Movers and shakers in Southeast Asia’s genAI space

Duc Tran contributed to this story.

Southeast Asia is buzzing with AI activity.

The region now has AI agents that can spot ecommerce trends by scraping product reviews and those that can develop no-code robotics designs. Some have also launched multiagent systems for enterprises.

Hundreds of founders are building applications upon existing foundational AI models, too, largely buoyed by the availability of open-source tech.

We’ve pulled together a list of prominent people from private and public sectors shaping the region’s AI landscape. They’re builders innovating on new applications, policymakers steering the industry, or researchers on the cusp of the next breakthrough.

Whether you’re curious about the space or looking for like-minded founders, we hope this can serve as a starting point.

The people we’ve included check the following boxes:

• Top AI leaders of large companies, only if their main remit is AI. For this reason, CTOs and chief product officers are excluded.
• Startup founder or CEO building an interesting AI product
• Companies incorporated in Southeast Asia, with the region as one of their bases
• Generative AI companies, rather than “traditional” AI companies
• Academic researchers, as well as chief scientists/researchers from public and private AI research labs
• Government leaders shaping AI policy

Notably, governments and corporations have also driven the development of region- and country-specific large language models that take into account cultural nuances. Indonesia’s Sahabat-AI, for instance, is a joint effort between Goto Group and telco firm Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison.

See also: SEA’s AI players target end users as DeepSeek stifles LLMs

The list also highlights several trends. Of the 28 AI startup founders included, 20 – over 70% – run companies that are incorporated in Singapore.

Still, the concept of a “headquarters” is becoming increasingly fluid as more founders choose to base themselves in the US or split their time between the US, China, and Singapore – even though their companies are incorporated in the city-state.