Founder Series: Pollen

Our Founder Series is a collection of written interviews with our portfolio’s founders, in which we shine the spotlight on the businesses they’ve come to build on the base of disruptive innovation and get to know more about them as people.  

The next instalment features Liyana Sulaiman and David Ng, Co-Founders of Pollen - Pollen is your liquidation operating system & AI co-pilot for aged, unsold, obsolete inventory.

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Tell us something about yourself.

David:‍

Originally I’m from Singapore, but was raised in California. I've been back in Singapore for about 11 years now. Pollen is the second B2B venture-backed company that I've founded.

Liyana:

Born and raised in Singapore, having traveled to multiple cities and worked in the U.S. for a tech startup over 10 years ago, I've been bitten by the tech startup bug ever since! I've done both tech product development work and tech advocacy, including running the Girls in Tech Singapore chapter for 4 years. Like David, I'm also on my second venture-backed startup journey but this time I’m definitely working on my life mission – reducing business waste.

How did you guys both get started on your entrepreneurial journey?

David:

Well, my journey into entrepreneurship started with my father, who ran a startup in Silicon Valley back in the 90s, right out of our garage. Growing up surrounded by tech in Silicon Valley, seeing friends and classmates do amazing things, naturally sparked my interest. What really drew me back to Singapore was the government's support for early-stage startups through the National Research Foundation under the Prime Minister's office. It was innovative for Asia at the time, and with friends and family here, everything aligned. That's what got me hooked on working on things I'm passionate about.

Liyana:

Well, there are a few influences in my life that led me to where I am today. Growing up in an entrepreneurial family, both David and I have been immersed in the world of tech startups, I think we're fortunate. My dad was a tech entrepreneur who ventured into specialised silicon chips during Singapore's rise in silicone manufacturing. Unfortunately, his business didn't survive the Asian financial crisis, leading him to work for Mr. George Koh, a prominent entrepreneur managing various companies.

 Working alongside my dad, I witnessed firsthand the challenges of excess inventory and waste management in warehouses. I saw that year on year, the only way to solve that would be a last-minute resolution, which is to clear the warehouse through warehouse sales. But of course, these are poorly marketed. At the end of the day, we just end up throwing all that into landfills, basically arranging for waste disposal companies.

This experience, coupled with our family's deep-rooted environmental consciousness, inspired me to prioritise sustainability. Being half Dayak, from Sabah, Borneo, Kalimantan, we are very nature-conscious people. We really, really care about environment. We feel like we're custodians of the environment and therefore it is our duty to not contribute waste to it and to protect it.

Both my Dad’s entrepreneurial spirit and my innate sense of duty in protecting nature have guided me in my entrepreneurial journey. Even though my dad’s business didn’t survive, as his daughter I’m always trying to prove his hypothesis that the barrier to building a successful business is not that you can’t get investors but rather, that you don’t have the right ideas. While this is the second venture I’m building with David, I believe we do have the right ideas and are very complimentary in our traits.

What is you "How I met my co-founder" story?  

David:

Let me take you back first. I was working in tech in the Bay Area when we heard about this new Singapore government funding opportunity which made us think we could maybe we spin off some of that company or just start from scratch in Singapore. We ended up deciding to go for it and moved out here permanently. Unexpectedly, we gained traction very quickly during that process. Within the first month we got invited to speak at a conference by E27, we got a customer in Singtel and we got funded by WaveMaker. After all of this initial success it became very apparent that we needed to hire people with specific skillsets, but we wanted someone who understood who we were. Our DNA of “being from neither here nor there”, not fully American but not fully Singaporean either. And Liyana, who got highly recommended to us, fit the mold exactly.

Now, why did we decide to team up again? Despite the challenges we faced in our previous venture, we recognized that our setbacks were not due to our capabilities as founders. Rather, they stemmed from certain incorrect assumptions we held. We both felt we were really close to unlocking some really big things at the last business, so we had this equal size “chip on our shoulders”. And we already knew that, okay, I have this weakness, I have this strength. Both of us kind of realized what those were and how we complement each other. We now hold this massive internal motivation to do better than what we think we could have, despite potential external skepticism. This has really turned into the fuel that drives our fire and we have held onto this even through tough times like COVID, propelling us forward.

Liyana:

I view it a bit differently, in perhaps a more technical light . You can think of our relationship as the MVP project, right? MVP has a set of criteria, outcomes, assumptions, and hypotheses that we're trying to fulfil at the end of the day. We evaluate ourselves against these criteria, examining our communication and organizational skills. We simulate real-life scenarios, seeing where we excel and where we need improvement, constantly iterating on our co-founding relationship. Ultimately, we concluded that despite the challenges,  we’re still a good fit for a second venture. We just needed the right idea, something big enough to allow us time to course-correct and ensure success. So, I tend to see our co-founding relationship as an MVP project, akin to a scientific experiment. It's a rigorous process, but it's what makes our foundation even stronger. Actually, perhaps the fact that we did go through the experience in the first startup has made the foundation even stronger.  We have laid the groundwork; now it's about continuing to iterate and build upon this working relationship to create a successful organization that delivers exceptional results.

How do you complement each other?

David:

This topic could fill hours of discussion, but I'll summarize. It really boils down to our shared values that have taken over 10 years to formalize. Those values are empathy, transparency, and curiosity. We're both incredibly curious people, which is essential as founders, you know? You're navigating uncharted waters, making assumptions that could change the game, but they're still just assumptions, so you need to be curious and push yourself. That was the starting point, realizing that curiosity binds us. But our diversity is our strongest suit. With my background in law and engineering, I tend to approach things linearly and logically like “A, B, C, D, E” and I value transparency above all, that's the other value. Not to say that Liyana doesn't, but that tends to be my go-to when we're trying to resolve certain matters. I present arguments almost like a lawyer would, focusing on getting the facts straight before jumping into it. And, you know, sometimes that's not the easiest type of approach to deal with when you're having a disagreement because it can be a little bit argumentative. Liyana, on the other hand, brings empathy to the table, something I admire greatly. Having been through the ups and downs of founding, hiring, firing, and raising money, she understands people on a deep level. In a diverse region like Southeast Asia, this empathy is crucial for success. We've realized that to build a successful company here, you need to understand individuals. Liyana embodies this perfectly. So, our values are empathy, transparency, and curiosity, which we have managed to crystalize and pass them onto our team, embedding them into the core of our current company.

What are some exciting things that Pollen is working on right now?

David:

What isn't exciting? This is also a multi-hour discussion but I’ll limit it to two of our initiatives.

Firstly, working in sustainability you can only do so much when the product is close to expiry, or actually in need of liquidation. However, there is quite a bit you can do before a product even needs to be liquidated at all, at least from a data perspective. Imagine that you own something, and you're wondering what happens if in 6 months you need to potentially sell this product. Wouldn't you like to know where you could sell it? How much money you would you be able to make? Or would you like to wait to the last minute when you actually need to sell it? One of the exciting things we’re developing is a modelling tool akin to stock trading simulation to predict various outcomes based on factors like expiry date, location, and pricing.

The second exciting thing we're working on is PollenSave. It's an initiative aimed at making discounted essential products more accessible to those who need them most. Through Pollen Save, we're forging partnerships with marketplaces and other stakeholders to minimize additional markups and deliver these goods directly to consumers. This is a completely new channel for us and we're hoping that that will solve some of the accessibility aspects of sustainability too.

What is your advice for budding entrepreneurs?

Liyana:

For budding entrepreneurs, I think the really important word here is “commitment”. Over the last decade, I've undergone a transformation from being an idealist to embracing a more stoic mindset. What this means is that I prioritize commitment to the journey, including embracing failures and learning from them. As I always say, it's not just about having a great idea; it's about being committed to realizing that idea and becoming the person who can deliver on it.

On top of that, as a female entrepreneur, that is a loaded term in of itself, I think that it can be an added challenge. For me personally, I have suffered from imposter syndrome and the need to constantly prove myself in a demanding work environment. Product development often involves extensive lead times, financial investments, and juggling various priorities which are not easy. So therefore, being a founder is not a role I take lightly.  And I would say to every founder who is really serious about making it, they have to truly commit to the journey, to the lessons and to becoming the person that they needed to be in order to be successful.

 And at the root of it all is integrity because that is what I think it takes to commit. I believe in standing by what I say and demonstrating integrity in my actions. Whether it's pitching a bold idea to investors or persevering through setbacks, I remain committed to the hard work required to achieve success. It's this commitment, driven by integrity, that fuels my resilience and determination as an entrepreneur - I like to walk the talk as a person.

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