Pach Ang, the Founder and Managing Director of ‘RedFilo’ a distinctive event management company is an un-paralleled business head of the days. His is an extra-ordinary personality that is charmed by courage, passion and commitment to the job and a supreme commanding leadership that makes him un-comparable to any other business personality. Perhaps, it may be this inborn quality in him that makes him distinctive and to add to this is ‘whatever projects he undertake, always glitter like anything’. “If you give me this job, I guarantee I’ll be the first one in, and the last one out.” Answering a question as to what this ‘RedFilo’ meant he said, “It is from where I used to serv e, the Singapore Commandos, a veteran of more than 32 years of his military career donning the prestigious coveted Red Beret, a symbol of Honor, Prestige, Professionalism, Courage and Discipline. That’s the value we as Commandos uphold and I wanted to remind myself of that value”. Secondly, ‘the color RED symbolizes courage and bravery, which happened to be my Surname in ethnic Chinese too’.
As for FILO, in events – like in the Commandos and Special Forces, we are the first ones in (FI), and last ones out (LO). So, I proudly tell my clients, “If you give me this job, I guarantee, I’ll be the first one in, and the last one out.” Pach Ang was the recipient of “Employer of the Year Award” at the recent Middle East Event Awards and he considers it a big honor to have got such a great recognition. He is surprised to have received such an honor, especially because of the fact that his company ‘RedFilo’ is still young and emerging in the market with only seven years since its establishment. He has expressed his gratitude to the judges and the industry for the recognition and appreciation that has been given to the company.
Pach Ang has a different style of running the company and according to him it is completely opposite to that of a corporate business. He believes in strong bonding, and a camaraderie family set-up According to him, sometimes the staff takes it in turns to cook their specialty for the team. In RedFilo, they believe inthe policy of “A family that eats together stays together.
Pach Ang, very honestly clarifies that the credit for making RedFilio, a great place to work does not go to him, but to the whole team and that the most important factor is motivation and team-spirit. He further says, ‘it’s a mentality I got from being in the Special Forces, we train, we train hard. But when we do things- we do them together. I have a huge chrome shinning bell in my office, because in the Special Force, “goring this bell when you want to quit”. Obviously we don’t want people to quit, so having it here in the office is something of an inspirational, symbolic statement, more than anything else. Till date, no ones rang that bell obviously; they become stronger and better in what the aim to achieve. He further added, “The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday”.
To a question about the switching over of career after 32 years of service in the Singapore Armed Forces as special forces commando to the event management, he said, ‘It was a case of been there, done that. Done too much of the soldier stuff. 32 years, honestly is a long time’! He added further that, his Dad was serving the British Army in Singapore and so from a very young age, he wanted to be a soldier. “When you start young, you push yourself a lot, and I did a lot of those. Under his belt, he clocked an impressive 3500 skydive jumps. He is also the founder of the renowned THE RED LIONS, Singapore Parachute Team. According to him, the military service has helped a lot, to shape him to have that sense of leadership and ability to command a group of people. But it’s not just about leadership and teaching people how to do events – it’s about the passion. When I do events, I want to create experiences of exceptional quality– I want my people to have the same, feeling. We’re not a company that just researches, cuts and pastes. I want to design and conceptualize something that is not been done before, something that belongs to us. I guess this stems from the military, where you go through a lot of detail and meticulous planning. Answering a question on “EXPO 2020”, Pach Ang said that, ‘with Expo 2020, there are a lot more people outside our existing technical, event and production company sphere who are very keen and interested to set up event management offices here. Now, if the current industry players are not strong enough and don’t work together, other people will be out lasting.
We are competing amongst ourselves; people are out for each other. You’ll have big companies who will be fresh and hold their own appeal, so in the next five years we have to do it together, work together and do it for the UAE, towards ‘EXPO 2020’. The industry needs to connect and not compete, see how we can collaborate and strengthen. RedFilo organized some of the biggest events held in the United Arab Emirates with offices in Abu Dhabi, Beirut, Dubai and Singapore. Our impressive accomplishments, accorded more than 7 accolades in the Middle East Event Awards, spoke loudly about our work in the event industry. Having been awarded some of UAE’s large scale events, placed RedFilo onto a higher benchmark and set RedFilo apart from other event companies. Since, its inception, the group CEO, Founder and Managing Director, Pach Ang, headed RedFilo in creating unique events. “At RedFilo, we are not just event managers, we deem ourselves as, Event Architects. We believe in elevating the standards of events, by ensuring superior quality and professionalism, to engage the audience and senses, and to promote excellence. As Events Architects, we are guided by our continual commitment and values to achieve the aims and objectives of our clients”, Pach added.
