In Good Company• Oct 15, 2025• 48:50Interview

Forrest Li - CEO of Sea | Podcast | In Good Company | Norges Bank Investment Management

From In Good Company

Forrest Li•CEO, Sea

Executive Summary

is a dominant Southeast Asian technology conglomerate with market-leading positions in its three core businesses: Garena (gaming), Shopee (e-commerce), and SeaMoney (fintech).
The company achieved a 100-fold increase in valuation over a decade by capitalizing on the mobile internet revolution, with its e-commerce arm Shopee capturing nearly 50% of the regional market.
A key competitive advantage for Shopee has been its deep investment in localized, in-house logistics to solve complex last-mile delivery challenges unique to Southeast Asia.
CEO Forest Lee identifies Artificial Intelligence as the next major growth catalyst, believing it is the key driver that could propel SEA from a $100 billion company to a trillion-dollar valuation.

12 quotes

Concerns Raised

Navigating significant stock price volatility
Sustaining market leadership against intense global and local competition
Managing the operational complexity of diverse business lines across multiple emerging markets

Opportunities Identified

Leveraging AI to unlock massive efficiency gains and create new revenue streams
Continued expansion of the high-growth SeaMoney fintech and digital lending business
Deepening market penetration in large emerging markets like Brazil
Incubating new AI-native businesses by empowering employees with internal development tools

Key Themes

The Power of Localization

SEA's success, particularly Shopee's, is rooted in its strategy of building hyper-localized solutions from the ground up. Instead of applying a generic global playbook, the company focused on solving specific regional challenges like fragmented logistics and low credit card penetration.

This demonstrates that a deep understanding of local market nuances can create a powerful competitive moat, enabling a regional player to outperform global giants like Alibaba and TikTok.

Synergistic Business Ecosystem

SEA's three main businesses are deeply interconnected and mutually reinforcing. The fintech arm, SeaMoney, originated from the need to solve payment challenges for Garena and Shopee, and has now become the largest digital consumer lender in the region.

This highlights a successful strategy where solving internal operational problems can be scaled into new, highly profitable business verticals, creating a flywheel effect for growth.

Riding Successive Technology Waves

The CEO explicitly credits the company's growth to a $100 billion valuation to riding the 'mobile internet revolution'. He now positions AI as the next transformative wave, with the potential to unlock a similar order-of-magnitude growth and create a path to a trillion-dollar company.

This provides insight into the company's long-term strategic vision, which is focused on identifying and aggressively adopting foundational technology shifts to drive future growth.

Pragmatic AI Implementation

The company is not just talking about AI; it's actively deploying it to drive efficiency and enhance user experience. Concrete examples include using AI chatbots for 80% of customer inquiries, generating art assets for games, and developing intelligent in-game bots for its title Free Fire.

This shows a practical, bottom-up approach to AI integration that is already delivering tangible business value, moving beyond hype to focus on real-world applications that improve operations and products.

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Topics

SEA Ltd Forest Lee Southeast Asia E-commerce Shopee Fintech SeaMoney Digital Lending Mobile Gaming Garena Free Fire Artificial Intelligence AI Implementation Logistics Emerging Markets Corporate Strategy Market Leadership Brazil Market Expansion

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