Razer founder and chief executive officer Min-Liang Tan was in the country last October 26 and 27 to grace the Pinoy Gaming Festival event held at the World Trade Center in Pasay City.
Tan and company set up a Razer booth, which sold Razer apparel, with the proceeds going to recovery efforts in earthquake devastated areas in the Visayas.
The US-based hardware company, popular among gamers worldwide as producer of top high performing gaming hardware and system, intended to raise US $10,000 as donation to Philippine Red Cross recovery efforts.
“Our thoughts are with those who have been affected by the earthquake. We have employees, partners and Razer fans who have families in the earthquake-impacted area and we want to ensure that there is relief and support on hand,” he said.
Min-Liang Tan
This year’s Pinoy Gaming Festival marks Tan’s first official visit to the Philippines. A purpose of the visit is to strengthen Razer’s relationship with local fans.
Tan granted media interviews, which provided more insight into the company he founded in 1998.
Born in Singapore, Tan started young as a gamer. He said necessity—or the lack products that fit the needs of gamers—drove him and his friends to start Razer.
First they designed peripherals like a gaming mouse and the gaming keyboard. The first products were praised for the unique design and the functions that truly serve the gamer’s need for responsive hardware.
Razer’s logo of three intertwining green snakes also came early. “We were designing the mouse and we thought what animal eats a ‘mouse’? Thus the snake became our symbol and it became very recognizable and popular. A number of Razer fans had that logo tattooed on their body.”
Beyond gaming peripherals, Razer is now producing high performing gaming machines such as notebook and tablets. The company’s current crop of products include the Blade and Blade Pro notebooks, ultra slim gaming notebooks fitted with the most powerful processor and graphics. Its gaming tablets include the CES award winning Edge and Edge Pro. Tan describes Razer products as the Lamborghini of the PC hardware, and the company similar to a boutique store–it sells only the best.
According to Tan, Razar is the only gaming hardware company in the world with dedicated gaming user interface research and development labs. The company’s design centers are located in facilities in California, Singapore, Shenzen and Taiwan.
“We tell it like it is: some can pretend to co-develop products with professional gamers, but gamers don’t develop technology: scientists and engineers do (and ours just happen to be gamers as well). We develop and design our products in our own labs and then put them to the test with top professional gamers who use them in pro-level tournaments and then provide us with feedback. Then we iterate on the product, refining it with the feedback—over and over and over again. That’s how it’s done, that’s how Razer product is built from ground up.”
