Only one in Japan.
That is the count of tech founders under 60, each worth over US$1 billion, inside their market’s Forbes top 50.
Japan’s one is Yusaku Maezawa, who founded ZOZO in 1998.
The names you might expect are missing for a simple reason. Masayoshi Son (69) and Hiroshi Mikitani (61) are past the age line.
🇨🇳 China: 11
🇰🇷 South Korea: 8
🇸🇬 Singapore: 8
🇦🇺 Australia: 8
🇭🇰 Hong Kong: 1
🇯🇵 Japan: 1
🇹🇼 Taiwan: at least 1
🇹🇭 Thailand: 0
🇲🇾 Malaysia: 0
🇮🇩 Indonesia: 0
🇵🇭 Philippines: 0
The companies say more than the totals.
China: ByteDance, Tencent, PDD, Xiaomi, Cambricon, DeepSeek.
Korea: Coupang, Naver, NCSoft, Smilegate, Yanolja, Dunamu.
Singapore: Sea, Razer, Espressif, Flipkart, JOYY, and Facebook’s Eduardo Saverin.
Australia: Atlassian, Canva, AirTrunk, Stake/Kick.
Hong Kong: Lalamove’s Chow Shing Yuk.
Taiwan: Hon. Precision.
Two of China’s eleven are AI founders around 40: DeepSeek’s Liang Wenfeng and Cambricon’s Chen Tianshi.
Japan’s only qualifier built ZOZOTOWN, which took off in the late 2000s.
I live in Kuala Lumpur. I take Grab almost every day, shop on Shopee and Lazada, and use Lalamove for deliveries now and then.
The founders of Sea, which owns Shopee, are on this list. So is Lalamove’s. Grab’s founders, who started the company right here in Malaysia, are not. Not yet. I expect that to change.
Japan’s count will change too. The question is when.
Source: Forbes market lists as of Oct 10, 2026 (China: 2025). Telecom excluded. Taiwan: confirmed minimum.
