A cereal craving in the dead of the night was what had Evan Chow identifying a gap in the market. “I had no way of getting cereal at that hour. Neither GrabFood nor the other platforms back then carried it because they were focused on F&B, not errands or flexibility,” he recounts. “This made it clear that there was an opportunity for tasks that did not fit into existing service categories.”
It was while pursuing a business degree at Singapore Management University that he met two like-minded peers, so he got them on board co-founding Quest. Described as an AI-powered marketplace for any service imaginable, Quest matches service seekers with service providers for jobs that typically involve errands, deliveries, and content creation, though Chow notes a recent rise in the purchase of goods from overseas. The majority of the platform’s 450,000 users are between the ages of 21 and 35, and over 100,000 tasks have been completed since its launch in 2021.
Chow graduated in 2023 and currently leads a team of 10 in his role as CEO. Although Quest started as a C2C platform, he says, its transition into an AI-powered service marketplace means it now leverages AI to recommend pricing, enforce moderation, and match users based on location, availability, pricing preferences, and past behaviour.
The company is at present developing an AI agent that can autonomously process a user’s request, find and screen the right person for the job, and handle coordination. As it stands, its small pool of older users isn’t attributable to a lack of interest, but a lack of technological know-how.
In Chow’s experience, older people are also keen on delegating tasks, but struggle with uploading posts.
“That’s exactly why we’re building an AI agent that works via WhatsApp or SMS. There’s no need to download the app. Just say what you need and we’ll handle the rest.”
Evan Chow on the advantages of AI agents
To maintain stringent safety standards, Quest implements secure payment systems, ID verification, and AI to detect bad actors. All posts are monitored for scams and abuse, and every payment is held in escrow until the task is completed.
Conceivably, growing a startup has been no walk in the park. Chow’s biggest challenge has been in liquidity—having enough supply and demand at the same time in a horizontal marketplace. “We had to constantly monitor the balance of supply and demand, and make decisions and growth experiments to target either of them.”
Another obstacle has been in building trust. When Quest’s user retention rate plummeted due to reliability issues, the team found themselves having to wield a doubleedged sword in the form of secure payments. As such, private chats can now only be initiated after payment has been made on the app. “We knew we’d lose a great number of our users with such a big change, but we pushed on.”
But one can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. “It was the best decision for the long term. Both challenges required us to go back to the fundamentals and build a better experience even if it’s harder in the short term.”
Chow is glad to not only facilitate work flexibility, but also access to income for people who tend to be overlooked by traditional job markets. “Whether you’re a student, creative, or caregiver, you should be able to earn on your own terms,” he makes plain.
His advice for aspiring entrepreneurs? Solve a real problem. “Don’t just build for hype or what’s trending. Sometimes, more than just achieving product market fit, there’s also a founder-market fit.
Also remember that the best startups aren’t the ones that get everything right at launch. “They’re the ones that stick around long enough to keep learning and evolving.”
Photography Mun Kong
Art direction Ed Harland
Grooming Keith Bryant Lee using Shu Uemera & Keune Hair Professional
Photography assistant Melvin Leong
