Shaun T. Dy's Business & Economics Perspective Blog

Tealive Asia I've tasted many milk tea brands. However, Tealive is the first one I've tasted that fits into the halal standards. Tealive Philippines has its more or less standard coffee shop food with a halal twist. During the time when the ube flavors came in-- I wrote that Tealive may want to invest in the Bangsamoro region . I checked the Tealive Asia Facebook page and found some items not yet served at Tealive Philippines. One of them is the Nasi Lemak Ayam Rendang (picture above). Historically, the Philippines has had its settlers from Malaysia and Indonesia. Taiwanese natives also descended from Malaysians and Indonesians. I even remember seeing how Malaysians and Indonesians are often mistaken as Filipinos. One might find similar delicacies between Mindanao Malaysia and Indonesia. For example, reading about  25 Malaysian desserts  made me think, "It's closer than expected!" The lokot-lokot of the Philippines is similar to the garajilu of Malaysia or Indones

News of Tealive establishing its 50th branch in the Philippines  (which makes me wish Jollibee would expand faster in Malaysia soon) makes me ask, "When are they going to enter the Bangsamoro region?" Some time ago, I wrote a post about how Tealive opening in the Bangsamoro region would be a huge business opportunity . It should be noted that  former Malaysian prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, saw the potential of the Bangsamoro Region . Tealive isn't a Taiwanese but a Malaysian company where  the company uses only Halal-approved ingredients . Here's a photo from the Manila Bulletin Lifestyle's Facebook page . This was also written about the upcoming Ube series: LOOK: Tealive opens its 50th store in the Philippines at Park West, BGC, Taguig City.  At the event, ube is definitely in. Apart from celebrating the opening of their 50th branch, Tealive unveiled new “UBEr flavors,” cementing the status of the bright purple root as the flavor of the year for 2024 .  The

Tealive Asia, the man in the picture is CEO and actor Fikry Ibrahim, hoping to see him in the Bangsamoro Region soon I did write a few articles about Tealive. These were about my experience at Ayala Central Bloc , how I'm currently fascinated with Tealive's palm sugar series , and the origins of Tealive in Malaysia . The current CEO is Fikry Ibrahim of Malaysia (above). Ibrahim was made Chief Expresso Officer (CEO) of Tealive . I felt that I needed to write this article because I found what might be a new business opportunity for developing Mindanao. I did some research on palm sugar and ended up writing about the Masarang Foundation in Indonesia . I advocated for ease concerning equity restrictions where certain industries only allow FDIs to own less than 50% (such as the 60-40 arrangement) to allow them to invest without having to look for a Filipino partner. I'm still against the sales of land to foreigners like a mall owner doesn't sell their spaces to tenants. With

KL Foodie I remembered having a meal at Tealive Ayala Central Bloc (read here ). What I never thought of was that Bryan Loo, the founder of Tealive and CEO of Loob Holdings, was once the CEO of Chatime Malaysia. I read through Compare Hero's article on Chatime vs. Tealive  (the article was updated last November 2021). From the ashes of a terminated contract came forth a rival for Chatime.  The Bubble Tea Disagreement The original disagreement between Chatime and Tealive started back in January when La Kaffa, the Taiwanese owner of the Chatime brand, announced they had terminated the master franchise agreement with Bryan Loo and his company Loob Holding even though the agreement still had more than 20 years to go. The reason for the termination was that Loob Holding was allegedly using raw materials that were not part of the prescribed recipe to produce its tea. During the initial press release, La Kaffa International also declared that all Chatime outlets would now fall under the d

I usually tend to associate sugar with cane sugar. In this case, Tealive (read my review here ) uses a sugar known as gula aren. I did some research and found out that Gula Aren is made from the sap of the sugar palm tree. The fruit is also known as kaong in the Filipino language. Granted, the Filipino language also derives from the Malaysian and Indonesian languages--it may be derived from the Indonesian word kolang kaling . The Philippines may also be producing its own gula aren or palm sugar. Sugar palm or kaong is pretty much grown as a staple in Filipino cooking too. Here's a video from an Indonesian woman. Watching this, it's safe to assume that kaong farmers in the Philippines follow more or less the same routine. Maybe, some people may call it latik though latik is made from coconut milk and not coconut sap. Though, some Filipinos may still call palm sugar as latik. The video above also shows an Indonesian binignit with some kaong. I was shocked to learn kaong is also u

I have tasted several foreign-owned tea shops. My first experience with tea shops was with Chatime (read here ). Now, I heard of this new coffee shop (or tea shop, take your pick) called Tealive. At first, I thought it was Taiwanese but when I Googled it--it was Malaysian. It made sense that the company uses only Halal-approved ingredients  since Malaysia has a huge Muslim population. The founder is Malaysian-Chinese businessman Bryan Loo of Loob Holdings. Loob here also means inside as the Tagalog language also derives from the Malay language. Tealive would later head to the Philippines. It would be like getting Filipinos closer to their Malaysian heritage after all.  The branches in Cebu include SM City, SM Seaside, and Ayala Central Bloc. The one I ate was at Ayala Central Bloc. Someone gave me a taste of their sandwich and their signature coffee. I was pretty much impressed that I decided to dine in there. I went to try their lychee tea and chees burger. For a note, their ham sandw