Mr Lim Chinn Hwa: It is better to make a decision, and be wrong, than to sit on a problem and let it fester, because then it will become a bigger problem.

Careers in Infocomm

Analytical skills, acumen and character – these are the traits that have stood him well in his infocomm career, says Mr Lim Chinn Hwa. The systems engineer turned cloud computing entrepreneur shares his experiences as Chief Technology Officer of AkSaaS, a technology-focused incubator that helps businesses develop Software as a Service applications for the global marketplace.

What sparked off your interest in infocomm?
I laid hands on my first computer – a Sinclair – when I was a teenager. I programmed simple mathematical games for myself. I was always interested to find out how things work, how you actually put an instruction to a computer and have the computer interact back. The computer can only be as smart as its creator, so I wanted to find out how smart I was. That’s how I started my journey.

When did you start your career in infocomm?
After I graduated with a computer science degree from the University of Indiana, I joined Singapore Computer Systems as a systems engineer working on projects like simulators and developing applications for the air force, army and navy. The experience exposed me to the best programmers and engineers from around the world.

What are some of the other key infocomm jobs/roles that you have held since then?
I went on to do a stint with a Stanford University start-up for four years. Having dealt with all these fun military stuff, it was time to get into the real world, and where else to go but to the mecca of IT - Silicon Valley. I was involved in the development of unified messaging systems which required the use of massive amounts of server power. I learnt how to control many large racks of servers and to support very high transaction volumes. That’s where the foray into the cloud came into the picture, because part of it was about understanding the infrastructure behind the complex transactions and how you actually do distributed programming. Slowly, that became Software as a Service (SaaS) and cloud computing. Later, when I returned to Singapore, I was introduced to Exploit Technologies, the commercialisation arm of the Singapore Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), and started up AkSaaS.

Describe some of the major highlights of your infocomm career to date.
One of the major milestones would be when AkSaaS won our first contract with Visa. This allowed me to engage with MNCs, understand their global requirements and measure ourselves against very exacting standards for the delivery of solutions. The project required us to manage the solution for the whole of the Asia Pacific so it was large not only in terms of the programming effort, but also in terms of the geographical spread. The experience that we had with them, complying with their governance and other requirements, made us grow up very quickly.

It also got us the attention of bigger boys like SCS. We built the management platform for their Infrastructure as a Service, as part of the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore’s (IDA) Grid Service Provider initiative. Working with SCS was like a homecoming for me. It also gave us a stepping stone to bigger things. SCS’ partner HP recommended us for a project with Maxis Telekom in Malaysia, and we helped them build up a cloud from scratch to deliver Infrastructure as a Service nationwide.

IDA noticed that we had specific skills and asked if we could impart them to other developers. So we embarked on a three-year programme to provide consulting services to fellow ISVs, to help them get into this area. We are now participating in a similar project in Malaysia and engaging with another telco in Thailand.

Describe what you do in your current role.
As CTO of AkSaaS, I have to be able to take advantage of what I learnt in the US and make sure that we have that two to three years’ head-start, and keep it that way. The network helps – I still stay in touch with some of the best programmers in the world. I also have a very keen interest in new industry innovation. I like to read and to follow what the big boys are doing - Microsoft, Oracle, Google, Yahoo, Amazon, Salesforce, HP, IBM…

I manage people. IT is 100 per cent about people. If you cannot manage people you have no product. I need to stimulate my team members and keep them engaged. I need to give them a vision – a shared vision so that they can commit themselves to take up the challenge of running this race.

And I must take the necessary steps to achieve this vision. Focus on what you want, and be flexible enough to work around obstacles. And along the way, you have to manage your cash flow well, because there is also the financial struggle.

One of the things my shareholders taught me is that when making difficult decisions, there is only an “In” tray and an “Out” tray; there is no “KIV” tray. It is better to make a decision, and be wrong, than to sit on a problem and let it fester, because then it will become a bigger problem.

What are the important skillsets required for your role and how can they be acquired?
You must be very analytical - both from standpoint of taking something and breaking it down, and then reassembling it into something new. Assembling something back is not exciting. The outcome must be new. For example, if someone writes an application in 1,000 lines, I’d want to be able to do it in 500 lines. There has to be that little bit more – always more efficient, or more productive.

You also need to have the acumen, that sixth sense to sift out the noise from the nuggets. You can hone this by mixing with people in this business – the investors and those who are successful. Learn from them. Find out how they make decisions. When you are always in that environment, your decision-making becomes very sharp and your mind has the ability to focus. The IT business is about people, so the transmission of knowledge, capabilities and competencies is a people-to-people exchange, not a system-to-people exchange.

The third thing you must have is character - you must have determination because you will get a lot of knocks in life. You must be able to motivate yourself, take criticism, and pick yourself up when you are down. I am an eternal optimist. You need to be positive to keep going.

What are the important skillsets required of cloud computing professionals?
Cloud technology is the culmination of a lot of things, but basically there are three areas you need to be equally knowledgeable in. The first of these is infrastructure. This is technical in nature - how do you design the infrastructure – the network, the servers, the routers. You also need to be competent in software – the OS monitoring system, the applications that are needed to put everything together. The third area is – how do you operate and maintain the hardware and software. If something goes wrong, how do you problem solve? In other words, you must understand how the entire IT ecosystem functions. To achieve this, you have to hone your skills one area at a time.

I started with a computer science degree, which is generic. When I worked as a systems engineer, there was a lot of hardware involved - how to put simulators together, how to put different computer parts together. Then we had to write different applications to run this and create a virtual environment. This is where software, algorithms and heuristics came in. The third thing was to put all these together, and that is how AkSaaS started. We knew hardware and networking and software. What we did was to put these things together, maintain them and offer them as a service.

People coming into cloud computing must be quite multidisciplinary. They have to learn, whether through apprenticeship or through mentoring. It is important to get involved in projects that allow for this kind of exposure.