Acing It

Armed with a take-no-prisoners work ethic and an insatiable appetite for success, Natalie Sit has gone from making wonton noodles to heading her very own ICT company. The CEO of Acestar Sdn. Bhd. speaks to The Peak Malaysia about shaking up Malaysia’s IT services industry, the importance of investing in her employees, and what it takes to start all over again from square one.

- Renyi Lim

Would it be cheeky to suggest that if Natalie Sit ever fancies a career change, she has a solid backup option in the F&B industry? We’re discussing her earliest years, which stretch all the way back to her childhood in Ipoh, when she hadn’t even set her sights on Malaysia’s IT industry yet. “I grew up in a very small town called Pasir Pinji, which was really considered a kampung at the time,” she says. “My parents ran a stall selling wonton noodles, so when I was eight years old, I’d already started helping my mother to make the dumplings. I can still make perfect wontons—the shape of every dumpling is exactly the same!”

Still, there’s hardly any reason for Sit to start diversifying just yet. Not when Acestar Sdn. Bhd., the ICT company that she’s been running since 2008, is looking at last year’s estimated turnover of RM42 million - and all this, mind you, with a team of only 16 staff. But even a quick conversation with Sit will reveal exactly why Acestar has shot to success as an IT supplies, services, and solutions provider, delivering - among other things—over 25,000 seats of Adobe Creative Cloud licenses within Malaysia. She’s focused, she’s clear about what and who her target markets are, and she’s incredibly determined—largely because, as she explains, she knows exactly what it’s like to climb a ladder starting from the lowest rung.

THE HARD SELL