Annamalai SarathBabu

infrastructure enjoyer

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

@krishashok Classics like Vanilla Chocolate ice cream are day and night if made french custard style with Eggs. Other flavors... Meh..

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

@krishashok Is your favorite flavor chocolate?

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

These are weak numbers compared to the bay

[droid mom @notdroidmom]

looking at the price history on a house will piss you off

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

TIL Malaysia bans Israeli citizens from entering Malaysia, even if they hold dual passports.

[Balaji @balajis]

Should the global tech community continue investing in Malaysia?

Given recent events, I raise this question respectfully for the consideration of Prime Minister Yang Amat Berhormat Dato’ Seri Anwar bin Ibrahim (@anwaribrahim), for the people of Malaysia, and for our friends in the Malaysian tech community. The answer will be of interest to anyone in global tech that’s considering building, investing, or expanding in Malaysia, including executives at Google, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft, founders of tech unicorns like Coinbase and Solana, and investors at the world’s largest venture capital funds like a16z and Polychain.

As context, I am the former CTO of Coinbase and former General Partner at a16z. In October 2024, I opened a startup society called Network School in Malaysia, because I felt I’d been invited in by the government’s pro-tech policies.

Specifically, the KL20 initiative set out Malaysia’s ambition of becoming a top 20 global tech hub. Their MDEC digital nomad visas and MM2H investor visas were created to facilitate an influx of global talent and capital. And the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone was announced to facilitate the flow of capital and talent between Malaysia and Singapore, where I live. When taken in combination with Malaysia’s datacenter buildout and its policy of welcoming visa-free visits for 98% of the world, it seemed like Malaysia might be a great place to build a global tech hub that was simultaneously inexpensive and easy to visit (especially for non-Westerners).

And that’s what we did, by creating Network School. It’s an international tech community with its first node in Forest City, Malaysia. We picked Forest City because it had millions of square feet of empty space, because it was one hour from Singapore’s capital markets, and because it was within the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone. Then, within 18 months, without a single penny of government money, we built Network School into a global attraction that brought thousands of engineers, investors, and builders from 70+ countries to learn technology, burn calories, earn online, and have fun, integrating with the local Malaysian economy along the way.

Indeed, in terms of quantifiable contribution to the Malaysian economy, we’ve already invested 100M+ MYR in our campus to make it startup-friendly. For perspective, that’s about 4% of the budget of Johor, the Malaysian state where Forest City is located. We employ dozens of Malaysians directly and indirectly at every level from executive to staff. We’ve backed Malaysian tech startups like Collektr, hosted events for local teams like Superteam Malaysia, and are major customers of many local businesses like barbers, laundromats, and restaurants. We’ve also revitalized the multibillion-dollar Forest City project, causing millions of MYR in real estate appreciation. And, as the video below describes, we were on the cusp of a 500M+ MYR expansion to grow our community, as well as a global merit scholarship with my friend Amjad Masad of Replit.

However, that emerging multi-billion dollar success story — which should rightfully have been hailed as a huge victory for the pro-tech policies of the Malaysian government — is at risk of being derailed by a fake story spread by an anonymous account named MP4P.

In short: on the day before the July 11 Johor elections, MP4P posted an Instagram post falsely accusing Network School of harboring illegal aliens. The sensational accusations caused a tizzy in Malaysia, until Malaysian authorities came to our campus on July 14 to investigate. (I should note that the officers were very polite and professional.) After checking hundreds of physical passports from 40 countries, including dual passport holders, the authorities confirmed to the press on July 15 that all travel documents were in order. During the process, we cooperated fully; in the thread below you can see a photo of the men, women, and children of Network School smiling and holding up their passports in the bright daylight. Our faces are shown and our names are known; we have nothing to hide.

With that said, the process is the punishment. What MP4P did is very similar to the American crime of “swatting”, because MP4P created a hoax report of a serious threat, thereby forcing the Malaysian police to take time away from protecting the Malaysian people towards investigating a nonexistent issue. Moreover, this anonymous MP4P account has also called for Malaysia to boycott Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft…a move that would cost ordinary Malaysians thousands of jobs…even while MP4P’s own Instagram collaborators promote their Apple and Google apps! I mean, we aren’t talking about a credible accuser, but just someone screaming inconsistently at the top of their lungs on social media for traffic, an all-too-common phenomenon these days.

Anyway, at this point, all further investment we were planning to make in Malaysia is on hold until we get sufficient assurance that such issues won’t recur. So are the investment plans of many of our friends, including the execs and investors at global tech firms that we brought to Forest City. Because to put it very plainly: we have invested 100M+ MYR in Malaysia, while creating jobs for dozens of Malaysians, and our faces and names are known. Our Malaysian executives and employees deserve the benefit of the doubt over anonymous internet trolls.

There are two paths forward. In the first case, if Malaysia still wants continued global tech investment, if it wants to be a top 20 tech hub, if it wants us to revitalize Forest City, then we request an audience with the Prime Minister’s office to discuss the terms of a memorandum of understanding between Network School and the Malaysian government, similar to the document recently signed between the Solana Foundation and the Kazakhstan government.

Specifics can of course be discussed, but we would publicly commit to abiding by all Malaysian laws (we already do) and respecting Malaysia’s sovereignty (never in question). In return, they’d get to know our friendly community, and realize that we actually chose Malaysia because we thought it was a great place to build a tech hub where engineers from the global South, investors from the West, and builders from Malaysia itself could meet new people, build cool things, and perhaps create millions of dollars in economic growth in the fullness of time.

That vision of peace and trade, internationalism and entrepreneurialism, is still on the table. We aren’t asking for any money — just a meeting, to help restore confidence in Malaysia as an investable jurisdiction. Alternatively, if you don’t want our investment, or those of our colleagues at billion dollar funds and trillion dollar companies, we will of course respect your wishes, and reallocate our capital to other countries instead.

Either way, we will remain friends and abide by your decision. Please let us know.

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

@manirajan Will do! And this is a great year for you to get one too :)

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Finally got the Terra by Delhi Watch Company!

Excited to get back to Indian watches

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Apparently there's a https://t.co/4KsVf6aRXa which used to be Madras Watch Works. Watches look over styled and not even San Martin standards

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

We've got Delhi Watch Company and Bangalore Watch Company. Apart from TN State's own watch company, Titan, who is starting Madras watch company?

Maybe @avataram retirement plans?

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Finally got the Terra by Delhi Watch Company!

Excited to get back to Indian watches

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

@avataram All thanks to that one Teddy Video!

Got 2 yesterday night just in time to be in Oct 2026 production

https://t.co/7zhe9OU6az

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Finally got the Terra by Delhi Watch Company!

Excited to get back to Indian watches

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

I discovered em dashes (and even the key combo to do which is optn+shift+-) thanks to AI slop.

What a beautiful thing that unfortunately I will never use anymore

[Bret Taylor @btaylor]

I deeply resent that AI has forced me to eliminate em dashes from my writing for fear of signaling slop

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Chakkaravarthiya vaazhalam. Delulu is indeed the solulu

[jo johnson @josbjohnson]

you must believe you are special and then go so hard, for so long, with such violent refusal to accept any other ending, that reality itself starts running out of ways to tell you no. you must wage a war daily against the ordinary outcome, until the belief you invented out of nothing in a room by yourself has been hammered into the world so many times that it stops being a claim and becomes reality.

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

@visakanv Congratulations 🎉

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

I love how this doesn't include the Model 3 or any other sedan

[Nic Cruz Patane @niccruzpatane]

Tesla Cybercab is 42% more efficient than a Model Y AWD.

It’s also 126% more efficient than a Jaguar I-Pace, which Waymo’s gen 5 platform.

[James Clear @JamesClear]

Finish something. Anything. Stop researching, planning, and preparing to do the work and just do the work. It doesn’t matter how good or how bad it is. You don’t need to set the world on fire with your first try. You just need to prove to yourself that you have what it takes to produce something.

There are no artists, athletes, entrepreneurs, or scientists who became great by half-finishing their work. Stop debating what you should make and just make something.

[‏ً @omgsidewalks]

The Full grown adults who can’t vacation, take a gap year, have hobbies, play an instrument, speak multiple languages, swim, cycle, skate, or backpack. Just a lifetime of hustling and trying to escape survival mode. These are subtle poverty metrics nobody really talks about.

[staysaasy @staysaasy]

If you’ve never gotten a below expectations score in you’re career, you’re not taking enough risk.

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

I'm very confused by all the accounts spewing "hacks" about Trump accounts already and people asking clarifying questions.

Is this all engagement farming or do you people generally not directly talk to an AI about how it affects me and my kid and just learn from Twitter?

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

It's also the only "bank" inside the Valley Fair mall, which grosses> $1B yearly only behind South Coast plaza in CA

[M. Nolan Gray 🥑 @mnolangray]

True San Francisco locals know that this zoning arbitrage Capital One Café is the play for coffee.

[Annamalai SarathBabu @adrasakka]

Signed a Costco not-enjoyer and a W+ and Whole foods+Prime enjoyer

[Arun Rao @sudoraohacker]

I’m going to be a @Costco contrarian and say they offer poor value. Went for my first trip in years (Richmond Bay Area) - lines to park, no spots, lines to order stuff, lines to check out. Easily a poor use of time. The prices are the same as Walmart and Sam’s Club, and frankly not far from Amazon, but those two deliver to my door and easily could save 1-2 hours per trip. The Costco and Instacart partnership also doesn’t pencil out due to much higher prices. As far as I can tell, maybe Costco works for the small corner shop owner that buys bulk to resell for convenience (doubt it), or the scrappy senior on a tight budget but many hours to spare - but I just don’t see it working for busy families.

My recommendations:
-Get some efficiency experts to come make processes faster, from member sign up clicks to reducing all the lines (automated cart checkout with surveillance would go a long way)
-Better traffic management to get people in and out
-A competitive digital offering that they run - outsourcing won’t work (it could be limited to higher margin areas and also charge more for the subscription).

I don’t think I’ll be returning to Costco anytime soon, but a bit disappointed to see it as being so uncompetitive.