Boost's Gary Yeoh joins Fave Malaysia as country manager

Fave has appointed Gary Yeoh as country manager for Fave Malaysia. Yeoh (pictured) will oversee the day-to-day business operations while further developing the growth and market leadership in the country to accelerate the national adoption of a smarter digital payment method.

He was formerly director of partnerships at Axiata Digital's Boost and was part of its founding team. During his five years at Boost, the Wallet is said to have grown to a base of over nine million users and 350,000 thousand merchants. Yeoh was also in the loyalty space for a period of time working as GM for Sunway Loyalty and director for BCard, according to his LinkedIn.

During his time at Sunway Loyalty, Yeoh rebranded and restructured the Sunway Pals programme, and launched a co-branded card programme in partnership with a number of major brands, according to his LinkedIn. He also entered into strategic partnerships with brands such as Digi, Celcom, U Mobile, Astro, Enrich, Air Asia - now Capital A - and Petron.

Yeoh also pioneered the Berjaya Loyalty programme, leading the business development for over six years and as a result, the programme grew to a base of 4.5 million cardholders with over 100 merchants. A+M has reached out to Boost for comment on Yeoh's replacement.

According to him, Buy Now Pay Later is growing to be crucial to personal finance and cash flow. "BNPL encourages spending with lesser financial restriction. At the same time, it increases the speed of economic recovery. With BNPL spearheading growth in the country, I believe it will replace traditional payment methods with its flexibility and convenience," he added.

Meanwhile, Joel Neoh, CEO of Fave Group, said: "We are pleased to have Yeoh join the Fave team during this exciting time as we are seeing rapid evolution in the payments space, in both consumer expectations and merchant needs for smart payments. I am confident that with Yeoh's leadership, Fave will grow and further strengthen our position in Malaysia's digital payments and BNPL landscape.”

Last April, Fave was acquired by Pine Labs for over US$45 million. Through the acquisition, Indian consumers can now use the Fave app to save across 500,000 merchant network points powered by Pine Labs across 3,700 cities in India. Pine Labs is a merchant commerce platform based in India and Malaysia that serves prominent large, mid-sized and small merchants across Asia and the Middle East. During last year's announcement, the company said it would hire over 100 new employees in Southeast Asia and India.

Neoh also told A+M previously that the employees will specifically focus on data science, engineering and product for Southeast Asia. It was also recruiting for business development and marketing for local teams in Southeast Asia and India.

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