Min-Liang Tan is a Singaporean entrepreneur. He is best known as the co-founder, chief executive officer and creative director of gaming hardware company, Razer Inc., and CEO of THX. He oversees the design and development of all Razer products. Tan was a lawyer before he co-founded Razer with Robert Krakoff. Tan is a board member of Intellectual Property Office of Singapore. Tan was included in the "Top 10 Most Influential Leaders in Tech" in 2015 by Juniper Research. Tan was named one of "The 25 Most Creative People in Tech" by Business Insider. He has been ranked one of the top 40most powerful people in gaming by Kotaku in their "The Kotaku Power 40" list. Tan was ranked No 1 of the 30 top South East Asia tech founders by TechinAsia. Tan was named the Asian of the Year in 2016 by the Straits Times. Tan debuted in 2016 on the Forbes Singapore Rich List with a net worth of $600 million and became the youngest self-made Singaporean billionaire at the age of 40 with a net worth of $1.6 billion when Razer went public in 2017. He has won awards from his alma mater, the National University of Singapore, including their Outstanding NUS Innovator Award in 2011, and as one of their Outstanding Young Alumni. in 2015. Tan has a cult-like following worldwide and his fans have created fansites of him as well as even tattooed Tan's name on themselves. One of his fans has gone as far as tattooing Tan's face on himself. Tan is a founding member of the Open Source Virtual Reality platform, which aims to create a common standard for VR program design. The next frontier for Razer has been said to lie in the realm of virtual reality, and Tan hopes to create an entire virtual reality industry, citing that the prospects are “phenomenal” in entertainment, health care and military applications.
Early life
Born in 1977 in Singapore to a real estate consultant and homemaker mother, Tan is the youngest of four children in his family. Being raised in Singapore, he is fluent in English and Mandarin. Two of Tan's siblings eventually became doctors, one of whom is the renowned clinician-scientist Min-Han Tan, another became a lawyer, and the last — Tan — an ex-lawyer.
Prior to founding Razer, Tan was an advocate and solicitor for the Supreme Court of Singapore. In 1999, Tan and Robert Krakoff meet and work together to design the world's first gaming mouse - the "Razer Boomslang". In 2005, Tan and Robert Krakoff acquire the rights to the Razer brand and officially incorporate Razer Inc. in San Diego, California. Tan takes on the role of CEO and Creative Director of Razer. On Mar 31, 2015, Tan was appointed as a board member of Intellectual Property Office of Singapore. On November 13, 2017, Razer goes IPO and Tan becomes the youngest self-made Singaporean billionaire at the age of 40.
Appearances in movies and games
Tan was a backer of Wasteland 2 and on Kickstarter which resulted in him being added to both games as a non-player character. He also appears in. Tan has also had cameos in movies like where he acted as a zombie.
Donations
In March 2012, Tan contributed US$10,000 to the Wasteland 2 Kickstarter project where he admitted it was to atone for infringing the copyright of Wasteland when he was a child. Brian Fargo replies that Tan has more than made up for his downloading of the game. In November 2014, Tan donated US$10,000 and did the Ice Bucket Challenge in an effort to raise funds for ALS. In February 2015, Tan donated £10,000 to fight Motor Neuron Disease. The donation was done via Twitch live stream subscription to ProSyndicate.
Allegations of Abuse
In December 2019 Kotaku based on the statements of 14 former Razer employees, containing wide allegations that under Tan's leadership Razer celebrates a culture of fear, and that Tan himself berates, threatens and shames his staff.
