Creative’s new CEO is no Sim Wong Hoo – but he shouldn’t strive to be

[SINGAPORE] Sim Li Ern, the nephew of the late Creative Technology founder Sim Wong Hoo who died in 2023, has his work cut out for him.

The 47-year-old was appointed earlier this month as chief executive officer of the electronics company where he has worked since 2002. And he has big shoes to fill.

After all, in an alternate universe, we could all be listening to Zencasts – instead of Podcasts – on Spotify.

The term “podcast” was coined as a blend of Apple’s popular “iPod” and radio “broadcast”. But older Singaporeans will remember a time when local company Creative Technology had a portable media player – the Creative Zen – that rivalled the Apple iPod.

Creative’s Zen enjoyed a strong foothold in Asia, especially in its home ground in Singapore.

This battle for MP3 player supremacy culminated in a legal tussle.

Creative held a patent on a music management interface that was commonly seen on audio players, including the Apple iPod. The two companies eventually reached a settlement, with Apple paying US$100 million to Creative.

But while Creative won this battle, it lost the war.

Instead of engaging in an expensive, direct head-to-head competition with Apple, Creative joined the “Made for iPod” programme and started to make iPod accessory products as a way to grow revenue.

To some observers, this was seen as a subtle bowing to the iPod’s dominance. And interest in the Zen slowly tapered off.

But the Zen was not the first product that Singapore’s tech legend Sim Wong Hoo was famous for.

Creative’s Sound Blaster, a stand-alone sound card for personal computers – among the first to be widely available to general consumers – dominated the PC audio market until the 2000s.

And it was certainly not the last great invention from the Singapore home-grown company.

In 2012, Creative launched the HanZpad, a tablet powered by its own chips – made by subsidiary ZiiLabs – that took aim at China’s sizeable education market. There were reports that it was also widely adopted in Singapore schools.

In 2018, the company marked its return to the consumer audio space it once dominated with the Super X-Fi. The award-winning audio technology uses computational audio and artificial intelligence to create a “holographic”, immersive headphone experience.

The product was launched to much fanfare, and triggered a surge in Creative’s share price.

The counter in 2018 surged more than 250 per cent, sparking hopes of a Creative revival in the market.

Bizarrely, Creative has now divested its Super X-Fi assets – including intellectual property (IP) rights and inventory – to a spin-off entity for US$5 million.

The spin-off entity, Zeica Labs, was set up by an unnamed “management employee” who was responsible for overseeing the Super X-Fi business and intends to pursue a business venture involving Super X-Fi technology.

The company announced on Thursday (Jan 15) that, following the completion of the transaction, it now holds 40 per cent equity interest in Zeica.

Creative said in an announcement last August that this divestment was in line with its strategic direction to “streamline its businesses” and “unlock value from certain portions of its IP portfolio”.

But if there is any lesson from the fact that the world is now listening to Podcasts instead of Zencasts, perhaps it is that Creative might be better off not giving up on its IP.

And as the company continues to chalk up losses – it has not turned a profit in any full-year period since FY2016 – the main task for new CEO Sim Li Ern to ensure that his uncle’s legacy continues is to convince investors that Creative still has viable businesses.