First Class Service and a Battle Tested Product

A few years ago, when my company secured an investment, the conversation turned to the tech budget.

When the CEO asked how much engineering would need, I asked for their initial thoughts.

The answer: around 10% of the raise.

The reasoning was simple. We have a decent platform. For over a year, we’ve had zero major issues—no downtime, no data loss, no corruption. Because engineering has been doing its job, day and night. And as usual, no one remembered how someone fixed a bug at 3AM.

The disconnect became clearer when I tried to hire a top-tier engineer from outside Singapore.

The CEO refused to meet the candidate’s expected salary, arguing it was “too high compared to the local market range.”

Meanwhile, the CEO’s own compensation is benchmarked against San Francisco standards—even though we are not in SF and not yet profitable.

At the same time, the company’s investor pitch claims we provide “first-class service and a battle-tested product built by world-class talent.”

I can’t help but murmur to myself:

It’s a trap.