Cover story: as Gen.T turns 10, past and present honourees define success and the future they’re betting on

The shift reflects lessons learned from building Malaysia’s first and most prominent technology unicorn company. For Cheng, the most meaningful milestones are not singular achievements, but markers of progress towards a larger ambition: creating a disruptive solution that can transform a vast market across Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia. Each milestone, he says, signifies getting closer to becoming “the very clear leader” in what CARSOME set out to do: providing customers with peace of mind through the entire lifecycle of their pre-owned vehicle ownership experience.

Looking ahead, Cheng believes the next great opportunity remains widely underestimated. While many recognise the promise of artificial intelligence, he argues that few have fully embraced its potential. “AI is a very big breakthrough with many use cases and levels of impact, but some may not fully realise its potential yet,” he says.

As an entrepreneur, he sees the future not simply in adopting AI tools, but in becoming “AI native” as both a platform and an organisation. From individual workflows to team collaboration and business operations, Cheng believes the winners of the next decade will be those who seize the chance to integrate AI into the fabric of how they work, not as a replacement for human ingenuity but as the scaffolding that supports it.

Co-founder and CEO of Dododots

Having often been told that successful ventures can only thrive through a curation of star players, Esther Erin Wong Yan confidently refutes the notion. As a business owner, success for Wong has come to mean creating an ecosystem where there’s room for everyone to grow. “I don’t believe in the concept that people are replaceable, even if some people might suggest that you should only ‘keep the best and fire the rest’.”

Since co-founding Dododots, Wong has learned that employees who may not be star performers on paper can contribute immeasurably to morale, positivity and team cohesion. “I don’t think success means having only the best people. Personality hires add to company culture, and they make it a happy one,” she says. “I prefer building a good culture because when people can breathe in that positivity, they treat others well and the whole company moves with forward momentum.

That same willingness to trust her instincts has defined her entrepreneurial journey. When asked what she is betting on that others still underestimate, Wong is forthright: pimple patches. “When I started this business, everyone said it would not work,” she recalls. Among the sceptics was her late father, a loving source of support who struggled to understand why his daughter would leave a stable career path in the medical field for “facial stickers”.

Five years on, Wong sees something far greater than a beauty trend. While acne remains a source of insecurity for many, she believes products like Dododots have helped change the conversation around it. “Instead of feeling like your day is ruined by a blemish, it has become about having the agency to select a fun patch. The conversation no longer revolves around the shame of struggling with pimples, but in the choice of self-expression. It’s really positive.” The shift in mindset, Wong believes, is the real success story.

Founder and CEO, Loob Holding

For Bryan Loo, one of the biggest misconceptions about success is that it follows a straight line. The founder and CEO of Loob Holding, best known for building Tealive into Southeast Asia’s largest lifestyle tea brand with more than 900 outlets across eight countries, believes the reality is far messier and far more rewarding. “Success is not a linear process,” he says. “Your work will see many iterations, and there will be a lot of up-and-downs along the way, but staying committed to making perpetual improvements will always bring success.”

Read more: Brewing Something Bigger: Bryan Loo on purpose, reinvention and the making of a Malaysian empire

Rather than chasing a singular destination, Loo views entrepreneurship as an ongoing journey defined by perseverance and continual learning. At 24, Loo had made the choice to leave a career in biotech to start his own business, with no idea what it meant at the time. Today, beyond Tealive, Loob Holding’s portfolio also includes Bask Bear Coffee, Sodaxpress and WonderBrew Kombucha.

Serving an estimated 50 million cups a year, Loo has consistently met challenges along the way as an opportunity for growth. “You can’t afford to feel that business is a painful process. The day you decide to be an entrepreneur, a leader, is the day you choose a road that has no end,” Loo explains. “It’s about making it to the ‘quick-win’ milestones along the way, which eventually link together the path to a major triumph.”

Looking to the future, he remains convinced Malaysian ingenuity should not be underestimated. “One thing I’ve been betting on since day one of building this business, is that a world-class brand can and will come out of Malaysia.” For Loo, building an internationally recognised tea brand is a testament to the idea that perseverance, innovation and consistency can overcome the absence of historical advantages in tea cultivation. “You can still build a competitive business even if you don’t have the origin story to back you up.”

Founder of Penwings Publishing

Success has little to do with the accolades hanging on a wall, according to Charissa Ong Tse Ying. The best-selling author, founder of Penwings Publishing and creative manager of PlayStation Studios Malaysia (PSM) describes herself as a former “achievement-chaser,” once viewing them as a tangible measure of success. “Over time, I realised that having certificates and trophies don’t mean anything. When you walk into a room, you’re always going to start from ground zero in terms of making an impression. You’re always going to have to build trust with new people from the ground up,” she says.

Today, Ong measures success differently having gained insights through branding new authors and books for the Malaysian market, while also managing a team across multiple gaming verticals at PSM, spanning marketing and product usability to community education, branding and user research. “I define success as being able to inspire confidence in one encounter, that I have the mind, perspectives and requisite empathy needed to achieve the goal. It’s about the quality of character and a ‘success-oriented mindset’, over just looking good on paper.”

That emphasis on influence also shapes what she believes is most underestimated in leadership: the ability to persuade people to believe in themselves. “The power of manipulation is something you can use for good,” Ong explains, emphasising the skill transcends just being a persuasive communicator. She insists great leaders are able to recognise strengths in others and help people develop confidence in their own abilities.

See also: Author, publisher, and tech-whiz, Charissa Ong is on a mission to nurture lifelong readers

“Having the power to bring out the best in others, to have them believe in themselves is a very underestimated skill,” she says. Empathy, she argues, is only the starting point. Effective leaders go beyond saying “I hear you” and instead empower people to trust their own judgement and capabilities.

Singer and Actor

“One myth about success I’ve come to believe is that when you have it, it gets easier. It actually gets harder,” says multi-hyphenate talent Daiyan Trisha. An accomplished actress, singer, songwriter, poet and high-fashion icon, she is also the owner of Butterfly Florist & Slowbar, an aesthetic flower café in Petaling Jaya. In 2025, Daiyan won the prestigious Ultimate Award at the 2025 Anugerah Melodi Terhangat (AMT 2025), recognising her as one of Malaysia’s most influential public figures based on impact, public engagement and cultural relevance.

“I used to believe if I had all I dreamed of, I would be the happiest person in the world. I am happy and grateful, but success does come with the risk of exposure to things that could ruin you as a person,” Daiyan explains. Great opportunities are often accompanied by greater sacrifices, tougher decisions and new forms of pressure. Rather than removing obstacles, success simply changes their nature.

Reflecting on the lives of successful athletes, entertainers and global superstars, Daiyan sees a common truth: meaningful success requires more than talent, hard work or dedication alone. There is always a price attached to reaching the highest levels of any field. “We have to gracefully accept there’s more to lose and always growing pains along the way.” The experience of kickstarting her music career through YouTube has informed Daiyan’s belief of what is being underestimated today: authenticity. As content creators increasingly chase trends, virality and algorithms, Daiyan worries that individuality is being lost in the process. Endless streams of similar content may generate attention in the short term, but she believes lasting relevance comes from something deeper.

“Having a strong foundation in knowing who you are within your many passions is what’s going to float you in the next ten years to come,” she says. Drawing from her own experience, she encourages creators to resist temptation: “People need to stop chasing trends and start chasing themselves.”

Founder & CEO of Mesolitica

“I used to think success was a matter of luck,” says Khalil Nooh, founder and CEO of Mesolitica. This Malaysian artificial intelligence (AI) startup is known for developing the country’s first locally trained Large Language Model (LLM), MaLLaM which was released on December 12, 2023 through early support from NVIDIA, Microsoft and Amazon Web Services (AWS). “These days I ask what can I do to keep replicating ‘lucky streaks’ for myself, which has been about learning fast and persistently exploring every idea through technology.”

Khalil now views success as the byproduct of experimentation and an openness to opportunity even at risk of failing. In a field evolving at breakneck speed, he believes people need to actively equip themselves for the possibility of abruptly confronting a post-labour economy. “How do we push the forward button in AI adoption to accelerate progress and keep pace with superpowers like China and the US?” he asks. “We need to drag people through progress, to open their hearts and prepare for what’s ahead.”

A self-described “techno-optimist,” Khalil believes AI will positively change the future. “My goal today is to create the ideal AI Employee or Digital Worker, one with full autonomy of knowledgebased work.” He is actively investigating the possibility of this within 500 Global’s AI Residency programme, under the technical thesis title of “The Future Is Solo” (TFIS). “Under TFIS, I’m exploring how a person might build a one-person company worth a billion dollars. My timeline is 2030, in line with Google DeepMind’s projection for artificial general intelligence (AGI) to match or exceed human cognitive abilities across virtually any intellectual task. Keep in mind that it may come earlier.”

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While concerns about job displacement and declining critical thinking dominate public discussions, Khalil argues that the technology should be used to deepen human capability and the rest will fall into place. “We need to learn to use AI not to consume answers, but to have it assist us in following intellectual curiosity while deep diving into topics of interest.”

Founder and CEO, FatHopes Energy

One lesson has become increasingly clear to Vinesh Sinha throughout his journey as both an entrepreneur and energy pioneer: what you see is not always what you get. “It’s easy to look at somebody successful and think everything is hunky-dory, but just like a duck, they’re composed on the surface and paddling like crazy just beneath the surface,” says the founder and CEO of FatHopes Energy, a Southeast Asian biofuel company that specialises in turning waste fats, oils and grease (FOG) into advanced biofuels, primarily Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF).

While outsiders often see achievements, milestones and growth, Sinha believes the reality is always more complex. Every business, no matter how successful it looks, is navigating challenges, trade-offs and uncertainty beneath the surface. “Look at what’s happening right now in the Strait of Hormuz. With energy prices going up, it’s easy to assume the sector is doing well, but it’s not straightforward at all. Energy is so much more nuanced.”

While public debate is often framed around a binary choice between fossil fuels and electrification, Sinha is betting on something far more diverse. “The energy mix of the future is going to be extremely diversified,” he says. Rather than relying on a single dominant solution, he believes countries will increasingly draw on a range of energy sources, from waste-to-energy technologies and biofuels to synthetic and emerging alternatives. He anticipates nations prioritising domestic energy production and security over pure economic efficiency. “It will be a reversal of globalisation in the energy sector,” he says, summarising the shift.

For Sinha, the most effective innovations will not necessarily be the most visible. Instead, he champions “drop-in” solutions such as biofuels that work within existing infrastructure and require minimal behavioural change from consumers to seamlessly transition to alternative energy. “How can the consumer be using it without knowing that they are? That’s the litmus test. The aim is achieving equilibrium in price and infrastructure. In any business that’s trying to disrupt, the biggest challenge is trying to break from hegemony.”

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