How I built a $2 billion-a-year super app called Grab: “20 hours a day”

The rise of Grab: How I built a super app that brings in over $2 billion in annual revenue

Anthony Tan didn’t need to start a business to get rich.

He is the youngest of three sons from one of Malaysia’s wealthiest families. His father, Tan Heng Chew, is the president of Tan Chong Motor, a multinational car dealership founded by Tan’s grandfather in the 1950s and publicly listed on the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange.

You might call me a “rebel without a cause,” Tan said. But my mission is to create something that can be a “force for good.”

Now, Tan is the co-founder and CEO of multinational ride-hailing giant and super app catch. The company’s revenue exceeded $2 billion in 2023 after going public in the United States in December 2021, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.

catch

Today, in addition to providing ride-hailing services, the company also offers food and grocery delivery services, as well as financial services such as payments, loans and digital banking. Until 2023, Grab also serves more than 35 million customers in eight countries in Southeast Asia and provides 13 million gig workers.

“I remember when I met with President Marcos in the Philippines, he reminded my board and me… (Grab) really made a difference in unemployment numbers across the country,” he said. “I would say it makes us all happy.”

Starting a career

In 2009, Tan began studying at Harvard Business School, where he met co-founder Hooi Ling Tan. They both grew up in Malaysia and became good friends after sitting next to each other in a Business at the Bottom of the Pyramid course.

One day in 2011, they were talking about the taxi system in Malaysia when the system notorious Because it’s not safe, especially for women. The two decided to accept the challenge.

“We want to make it the standard sanitation standard so that women can get (safely) wherever they need to go,” Tan said. “We all really believe we are very lucky (and) we want to serve Southeast Asia.”

They then drafted a business plan and submitted it to the university’s entrepreneurship competition. They won second place and received a $25,000 prize, which was used as seed funding for Grab.

Today, Grab is backed by the likes of SoftBank and has a market capitalization of more than $14 billion.

However, Tan’s journey to founding Grab was not an easy one.

It’s very stressful… I probably have to work 15, 18, sometimes 20 hours a day, and that’s from Monday to Sunday.

Tan grew up in the family business and hopes to return to corporate work when he returns from school. So when he approached his father with the idea of Grab, the conversation was not taken lightly.

“(My father) said ‘Hey, I don’t think this is going to work, so please don’t bother me about it again,'” Tan said. “It’s tough. The idea that it’s never enough…but, I think those (moments) pushed me to say, ‘Look, I can create something that actually solves a real social problem.'”

He took the same strategy, improved it, and brought it to his mom, who eventually became Grab’s first individual investor. With funding from the entrepreneurship competition and his mother, Tan started the company in June 2012, investing all the money in the bank.

“20 hours” working day

The first few years of business were anything but glamorous.

Tan and his co-founders were essentially just tasked with building new infrastructure for Malaysia’s taxi system, but funding was a big constraint.

The original office was located in a small room in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – a region of the world notorious for its perennially hot and humid weather. The office has no ventilation, air conditioning, or even Wi-Fi. “We have to connect via mobile phone,” Tan said.

It’s also difficult for the team to bring drivers on board without enough funding, so they have to get creative.

Anthony Tan works as a delivery driver for Grab.

Provided by Grab

In the early days, Tan traveled across Southeast Asia trying to convince taxi drivers to try Grab.

Chen noticed that drivers in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, would stop at a gas station for coffee before going to work in the morning. So he would show up at around 4am to offer free coffee to taxi drivers, which was also the time he pitched taxi drivers to join Grab. “This is the only way, and there are many ways like this,” he said.

“In Manila, I remember going to the taxi fleet because they always changed shifts around four in the morning…and (I spent) time with them (drinking some) cheap beer and (trying to) understand their pain, Their question, why do they need more revenue,” Tan said.

“It was very intense,” he said. “While flying — when we were going through the growth and expansion phase, I was flying two to three cities a week — I was probably flying 15, 18, sometimes 20 hours a day, and that was Monday through Sunday.”

Moving Southeast Asia forward

In 2018, after a long and hard-fought fight, Uber agreed Sold its Southeast Asia business to Grab in exchange for a 27.5% stake in the company. As part of the deal, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi joined Grab’s board of directors. The deal establishes Grab’s dominance in the region.

What started as a dream to solve security issues in Malaysia’s taxi system has become Southeast Asia’s dominant super app, but that dominance has been controversial. The company faces antitrust charges from critics and regulators.

There is no doubt, however, that Grab has shaped Southeast Asia’s infrastructure.

In December 2021, Grab was listed on Nasdaq.

Provided by Grab

It has transformed the daily lifestyle of people in the region and by providing services such as microfinance schemes to people at the “bottom of the pyramid”, enabling them to afford smartphones and start earning money as drivers.

“That’s what sets us apart, right? Understanding what their problems are,” he said. “People might say, ‘Hey, Anthony, you’re just serving a niche.’ Well, it’s a big niche that’s poorly marketed and underserved.

“It’s all about really helping them and providing them with an ecosystem that no one else can do…that’s what differentiates us from any of our peers.”

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