Making pictures speak: The Infographics Entrepreneur

Ai Ching Goh — The Infographics Entrepreneur

After graduating as an Experimental Psychologist, Ai Ching ‘experimented’ with investment banking and advertising before starting Piktochart (www.piktochart.com) with her then-boyfriend — Andrea, who is now her husband. Both Ai Ching and her husband were from a corporate environment. When she fell sick through burn-out, it forced her to re-evaluate her priorities in life. What they knew when they left their jobs was that they wanted to create a workplace environment where people were happy and motivated by what they did and their contribution. They started a web design agency first but did not enjoy the servicing part of it. Then they came across infographics and were fascinated by the idea that a non-designer like them could still design informational graphics.

They went to the Chinaccelerator (in 2011, there were no accelerators in Malaysia) and then built the idea from there. In the beginning, there were a lot of naysayers and they did not do a good job with user experience and it took them about a couple of years of making mistakes to discover what building an app was really like.

From four people working day and night in a small Penang-based warehouse, their first do-it-yourself infographic platform was born. The first version of Piktochart was coded by Andrea and took approximately four months. Today, they are serving over 4.3 million users with 45 team-mates and growing every single day.

Ai Ching love singing, doing crafts (paper clay, woodwork, painting), reading although she claims that she is really not a very artistic person!

High point in career

“I’m not sure if there’s a single “high point” but it happens every time around Christmas season when I look back and see the team that is with me, it gives me an enormous sense of gratitude of being brought so far in Piktochart’s life.”

Most challenging assignment so far

“Letting go off people. It’s the hardest lesson to do because nobody likes doing that. I’m also learning more about candour – speaking the truth in love. It’s often damaging to withhold feedback from people when they need to hear it.”

Greatest inspiration

“I don’t really have one apart from Jesus Christ.”

Most important milestone in life

“Getting married to my most amazing husband.”

Women are the better halves. What does it mean?

“I’m not quite sure Although my husband is a developer and tends to avoid the limelight, I don’t think the business could run if it wasn’t for his technical expertise in setting up the ground work in the beginning. Women and men are complementary to each other.”