"Why do I make the decision for six lives? That was when I was brave enough to tell her, crying, ‘Mommy, I’ll be a good boy. I’ll listen to anything you say.’ I said, ‘I don’t want to die. I really don’t want to die. I choose life.’ We survived. I have my child, she is now a grandmother, and my sister has a child too. That moment toughened me and shaped why relationships matter so much to me. People ask why I’m afraid of heights, and I say no, because I almost jumped before." - Eldred Wee, Founder of Edenity
"With AI, vouching is now automated, but vouching means checking whether a real receipt and invoice match the bank statement and the full flow of money. When I reviewed the engagement, I saw receivables rising, sales increasing, and the sales director constantly trying to curry favor every time I visited. I worked on that audit for three years and kept thinking something was wrong. If we did the audit properly, it would not pass. In the first year, I reported it and was told to just close the audit. In the second year, I said I could not do this anymore and that I would take action if it continued. By the third year, everything unraveled." - Eldred Wee, Founder of Edenity
"Audit meant working late, juggling studies and exam periods, and grinding through long nights. I learned a lot and almost uncovered a fraud as a junior. It was hard to navigate because there were many stakeholders. I had to extract information from people who partly knew the truth, piece it together for the finance manager, and then report it clearly to the audit partners. That experience was unique and shaped why I started in accounting and finance." - Eldred Wee, Founder of Edenity
Eldred Wee, Founder of Edenity, joins Jeremy Au to unpack why corporate services and accounting firms sit at the center of Southeast Asia’s next wave of SME acquisitions. They explore how Eldred’s early career in Big Four audit shaped his ability to spot incentives, fraud, and double or triple books, and why these realities define investing in the region. The conversation covers the rise of roll-ups in accounting and corporate services, why organic growth is hard for B2B services in Southeast Asia, and how aging founders and low digitization are creating a narrow transition window for buyers. Eldred also shares why price arbitrage alone rarely works, how culture and trust determine post-deal success, and why relationship-driven execution matters more than capital in small business M&A.
04:33 Big Four audit trained judgment, not just rules: Eldred learned how incentives, weak controls, and human behavior enable fraud to persist over years.
09:21 Double and triple books are a regional reality: Separate records exist for tax, management, and true economics, shaping how investors must assess risk.
11:58 Accounting is at a transition point: AI and digitization are advancing fast while many traditional firms remain underprepared.
12:38 SMEs form the backbone of Singapore’s economy: Small firms drive close to half of GDP and most employment, making corporate services critical infrastructure.
14:20 Inorganic growth beats organic growth for B2B services: Fragmentation and regulation push buyers to acquire existing firms rather than scale from scratch.
18:47 Culture outweighs financials in small acquisitions: Employee loyalty and founder habits often determine post-deal success or failure.
29:12 Personal history shapes leadership and dealmaking: Eldred’s early life experiences reinforce his focus on trust, relationships, and long-term legacy.
Jeremy Au (01:02) Hey Eldred, so excited to have you on the show. I think we've hung out a few times for various podcasts, and I was like: "You know what? It's time to make this happen for you to come on mine." So I'm excited to have you because you're somebody who understands how deals happen, especially for search funds, entrepreneurship through acquisitions, and all that stuff, which is starting to get a bit hot right now. A lot of momentum is going on, so I think this is a good time for us to chat. But first, could you introduce yourself?
Eldred Wee (01:29) Yeah, so hi guys, my name is Eldred. I named my company after my son. I'm the founder of Edenity, and what we really do is mergers and acquisitions for Singapore SMEs that are often overlooked by investment bankers. We can dive a little bit deeper into that. For my non-profit, I lead the Hainan Business Chamber; we gather the Hainanese, which is a minority dialect group, together.
Jeremy Au (01:49) Fantastic. So growing up, were you very proudly Hainanese?
Eldred Wee (01:52) To be very frank with you, it’s a little bit of a "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" situation. Both my mom and dad are Hainanese, but sadly they divorced when I was nine years old. So the Hainanese roots weren't that strong before. But after 10 years of corporate experience, I realized: "Hey, maybe I'm into entrepreneurship." My mom is a little bit like the "rich mom"—she's like: "Oh, sorry, I'm not an entrepreneur, I can't help you. But you know our family friends, Mr. Bean or Mr. Low? Why not check them out?" So we actually spoke, and they were like: "Hey, why not join the Hainan Business Chamber?" And I fell in love—like, what is this dialect, this language that I'm supposed to know but don't? There are warm, fatherly figures, entrepreneurs like giants, and they're coming to me saying: "Oh, you are Hainanese? We are a minority; we need to help each other. How can I help you?" and it goes on and on. Imagine if the dialect dies within our generation; I’d find that such a big pity. Especially since Hainanese is a minority; if you are serving National Service, you’ll learn Hokkien somehow or another, but Hainanese...
Jeremy Au (02:41) So let's talk about the Hainanese. Do you speak Hainanese fluently? What are the practices of Hainanese people versus other groups from your background?
Eldred Wee (02:49) Yeah, so maybe a super short background: I think for the Hainanese, we were the late settlers in Singapore. So all the good jobs had been taken, right? All the Hokkiens had them because they were the majority. So we were late settlers, and there wasn't much left to do. So we typically served the British back then. We were servants. We dominated the F&B scene because we cooked. Like, for example, Ya Kun Kaya—usually butter toast for the British. So that's what we did. We also spent a fair bit of time being shipbuilders, actually doing jobs that nobody wanted to do. So that's how the Hainanese in Singapore started growing up. It began with going to the Chamber. We do speak in English, but sometimes you can't actually express everything. I'm actually taking a Hainanese course with the Hainanese Hwee Kuan, or the association, every Wednesday of the month.
Jeremy Au (03:36) Yeah.
Eldred Wee (03:36) I'm starting to learn it properly. I teach my son, Eden, Hainanese, so that he knows we are Hainanese.
Jeremy Au (03:42) Wow.
Eldred Wee (03:42) And so from a very young age, he’s started to learn. And the beauty about that is my mom is semi-retired, so she teaches him Hokkien, Hainanese, and even Cantonese.
Jeremy Au (03:51) Who are some of the famous Hainanese people in Singapore?
Eldred Wee (03:54) In F&B, I’d say Killiney, Mr. Bean, Old Chang Kee is another one. Danny Loong from Timbre is another one. Non-F&B, we probably look at Cortina Watch—Anthony Lim. He's actually the founder of the Hainan Business Chamber. We founded it 15 years ago. Recently, we did an 800-person gala dinner gathering the Hainan Business Chambers from all over the world. We had a 250-person business symposium and even got featured in the Business Times for that. Keeping the culture alive, keeping the community alive—how are we going to do that? We are a diverse bunch. Fun fact: the majority of the Kaya that’s produced in Singapore is actually Hainanese as well. Of course—Kaya, coconut, palm island—it's very similar to Hawaii in the States.
Jeremy Au (04:36) But Hainan for China. I’ve actually been to Hainan.
Eldred Wee (04:38) When was that?
Jeremy Au (04:39) That was in 2012 to 2013. I think I went to both the work parts but also Sanya. I was consulting for an alcohol brand, so we had to go and look at due diligence—Hawaii or China? And obviously, watching people drink and observing it. So it’s actually quite interesting because I'm totally sober and everyone around me is 1000% drunk because they’re partying hard. You see the Chinese tourists but also a lot of Russians partying hard. And I was like: "Wow, this is quite a party scene." Obviously, I also had the Hainanese chicken rice, and it was very different and disappointing. The chicken is fluffy and fat.
Eldred Wee (05:17) So it's more for Wenchang chicken. It’s a little tougher. For the dish in Singapore, we’ve actually tailored it to our taste already. And there's like the cold version and the hot version in Hainan.
Jeremy Au (05:24) Yeah. But actually, what I didn't realize was that the seafood was really good as well because it's an island. Makes sense. You grew up with your parents being divorced, and then you decided to do accounting and eventually joined a Big Four firm as your first job. Why did you decide to do accounting of all jobs?
Eldred Wee (05:36) Yeah, so I actually stopped taking money from my mom at the age of 10. So I’ve been hustling part-time. I was doing well in Principles of Accounts in secondary school and realized: "Why not just do it?" So from a diploma to a Master's in accounting and finance—that was good. I needed to go to work as soon as possible, so I got a full-time job. But what could I do while studying part-time? So I leaned into a Big Four firm. It was two years of hell—auditing, working late, juggling studies, and then exam periods. How do you juggle all that? You’re grinding super late nights and learning a lot. I almost called out fraud in one of my audit engagements as a junior. And it’s so hard to navigate because you have so many stakeholders. How do you try to get more information from people that kind of know but don’t know? How do you report back to the finance manager, trying to piece it all together? How do you report back to your audit partners? That was a very unique thing. So that's why I started in accounting and finance in PwC.
Jeremy Au (06:31) That's really interesting. Out of all fraud incidents, only 3% are caught by their external auditor. So I'm surprised that you were one of the 3%.
Eldred Wee (06:37) Yes. And to be very frank with you, it was as a junior. It’s a story on its own. I can actually share a little bit as well. Initially, for most fraud, there are so many different kinds. But the key thing I was doing—like any junior auditor—was vouching. Now you no longer vouch because with AI technology, it’s auto-vouching. But what does vouching mean? It means you actually look at the proper receipt and invoice and match it to the bank statement and make sure there’s an entire flow. So when I was looking at it, I was like: "How come the receivables are going very high?" And the sales were evolving, and the sales director always wanted to curry favor with me every time I went there. It was an engagement I did for at least three years and I was like: "What's going on? This is no good. I can't report it back. Is there something wrong?" To do the audit properly, it won't pass. The first year I reported it back, and they were like: "Okay, just close the damn audit." The second year, I really couldn't do this anymore. If you don't want to flag it out, I'm going to take action on it. And that's where, in the third year, everything unraveled.
Jeremy Au (07:31) Yeah. So how long was this fraud going on for? What was the exact approach they took, if you can share?
Eldred Wee (07:36) Yeah, so high-level: the commission was based on revenue, not collection. And there was an incentive to inflate. For fraud, you always look at what the incentive and motivation are. You can actually dust it off for collection; it really depends on whether you want to pick it up and do the proper work. Same thing for auditing; we follow our audit methodology, and if you follow that through, you definitely will pick up a lot of things. Oftentimes, as you mentioned, internal staff would have picked it up from the get-go. One thing why it was different for me was that the finance manager kept changing as well.
Jeremy Au (08:07) That's a bad sign.
Eldred Wee (08:08) Yeah. And it was so interesting because that finance manager actually was ex-PwC as well. And that's why you're like: "Come, let's really catch it this time."
Jeremy Au (08:16) And I'm curious because the truth is that many of these finance managers are Big Four alumni who are on the accounting/audit side. They all have a lot of training. The CPA is not an easy destination to go for.
Eldred Wee (08:27) They are struggling to actually get people to study it. The younger generation is like: "Oh, it's no longer the iron rice bowl it used to be." And the reason why I took PwC was like: "Because you don't need to think so much; you definitely have a job," but now that’s not really the case.
Jeremy Au (08:36) Yeah. I'm curious because you have this finance manager who’s helping eyeball the fraud or letting it happen, and then there you are, auditing them. What's the relationship like? Why do you think they let it happen?
Eldred Wee (08:47) So it really depends on the size of the company and the workload. The finance manager typically spends so much time hitting all the deadlines already, let alone having a "side project"—which could be a main project—of unraveling this. It’s a bit tough.
Jeremy Au (09:02) The finance manager is coming in too busy, so they don't notice?
Eldred Wee (09:05) They don’t get ahead of it. Like, accounts receivable is going up—let’s go and chase for collection. How can we chase for collection? It’s not really coming in. So they get hit already and just think: "Oh, I'm just too busy."
Jeremy Au (09:13) Gotcha. And as you worked through that, you eventually left to do more of the deal side. What made you decide to leave Big Four accounting to do more of the deal side?
Eldred Wee (09:23) I think accounting is always going to be the bedrock of finance. You need to know the debit/credit. But I really think that in life you aren't exactly sure what you want, but through experiences, you eliminate what you don't like. So I thought to myself: "Oh, this is cool, but you're looking at backward numbers, not forward-looking ones." So I really wanted to get into the space of corporate finance in general. So I left and actually joined a private equity startup focusing on green financing—solar water, wastewater—across India, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, and Malaysia. An ex-IFC head of Asia started something on their own. You get to fly around. It's cool looking at different experiences, all SMEs. In PwC, I mostly did SME audits—one listed client, one IPO. I joined this very unique setup because typically the path is financial knowledge, you go to a sell-side firm, and then you "retire" on the buy-side. There was an opportunity where I joined on the buy-side. They wanted me to do more business development as well. So that was interesting—talking to various founders in different countries and how they operate. In Singapore, we are really very lucky because in other countries you have double books or triple books. How do you actually navigate through that as well?
Jeremy Au (10:24) That's such a cold, hard truth. In Singapore, everyone's so scared; you get single books—though there’s still shit that happens. But in Vietnam or Indonesia, double or triple books are very common; it just makes it impossible.
Eldred Wee (10:38) Even doing accounting is a headache. "What do I show? When do I show which books to whom?" Sometimes even the accountant gets lost. To be very frank, when I was looking at it, I’d ask: "So which one are you showing me?" And I’m experienced—"This is the same entry as this, but I think you sent me the wrong file." They’re like: "Oh, please don't tell my boss." But after that, I got everything that I needed to know about the company. But we decided to invest in it anyway.
Jeremy Au (11:00) You still decided to invest in it? So this is the interesting part about Southeast Asia: we're all aware there's a very common practice of double books, if not triple books. Because double books are from the management perspective and the incentive for the second book is for the tax authorities.
Eldred Wee (11:11) Yeah.
Jeremy Au (11:12) So there's a very common incentive. But then the problem is that the third set of books means it's out to defraud investors.
Eldred Wee (11:19) So I think the third set of books is realistically the true profit. You see, one is definitely for the tax authority, the second one is what the company needs to know and what the key people need to know, and the third is what the CEO really knows about the company. Sometimes the CEO is a little more savvy, so they do it on their own. But once you reach a certain size, you won't be doing the accounting anymore. Right? So that was when that particular accountant actually sent me version one, and I said: "Bullshit. Give me version two." Because if you give me version one, your valuation is going to be off, and there's no way I'm going to invest. Then they gave me version two, and I said: "Yeah, it makes sense, but on this particular item, can I have more info?" and she accidentally sent me the third version.
Jeremy Au (12:02) Hey, something is off, right? Okay. I think there’s the tricky part. A lot of venture capital funds have gotten into trouble because of this.
Eldred Wee (12:09) We looked at a fishery before. During my financing days, we had the owner come to our office and look at it, and it wasn't adding up. That was like five years ago.
Jeremy Au (12:17) Yeah, I also saw the fishery deal but didn't invest because the numbers were very bad. It was like the origin story for the "unicorn" story because we said "no" to him because the numbers were low. So he decided: "Let’s jack it up." That's what he said in his interview—he said: "Because Jeremy rejected my VC pitch because of low revenue, I jacked it up and then got my funding." And I was like: "Wow, that's why it's very tricky for investors."
Eldred Wee (12:37) And there are so many elements to it. The first element is definitely digitalization. Before COVID, everything else was not digitalized—internet banking, physical receipts, physical invoices. Accounting firms are in a better shape now, but not entirely, because with tech and AI, all these old traditional accounting firms are just going to be phased out. So that's why I focus on this golden period in the next two to three years.
Jeremy Au (13:00) Let's talk about that because you left this to now be an advisor to people who want to buy accounting and other corporate services firms. You say this is a golden period. Explain what this golden period is about.
Eldred Wee (13:12) Yeah, so if you're looking at it from a grand scheme of things, I would say there are two types of investors. One type says that at the end goal, accounting will be linked with all of the Fintech banks, and everything will be done by AI—full stop. There’s no need to advise. But the other side says that a lot of traditional firms are not even "techified," let alone using AI. So there's this transition period. This transition period depends on how long you think it’ll take. Some people will say: "Oh, it's actually in the next two years." Some people say it'll be in the next 10 years. So regardless, there's this golden period because of this aging population that we have. And in Singapore, close to 50% of our GDP is from SMEs. 70% of employment is by SMEs. SMEs can’t afford their own accountant, their own finance manager, or their own CFO. So who do you go to? They can actually outsource it. So with this whole avalanche—accounting used to be sexy, used to be like you can’t actually do it, but now nobody’s doing it anymore or nobody’s studying it anymore. Why? It's this kind of trend. Naturally, there's a lot of disruption in tech and in outsourcing, and there are old folks that really don't know how to "techify." And they won't have a LinkedIn, they won't have a website—they don't have anything. How do you actually get to these people? It’s through various media. Back in the day when you were doing your incorporation, who did you go to? That’s where that connection led to. But yeah, this period is really about that worldview of AI automating the finance function in the future.
Jeremy Au (14:37) What's interesting is that I had written a paper at Monk's Hill saying: "Hey, we're noticing that it's difficult for startups to do organic growth for B2B services because company formation is quite difficult in Southeast Asia." For example, Singapore is easy to incorporate, but how many people set up businesses compared to America? And they also don't have the venture capital to "hockey stick" up to drive growth. And then you go all the way to the Philippines, and it takes you 90 days and some extra "butter" along the way to even incorporate your stuff. So nobody wants to set up a business; it is so difficult, like crawling through broken glass. Franco Verona was talking about that difficulty for businesses. What I wrote was a paper saying: "Organic growth is difficult, especially targeting small enterprises that are hoping to grow like those in America—look at Rippling, look at Gusto." Those companies were growing like crazy during the boom times, but you don't see that lever here. No. So I said: "Hey, you know what we have to do? Probably look at inorganic growth—buying out existing vendors. Instead of selling them your tool, why not buy them out and eat that profitability?"
Eldred Wee (15:39) Yeah. So there are a lot of accounting technology firms that can actually raise money; in the tech valuation world, it's good. Then you realize: "Oh, I need to actually sell it." It's so hard to convince, especially the smaller ones. So why not just buy it? There are a couple of firms that can actually deploy that method as well. It makes a ton of sense. You have real clients, you can actually know the real pains, and you can do that. Why not add it on further and actually do a roll-up play?
Jeremy Au (16:00) There's this giant thesis, and I think there's a lot of people talking about it. I remember I wrote the paper, and then nobody believed me; now, three years later, everyone’s like: "That was good." I think what I'm suggesting is that there's more realism about the market now as well as a strategy approach. Because should it be venture capital funds funding it? Is it private equity funds? Is it search funds? Who are the targets? When to sell? What’s the upside? I think a lot more execution work is happening. What are you seeing now that you're looking at all these transactions?
Eldred Wee (16:35) In the entire roll-up scene, everyone knows that corporate services is recurring income and COVID-resilient. There were more incorporations right after COVID; everybody's trying to be a businessman right now. Going forward, there's going to be a lot of fractional roles, and maybe full-time employment is not the way to go. Everybody is deploying fractional stuff. So with all of this in mind, there’s a huge uptake. Who's going to serve them? Then you look at corporate services. When you're looking at that, the private equity firms have a minimum ticket size. They're like: "I can go as low as 20 million." But how many companies are there right now? They have all been bought up. And those that are not bought out, you can't afford—the valuation is too much and there's no arbitrage anymore. There are so many private equity-backed corporate services. BoardRoom is one of them. They used to be listed in Singapore; then 65 Equity and Tower Cap became their investors. I used to be the M&A advisor through Abacus Capital. Once you reach a certain size, there's no more left to buy. What do you do? And it’s such a fragmented market; there are 4,000 registered corporate services firms. And within the range of 1 to 5 million in revenue, there are probably 800. Even being laser-focused on this industry, I’ve probably only spoken to 200 or 300 because there's no easy way to gather them all.
Eldred Wee (17:48) So with all that in a roll-up play, you have number one: how do you get the capital in? Private equity is not coming in, so probably you have to look at interesting functions like search funds. Then you have to look at the "captain"—the face of the company who’s going to run the ship and who ideally has done M&A integrations before. But the captain needs a ship. The platform will have two sides. First is the platform company—you can't have a captain doing a 1 million revenue company; it doesn't make sense. So you need to be relatively sizable—ideally 3 million and above. Next is the technology—do you own the technology? Do you not? Finding those bolt-ons is rare. So that's why at Edenity, we spend 90% of the time focusing on corporate services—finding those targets and those gems. And it gets very nitty-gritty because for corporate services and accounting folks, you can't bluff them on valuation. They are numbers guys, not like an engineering firm or a media firm. So how do you have credibility? For myself, if I tell them I'm ex-JP Morgan, they don't care. But if I tell them I'm ex-PwC—"Who was your partner?" "Oh, my partner was this person." "Oh yeah, you used to be good friends. Okay, it's done." In 2026, we are creating a community for accounting firm owners and corporate owners to come together. But there are a lot of gaps in the market because individual segments have their own pains, and that's why it's so hard to execute a grand strategy.
Jeremy Au (19:15) I'm curious because there are all these different dimensions and different verticals. One thing I've seen is the buyer who doesn’t have accounting experience or operational services experience.
Eldred Wee (19:28) So many financial investors!
Jeremy Au (19:29) I think there's a lot of financial interest in the thesis. They just don't have the execution capability or aren’t even willing to bring on an operating partner to really do the work or incentivize them correctly. But that transformation work and the deal-making work—you need to do both, and they’re so tough.
Eldred Wee (19:50) So I think on that note, at Edenity we definitely have way more buyers than sellers. And the key thing is that "captain"—who's going to be the face of the company and really understands it? But how do you incentivize this person? Because if this person is accounting-trained and has done deals before, they can easily raise money on their own. So that's why in this industry at this size, it's a unique space. But the key thing is the captain himself; he wouldn't have the network and experience to hunt for gems in the broker space, especially SME brokers. Brokers in the corporate services space would just get exposed because you're talking to a guy who knows his numbers and valuation. There's not much value-add for them. So that's why I think where we are at right now is very unique because I give them insights. I actually introduce them to technology and I’m hyper-focused and hyper-niche. "Currently, what accounting software do you use? What practice management tool are you using? Are you on a CRM? I think you need to get investor-ready. I know you want to sell in five years, but let me work with you for two years to get you ready so that you'll be investor-ready in two." That’s why there's a lot of work, but they need people they can trust who have no hidden agenda. If a technology player goes to them and says: "Hey, my technology is good, please use this," they’re like: "Oh, you're trying to sell me something." But if I'm telling you: "Dude, I'm trying to sell your company, and if you want to sell your company, these are the things that you could explore," that's different. There's a reason why I chose accounting as well—50% of GDP, 70% of employment. All of these accounting firms individually have a network of more than a hundred clients, and yet they're often overlooked. So that's why I'm doing a lot of events and building with them and their clients as well.
Jeremy Au (21:33) I think that's such a good insight. I like the fact that you're saying there's a set of deal arbitrage—buying low, selling high—and then there's a value creation piece after the transaction has been done where you need to do the work to make it efficient.
Eldred Wee (21:54) Yeah.
Jeremy Au (21:55) And I feel like there's a link. But as you were saying in the arbitrage on the pricing side, these corporate services owners are savvy and actually understand how to negotiate. I think people saw it and said: "Okay, there's a double-bar arbitrage." But I think what we're saying is that the bottom bar of the transaction side is actually smaller than most people think because there are more buyers than sellers. Correct.
Eldred Wee (22:22) So let's use numbers: assuming it’s a 1 million revenue company and they have a profit margin of 33%. So if you go to them and say: "Oh, I'll buy your company at three times EBITDA," they ask: "How are you going to pay me?" "Oh, I'll pay you 50% upfront, then 20, 20, and 10." And they’re like: "Why would I need to sell to you? Because if I just hold the company for three years, it doesn't make a lot of sense." My first deal that I actually closed was a bit of a unique one—roughly one point something million in revenue and the multiple was roughly 1.4 times revenue. The main thing is having an earn-out that is shorter yet mitigates the risk. I think that's the key thing—how do you have proper due diligence to hit the sweet spot to know this company is good and fits my strategy? Anything that's too high, nobody's going to buy anyway. And with this strategy, I realized that it works a lot because when I speak to targets now, I can say: "I don't need to represent you. You keep your fees. Be reasonable with your valuation. Let's talk real numbers." And then we go deep. Hey, you're not just a broker. Truth of the matter is, after doing my first deal, I represented the buyer, but the seller was like: "Oh my gosh, you're so good. I've been trying to sell on the market for six years. You introduced me to one investor, and it closed in six months. Here are 20 of my close friends, and this is my best friend. Please take good care of her." When I went to that meeting with that best friend, we scheduled it for an hour and a half and it dragged on for two and a half hours. I was trying to find what was wrong with this business, but there was nothing wrong. At the two-hour mark, she said: "You know my business inside out. Why not just buy it and run it on your own?" But the key thing is that you lose independence the moment you own something and become a competitor. And that's why in this golden age, I cannot afford to do that. I'm a broker. And that's why this transition phase is also very unique in the SME scene because we are not talking about super big bucks. We are talking about something that can be easily obtained. I'm still trying to find the flaw; maybe the biggest problem is finding the right target whereby the exiting business owners won't come out and start something on their own or won't siphon out the revenue. I think that's the key thing that you need to do, and you only can do that through relationships. That's why for me, personally and professionally, my seven words are: "Connecting people through valued relationships."
Jeremy Au (24:29) And I think valued relationships are really important because I think the SME space is all about trust and credibility. Trust is really the crux of it. It’s a function of talking, chatting, and delivering what you promise.
Eldred Wee (24:45) Drinking beer—basically, you need to spend time so they know that you're genuine. After having my son, I really care about legacy. And especially the older folks—they love that you’re cultural. Nobody in my generation cares about it.
Jeremy Au (24:55) Yeah. I think what's interesting is that in a perfect world, you use price as a lever. Interesting part is actually the integration and handover piece. Because obviously the employees are loyal to the owner, they have legacy processes, and then you have a "first 100 days" where you want the value to happen. So what dynamics have you seen in terms of key success factors versus things that don't work for that transition point?
Eldred Wee (25:28) Two chains of thought: first, you represent the buyer and you want to do as much pre-diligence as you want. But how can you look at just pure pre-due diligence and not be seen as: "I'm just extracting as much as I can and I might just say bye-bye to you"? Culture is something that is supremely overlooked, and in a small setup, culture is everything. So oftentimes it depends on how long the owner has had the business, what their growth was, and what their current system is. By system, I don't mean what technology they use; I mean what kind of system you can put in place whereby the people that stay with you have stayed very long. Or do the people that come to you graduate very fast because they learn so much? Those nitty-gritty details are very tough for somebody who doesn’t specialize in this field. Because for corporate secretarial, accounting and tax, and HR/payroll, individually they are very different. There is also the linkage between accounting firms and audit firms. Because audit firms peak during the year-end period. So during the non-peak times, what do they do? They can actually help the accounting firms as well. So with all that in mind, understanding the culture is nitty-gritty, but it still boils down to one thing: the business owner. Is the business owner an operator? Or is the business owner in a managerial position? Or has the business owner built a system so good that it is running on its own—but if it’s running on its own and it's so good, then why sell? So those are the things where I really get into that nitty-gritty of things.
Jeremy Au (27:06) What's the approach? Do you incentivize the owner to stay? How do you think about that?
Eldred Wee (27:14) I think the interesting thing to think about is that you start off your entrepreneurship journey because you don't want to be an employee anymore. But for a business owner selling their first business, they're going to be an employee again for one, two, or three years. So having that mindset of: "Oh, I'm selling to this person. Can I work with this person?" And it gets a bit more complicated because the person who's doing the integration could be the captain, but the investors are the ones that pumped in the money. So there could be a scenario whereby I love the investors but I don't like the captain. Or I love the captain but I don't love the investors. And those nitty-gritty things can only be done with a proper advisor, not a broker. You need to know that nitty-gritty stuff. And it's going to be about more than just a vibe. "Oh, what's their working style? What was their mentality when they grew this business? How did they start out?" Is this very aligned with the investment thesis and the captain's thesis as well? That's why it's so tough. I think that's the crux. Often, business owners cannot be detached from their business, and that's the reason why they sell. Because they’ve tried all sorts of ways to be detached out of the business and they can't.
Jeremy Au (28:24) They can't retire. They can't go on holiday. If they’ve been doing this for 20 or 30 years...
Eldred Wee (28:31) Correct. And use the 1 million revenue example: maybe 300k in profit. They definitely will have their own salary, and they would have substantially enough. And then obviously regulations—there’s a lot of AML/KYC and they are cutting down on nominee directors with the CSP Act. For a business, there's too much risk, right? I just want out.
Jeremy Au (28:52) Yeah. You're like: "Oh, I see more paperwork. More paperwork doesn't drive revenue; it's just more pain, and I have enough money to retire for the next 10 years and enjoy life." 30 years if I live, I have enough for my kids, and my kids don't want to take over the business.
Eldred Wee (29:06) And also the key thing is that point: too much work but no revenue growth. So it depends on what are you looking at? Are you going to a price point war? Are you going with something awesome and slick—which is like VC-backed technology? Or are you looking at a Singapore Airlines instead of a Scoot model? I think you really need to think about the strategy to come up with a solid vehicle that can last. Oftentimes, I don't see somebody doing that strategy because I'm calling out all those private equity people—they're buying, but they're not integrating. They're not integrating because the "how" is very tough. If you're very opportunistic about the deal size, you just keep buying and don't think so much. Just close it and then try to get the client list. But how do you actually operate? How do you integrate all of the operations? How do you force them to use the technology? They have their own flow afterwards. We do as much as we can and then put a pause. So it’s like individual vehicles.
Jeremy Au (29:55) Yeah.
Eldred Wee (29:55) But the profit margin is good.
Jeremy Au (29:57) It’s not in a loss; it’ll still be steady.
Eldred Wee (29:59) Correct. But it wouldn't show the growth rate until they reset the integration team and their approach. Exactly. Yeah. So in a perfect world, they have the captain and the strategy is clear. But it might be a clutch. On that note, I'm just curious: do you have a personal story about a time that you've been brave?
Eldred Wee (30:15) Ah, definitely. It links back to—I think brave is when you have the lowest time of your life, therefore you need to be brave. So the lowest time of my life was right after the divorce, a couple of months in. My mom was struggling, so my mom actually came to me asking this question: "Eldred, are you ready to die?" I was 10. I was like: "Sorry, what do you mean?" She said: "You see, I'm very tired emotionally and physically. I've been busting my ass off, I work four jobs, and I'm still in a shitload of debt. Why not? I’ll carry you, your sister, and brother. You jump first and I'll jump. You are the man of the house. You make the decision." A huge part of me wanted to just do it because I was 10 years old and I couldn't earn money. The other side of things was: "Why do I make the decision for six lives?" and that was when I was brave enough to tell her—I was crying in tears—"Oh mommy, I’ll be a good boy. I'll listen to anything you say, anything." But I was brave—I was like: "I don't want to die. I really don't want to die. I really want to choose life." And yeah, here we are now. I have my kid; she's a grandma; my sister just had a kid as well. So we survived that and we were brave for that. But it also toughened me a lot, and that's why relationships matter so much to me. Because a lot of people say: "Do you realize why you're afraid of heights?" they’re like: "No," because you almost jumped before. Everything’s connected.
Jeremy Au (31:30) What ways did that incident change who you were or catalyze something in you?
Eldred Wee (31:41) I think the key thing is finding the "why" behind the "why." I'm a free thinker, so I'm not biblical, but "Edenity" is a pun on "eternity." A lot of people ask me: "Are you trying to create a church or something?" But I think one thing is really more toward finding the "why" behind the "why" and being very open-minded and loving because everybody has their hidden battles. You don't know what they're going through. A very happy man could take his life in a few days' time. So that is the philosophy, and that's why I think it's a bit of an overcompensation as well. I think intergenerational trauma is real. I really care about legacy, but how do I unwind the intergenerational trauma to move forward? It's really more toward sticking to those seven words: "Connecting people through valued relationships." Think about legacy, think about being human first, and deals will naturally come.
Jeremy Au (32:26) It sounds like you've invested a lot of time into self-work—thinking about and processing this. How did you go about doing it?
Eldred Wee (32:38) I don't have a therapist, especially in entrepreneurship, because it's always a double-edged sword: when you're happy, you're super happy; when you're sad, you're super sad. So what I do is every single morning I try to reflect as much as I can. Quiet time, right? Drink a glass of hot water and really reflect: "How am I feeling? Why am I feeling this way? What's the why behind the why? How come money hitting the bank is not making me happy? Am I looking for a bigger and greater impact? But passion doesn't actually feed you." This kind of conversation that you have with yourself, it compounds. So there was a period of time where I was very active on LinkedIn, trying to post as much as I could, which is a fraction of my reflection, but it really compounds. And now I get clearer every day, and that clarity helps my clients as well. So my client is like: "Oh, you really thought this," I was like: "Yes." Because I know—and I have done deals—I know how you feel. I know how you as a parent feel, and this particular company is like your baby because there are some of them that have actually poured so much into their business that they lost their family. And I would never want that to happen. So that's why every morning is sacred to me. That’s why they can relate so much with me as well. Relationship is not a one-time thing. There’s no strategy behind it. It's just being real, genuine humans and it's a lot of effort.
Jeremy Au (33:46) What is one piece of advice or gift that you would like to give to your children?
Eldred Wee (33:59) I think everything happens for a reason. Be totally yourself, and that will naturally unfold things. I truly believe everybody deep down is a good person, but because we have greed, we try to get as much as we can. We just want too many things in a very short period of time. Pacing yourself and just being the full version of yourself. And that's why I actually instill all these principles that I have at a very young age—trying to let him learn his legacy, how important it is to respect elders. You never ever touch mama's face unless it's to 'sayang' her. That kind of thing starts from young. So that's why when they ask me about 30 years from now, I can't even tell you, but if I'm doing it on a regular basis, it'll compound. And he'll be a very different person and I'm very sure it will be a platform for him to do anything he wants. It doesn't need to be M&A; with that network and that exposure, he could be doing anything that he truly wants.
Jeremy Au (34:55) Incredible. On that thoughtful note, I’d love to summarize the three big takeaways. First of all, thanks so much for sharing about your early days, talking about your family and obviously talking about your childhood—the divorce and the suicide consideration. Your desire to make things right and be able to provide for the family pushed you to get an early job. Thank you so much for such honest and frank sharing about your personal life shaping you into who you are. Secondly, thanks for sharing about the career decisions that got you from Big Four auditor and catching fraud to doing M&A deals. So now being an advisor and a broker with your own company, there's this wonderful trajectory of career decisions. And lastly, thanks for sharing about the emerging wave of roll-ups and private equity acquisitions. I think for me, two subpoints: one is thinking about it from an industry perspective, which is corporate services—very detailed, differentiated, and thoughtful about that expertise. Also thinking the other way around: the more honest reality is that price arbitrage versus how you actually create value—many haven't gotten that right yet. I think it's a wonderful set of learnings. Thank you so much for sharing.
