Asia’s headlines, explained with context.
Asian Insider treats regional headlines as entry points into larger questions about power, money, identity, and risk. Its conversations move from war and diplomacy to AI, education, religious culture, and Singaporean ambition abroad.
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Asian Insider is a Straits Times interview show built around the idea that Asia’s biggest stories deserve patient, grounded explanation. It moves quickly, but it does not rush past the hard parts. A conversation about war in the Middle East becomes a discussion of fuel prices, airline costs, cooking gas shortages, investor anxiety, and what Asia’s markets might do next. A report from Delhi turns devotional music into a window on India’s expanding spiritual economy, where bhajans meet EDM, stadium crowds, and performers such as Backstage Siblings. The show also keeps returning to power. China’s position in a Middle East conflict is treated through leverage, oil dependence, diplomacy, and strategic opportunity, with the human cost kept in view. Iran is discussed through leadership losses, military capacity, and the limits of a regime under pressure. Southeast Asia’s AI future is framed through jobs, industrial change, platform companies, and the region’s chance to build around practical strengths. The range is broad. The style is controlled. Episodes often begin with a scene, a figure, or a recent event, then work outward to the larger stakes. That gives the show a useful rhythm: specific first, analysis after. It is not a hot-take format. The conversations make space for background, definitions, and disagreement over loaded terms, as in the Malaysia education episode on UEC recognition and school policy. Business stories are treated as strategic stories too. Singaporean founders building in the United States become a way to talk about ambition, product fit, patents, integrations, and the value of being bold in crowded markets. The show’s center of gravity is Asia, but its map includes Washington, Beijing, Tehran, Delhi, Kuala Lumpur, Silicon Valley, and Singapore. It suits listeners who like news explained by people close to the reporting. The tone is measured, curious, and occasionally warm. Its best moments turn a familiar headline into a clearer picture of how policy, culture, and markets actually meet.
Made for: For listeners who follow Asian current affairs, geopolitics, markets, technology, and culture, and prefer reported conversation over quick opinion. It suits people who want regional stories connected to global consequences.
What sets it apart: Asian Insider stands out by pairing newsroom framing with correspondents, specialists, founders, and academics who can move from local texture to strategic meaning. Its strength is the Asia-first angle across politics, economics, faith, technology, and diplomacy.
Synopsis: Every Friday, get our distinct take on global issues with an Asian perspective, with ST’s globally-based correspondents.Produced and edited by: Fa'izah SaniExecutive producer: Ernest LuisA podcast by The Straits Times, SPH Media.
A smart lock went to space; you stay for sharper questions about how Asia actually works.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A word fight that keeps circling back to the students who live with it.
Asian Insider takes on Malaysia's education politics through the UEC debate, with Zerairi A.R., Shannon Teo, and Edim Koo teasing out what recognition really means and why that word keeps steering the conversation.
Two founders show how narrow products can carry cross-border ambition into the American market.
Jasmine Young and Anthony Chow arrive at the American market from very different angles. Young's Meow Mobile is a telco built for cat-owning parents, with a vet care plan folded in; Chow's Igloo focuses on retrofit access control for US rental housing.
Shenzhen's growth story still leans on Hong Kong's financial and entrepreneurial strengths.
Asian Insider tracks the Hong Kong-Shenzhen relationship through everyday movement: tourists returning to Hong Kong around Christmas and New Year, then Shenzhen thinning out for Chinese New Year before migrant workers bring it back to life.
A clear, brisk account of Max Maeder's bronze and the Paris atmosphere around it.
Deepanraj Ganesan frames the Paris 2024 Olympics around Max Maeder's historic bronze, then broadens the view with Kimberly Quek and Rohit Bhrishnath so the moment feels tied to Team Singapore rather than a single result.
Christian-conservative talk with moral urgency.
Congress, strategy, and the spectacle behind governing.
Left politics with history in the frame.
Famous lives, followed past the headline.
Asian Insider correspondents Magdalene Tang in Hong Kong and Joyce Lim in Shenzhen compare the two cities' evolving relationship.
This episode of Asian Insider reviews the Paris 2024 Olympics with a focus on Team Singapore's performance, headlined by kite foiler Max Maeder's historic bronze medal.
This episode explores how Asian supply chains, crucial for everyday products like bicycles, face disruptions from pandemics and geopolitics, with insights from Citi's Asia South Head of Services.
This episode previews President Trump's potential priorities for his second term, including executive orders, foreign policy goals like ending the Ukraine and Middle East conflicts, and domestic actions such as pardoning January 6 rioters.
This episode discusses how Asia's macroeconomic outlook and investment strategies are affected by the ongoing Iran conflict, featuring insights from a Maybank Securities research head.
This episode explores India's growing $70 billion spiritual market through the phenomenon of 'bhajan clubbing,' featuring a discussion about a devotional music concert by Backstage Siblings that blends traditional Hindu songs with modern EDM and dance elements.
This episode analyzes the potential silver linings for China amid the Middle East war, examining impacts on foreign policy, economic ties, and military strategy from Beijing's perspective.
This episode analyzes the ongoing Iran war, discussing the impact of recent U.S.
Former AMRO chief economist Kor Ho E tells Ravi Velur that ASEAN should treat AI as infrastructure "like electricity" and use it to build local applications, citing Grab and Sea Limited.
The Straits Times' Asian Insider opens right after Chinese New Year, with Zerairi A.R.
Asian Insider interviews Jasmine Young and Anthony Chow about building companies across Singapore and the United States, including Meow Mobile’s cat-focused AI telco and Igloo’s digital access-control business.
Javed Ashraf, chairman of the India Trade Promotion Organization, explains why India left RCEP after more than five years of talks yet has now signed an FTA with the EU and a framework with the US.
This episode features an interview with Professor Graham Allison discussing how to understand Trump's approach and the relationship between Trump and Xi Jinping in the context of US-China relations.
This episode analyzes China's leverage in the US-China trade war, featuring insights from a senior correspondent on Beijing's perspective and the historical context of tariff escalations.