A Fat Lot Of Good

Gleefully unafraid of getting his hands dirty, Vinesh Sinha’s decision to dive headfirst into the biofuel industry has seen him repeatedly strike it rich. As the Founder and CEO of FatHopes Energy insists, however, he’s chasing a bigger, better dream – a business with the capacity to benefit the majority of stakeholders on as grand a scale as possible.

- Renyi Lim

Of all of Jeremy Clarkson’s achievements, which include punching Piers Morgan (commendable) and destroying a Perodua Kelisa on an episode of Top Gear (a slight affront to Malaysia’s national pride), perhaps one of his greatest accomplishments – not that he might realise it – has been to inspire Vinesh Sinha. “My father gave me a diesel Pajero when I was still in school, and I was trying to find ways to lower its operational costs,” recalls the Founder and CEO of FatHopes Energy Sdn Bhd.

“I stumbled upon footage of Clarkson running a diesel vehicle on used cooking oil for Top Gear and, after I watched it, I had to give it a try.” As a teenager, the Penang-born Vinesh would visit his favourite eateries, persuade them to donate their unwanted waste oil, filter out any cooking debris through old T-shirts, blend the oil with diesel and get his engine running. “That’s where my journey really started – and since then, it’s been challenging but incredibly enjoyable and fulfilling.”

GREASE IS THE WORD

It’s not just Jezza who deserves credit for setting Vinesh on his path to the biofuel industry: an enormous proportion of it is down to the 30-year-old’s natural curiosity and unshakeable determination. “I’m intrinsically very inquisitive and that’s probably what got me going,” he muses. “I tend to question everything and why it’s done a certain way, especially with mechanisms. I’ve always had a great interest in vehicles and automotives, and that’s where an overlap occurred which really struck a chord with me.