Tech innovators enticed by Silicon Valley

Singapore

WHEN Lawrence Suen first met Fai Leong in the 1990s, they were both Singapore government scholars studying at Cornell University. Both later broke their bonds to pursue a career in Silicon Valley.

Their startup, Appsverse, was officially launched in 2011 and today it is one of the top photon flash-browsing software for iOS and Android platforms, generating millions in users across all their products, which include consumer, enterprise as well as educational software.

Unlike Safari or Google Chrome, Appsverse's product runs entirely on desktops. It consists of paid browsers that are connected to servers, which then deliver browser experience to customers. It costs Appsverse money to deliver this service, so its success lies in its ability to squeeze every little bit out of all the servers it has, said Mr Suen in an interview with BT.

The team is expanding the product portfolio to cater for the gaming industry, and is developing photon into a more general purpose browser, beyond the mobile sphere.

Mr Suen definitely sees expansion opportunities in Singapore, where his family lives and which he frequently visits and is still very closely tied to. "Both of us may have different reasons for breaking our bonds," said Mr Suen, who was previously bonded to Singapore's National Computer Board (NCB) - which was later split into two separate divisions: the National Computer Systems and the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore. "I wasn't really interested in being a government personnel; I was more interested in creating new technology."

After graduating from Cornell, Mr Suen went on to further his education at Stanford University while working at startup company ELetter on the side.

ELetter later helped break his bond with NCB and it became the first company Mr Suen worked full-time in, where he served as chief architect.

The idea for Appsverse started taking form in 2009 when cloud computing began gaining traction.

But prior to that, Mr Suen had co-founded another startup in Silicon Valley - L2 Solutions, a Web-based provider of integrated marketing technology solutions. While the San Jose-based company is still around today, he has since handed over his management role in the firm to someone else.

"Silicon Valley is like a magnet," he said of why he chose to set up shop there twice. "It attracts talented people from all over the world . . . It's (also) one area where it's easy to find people that have the interest to start companies."

According to Mr Suen, the Valley also offers better funding access. "It's definitely relatively easier to get funding here than in other places, and there are better sources of funding available."

Although they had the ability to bootstrap Appsverse, the co-founders are not closing themselves to future funding opportunities.

As for the challenges of starting up in Silicon Valley, in Mr Suen's view, costs and taxes in California, particularly for more profitable companies, are steep and there is a lot more bureaucracy involved.

And if it weren't for the fact that he and his co-founder had spent close to two decades there, they would have to take pains to get localised with the market as well as the culture of the United States, despite the fact that they both speak English.