Emerging-market businesses are entering a new phase of digital transformation. After a decade shaped by social platforms, search, content and performance marketing, the next shift is being driven by AI.
For Roar, this is not a sudden pivot. It is the next stage of a deliberate evolution: from digital publishing to platform expertise, to building AI-led ventures designed for the realities of emerging markets. Founder and CEO Mustafa Kassim speaks to Echelon about how Roar Global is approaching AI, why the venture builder model fits the region, and where the next phase of growth will come from.
Since establishment, Roar has changed as a business. What is the strategy behind that evolution?
When we started in 2014, we were responding to a major shift: millions of people across the region moving online through social platforms and cheaper access to data. Our first business was in digital publishing, built around credible, local-language content for the next billion internet users.
We scaled quickly, reaching 50 million users in a single month within two years. But that also showed us where the deeper opportunity was — not only reaching audiences, but helping businesses grow inside a digital economy increasingly shaped by platforms.
So we evolved from a media company into a venture builder serving businesses. Today, AI is the next layer of that evolution. Our strategy is to build specialised ventures that help companies across South Asia, APAC, and other emerging markets adopt platform and AI capabilities in ways that are practical, localised and built for growth.
You describe Roar as a venture builder rather than a holding company. What does that mean in practice, and why that model for this region?
A venture builder is a company that builds companies. Each Roar business solves a specific customer problem with its own team, focus and depth. Diversification sits at the holding-company level; the ventures themselves stay specialised.
That model fits this region because the opportunity is large, but fragmented across markets, customer needs, platforms and levels of digital maturity. Multiple focused ventures give us a more practical way to scale than trying to stretch one company across everything.
It is also how we have grown. Most of our ventures have emerged from problems we saw while building the previous one. When an opportunity becomes substantial enough, we spin it out rather than dilute an existing team.
You moved from B2C to B2B. What does that mean in practice?
we learnt while building our own media business. We had attracted large audiences and monetised through advertising. But we also understood how difficult it was for businesses in emerging markets to grow inside platform-led digital economies.
Many had real pain points that went unaddressed — not because solutions did not exist, but because the existing solutions did not fit local realities. So we moved from building audiences to building business capability. First across marketing technology and platform ecosystems, and now in AI.
What specific problems are you solving?
Most of the friction in our markets is not about whether the technology exists — it is about whether it actually works for businesses operating here. The platforms, AI tools and creative talent are global; the realities on the ground are local.
A business in Sri Lanka, Bangladesh or Cambodia wanting to advertise on Meta, TikTok or Google still faces barriers that developed markets take for granted – local currency billing, tax clearances, platform support, sales representation and performance expertise. Our Roar AdX and 3P Media businesses solve for that access, infrastructure and support.
The same applies to the creative and AI segments we serve. Creator Flow is a business that helps brands in Australia and New Zealand access credible UGC creators and produce short-form content at scale. BrandRadar helps brands understand how they appear inside AI search and discovery. Apex AI gives companies access to AI automation capability without building large in-house teams. Roar Labs is where we incubate the next set of AI ventures.
In each case, the opportunity is not simply access to global tools. It is making global capability work in local market realities.
How is Roar Global’s holding company model structured today?
Roar Global is structured across three clusters: Platform Media, Creative and AI.
Platform Media includes Roar AdX and 3P Media, which work across Meta, TikTok and Google ecosystems through media sales, advisory and platform consultancy roles.
Creative is led by Creator Flow, one of the fastest-growing UGC platforms in ANZ, giving the group a strong content and execution layer.
AI includes BrandRadar, Apex AI and Roar Labs. These focus on AI visibility, AI automation and incubating new AI ventures. This is the cluster we expect to scale fastest, as businesses across South Asia and the wider APAC region look for practical, localised ways to adopt AI.
How is Roar’s revenue structured today, and how do you see that changing?
Platform Media, Roar AdX, and 3P Media are still our largest segment, contributing around 45% of revenue. Creative, led by Creator Flow, contributes around 25%. AI is now around 25% as well, with Apex AI as the largest of the AI businesses, alongside BrandRadar and Roar Labs. AI is the cluster we expect to grow fastest, and most of the new ventures we build from here will sit in that space.
Platform Media gives us scale, customer access and distribution. Creative adds another execution layer. AI is where we see the next major opportunity.
You have moved quickly into AI, with three ventures up and running. Why move at this pace?
Two reasons. First, customers are ready. AI is the most open conversation we have had with businesses so far. There is clear recognition that transformation needs to happen; the question now is where and how.
Second, the economics of early-stage building have changed. AI has made it faster and more efficient to prototype, test and validate certain ideas before committing serious capital and teams behind them.
Apex AI is the largest of the three, giving companies access to AI automation talent to build tools, automate workflows and develop new products. BrandRadar helps brands manage how they appear inside AI search and discovery. Roar Labs is our incubator, currently building AI voice agents for call centres and customer support, with several other applications being tested for future spin-outs.
AI visibility, voice agents, automation — how do you make money from this, practically?
With AI, the commercial lens is simple: does it help a company grow revenue, reduce cost, or operate faster? That is how we evaluate what we build.
Apex AI is the largest piece and sits across all three. It gives businesses a practical AI capability layer – improving workflows, increasing operational efficiency, and embedding automation without the need to build a large in-house AI function.
BrandRadar sits on the revenue side — helping businesses get discovered through AI platforms in ways that translate directly into more customers and stronger top-line growth.
From Roar Labs, we are building AI voice agents for functions such as call centres and customer support, helping businesses reduce costs at scale. It is one of several AI experiments currently running inside Roar Labs.
” AI is the cluster we expect to grow fastest, and most of the new ventures we build from here will sit in that space.”
Why spread yourself across so many verticals so thinly?
It may look broad from the outside, but the model is deliberate — and as I said earlier, this is what a venture builder is. The diversification sits at the holding company level. Each company underneath it is focused on a specific problem.
In emerging markets, the opportunity is large but fragmented — across countries, customer needs, platform ecosystems and levels of digital maturity. One company cannot solve all of that well. Multiple focused ventures, working together, give us a better way to scale.
Roar is growing in Australia and New Zealand while doubling down on emerging markets like Bangladesh. How does that fit into one strategy?
Australia and New Zealand have strong demand for AI-led solutions and faster execution models. Businesses are actively exploring AI, but do not always want to build large in-house teams from day one. That is where Apex AI and Creator Flow have grown — we combine local market presence with scalable delivery from Sri Lanka.
Bangladesh, Cambodia and Nepal are different. Demand there is still heavily tied to platform maturity, localisation, advisory and execution support across marketing technology and AI. The opportunity is larger, but the work is closer to the ground.
Sri Lanka remains our largest market at around 40% of revenue and our operating base, with most teams here and much of our international delivery serviced from Sri Lanka.
Australia and New Zealand prove the model works in developed markets. Bangladesh is where we apply that learning at an emerging-market scale.
Where do you see Roar Global’s next phase of growth coming from?
In 2014, our premise was to serve the next billion users coming online. Today, the opportunity is to help businesses across this region going through their AI transformation. Every company is going through one, or will have to soon. In the early 2000s, businesses went through digital transformation. AI is the equivalent shift, and we want to be at the forefront.
We started from a marketing perspective because that was where platforms sat. The opportunity now extends well beyond marketing. Any function where AI can increase revenue, reduce cost or improve speed is a space we are interested in.
There are many AI products available. Do you build your own or integrate what exists?
Both. We build where we see a specific gap, and we integrate where the technology already exists.
Technology is no longer a moat. With AI, the advantage is no longer just in building the product. Tools can be developed faster and cheaper than before. The real value is in knowing what problem to solve, how to localise the solution, and how to get it working inside real businesses.
That is where Roar’s advantage sits. We have the customer relationships, market understanding and on-the-ground capability to take AI from product to practical business use. Anyone can build technology faster today. Not everyone can distribute, integrate and scale it across this region.
AI excites everyone, but is it really an easy conversation to have with customers?
Customers are more open to AI than anything else we have sold. There is genuine recognition that transformation needs to happen, and most companies know they need to figure out where AI fits.
The challenge is cutting through the noise. Everyone sees the same opportunity, and low barriers to entry make it easy for anyone to launch an AI product and make big claims. Customer appetite is strong, but the competitive environment is intense.
With barriers to entry so low in AI, what is your actual strategic advantage?
Distribution, trust and integration. We serve over 5,000 customers across Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zealand, Bangladesh, Nepal, Malaysia and Cambodia. When we launch a new AI product, we go straight to that customer base.
BrandRadar is a good example. We are only a year in, but we would not be anywhere near where we are without the network we had coming in. A lot of the early traction came through relationships we had already built through our Platform Media cluster.
That existing base turns a new product into a scalable business. Anyone can build the technology. Not everyone has 5,000 customers at the table.
You have pivoted twice in twelve years. How do you view those decisions?
Less as pivots, more as necessary evolutions.
Media publishing gave us scale and a deep understanding of how audiences, platforms and distribution worked in this region. But the unit economics of digital publishing in emerging markets are tough — ad-funded media at scale is a hard business anywhere, and harder here. We saw a better business helping advertisers and platforms reach those same audiences, so we made the call to wind down our own media operations and reinvest in building Platform Media.
Moving into platform media was the right next step. Businesses needed help navigating platforms that were becoming central to growth. We built a strong position there, especially in Sri Lanka, but even that market has a ceiling.
AI now feels like the next logical evolution. It builds on what we already understand — platforms, customers, distribution and execution — but opens up a much larger opportunity to help businesses transform how they grow and operate.
You bought out your early investors rather than raising fresh capital. Are you entirely self-funded?
Yes, we are self-funded and growing through internally generated cash.
Our model is capital efficient. New ventures usually start with a focused team, a clear customer problem, and a small pool of capital to validate the opportunity before we scale.
We have been profitable for the last four to five years, which put us in a position to give our early investors a good exit. The priority now is to build with discipline, stay lean, and maintain the freedom to take a long-term view.
“Sri Lanka remains our largest market at around 40% of revenue and our operating base, with most teams here and much of our international delivery serviced from Sri Lanka.”
Where do you see Roar in five to ten years, and what does the business look like today?
We want Roar to be recognised as a leading platform and AI company built in this region for emerging markets. Today, we have around 150 employees, a presence in six or seven markets, over 5,000 customers, and six portfolio companies across three clusters. Revenue is multimillion-dollar and growing.
The next phase is about scaling across multiple markets, multiple products, and eventually multiple continents. In emerging markets, the opportunity is fragmented — so scale will continue to come from building specialised ventures that solve meaningful problems and work together as part of one group.
Our focus is narrower than it sounds: build more AI-led ventures, expand deeper across South Asia and selected emerging markets, and stay lean as AI improves how we operate internally. We do not need to build the next OpenAI. We need to be the company that gets AI working inside the next thousand businesses across this region.