What this episode covers
Shiyan Koh, speaking from San Francisco, joins Jeremy Au to compare the Bay Area and Southeast Asia in the AI era. She notes that founder energy in the region is high while investor sentiment is low, and advises non-Bay Area founders to visit San Francisco quarterly. She argues the ecosystem would gain more from $100 million exits than from chasing single $1 billion outcomes. They discuss why small and mid-cap acquisitions are rare, citing conglomerate buyers and VC fund structures, including a roughly $30 million sale one fund blocked. They expect small AI-native companies, which Metronome's Scott Woody calls 'aliens', to favor angels who write $50K checks into $500K rounds. Shiyan closes with advice for investors, founders and policymakers.
7 Key Takeaways from this episode
- Visit San Francisco to reset your ambitionQuarterly visits keep founders current on a fast-moving frontier and show how big their peers are thinking. Basing someone there makes sense once you have US customers.
- Mid-size exits fill the missing middle of talentSoutheast Asia has people who start companies and people who run large ones, but few who have scaled one from 1 to 10. Exits of $10 million to $100 million create them, and recycle founders, employees and capital.
