Grab, Sea and more: How Singapore forged a startup ecosystem

IN 2014, a venture capitalist told Grab co-founder Anthony Tan that his scrappy startup could one day surpass the market value of his father's automobile company Tan Chong Motor, a household name in Malaysia.

But only if he executed his vision well. Part of that strategy was to move Grab's headquarters from Malaysia to Singapore.

"It wasn't very difficult to convince him," says Chua Joo Hock, a managing partner at Temasek-backed Vertex Ventures. Singapore was a financial hub, a market with affluent consumers - and its government was doing all it could to build a startup ecosystem worthy of envy.