In Good Company with Nicolai Tangen Sea CEO: Gaming Empire, Southeast Asia Strategy and Humble Leadership
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Oct 15, 2025 Forrest Li, the visionary founder and CEO of Sea, dives into the remarkable journey of building Southeast Asia's largest tech company. He shares insights on the evolution from a gaming distributor to a $100 billion powerhouse, revealing the staggering success of the game Free Fire. Forrest discusses humble leadership inspired by Forrest Gump, local solutions that outmaneuver giants like Alibaba, and the role of AI in enhancing customer service and game production. He also emphasizes the importance of core values and nurturing talent while balancing ambition with humility.
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Mobile Internet Fueled Exponential Growth
- Sea's 100x value growth came from riding the mobile internet revolution and expanding product scope beyond games.
- Forrest Li credits timing and platform opportunity for scaling from PC-game roots to a $100bn company.
A Family Trip Sparked Shopee
- Forrest Li described bringing his daughter to China and seeing mobile e-commerce deliver items to their door in a few taps.
- That family trip convinced him e-commerce was magic missing from Southeast Asia and spurred Shopee's origin.
Logistics And Local Addressing Won Market Share
- Local logistics and solving address fragmentation were decisive competitive advantages in Southeast Asia.
- Sea built its own address system and route optimization to deliver reliably where maps and postcodes fail.
