Mentor-in-Residence, The Finlab
https://www.linkedin.com/in/felix-tan-177311/

Short Bio of Felix Tan

Felix Tan has, from 1st August 2020, taken on the role as the Mentor-in-Residence at The Finlab to continue supporting selected SMEs and tech solution companies from around ASEAN as The Finlab looks to roll its business transformation initiatives across the region via The Finlab Online.

Prior to this, Felix Tan was The Finlab’s Managing Director from December 2015 and has led his team to successfully run 3 acceleration cycles and now has 13 portfolio companies across
6 countries selected from more than 1,000 applications across 50 countries. 11 of these have since raised funds (ranging from Seed to Series B) for their next stage of growth, and 6 have
been recognised at Singapore FinTech Festival in 2016 and 2017.

In mid-2017, Felix started working on the idea of extending the acceleration process to local SMEs so that their owners can be equipped with the tools and frameworks to manage innovation and business transformation internally. On 12 February 2018, The Finlab announced Singapore’s 1st acceleration programme for SMEs. Two months later on 12 April, the selected SMEs were revealed at a media event held at The Arts House.

This programme also caught regional attention and the 1st programme outside of Singapore was officially launched in Bangkok, Thailand, on 6th March 2019. The 15 selected SMEs were then revealed on 31st May 2019 and they completed the programme in August 2019. This same programme was also run with 16 SMEs in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and was wrapped up in December 2019.

Prior to The Finlab, Felix was the Business Development Director at Wong Fong Research & Innovation Centre. There, he was involved in many interesting projects; the most notable of which resulted in the Dendrobium (Singapore’s 1st fully electric hypercar) and the Motochimp (an urban mobility device). Both have garnered worldwide acclaim and reviews.

Felix’s involvement in the SME space deepened significantly while at Performance Leadership where he conducted leadership and management training for top-to-mid level management staff of many local SMEs in areas like strategy, negotiation, innovation, sales, customer service, and conflict management.

Having co-founded Singapore’s 1st internet company, SilkRoute Holdings, in 1995; and its subsidiary, ECNet, in 1996, Felix is no stranger to the technology startup scene. Both companies attracted venture funds totalling US$72.5 million, including US$25 million from Mr Richard Li of Pacific Century Cyberworks. He also helped to raise a US$20 million e-commerce fund under SilkRoute Capital to invest into B2B startups in 1999.

Felix was an active mentor at NTU Ventures where he helped startups refine their ideas and strategies to qualify for various government’s funding. He had also invested his own money into Singapore’s 1st fully articulated action figure kit (Stikfas) that became Singapore’s 1st company to successfully license production to Hasbro, one of the world’s largest toy companies, in 2001.

Felix graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science from Kent State University (Ohio) and represented Singapore in the 1989 – 1993 South East Asian Games in the sport of Fencing,
capping his fencing career here with a team bronze medal. He was part of the School Advisory Committee at Teck Whye Secondary School from 2002 to 2018 where he served as its Chairman from 2004 to 2012.