Ms Kim (Kimberley) Teo

Born in Singapore, spending her teens and 20s living in Singapore and Australia (Perth, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne) and now a global citizen sharing her time between the US, UK and Melbourne, Ms Kim Teo has spent her life embracing the unknown and being comfortable feeling uncomfortable.

Success throughout high school translated into a double degree at Monash University, where Ms Teo graduated with a Bachelor of Economics and Bachelor of Biomedical Science in 2009. A graduate position at JP Morgan followed and throughout her 20s, Ms Teo quickly climbed the corporate ladder as a management consultant working with blue chip companies including BP and Spotless Group.

But the call of independence, which was forged from an early age around the family dinner table where talk revolved around her parents’ various businesses, saw Ms Teo leave the security of a corporate career and embrace the life of an entrepreneur.

A side hustle ecommerce business - a bridesmaid dress rental service called Simply Borrowed - planted the startup seed, but it was meeting fellow founders Adrian Osman and Kerry Osborn in 2015 that was the impetus to leave the corporate world and work on her own ideas fulltime.

The trio founded Neighbour Flavour, a platform connecting home cooks with people wanting to buy home-cooked meals. Though the economics did not work out and the product did not launch, they took their learnings and went on to found startup consultancy Pitchblak, which helped hundreds of early stage entrepreneurs to avoid making similar mistakes.

Out of Pitchblak came Mr Yum, which is an ordering, payments and marketing platform used by hospitality and entertainment venues, with Ms Teo appointed Chief Executive Officer in December 2018. More than 5000 venues around the globe now use the platform to serve, connect and reward their guests in all types of venues, from cafes and pubs to stadiums, concert venues and airports. By enabling venues to understand their customers better, Mr Yum empowers operators to connect with their guests in personalised, meaningful ways, helping to drive repeat visitation and increase customer loyalty and satisfaction.

A passionate advocate for women taking leadership roles in technology and business, bringing big ideas to life and creating a dynamic company culture is the energy that drives Ms Teo and turns work into play.