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Welcome to Episode 6 of Leapfrog, a podcast about global entrepreneurs outside the American-centric bubble. I apologize for my glitchy voice in this episode; my seven-year-old MacBook suffered from a water damage!
Lucy Gao had been studying and working in the US for over a decade before reconnecting with her homeland. Instead of moving back to China physically, she joined the US office of TikTok, the Chinese-owned short video app that was seeing a meteoric rise around 2020, to gain a sense of home.
In Silicon Valley, Lucy experienced China’s rigorous “996” culture—working from 9 am to 9 pm, six days a week. She realized that TikTok's competitive advantage might not lie in its AI, but quite the contrary, in its large army of employees worldwide carrying out growth and user engagement tasks through highly manual work. This role, unique to Chinese tech firms, is known as yunying (运营), translated as “operation”, though it differs greatly from its Western definition.
Reflecting on her varied experience straddling China and the US, where she transitioned from software engineer to product manager, venture capitalist and now entrepreneur, Lucy also shared her simple rule for making important life decisions: listen to your heart.
Timeline:
2:17 Making life decisions the way Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs do
5:29 TabbyML as an open-source alternative to GitHub Copilot
8:18 How Lucy ended up attending high school in the US
11:07 Transitioning from software engineering to product management
13:27 Joining TikTok at the dawn of its global dominance
16:02 TikTok’s secret to success — yunying
20:06 Reverse culture shock at TikTok
23:58 To grow quickly, TikTok needed to rely on its China team early on
25:28 Moving back to China and becoming a VC during COVID-19
28:40 Lucy’s three life essentials
Mentions:
* TabbyML, a self-hosted AI coding assistant
* Jeff Bezos’ Regret Minimization Framework
* Steve Jobs on “connecting the dots,” from his famous commencement address at Stanford University in 2005
* Rui Ma’s podcast episode on the “operation” aka Yunying (运营) role at Chinese tech firms, and how it works differently in Western countries
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Welcome to Episode 5 of Leapfrog, a podcast about global entrepreneurs outside the American-centric tech bubble. Special thanks to Emma and Danny’s expert editing help!
Emma Meng always seems to be excelling as an outsider.
Raised in south China in the 90s, she became the first Chinese to be admitted by Cambridge to study French. After working in the fashion industry in New York, she returned to China and wrote a book about Elon Musk at the dawn of Tesla’s rise to become a household name. After riding her home country’s spectacular boom of battery-powered cars, Emma is now introducing Chinese EVs to the United Arab Emirates.
Aside from discussing China’s EV revolution and the UAE’s pursuit of energy diversification, I asked Emma what allowed her to flourish as an outsider in such wide-ranging realms. She harked back to something her sixth form college teacher said, that being Chinese wasn’t her weakness but an advantage.
“[My teacher] said she had the most fun reading my essay because my angle was always so different. So when I'm reading Shakespeare, when I'm reading Baudelaire, I'm reading from a modern Chinese woman's angle, which is different from the rest of the crowd in England.
I asked her, ‘but how about my grammar mistakes? I could never speak or write as fluently as native speakers.’ And she said, you know, Kate Moss is only 5 ft 7, and she's one of the most famous supermodels. So my teacher just kept telling me what I thought was my weakness can actually be my greatest strength.”
Timeline:
2:40 Why the UAE wants to learn from Chinese EVs
7:55 The UAE’s cultural openness was a surprise
10:59 How Emma built trust in her Middle Eastern clients
14:50 Going from French literature to the world of battery-powered cars
19:19 Why Elon Musk has many female fans, including Emma
23:30 Many Chinese are opposed to AI taking over their jobs
25:35 How Emma manages to thrive as an outsider
30:12 Marketing in the auto industry is still very “masculine”
32:45 But in China, women play an increasingly key role in car purchase decisions
34:50 Why the biotech industry needs cooperation between China, the UAE and the US
36:52 Recommendations
Mentions:
* Emma’s Weibo account, podcast (大小马聊科技), and her book on Elon Musk (Chinese, 2018)
* Emma’s book recs
* Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
* The Worlds I See by Fei-Fei Li
* Tesla secures Shanghai site for $2 billion China Gigafactory (Reuters, 2018)
* China’s EV makers want top oil producing nations to go electric (Bloomberg, 2023)
* China’s push for autonomous driving, explained by executives from top players (TechCrunch, 2021)
* China biotech scene, U.S. collaborations grow (AACR Journals, 2020)
* Chinese women’s car-buying power (Chinese, 21st Century Business Herald and NielsenIQ, 2023)
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leapfrogs.substack.com -
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Hello, this is Rita Liao. Welcome to Episode #4 of Leapfrog, a podcast about entrepreneurs who have left home and are reshaping a slice of the global tech landscape. You can read more about why I started this project in About.
In recent years, many young Chinese have decided to leave their homeland for better job prospects and a greater sense of security abroad. Netizens named this phenomenon “rùn” (润), a play on the English word “run”. The term reflects the motivations behind the exodus: economic uncertainties and increasingly limited personal freedom, which were exacerbated by the pandemic. China’s net outflow of emigration surpassed 300,000 in both 2022 and 2023, a significant jump from the 100,000s annual range between 2011 and 2017, according to United Nations data.
Among those fleeing, people from the crypto industry are particularly motivated to leave. In 2019, China cracked down on all forms of cryptocurrency trading. Scores of crypto exchanges left China, often moving their founders and employees abroad. But restarting a life in a foreign country isn’t easy. Those who remain in China keep a low profile and manage a remote team across the world, with no physical office or company registration in China.
Leah, my guest for this episode, decided to pack up everything and move her family to Singapore. She sought more regulatory certainty for their business and a brighter future for her children. Her move is difficult for her parents, who benefited from China’s rapid economic growth up to the 2010s, to understand. For them, the idea of leaving China, even as it faces challenges, is incomprehensible.
Timeline:
2:13 Leah joined the crypto industry, attracted to its promise of giving users control over their own data
6:15 Crypto gave Chinese people a unique chance to participate in a global economy
8:10 Crypto as a belief for people
9:29 Leah’s old job at a Chinese tech giant, and monetizing user data
11:35 China’s economic uncertainties prompted people to seek opportunities in a new industry and asset class
14:44 Living in China’s censored-internet is like being a fish in an aquarium
15:15 Leah moved abroad to give her children a “more open and free” education
16:00 Why Chinese entrepreneurs stay in web3 despite the crypto ban
18:26 Why Leah moved to Singapore
25:17 Managing a team of 60 people across the world
26:55 Boosting employee morales when crypto’s image is tainted
28:10 Few people in crypto are actual idealists
34:22 Leah studied English literature in university, but her old job never required her knowledge of the outside world
36:41 Leah’s career track is the 1% outliner in her university class
38:44 Leah’s parents, who benefited from China’s economic miracles, have a difficult time understanding why she left
41:10 Recommendations
Links:
* This piece by NYT’s Li Yuan is a great read on China’s “run” phenomenon and its disillusioned generation.
* Despite crypto ban, China’s tech talent rides the global web3 wave (TechCrunch, 2022)
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leapfrogs.substack.com -
Hello, this is Rita Liao. Welcome to Episode #3 of Leapfrog, a podcast about entrepreneurs who have ventured out of their native land and are reshaping a slice of the global tech landscape. You can read more about why I started this project in About.
David Chang belongs to the generation of Chinese who came of age during the nation’s economic reforms, and whose worldview was shaped heavily by China’s increased openness to the world. A cohort of them went on to study abroad and founded tech companies that aspired to capture international markets. In recent years, however, they found it increasingly difficult to go global from China as geopolitical tensions heightened. Rather than taking sides between the US and China, Chang is keeping ties with both while charting an alternative path in Japan, where he’s about to deploy his firm’s autonomous delivery vans.
Tune into this episode if you’re curious how Chinese entrepreneurs like Chang are navigating increasing geopolitical complications.
Chang himself makes for an intriguing subject. Defiant of norms and authority, he fought his Chinese headmaster over school uniform policy. He rebuked Chinese investors who questioned his qualifications as an eager entrepreneur due to his privileged background. This Tianjin native bridges seemingly opposite qualities. He's both nerdy and flamboyant. He praises Shenzhen’s entrepreneurial spirit while criticizing its burnout culture. Growing up in China's state-oriented economy, he has nonetheless come to embrace free-market ideals inspired by political philosophers like Friedrich Hayek.
Timeline:
3:40 Why Chang left Baidu as the Chinese tech giant was embracing AI
7:42 Shenzhen, the least bureaucratic Chinese city
8:55 Chinese VCs are skeptical of founders from wealthy families
12:12 Most Chinese autonomous driving founders are ‘too old’
14:35 How Chang’s Whale Dynamic cracked the Japanese market
16:25 Why Japan is the “best” springboard for Chinese founders going global
18:43 Challenges for Chinese firms raising capital from US investors
21:25 Chang’s fight with his school headmaster changed his life
25:25 Chang had a culture shock arriving in Shenzhen from Tianjin
27:17 What the UK taught Chang as a young adult
28:46 Why Chang decided to seek US residency
31:42 To survive China’s business environment, one needs to be politically sensitive
33:41 Chang’s criticism of ‘involution’ (卷), the burnt-out culture in China
36:33 Chang’s defiance against the Chinese education system
37:59 Chang’s love for Frederick Hayek and the free market
39:07 Adapting to different cultural norms
40:34 Being street smart in China
42:20 Chang’s three life essentials
Mentions:
David Chang’s LinkedIn
Baidu started going ‘all in’ on AI around the mid-2010s (Tech in Asia)
China’s burnout culture — involution, or neijuan/内卷 (The New Yorker)
Chinese entrepreneurs face increased scrutiny from the West (TechCrunch)
Friedrich Hayek, Austrian-British political philosopher of the 20th century and an advocate of free-market capitalism
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leapfrogs.substack.com -
Hello, this is Rita Liao. Welcome to Episode #2 of Leapfrog, a podcast about entrepreneurs who have ventured out of their native land and are reshaping a slice of the global tech landscape. You can read more about why I started this project in About.
Hailing from a rural chicken farm in eastern China, Winston Chi sauntered into a field after school every day, picking wild berries and daydreaming. It was a carefree childhood contrasting the academically rigorous, sedentary one his urban peers had in the 90s and 2000s. Occasionally, glimpses of the outside world came through gifts from visiting relatives, speaking to his village's history as a source of the Chinese diaspora.
When a relative brought home an early-generation iPod, Winston was enchanted — not by what music he’d put in the device, but its ability to store hundreds of songs. The original iPod sparked his interest in technology and a desire to explore the world beyond the berry field.
Winston is living in the Bay Area today. I talked to him just weeks after he sold his startup, Butter, to its larger competitor, GrubMarket, a pre-IPO company that offers software tools to farmers and growers across the U.S. On this episode, Winston talked about his journey from the chicken farm to a successful startup exit, the cultural differences he overcame (and is still working on) in the U.S., and how he handled his anxieties in life simply by taking action.
Winston’s words that stuck with me:
You don't have your family here. You have very limited support. So you actually need to be able to explain what you're planning to do, what's your actions and the potential outcomes to ensure you can gain support from people.
One thing I do believe is that if everything shut down, like all the restaurants were shut down… I think there'll be a new norm. In a few years when everything is back to normal, it will not be pre-COVID-19.
When I was there [near a California wildfire], the only thing that can deviate me from anxiety is taking actions. And that's still one of the thing I do believe: if you feel like you cannot really think it through on many things, take some actions and you will see through afterwards.
Because we didn’t grow up in Silicon Valley or went to Stanford and then work here, we have even a wider view of what the world should be, right? Especially if you are from a third-world country, you've seen the countryside super poor, you've seen the country developed so much in the last 30 years, and you have the belief that the world can be changed.
Timeline:
3:30 Winston’s biggest culture shock upon arriving in the U.S.: a society that rewards presentation, a contrast to Chinese people’s faith in meritocracy
7:00 Raising capital in Silicon Valley: try to make people’s life 10x better; and pitch in a way that even your grandpa can understand.
12:17 Winston doing the intuitive-enough-for-grandpa pitch
15:51 Why Winston pivoted from the crypto industry into a backward, “web 0.5” space
16:58 How COVID-19 inspired Winston to start a food distribution tech startup
19:18 Start building if you have a strong calling. It doesn’t matter if you don’t know the exact solution.
22:05 The best ideas always come from taking a walk and grabbing bubble tea with your teammates, not over a Zoom call.
26:35 How being an “outsider” positioned Winston well in building a food tech startup in the U.S.
28:42 Winston’s childhood in the Chinese countryside
31:18 How the diaspora community in Winston’s village shaped his understanding of the world at a young age
38:42 Winston’s three life essentials
Mentions:
DoorDash founder Tony Xu’s YC pitch in summer 2013
GrubMarket buys Butter to give its food distribution tech an AI boost (TechCrunch, May 2024)
The Art of Self-Defense, directed by Riley Stearns
The Social Network, directed by David Fincher
2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick
*Leapfrog is also on Apple Podcast, Spotify and other podcast apps. The RSS feed is: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/2686580.rss
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leapfrogs.substack.com -
Hello, this is Rita Liao. Welcome to Episode #1 of Leapfrog, a podcast about entrepreneurs who have ventured out of their native land and are reshaping a slice of the global tech landscape. You can read more about why I started this project in About.
When Xin Yan heard about Bitcoin in 2017, he was studying electrical engineering in Israel. He soon dropped out of the masters program and joined a wave of entrepreneurs trying to prove that cryptocurrency, and more broadly, blockchain, has real-world utility beyond enabling speculative bubbles and scams. Backed by Sequoia Capital, his startup EthSign is building a digital residency system powered by blockchain technology. In a few weeks, he might be shaking hands with the president of Sierra Leone to bring his solutions to the West African country.
Timeline:
6:00 The “ideological ivory towers” of the U.S. and China.
9:30 How Xin chose where to reside: a place with inflows of talent and capital, and absent of a “strong culture”
14:11 Why blockchain might be the solution to verifying online identities
15:45 Meeting and vetting the “professional ambassadors” of Sierra Leone
20:04 Venture capitalist Balaji Srinivasan’s “network state”
25:24 Players in the grey area are “always quick to adopt frontier technologies”
27:05 Regulators “should spend more time studying the newest technology”
27:50 People in China find ways to use crypto despite it being banned
33:28 How Xin learned from his grandpa to always seize opportunities in life
38:41 Xin’s three unconventional life essentials
Links:
* @realyanxin
* The Network State (Balaji Srinivasan)
* EthSign brings DocuSign-like features to Line, Telegram with a web3 twist (TechCrunch, December 2023)
* Asia emerges as a promising haven amid the crypto winter (TechCrunch, October, 2013)
* Despite crypto ban, China’s tech talent rides the global web3 wave (TechCrunch, July 2022)
*Special thanks to Jess for drawing the wonderful frog logo, Jordan for sharing the technicalities of podcasting, Vlad for polishing my words, and Yunan and Jason for inspiring my vision.
*Leapfrog is also on Apple Podcast and Spotify. The RSS feed is: https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/2686580.rss
This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit leapfrogs.substack.com
