Across Asia, economic growth has not translated into equal access to work. For many people, the barriers are structural: systems that were not designed to include workers without formal qualifications, those with disabilities, or those entering low-wage sectors for the first time. The gap compounds at every stage of a career.
For the ventures selected for The Amplifier's 2025 Employment track, closing that gap is at the core of their work. The Amplifier brings together the capital, mentorship, and market access that early-stage organisations need to turn promising solutions into practice.
Jointly developed by the Philanthropy Asia Alliance (PAA) and the Centre for Impact Investing and Practices (CIIP), the global mentorship programme backs high-potential, impact-driven businesses working on solutions aligned with Asia's sustainable development priorities. Backed by more than 70 partners, the programme combines mentorship, market access, and catalytic capital to help innovations move from concept to implementation.
The 2025 edition features three thematic tracks: Innovation and Circularity in the Textile Value Chain, SME Supplier Sustainability Transformation in Tourism, and Unlocking Opportunities and Breaking Down Barriers to Employment. Each aims to address systemic challenges through collaboration, innovation, and capital mobilisation.
L-R: Hiu Chii Fen, Centre for Impact Investing and Practices; Dawn Chan, CEO, Centre for Impact Investing and Practices; Zhihan Lee, Co-Founder and Group CEO, BagoSphere; Ali Shabbar, Co-Founder and CEO, DeafTawk; Shaun Tan, Co-Founder, Inclus; Susan Clear, Global Head, Social Impact Investing, Macquarie Group Foundation.
BagoSphere (Singapore / Philippines): Building confidence before building skills
L-R: Ellwyn Tan, Co-Founder and Business Development Head; Zhihan Lee, Co-Founder and Group CEO; and Tippi Fernandez, Co-Founder and COO.
In frontline sectors like education and hospitality, high turnover and limited upskilling opportunities create a cycle that is costly for employers and limiting for workers. BagoSphere's Co-Founder and COO Tippi Fernandez sees a deeper issue behind the numbers.
“The problem is not the lack of jobs, it’s readiness. We train jobseekers and frontline workers in human capabilities to help them become confident, purposeful, and driven,” she said.
Growing up in low-income communities, Tippi observed that many young people and workers feel disempowered, not for lack of ability, but for lack of belief in their own potential. BagoSphere responds with a model that pairs technical upskilling with the restoration of purpose and confidence, connecting job seekers to meaningful roles while giving existing workers a genuine path forward.
Starting from a community of 42,000 jobseekers and alumni, the organisation is leaning on The Amplifier programme to strengthen its marketing strategy, broaden its product range, and build longer-term partnerships across Southeast Asia, with an ambition to reach one million frontline workers.
DeafTawk (Singapore): Making communication accessible at work
L-R: Wamiq Hasan, Co-Founder and CTO; Abdul Qadeer, Co-Founder and COO; and Ali Shabbar, Co-Founder and CEO.
Globally, an estimated 1.5 billion people live with some degree of hearing loss, yet communication systems in most workplaces were not designed to include them. That exclusion compounds at every stage of a career, from job interviews to daily interactions with colleagues and customers.
Ali Shabbar, Co-Founder and CEO of DeafTawk, lives with a visual impairment and his co-founders include members of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community. Together, they built their solution from lived experience.
"We are all founders with disabilities ourselves, and we know the pain point of this community very well because we live with the problem. That's why we started that solution. So we not only solve our problems, but help others to be empowered and be part of this society,” he shared.
DeafTawk's platform provides on-demand interpretation services in multiple sign languages, giving deaf users round-the-clock access to qualified interpreters, whether they are showcasing skills to a potential employer or engaging with customers on the job. Through the Amplifier, the company is expanding into China, Korea, Japan, Malaysia, and Indonesia, bringing that access to markets where demand is great and provision remains limited.
Inclus (Singapore): Enabling independence through employment
L-R: Shaun Tan, Co-Founder, and Anders Tan, Co-Founder and COO
For people with disabilities, a job is rarely a standalone goal. For Shaun Tan, Co-Founder of Inclus, financial independence is the foundation of broader autonomy, and it is one that many people with disabilities and their caregivers struggle to reach.
Inclus supports people with disabilities across four areas: employment, internships, training, and enrichment programmes. Working with corporations, schools, and community partners, the organisation creates inclusive pathways into work and supports progression within it. Demand has grown to the point where the team's own capacity has become the constraint.
"We're at a stage of growth where we are reaching the capacity of what we can do with human capital. The space that we're in is very labour-intensive,” said Shaun.
Rather than scaling headcount alone, Inclus is using The Amplifier to develop solutions that extend its reach without placing unsustainable pressure on the experienced professionals who deliver its services.
From Employment to Empowerment
BagoSphere, DeafTawk, and Inclus approach the same challenge from three directions: readiness, communication access, and sustained progression into independence. Supported by the Macquarie Group Foundation as Impact Innovation Partner, and strategic partners NTUC's Employment and Employability Institute (e2i) and Generation Hong Kong, each mentee will receive up to S$100,000 in catalytic capital alongside a year of tailored mentorship, market insights, and cross-sector support.
What the Amplifier employment cohort demonstrates, collectively, is that workforce inclusion is not a single policy lever or product feature. It is a continuum, and progress at each stage depends on someone having been willing to invest in the one before.
🔗 Learn more about the Amplifier programme.
💡 Follow PAA and CIIP on LinkedIn for more updates and opportunities to collaborate.
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