Singapore Counter Highlights, Part of our Global Counter Series

2025 has been a landmark year for our Global Counter Series: community-led gatherings designed exclusively for corporate venture capital (CVC) leaders worldwide. We kicked off with London Counter (May 2025), followed by our flagship Women in CVC Summit in San Francisco (May 2025), and then our first Japan roadshow, Japan Counter (July 2025), hosted across Tokyo and Osaka. It all culminated in Counter VII and CVC Week in San Francisco this past September, the world’s largest gathering of corporate venture investors.

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Each Global Counter event shares the same DNA: curated content through an invite-only, corporate-only format; real talk with no party line, where we openly discuss both the challenges and opportunities shaping CVC; and a fresh approach led by former CVC leaders who have actually lived the work, not borrowed the playbook.

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Singapore Counter was born out of leadership within the community itself.
At Counter V in San Francisco, Glen Liu of R3D3 Ventures pulled us aside and said plainly: there’s a gap for corporate venture connectivity across Southeast Asia and Counter Club is uniquely positioned to fill it. And so, the first-ever Counter Club summit in Southeast Asia was born, co-hosted by R3D3 Ventures and Wavemaker Partners.

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This recap is just a sample, corporate VCs can get the full notes packet on Counter Club now!

Counter Club members (corporate VCs only) can access the full notes summary and slides in the media center of the CVC Week Hub: https://counterclub.vc/

‍If you are a corporate investor and not a member yet, you can request to join here.

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Session Highlights

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1. CVC Leadership in Practice: Lessons from 20+ Years

Patrick opened with the reminder that enduring myths about CVC (“slow, dumb strategic money”) persist because CVCs often fail to proactively tell their story. His advice:

“Dispel the CVC myth... Preempt the misperceptions and address them upfront.”

He emphasized executive sponsorship, stakeholder-specific playbooks, and measured team growth as the real drivers of longevity.

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2. Jefferies Private Markets & M&A: Where Are We in the Cycle?

Rehan framed the state of global capital markets with one clear message: exits are becoming more achievable again, but with higher bars for profitability and durability. Key facts from his sections:

• Public markets near all-time highs and tech IPO windows have reopened (particularly for profitable, scaled businesses).
• Private equity now dominates global M&A volume, aggressively deploying dry powder.
• Technology, Industrials, and Energy are leading M&A activity due to AI, reshoring, and infrastructure trends.
• Persistent geopolitical tension remains the core headwind to cross-border deals.

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3. From the Frontlines: Driving Corporate Growth Through Venture

With decades of CVC experience across Visa, The Hartford, BBVA/Propel, and now IBM, Tom has built and rebuilt CVC programs through multiple booms and busts. As he put it, “It's been 25 years of hard lessons.”

At IBM, Tom took on what he called “the ultimate corporate venture challenge”: turning a legacy, mostly-in-name-only venture effort into a $500M enterprise AI and quantum fund that now backs 20+ companies and has helped IBM regain relevance with founders and the market.

His core message to corporates was simple and direct:

“It’s never strategic to lose money, but the money doesn’t move the needle; what moves the needle is the insights.”

The funds that endure are the ones that pair financial discipline with a clear, systematic way of translating startup learnings into strategic advantage for the mothership.

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4. Data Behind the Deals: APAC Corporate Venture Trends

PitchBook’s macro meets Counter Club’s micro. The standout data point:‍

Japan stands out for its resilience, Ansel pointed out. It’s the only APAC region increasing its share of CVC deal value and count since 2021.

Japan’s stable leadership cycles and long-term employment culture are sustaining CVC momentum despite broader APAC pullbacks.

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5. How AI Is Transforming the Corporate & Startup Landscape

Deborah Im brought a rare combination of perspectives to the stage: operator, founder, big-tech exec (Meta, Stripe), and now Head of Legal for APAC at OpenAI, after initially advising the company on its Asia expansion. Her through line: AI is no longer a “whether” question for corporates, it’s a “how fast and how deeply” question. As she put it,

“The time has passed to debate whether to adopt AI... everyone should be adopting AI, and it has to come from the top.”

Deborah urged leaders to “AI-fy yourself” first and then normalize AI use across the organization, rather than letting employees quietly rely on shadow tools that expose corporate data. She also drew a sharp contrast between startups and large organizations: startups can grow up AI-native with no legacy jobs or workflows to protect, while corporates face internal resistance from exactly the functions (legal, IT, middle management) that feel most threatened. That’s why, in her view, AI strategy cannot be crowdsourced: “If you open it up to debate across teams, you’re going to get pushback. Leadership has to make the call."

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6. Corporate, Startups & Government: Success Stories

Glenda Tan distilled years of cross-sector partnership experience into one line:‍

“Success comes back to clarity — in people, in process, in pilots.”

Only ~1 in 5 corporates have a repeatable process for startup collaboration, a core blocker discussed across the panel.

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7. State of APAC: How APAC Corporates Operate & Invest Cross-Border

This panel explored where APAC corporates are finding opportunity amid geopolitical fragmentation. Two standout insights:

• HSBC Ventures shows that winning globally requires solving locally first: commercial success is measured by multi-year adoption across regions, built on real customer needs like credit mobility and data portability, shared Louisa Zhang.
• Since 2000, Australia has produced 1.22 unicorns for every $1 billion invested — the highest ratio globally(Anthony Potts, confirmed by Bloomberg article.

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8. Transformation of Banking & Fintech: Corporate Banking × Fintech × Web3

The final panel of the day explored how corporate banking, fintech, and Web3 are rapidly converging as institutions adapt. Panelists emphasized that customer expectations for instant, borderless finance, combined with clearer regulatory framework, are pushing banks and fintechs into deeper collaboration with Web3 infrastructure.

Bao Yi from Amber Group captured the convergence of fintech and digital assets:
“Users expect always-on service, programmable money, and borderless transactions… this real demand underpins the convergence.”

Demand — not hype — is forcing banks and fintechs into deeper collaboration with Web3 infrastructure.

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Corporate VCs can Explore More on Counter Club

It was a true pleasure sharing a taste of Counter with the Southeast Asian community. This summit marks just one stop in our Global Counter Series, with it all culimnating in CVC Week this fall 2026 in San Francisco.

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Counter Club members (corporate VCs only) can access the full notes summary from this event ans network with our global community: https://counterclub.vc/

‍If you are a corporate investor and not a member yet, you can request to join here.