Disruptr: Koh Cha Ly, Founder and CEO of UrbanMetry Sdn Bhd
Share with us what you do and what inspired you to start the business
- I was trained as a City Planner and returned to Southeast Asia after my Masters. I served in both public and private sectors in infrastructure and real estate development. The gap in quality city data to drive decision making was apparent, resulting in guesswork and unsustainable development in emerging cities.
- Hoping to build better cities, I started the UrbanMetry.
What has the journey been like?
- Dramatic. The entrepreneurial journey has been more challenging than I imagined and the mental maturity and leadership skills required has been a steep learning curve. I am starting to get the hang of it but am at the very beginning of still a very long upward climb.
Biggest achievement and what is one regret that you wish you had or had not done?
- Our biggest achievement is clearly our ability today to allow the government, businesses and bankers to access quality city data for decision making. We take great pride when our clients do well in their business, empowered by the data we make available. One regret perhaps was hiring too fast when things got intense. Discipline in culture is important at our stage.
Where do you see yourself in the next 1 year?
- In one year, I hope to have executed my personal goal of training my managers to be leaders. As we grow as a company, middle managers take the most of the brunt as we expect them to grow as a leader and deliver impossible results at the same time. I need to have succeeded in this in one year.
Where do you see yourself in the next 5 years?
- Over the next five years, I hope to have experimented with some of my theories and philosophies around building a sustainable organisation that adds value to our cities and society.
- What is one local startup you would like to work together with and why? We already work with many local startups but are happy to work with Kumpool, a ride pooling platform in Malaysia.
Who is one founder (local or international) that you look up to?
- Su Ah Lee from s.Lab, Korea.
Why would/should investors invest in your enterprise?
- Urbanmetry believes that there are significant impacts that can be made for the sustainability of our planet if we can equip our key decision makers with quality data to make better decisions. Investors who firmly believe that they should mobilise their capital for the people, planet and profit triple bottom lines should invest in Urbanmetry.