Leland Lai is an Executive Director at the Arizona-Taiwan Trade & Investment Office as well as a Managing Partner of phireGen Advisory Group.

Lai has built several fast-growth businesses in both Asia and Silicon Valley. He is currently active as a BoD / strategic advisor to SBIE2 (originated as a SoftBank Investment company), plus various SMEs and startups. Prior to this, he headed Facebook’s Telecom infra Project to reach the 3.8 billion people who still do not have internet access. Before this, he led GSMA (trade association for 800+ mobile carriers) through a major strategic pivot that grew Mobile World Congress Shanghai by 73% annually over 7 years. Lai was part of the 2007 Terayon executive team (Nasdaq:TERN) when Motorola acquired it for USD 140M and part of the 2001 eOn Communications’ IPO team (Nasdaq: EONC). He began his career in 1990 at Hutchison Telecom (SEHK: 2332/ NYSE ADR: HTX).

Lai has been recognized by Shanghai Municipal People’s Government as one the city’s Conference Ambassadors. He was named as an Executives to Watch by Fierce Wireless Magazine and received an Award for Excellence in Technology, Media & Telecommunications from WI Harper.

Lai holds both an MBA and a BS in mechanical engineering from UCLA, as well as a postgraduate fellowship in public policy from The Coro Foundation. He served in the U.S. Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps and is a U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) licensed pilot and an American Sailing Association (ASA) certified bareboat captain.

Based in Taipei and Hong Kong.

“We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give”. — Sir Winston Churchill