• Aaron Tan, Co-Founder & Group CEO, Carro
• Kelly Wong, CEO, VNG Group
• Dr. BJ Han, Co-Founder, Board Director and CEO, Silicon Box
• Aastha Maheshwari, Senior Reporter, Indonesia, DealStreetAsia [Moderator]

With Aaron Tan (Carro), Kelly Wong (VNG Group) and Dr. BJ Han (Silicon Box), this founders’ session gets practical about building through a trough year – H1 2025 was a six-year low for SEA venture with early-stage softness, valuation pressure and a private-debt pullback – even as Q2 showed a selective rebound with capital concentrating in fewer, higher-quality rounds (notably US$10–25m and select late stage). Against that backdrop, this session will unpack how to balance runway, profitability and ambition across very different models – from Carro’s shift to disciplined profitability ahead of a potential U.S. listing, to VNG’s platform recalibration (Zalo, ZaloPay, games), to Silicon Box’s deep-tech scale-up after a US$302.5m Series B and Singapore’s S$2b advanced-packaging ramp. Expect pointed questions on the operating levers, governance choices, and capital stacks (equity, structured, venture debt) that work now – for SEA founders and the 40% of our audience building from outside the region.