okay go on go on it's so fun yeah go on so to me okay slam down case

yeah okay what more do you need yeah sure yeah so i think the lawyers were pretty shocked as well because they said it's so under the nose it's so brazen so anyway in the meantime um The law firm came up with a preliminary report of all these potentially like 15 offenses.

Right.

And the deputy general counsel decided it's time to go to Bali for a baby moon.

He went to Bali.

Okay.

Wow.

So

where does the suspicion come from that Singaporean-born products, they can't match Western blocks? Where does that come from, maybe in the psyche of the Singaporean? I don't know.

I mean, it's a very Singaporean thing, I think.

I don't know, because we...

I mean, and I'm a Singaporean, right? So this is just speaking from what I've seen and experienced is that if there's a local aspect to something, there is this thing that it can't be good enough, right? And that's why I call it a Charles and Keith effect because overseas, like you will see them in all the luxury stores.

And I think... someone told me like was it LVMH or one of those like luxury brands actually took a stake in them but then locals here would be like why are you having a Charles and Keith bag why should I waste money it's local it can't be good enough as say I don't know a Japanese product a Korean product or a European product right and So I think that also kind of has fed into the VC space here.

So having spoken to a lot of local founders, it's kind of like we are feeling that way as well.

Like, you know, they always get the advice, don't position yourself as a Singapore company.

Is that why you think?

And has your background helped you in building out this platform and getting traction on investors and so forth?

Yeah, I mean, the platform was conceived on two, I would say, hemispheres, right? One being my experience as a general counsel, having seen how poorly companies generally deal with these cases.

You know, anything that's raised, there's always a knee jerk reaction of either pretending it doesn't exist or hoping it goes away on its own or going after the whistleblower, right? Like, oh, the person raising that concern, what's their motives? Why are they doing it? And all these things.

So generally, I think companies don't manage these types of issues pretty well.

So I've used that side of the experience.

And then also the whistleblowing journey, trying to put it all together and creating a product that would help them sensibly manage it.

Because What I want to do with Confide is to strip away the subjectivity, the emotional aspect of whistleblowing, because whistleblowing is an emotional issue.

Do you think we need a global remuneration regulation for whistleblower that they should receive some economic benefit somehow?

What is it that made you feel that you couldn't just stand by and just let this happen?

Because when I was in the company, the way they came after me because of what I knew, that was bad in itself.

They really went all the way.

So they did it in a staged fashion.

So the first way is obviously the board got involved and they told me to stand down.

I was then isolated out of the investigation.

They then coordinated with the local director in Singapore.

Whistleblowers aren't always seen as heroes, right? And from your perspective, what differentiates those genuine whistleblowers like you from those harmful manipulation?