Jasper Yap, 29, has always loved doing business.
His first venture was selling Ninja stars that he had made. Each piece went for 50 cents. He was in primary school then and managed to make about $5 before his teacher got wind of his enterprise and shut it down.
Jasper’s “enterprises” in school did very well. But he never imagined he would be part of a business start-up, much less a founding member of one.
“My mum scolded me, but I just felt like selling things,” he told Salt&Light.
His next money-making pursuit was to hack the online game MapleStory so he could level up faster. Friends would pay him to help them in the game. Charging $2 per session, he managed to earn $70. Jasper was 12 then.
He grew up to become co-founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of B2B marketplace start-up Eezee at 22. But before that, he would have to watch his parents’ marriage fall apart, be detained in a boys’ home, and live through want and poverty.
Read Part 1 of his story here.
The turning point
Had his family life not imploded when Jasper was 13, he may have gone on to start more businesses in his teens.
Instead, life took a different turn.
He joined a gang, smoked and did drugs. In 2009, 15-year-old Jasper was arrested for vehicle theft and robbery, and sentenced to two years at the Singapore Boys’ Home.
Unexpectedly, it was at the Home, where he was detained for two years, that Jasper was given a chance to turn his life around.
“I didn’t realise it was the Lord. But as I grew up and reflected on it, I realised it couldn’t have been me.”
“That was when I remembered that when I was young, I used to go to church and there was a peace I’d felt. And I remembered the Lord,” said Jasper.
So when he was invited to Christian fellowship at the Home, he went.
One day during worship, they sang the song Mighty to Save.
“When I heard the verse, ‘Everyone needs compassion’, I thought, ‘Lord, I really need your compassion.’ I felt the presence of the Lord and I started to cry,” he said.
The realisation that God is real shook him to the core.
As he read God’s Word, his broken self-image slowly healed. The boy who never thought that he would amount to anything started to believe that God had a plan for him.
“I started to think: What do I want to do in the future? Before, if you had asked me, I would have said, ‘Cut hair, zuo Ah Long (become an illegal money-lender), sell (pirated) VCDs.’ I wouldn’t have said, ‘Go to poly, uni, build a business.’”
Jasper had dropped out of Secondary Two. But at the Boys’ Home, he took the opportunity to return to his studies. He did so well that he topped his cohort during his N-level examinations.
“There was a change in me. I didn’t realise it was the Lord. But as I grew up and reflected on it, I realised it couldn’t have been me.”
Lessons from failure
It was then that Jasper resumed his entrepreneurial endeavours.
While preparing for his N-level examinations, he worked at a recruitment agency. His boss gave him a little piece of the business to manage – recruiting part-timers.
Though many of his earlier businesses did not succeed, each failure taught Jasper a lesson that he would later apply to Eezee.
Jasper went door to door to companies and restaurants to secure a good part-time worker rate. With that, he offered to pay his part-timers slightly more money than the market rate and had them recruit others. Whatever was left was his commission.
The model was a success and he made a few thousand dollars within months – a big sum for an 18-year-old.
While serving National Service, he worked at a maid agency. He saw how much paperwork was involved, so using the software programming skills he’d learnt in polytechnic, he created a programme to automate administrative tasks. The programme worked so well that it was used in all 12 of the maid agency’s franchises. Other maid agencies ended up using it as well.
“My flesh is weak. I cannot bring anything into existence. So I need God.”
“All of my life, I never really did anything to make people proud except for my N-level results,” said Jasper. “This programme was the second time. I started to believe I could do things.”
He would go on to be involved in a few other tech businesses while still studying at the polytechnic, but none took off. He now realises that the failures were necessary.
“When I was a new believer, I had a hint that God was working in my life. But I also thought that I was good. I had pride. I kept thinking I’m going to buy this condo, buy that car.
“My faith foundation wasn’t strong enough,” he admitted. “If you had put this weight (of success) on me then, I would have crumbled. I would have forgotten the Lord.”
Out of each unsuccessful attempt, he gleaned something valuable about doing business.
But, most importantly, Jasper learnt to rely on God.
“I came to terms with myself. My flesh is weak. I cannot bring anything into existence. So I need God. I need to lean on the Lord to do this.”
Open doors
When God eventually opened the door for him to meet his future business partner, Jasper was “not in a good mental state”, as he was discouraged by the lack of breakthroughs in his businesses.
“I came to a point where I was tired but I just continued to trust,” he said. “So I told God, ‘I enjoy coding and bringing things into existence. I leave the rest to You.’
“If we keep holding on to things, we can’t let go and He cannot take over. This way, when the day comes that you see the fruit, there is no doubt whether it was me or the Lord.
“It is Him, His grace and favour, that opens the doors, gives me strength to labour and gives me wisdom.”
“So I told God, ‘I enjoy coding and bringing things into existence. I leave the rest to You.’”
Jasper had graduated as valedictorian in polytechnic where he had thrived as an engineering scholar.
When a man who was trying to build an “Amazon-style programme” for business procurement approached his school for a computer engineer to build it, Jasper’s name came up.
That man, Logan Tan, wanted to create a digital platform for businesses to sell and manage their products through a seller centre.
For many businesses, procurement is a mainstay requiring contacting several different vendors at the same time to enquire about items or to secure them. There was no option to buy the items online, nor a central depository for easy price comparisons.
After hearing Logan’s pitch, Jasper agreed to work with him. But he did not want to be an employee, he wanted to be a co-founder.
“I knew the business was right for disruption,” said Jasper.
As the two entered into a partnership, opportunities opened up. Jasper, who had previously not been able to get onto Ngee Ann Polytechnic’s incubator programme, received an offer from them.
With that, the pair formed Eezee in early May of 2017, together with a designer. Their product was launched in five months.
Faithful in little
The euphoria did not last.
By 2018, they were making profits of just $5,000 a month, barely enough to sustain the three people on the team. Jasper had drawn no salary for nearly two years.
To keep going, they needed to bring in five-figure sales. But they had no money to run advertisements.
“How can the Lord put big things into your hands if you don’t even handle the small things?”
Efforts to secure investments came to naught. As they met with rejection after rejection, sales also fell.
Around that time, Jasper and his then girlfriend, now wife, Amanda, learnt about tithing from their cell group leader.
“He wasn’t telling us to tithe,” Jasper clarified. “He just said, ‘When you tithe, you acknowledge that God is alive. We are tithing to God.’
“He also said, ‘How can the Lord put big things into your hands if you don’t even handle the small things?’”
Jasper was serving National Service and drawing an allowance of $600. Amanda was a student and had an allowance from her scholarship. They both decided to tithe the little that they had to honour God.
“The month I started tithing, we started to see an increase in our sales. Some things cannot be explained. I don’t really know how it happened.
“But I said, ‘Lord, thank You so much. God, You are so good.’”
Lessons from DMV
As his business grew, Jasper began to wonder how he could connect his faith with his work.
“The start-up culture may not sit well with many Christians. We work on tight timelines and we need to drive people. I wondered: Is this right?”
He began praying for a Christian business community to guide him. In his search for investors, he met Chris Yeo, CEO of Doku, a B2B payment platform.
Jasper (back row, third from the left) learnt from DMV founder Chris Yeo (front) what it meant to be a Christian business owner.
Chris did not end up investing in Eezee, but as the founder of Digital Mission Ventures (DMV), he did introduced Jasper to DMV Redemptive Labs, an accelerator for early-stage tech founders looking to steward their businesses for God.
Jasper joined the three-month programme which included a week-long stay-in session every month.
“I got to meet like-minded entrepreneurs. I remember a conversation that really moved me. One of them shared a verse – 1 Kings 19:11-13 – and said, ‘As entrepreneurs, we think of big deals, we look at the big things. But the Lord is in the still, small voice on Sunday, in your quiet time with Him.’
“That hit me very hard,” said Jasper of the reminder to stay centred on God.
“Until now, I didn’t see myself as a shepherd. But a boss is a sort of shepherd.”
The godly principles DMV taught also shaped Jasper’s perspective as a business owner.
“Most businesses work in the realm of exploitation. Some try to be ethical. But few businesses are redemptive.
“Exploitative means I pay you as little as I can. Ethical means I pay you what you are worth. Redemptive means I pay you more than market rate because I know that if I take care of you, you will not want to leave.
“This has helped me to realise the nature of business and how I want to move from ethical to redemptive.”
Jasper was also challenged to think about his role in the workplace.
“We are founders. We have influence. How do we call people to the Lord? Until now, I didn’t see myself as a shepherd. But a boss is a sort of shepherd.
“Chris told us that when he first became CEO of Doku, he asked, ‘How can I honour You, Lord?’ On the first day, he told everyone, ‘I am a believer.’ It was as easy as that. In his first engagement, he talked about his faith.
“Now I see my purpose as a Christian founder,” said Jasper. “I ask, ‘Can I bless the people? Can I tell them the Lord is good?’ I have started testifying and bringing up the Lord more.”
Jasper brought his designer, Terence Goh, to church and now they share Bible verses to encourage each other in their work.
Because of his love of worship, Jasper also plans to start a praise and worship session at work every month.
Ready to lose it all
Two years ago, Eezee raised US$7.5 million in Series A funding. This round of funding refers to the first round of venture money a start-up raises after the seed funding and angel investor round.
It is only secured by companies that have shown progress in building a business model and the potential to grow and generate revenue.
Jasper with his Eezee team. The start-up now has some 80 people on its payroll.
At the time that Jasper was looking for investors, the war in Ukraine had just started. Investors were cautious. As the possibilities fell through one by one, Jasper prepared for the worst for Eezee.
“It was a very tough time. I sought the Lord and I found peace. And I knew that even that came from Him.
“I knew that, even if Eezee is gone, He will bring me another thing that is better for me. I told the Lord, ‘I’m ready to lose everything because I know You are my source.”
“It’s not me. It is the grace of God.”
By June 2022, the team was down to their last investor. The pitch was going poorly and there was one last decision-maker to convince. If he gave the nod, Eezee would have its Series A funding.
The team had just 15 minutes to present its business case.
“We prayed frantically as I prepared to do the demo,” Jasper remembered.
He walked through the demonstration in 10 minutes, surrendering it all to God. A month later, they were told that they had secured their investment. Jasper’s presentation had sealed the deal.
Said Jasper: “God, You are good lah. Through You are all things, from You are all things (Romans 11:36). I just need to sit at Your feet and worship You.”
Eezee is on track to be profitable by this round of funding. The start-up has over 2,000 suppliers and manages more than 400 enterprise customer accounts, including major companies like SMRT, PSA, SIA and Rolls-Royce Singapore.
The team of three is now 80 strong. Apart from being in Singapore, Eezee has also opened in Malaysia and Indonesia. The Philippines is next and Thailand is likely to follow.
“I never would have believed that I would be a CTO. When I sat in the Boys’ Home and looked at my future, these were not the thoughts I had about myself.
“This is really grace upon grace,” said Jasper. “It’s not me. It is the grace of God.”
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