as a community. I mean, in the US and Europe it's been a thing for the last 10 years. But here, I mean, left, right, and center you're hearing conferences, you are hearing about, you know, PE partners who say, "Oh, you are doing this, how's it going? You want to do more?" Yeah, I think so. I think it's—

Jeremy Au: So I think that's the point that I'm trying to say here is that I feel like you started super early. Okay, I say 2025 is probably where we turn the corner to be like, "Okay, companies..." I think what I would say is that 2021 to 2023 was the year of the VC boom, right? And so people didn't look at search funds, people were saying like, "Let's build companies." 2024 was everybody just trying to figure out what the heck is going on and you know, figuring out what is the short winter, long winter, blah, blah, blah. I would say 2025 is the first year where I was like, "Okay, VC-backed businesses have a structural component that's currently difficult to see, but we see a path for private equity plays." We see a path for roll-ups. We see a path for mass consumer brands with slower growth, but, you know, having a high ceiling to hit towards. I think 2026 would be the year of the search fund, from my perspective. I don't think it's 2025 yet.

Aik Chuan Goh: Oh, man. Dude. That means I'm too early again.

Jeremy Au: No. I'm just saying... so you started out very early for sure, right? Mm-hmm. In all the way back in 2023.

Aik Chuan Goh: That was when the fundraising started.

Jeremy Au: That was when fundraising started, right? Which was super early. What made you say like, "Okay, you know what, I'm willing to be first in this category?"

Aik Chuan Goh: I don't know. I honestly haven't thought about it that way. I was just like: there's a problem, there's money, there's people interested in this. It just made sense. Let's give it a try. There were a lot of naysayers which we can talk a little bit more later on, which was really challenging to get through. But yeah, I never thought about it as the first and hence it was a risk. It was more like, "Yeah, let's get it."

Jeremy Au: Yeah, I mean I think 2026 is easy for people to say this because first of all, you know, you're leading the way. Yeah. Now there's also, I think, several... like Tyson, right? Is building out the search fund kind of like a hub for folks. Yes. Yeah. And then Dennis and the team at Partners, is building this in the more in-house approach. Yep. So he's on a peak, you know, wearing this—

Aik Chuan Goh: He is a good-looking chap. He's a good-looking chap. I know. I can't do the peak,

Jeremy Au: you know, I is like... I don't know, who knows? So maybe next time we'll be there in the leather jacket, right? But I mean, so I think 2025 is like all these early, whatever it is. And I think people who want to do it in 2026 actually understand it's like: drop the dream of being your own boss. 'Cause you're stuck at McKinsey and you're like, "You know what, the one thing better than making slides for somebody who doesn't execute it is executing it." So it's like small-cap, private equity playbook, execution, you know. Which is why people want to do it, I think. And then obviously also it's less scary because people are like, "You have done it," but I just don't understand how you started doing it—2023 is bonkers to me because, okay... if you tell me... sorry, and I don't want to say this... okay... you also use this phrase that you are the first "traditional" search fund. So what does that mean? But also don't know yet, is it means that you have to ask people to fund you to do it. Which is very different from self-funded search funds, which is: "I'm rich enough, or my parents are rich enough," sorry to say this, to help me put this together. Okay. Not everybody's like that. Yeah. But, and then they buy a target, which makes sense, fine. But for you, you had to go out to ask people for money in 2023, which people didn't

Aik Chuan Goh: understand the category. Oh, did I? I mean, I don't even think about it in that lens. I mean, yeah. You think about what Scott... so Scott's first... for all intensive purposes, one of the first self-funded searchers in Singapore. He started with nothing. I mean, he had no money. He just knocked on doors on both the business side, yeah, as well as the investor side and just got everything together. He didn't pay himself a salary. Strange thing to say, but if you think about my journey today, I don't think it's hard compared to what Scott did. Okay. I'm just like, "Fine. You're right. You're right."

Jeremy Au: So

Aik Chuan Goh: like Scott... yeah, if he did it, then I can do it.

Jeremy Au: So, so Scott is the hardest for sure. He is the hardest.

Aik Chuan Goh: And don't get me wrong, he's a better man than me. I'm absolutely sure he's better than me. And

Jeremy Au: by the way, all our wives... or all our spouses... oh, sorry... all our significant others... yeah... yes, they know each other as well, which is a party for all anyways. But yeah, so he's definitely... okay, so definitely he's got a crazy start. So

Aik Chuan Goh: he had the hardest job. I followed his coattails.

Jeremy Au: But what was it like fundraising,

Aik Chuan Goh: because you had to explain the search fund as a category like... So it was a very interesting journey also in terms of... I think it's a... it is a lesson in marketing, right? What I very quickly realized was there were just two camps of people. Mm-hmm. One camp who said... folks would laugh me out the door, right? Literally, who just went like, "Yeah, this just does not happen." And then there's a second camp of people who say, "Where were you? This should have happened five years ago. Yes. How much do you need? This is some money," right? It was very extreme. I had half-hour meetings. Mm-hmm. First meeting, I was referred by someone to meet this person. Within half an hour, they asked, "How much money you need?" And that was the end of the conversation. And then we signed the rest of it, really. Yeah. Yeah.

Jeremy Au: What was hard about that process actually, now that you know, you've been in it two-plus years, you know.

Aik Chuan Goh: This whole process or that particular fundraising?

Jeremy Au: I mean, I think that for most people... I'm just saying, it would seem like fundraising is the hardest part. I don't know. I mean, I'm just saying it from the outside because, to me at least, it seems like: yeah, if you had enough money and you had to buy a target, and a target is willing to sell because they don't have a successor, that seems like the easy part. I'm just saying that this is from the outside in, but the hard part is asking for money. But I'm just kind of curious from the inside: what is your actual reality?

Aik Chuan Goh: I honestly think that's not the hardest part. No, the hardest part is finding a high-quality business. The reason why the search fund asset has done so well is because the structure from day one is set up to... By default, you are not buying a business. You remember stats 101, right? Your alternative hypothesis. Yeah. I think that is buying a business. Yeah. So I think being able to cross that threshold... And also we can talk about the technical details in a bit, but the nature of search funds is that it does not have a deployment target, right? You are not forced to push to deploy capital if you don't have to. There's almost no pressure. In fact, my investors... they don't pressure me to deploy capital at all, right? So that, I think, in turn makes the investment a lot harder because you just need to develop so much conviction in the business that you're buying into that you'll finally be willing to stand in front of investors and say, "Dear investors, I know you guys don't want to deploy more cash, but I truly think this is the one. This is the one I want to marry. These are the reasons why," right? So I think to get to that threshold is just not an easy thing to do. And of course, needless to say, the asset class is very new. You know, it's very difficult to communicate to business owners. You are often not going in with a large, you know, budget and throwing money at the seller. So you're going to be fighting so much more because it's really an uphill battle, right? To get the seller across the line to say, "Hey, you know, AC or whoever the searcher is, has the right value system, has the right beliefs, and he will take my business to a different place, to a different level eventually," that I'm willing to forego, you know, 10, 15, 20% more money maybe if I waited for a few more years for like the ideal buyer to come in. It's almost like... you know, Jeremy today is successful, right? So it's easy to say, "Hey, I bet money on you." But you know, Jeremy back in maybe your uni days... yeah... three years under your belt and you come out and say, "Hey, give me money. Trust me with a business," and the other person trusting you to give you the business. It's an uphill battle. I don't know if I say that well enough, but. Yeah. Yeah.

Jeremy Au: But let's double-take to that, right? Because basically, you're saying that hunting for the right deal, selecting it, and also closing the deal is all the real difficult part, not the fundraising part. Let's double-take to that because I'm so curious, right? Because: How do you hunt for a deal? Like, because... I mean, do you end up like running hypotheses and say like, "Hey, this is the pipeline, these are some candidates, these are things that I somewhat believe in, these are things I have a high conviction in?" Were there tries at trying to persuade or get across? Like how does that selection process, hunting process come about?

Aik Chuan Goh: So I think it's really quite similar to any PE or VC shops, right? Some folks start off very vertical-driven yourself, thesis, and then go from there. Some folks just really meet and met as many people as you could. For us, I started off more, maybe more vertical-driven. We had certain pieces to the industries that we want to go deeper. But I very quickly realized that because I narrowed my mandate into Singapore, almost every thesis that we found probably has about like 10 companies in there of which only five of them are of the right size, of which none of them are selling. Then that very quickly brought me to a point where: "Hey, you know what, I think the bottleneck is a seller of the right demographic, right profile who could be interested in letting someone into their baby, help take care of their baby." Right? That is hard. Developing a thesis... you and I, with our consulting background and VC background, can generate, you know, pages and pages of it any day, right? So I think that's the easy part.

Jeremy Au: Maybe we should talk a little bit about that process of financing it, right? Because in the US, search funds are huge because also because of

Aik Chuan Goh: the

Jeremy Au: government debt structure, where I think on one end there's a lot of private capital for that lending facilities. And then other part of it is the Small Business Administration. They have loans to support businesses that end up becoming actually a great multiplier for the equity component to make it a levered buyout that's viable at the, you know, search fund level. Whereas I think that in Southeast Asia, that doesn't exist to the same magnitude.

Aik Chuan Goh: No, it's very... it's definitely not to that level. Yeah. But this topic is really interesting, right? I mean, you talk about: within search, there are a few key value-creation levers, right? When you are in a more mature market, where we're talking about 3% year growth, your leveraged buyout lever—i.e., how do you use that to supercharge your returns—becomes much more relevant. But if your value-creation thesis is around growth, around EBITDA improvements, EBITDA margin improvements, then actually the role of that is... it's important, but it's not as critical, right? And, you know, I was just talking to a few of my peers in India. We were sharing, we were trading notes about debt, how to fundraise about debt. We concluded in India, that is not something that they need to care about. Frankly, they don't care if they don't raise debt, they're fine, because a lot of deals that they're looking at, it's like 20, 30% year-on-year growth. There's a high chance that they can get in that, you know, a certain EBITDA multiple and then exit at two times just because their stock market is just so, so, so happening at the moment. So in those cases, why do you care? You don't need debt to reach your IRR targets to do your return targets that investors set for you. But obviously, in Singapore, I think the story is a bit in between, 'cause Singapore as a country, you know, 3% GDP growth rate year-on-year, for all intensive purposes is a developed market, but in certain spots, they're still a bit like developing market dynamics. So I think it's a bit in between, but in the US I think it's a bit different, 'cause there are a lot of businesses that fundamentally, they're super stable, super resilient. All we need to do is put 90% debt on it, supercharge returns, suddenly, you know, 5% year-on-year growth becomes five times 10 at 50% ROI, right? So I think you also kind of need to understand the context of how the deal delivers value and then talk about it visibly like that.

Jeremy Au: I think what you're suggesting is: how the deal delivers value, right? So I think there's often the two major beautiful parts in the bar chart, right? You know, one is going to be about your valuation arbitrage, right? You are able to negotiate a better deal because there's distress, succession crisis, you know, information asymmetry, you know, or market asymmetry. So I think it's an arbitrage there. And then second part is the value creation lever, right? Which is about either increasing revenues and growth or in terms of decreasing costs to generate the EBITDA piece. What do you think are the primary levers you think for search funds in... I don't know... I don't even know if I can say Asia, but Southeast Asia or Singapore... I don't know where you're comfortable.

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, I probably don't want to comment too much about Southeast Asia. Let me share a conversation actually. But I think for Singapore, I think if you ask me, it is a fairly low information asymmetry market. Most business owners, by the time we speak to them—and this afternoon I was speaking to a business owner—his reaction was, "Oh, you are like the X number of PE fund that has come to my office to have a chat with me about this." It's... all of them have gone through multiple rounds of conversations so they know their worth, right? So I don't think the information asymmetry is where value creation is going to come in. I think where Singapore's value creation will come in probably will be a mix of two levers. One is that, yes, debt is not super available visibly like in the US—it's not 90% loan-to-value ratio—but it doesn't change the fact that you can access pretty cheap loans in Singapore. But the fact that SORA is very low and it's always been decently low... when we talk about, you know, five to 8% effective, free on your debt, it's very doable, right? So I think there's some value creation that comes in from that. And the fact of the matter is—that long conversation—a lot of SMEs in Singapore are under-leveraged. A lot of SMEs in Singapore are under-leveraged, right? Mm-hmm. All you need to do is just make sure that the WACC is adjusted better because you have some debt introduced into the capital structure, but you're fine. Yeah. Then, of course, Singapore there is, I think still, as I said, some growth, not a lot. 5, 6, 7, 8, 9% very possible in a lot of the small-to-medium enterprises, even in mature markets. Yeah, so I think those two are probably the key levers where a lot of things will happen.

Jeremy Au: So I think there's a fantastic insight, I think, and I think that pushes a lot into the cultural mindset, I think, for a lot of business owners for that. So I think it's a great insight there. And I think the other great insight that you have there is also about the growth lever as well, actually. Because I think that even though we look at Singapore as a mature market, but in fact, Singapore is still a hub for the region, right? Mm-hmm. And so I think for the right business that's in Singapore, if they're willing and you're willing to help them figure out how to grow regionally, yeah, or partner regionally, then I think there are growth levers that can exist. And you know, my favorite is always like all these like, you know, Singapore shoes going into... you know, the Givi shoes—

Aik Chuan Goh: Oh.

Jeremy Au: And they're doing so well in Southeast Asia and Asia. And—

Aik Chuan Goh: Givi Shoes is from Penang, right? Penang.

Jeremy Au: Okay. Thank you. Thank you. But you know, it also got integrated. Anyway, then TWG is a good example. Bacha Coffee. Yeah. I think good examples of consumer brands who are all under the same group, by the way, TWG.

Aik Chuan Goh: They figured it out.

Jeremy Au: Yeah. Bacha Coffee and TWG are all under the same V3 24 group. And they have the same playbook, which is: premium, regionalized, you know. Yeah. You know. Anyway, so a lot to learn and so, interesting to see how that plays out. So my last question I have for you is: could you share a personal professional story about a time that you've been brave?

Aik Chuan Goh: So I think this journey especially... you know, I think as you can tell from what we discussed prior to this, I'm trying to take a journey where... I mean, I grew up being very Asian, right? Where your parents teach you, you know: respect experience, respect wisdom, respect your elders, respect for what comes before you. But during my fundraising process, I had several instances, actually one very painful instance where there was an individual, a quite respected investor, who I spoke to about the idea. And he very quickly just said, "You know how many SMEs I meet in Singapore? None of them are of high enough quality that I ever consider putting money in." And I think that was a really painful... it took me a few weeks actually to come across that. 'Cause I think in my mind, on one hand, you have this idea that: "Hey, I have a respected elder who has been investing for a long time." How do I contextualize this "wisdom," quote-unquote, that he gave right at that moment versus what I'm trying to do—which is, to some degree, you're trying to respect what was done before you and then build the next level on top of it. So it took me a few weeks, but I think I finally arrived at a point where I managed to rationalize, I think, his lived experience and his value system. And then I think I realized that, you know, what he says was true within his reality and how he was brought up. But I think it's also, to some degree, how... you know what I believe... which is there are pockets of high-quality SMEs in Singapore, whose best practice deserves to continue on the next generation. I have a right, as much as he does, to assert that thesis, right? Yeah, I think so. I would say that was... I don't know if it's the bravest thing that anyone has ever done, but that I think will probably be something within my search fund journey, something that really continues to drive me, help me to crystallize the experiences that I see today.

Jeremy Au: I mean, I think it's totally fair that that's a story of bravery because it's somebody that you respect basically being skeptical about your thesis and your approach, right? And I think it's one thing to be skeptical about you as a person. Mm-hmm.

Aik Chuan Goh: So—

Jeremy Au: I think being skeptical about your vehicle or approach, mm-hmm... and I think to be skeptical of all Singaporean SMEs effectively, which is... you know, both and always... but it's a big statement to make actually, right?

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, he has his views. So, you know, I think I've learned to respect the person, respect his lived experience, but also contextualize, I think, some of the things that he says.

Jeremy Au: I mean, I don't think he's necessarily wrong because what he's basically saying is that for some companies that he sees, or many companies he sees, he's not a fan of their current leadership approach. But to contextualize it, that's why you are coming in with a fresh, energetic approach to help revitalize that leadership, right? Yeah. I mean, you know, people can only sit until they're like 20-something years old, right? You know, maybe their early 30s. And after that, you know, you don't see any Olympic swimmers in your 40s or 50s or 60s. Yeah. You know, so for many SMEs, you know, like... their best times, their prime days, you know, when they were going for it... market size, opportunity, et cetera... that's why they want to hand over to the next generation or to new leadership or new talent to push it forward, right?

Aik Chuan Goh: Mm-hmm.

Jeremy Au: Yeah, I think so. Yeah. But I'm just kind of curious because: how did you recontextualize or how did you, like, process that? Did you, like, I don't know, go for a walk? Did you meditate? I don't know what it is... did you talk to your wife about it? I was saying, you know, I was... how do you, because, you know, it is tough, right? Because you know, like you're saying that it's skepticism, right? In that sense, right? And so how do you deal with that? Yeah.

Aik Chuan Goh: I mean, this is nothing new, right? Sometimes you just need some friends around you who would support you unconditionally, whom you have respect for their opinions, and just being able to say, "I'm feeling pretty miserable right now because of this," and they become your sounding board. Yeah. You know, the man has a certain lived experience that, that maybe colors his view. I think having multiple points of anchors around you, whether your wife, your friends... so I think I had that. Of course, I mean, there are long, nice walks at the beach and just kidding. But yes, there was some time for introspection. Yeah. And I really needed some time to think about it, but I wouldn't say I have a special formula to solve that. Yeah. It's just you need time.

Jeremy Au: Yep. Yeah. Awesome. On that note, I'd love to summarize the three big takeaways. I didn't mean to keep going, but here are the three big takeaways. First of all, thanks so much for sharing about your early Conjunct Consulting days, other days volunteering at a social enterprise together. And you know, I think it was just, you know, good to kind of walk through a little bit more about what you were thinking in your career and what you were happy with, what you were dissatisfied with, and what you were searching for. Which brings us to the second chunk, of course, is I think your later career where I'm sure you, as a UBS analyst and social enterprise volunteer, did not envision yourself doing, which was, you know, being a GM of two different technology companies, right? At Uber as well as an education tech company, as well as a McKinsey consultant and an INSEAD MBA along the way. So I think a lot of good learnings about... I think the various career decisions that you made and what were the things that you got to learn, some of the things you got to reflect on, and even a nice little set of learnings about the Uber story, about, you know, lessons that can be taken away from it—which is first of all being sure to deliver cash, and Gojek's which is a form of localization. Secondly, which is about making sure that you are taking the fight to every, you know, city and country and making sure you don't let somebody run away with the profit pool in a market that you didn't think was worth much, but actually turns out to be worth a lot when you let them have the market leader position on it. And lastly, thanks for sharing about the value of strategic alliances and partners and joint ventures or collaborations. I thought that was just a really good learning. Lastly, thanks so much for sharing about your search fund, about Garlic Capital, and about your approach to being the first conventional search fund, which is funded by LPs, and to look for targets and others. It's a masterclass in terms of how you felt confident about starting it so early, how you went about fundraising, how you went about searching for targets, and some of the unanticipated difficulties and challenges and criticisms that you can get along. Mm-hmm. On that note, thank you so much for sharing.

Aik Chuan Goh: Thanks, Jeremy.