Temus Backs Filipina-Founded Thinking Machines to Scale Enterprise AI Across Southeast Asia

MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Temus, a Singapore-based AI and digital transformation company established by Temasek, today announced a strategic investment in Thinking Machines Data Science, a Filipina-founded AI and data company headquartered in the Philippines and OpenAI's first official Services Partner in Asia Pacific.

The investment marks a recognition of Philippine-built AI talent and capability. Founded in Manila, Thinking Machines has built a decade-long track record in data platforms, AI implementation, and enterprise AI delivery across Southeast Asia. By joining forces with Temus, the company will bring that expertise to a wider regional client base, supported by Temus' enterprise transformation capabilities, scale, and delivery infrastructure. Together, the two companies aim to help enterprises move beyond pilots and embed AI into real workflows that create measurable business value.

Across Southeast Asia, companies are moving from AI experimentation to implementation. Many still face the same practical barriers: fragmented data, legacy systems, complex workflows, and talent gaps to design AI-native workflows. The partnership brings together the capabilities required to address those challenges, from data engineering and governance to workflow integration, AI deployment, executive enablement, and workforce capability building.

For clients, this means broader access to end-to-end AI and digital transformation support. Thinking Machines brings specialist AI and data execution, regional delivery experience, and OpenAI-enabled services. Temus brings enterprise reach, transformation infrastructure, and experience working with public- and private-sector organisations across healthcare, financial services, education, and government.

"We built Thinking Machines on the belief that the Philippines can build up and scale world-class AI capability," said Stephanie Sy, Founder and CEO, Thinking Machines Data Science; Managing Director, Applied AI & Data, Temus. Joining the Temus group allows us to pursue that ambition at a much greater scale while staying true to our team, our clients, and our mission," she added.

Thinking Machines was founded in Manila in 2015 by Stephanie Sy. Over the past decade, the company has trained more than 10,000 professionals in AI and deployed hundreds of AI systems into production with organisations across financial services, retail, conglomerates, and the civic sector. It operates offices in Manila, Singapore, and Bangkok. Its recognition as OpenAI's first APAC Services Partner and its recent award of advanced partner status reflect a track record of deploying AI systems across diverse operating environments in the region.

Against this backdrop, the Temus investment signals growing confidence in Philippine-built AI talent and innovation. With Thinking Machines' track record across diverse operating environments in the region, the investment opens opportunities for local enterprises to access advanced AI, data foundations, workflow transformation, and adoption support.

Accelerating production-grade AI deployment across Southeast Asia

Temus, ~500-strong and anchored in Singapore, provides full-stack AI transformation spanning cloud and application engineering, consulting, and design. Its work supports Singapore’s Smart Nation and National AI Strategy priorities, with a growing regional presence across Southeast Asia.

The partnership combines Temus’ transformation delivery infrastructure with Thinking Machines’ experience in building data platforms and deploying enterprise AI systems. Together, the two firms are positioned to help organisations build the foundations, talent, and repeatable delivery systems needed to make AI work at scale.

“Many enterprises are navigating the challenge of running AI systems that hold up under real operating conditions - constrained data, regulatory requirements, complex workflows. That requires a different level of engineering, governance, and integration. Thinking Machines brings deep capability in that layer of the problem. This investment connects two parts of the system that need to work as one: how AI is built, and how it is made to operate at scale,” said Sng Ren Yeong, Chief Executive Officer, Temus.

"This investment is a recognition of a shared mission - two teams that were each built by people who came home to build. Thinking Machines gains the reach and resources of the Temus group. Temus gains a team that has been doing serious AI delivery work for over a decade. Together, we are better placed than ever to help organisations move from AI pilots into production, for Singapore and beyond," he added.