For Davy Sanh, the road to founding Pop Padel didn’t begin with a business plan. It began with a lifelong love for racquet sports and a restless desire to build something with real community impact. Davy spent years straddling two worlds: the discipline and joy of elite sport, and the scale and strategy of corporate leadership. It was only when he discovered padel that everything clicked.
Here was a sport that blended his passions with a lifestyle ethos that felt fresh, modern and deeply relevant to how people want to move and connect today. That spark grew into a vision far bigger than courts. Pop Padel was imagined as a full ecosystem where wellness, culture, competition and community come together in one vibrant space.
He recognised immediately that Southeast Asia was primed for something just like it. Today, that intuition has transformed into one of the region’s most exciting new lifestyle movements, with Pop Padel leading the charge as a sport, a social hub and a new way of living active in cities like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur.
Personal Journey & Entrepreneurial Shift
Davy, your journey from national tennis player to corporate executive with stints at KPMG, Grab, and SATS is anything but conventional. What inspired the leap from boardrooms to building padel courts?
The leap from corporate boardrooms to building padel courts wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision. It was the result of years of reflection, a deep love for racquet sports, and a desire to create something meaningful and community-driven. Padel, with its fast-paced, social, and accessible nature, lit a spark. It combined my lifelong passion for sport with an opportunity to build something new from the ground up. This padel venture offered freedom, creativity, and the chance to build a lifestyle ecosystem centered on wellness, play, and connection.
How has your experience in both elite sport and corporate strategy shaped your vision for Pop Padel as more than just a fitness offering, but a lifestyle movement?
My dual background in elite sport and corporate strategy has been instrumental in shaping Pop Padel not just as a fitness brand, but as a lifestyle movement rooted in community, performance, and culture.
From elite sport, I would bring the discipline, resilience, and obsession with performance, not just physical, but in how teams are built, how spaces are designed, and how people engage with the sport. I hope to understand what it takes to create environments that inspire excellence and joy — whether you’re a first-timer or a competitive player. That competitive mindset informs everything from court quality to coaching experiences to how the brand cultivates talent.
From corporate strategy, I bring the vision to scale sustainably, build operational models that work across different markets in SEA, and understand consumer behavior at a deep level.
What was the defining moment that convinced you padel was the next big thing for Southeast Asia and that you had to be involved?
The defining moment was in December 2022 on a year-end holiday trip to Bali. I signed up for a padel tournament at Jungle Padel with my brother Boris. We were surrounded by energy, music, food, drinks, laughter, and a sense of community that felt electric and effortless. There was a vibe: competitive yet casual, active yet accessible. I knew this was what Southeast Asia needed. A region rich in energy, deep history in traditional racket sports and a rising wellness movement but lacking a sport that’s easy to pick up, inherently social, and scalable across urban spaces.
Padel wasn’t just the next big thing. It was the perfect convergence of sport, lifestyle, and community. And I knew I had both the passion and the playbook to bring it to life.
Launching Pop Padel & Building the Ecosystem
Photo: Pop Padel
Bringing a relatively unknown sport into new markets comes with both risk and reward. What were some of the key challenges and unexpected wins when launching Pop Padel in Singapore?
Pop Padel’s early challenges stemmed largely from padel’s low awareness in the region, with many people confusing it with pickleball, making education a key hurdle. Securing suitable real estate was equally difficult, especially sheltered spaces with the height required for proper padel play. At the same time, attracting sponsors and investors to an unproven category in Southeast Asia was a significant obstacle. I had to lean on my corporate credibility, my expertise in the sport and my capacity to grow a sizeable padel community in Singapore.
Once people tried padel, they found it addictive, and it created immediate word-of-mouth momentum. Players brought friends, those friends brought colleagues, and the community began expanding far faster than expected. High retention and frequent repeat play quickly became hallmarks of the early Pop Padel ecosystem, signalling that the sport resonated deeply with newcomers.
That initial traction soon extended beyond early adopters, drawing interest from corporate teams, wellness communities and families seeking active, social experiences. This surge unlocked new partnership opportunities with brands and event organisers. At the same time, demand for coaching soared, with players eager to improve their technique and understand the sport’s strategic nuances. Within the first month, Pop Padel’s resident coaches were already juggling waitlists – a clear evidence of how seriously the community embraced the sport.
Securing a 7-figure investment from Apricot Capital is no small feat. What do you believe resonated most with investors about your pitch and your vision for the sport?
Investors were drawn to a vision that went far beyond building courts. Pop Padel was positioned as a lifestyle ecosystem with touchpoints spanning sport, community, dining, retail, wellness and even media. The work done in building an early community of adopters before our facilities and the Pop Padel brand were even a reality proved my true passion for this field. In the meantime, I had also spent time travelling in other parts of the world to connect with like-minded pioneers of the sport. For instance, I attended the Padel World Summit in Malaga in May 2024 as one of the speakers for the development of padel in Asia.
The timing further strengthened the pitch. Padel was exploding in Europe, gaining momentum in the U.S., and perfectly poised for growth in Asia, creating a rare window of opportunity. With secured public land in Singapore and the agility to move quickly, Pop Padel was well positioned to capitalise on this moment. Ultimately, investors connected with the emotional core of the story.
Photo: Padel.my
Pop Padel’s partnerships with global names like MejorSet and NOX bring world-class credibility to your courts and gear. How did these collaborations come about and why are they so crucial to your expansion plans?
These collaborations with MejorSet and NOX, two of the most respected names in the global padel scene are about shared vision, aligned values, and strategic leverage. I knew from the beginning that credibility would be a make-or-break factor in building Pop Padel with rapid expansion plans in mind.
MejorSet (the official court supplier of Premier Padel) was the obvious choice for courts with our vision to build professional tournament ready facilities. I wanted top-quality courts from Spain with the proper grading of turf and glasses, to also ensure safety of play for all.
With NOX, a globally loved gear brand, it was about more than just equipment. It was about building culture and accessibility, offering premium yet approachable gear that players could trust. NOX saw Pop Padel not just as a buyer, but as a gateway into a new, high-potential market.
Expansion isn’t just about more courts, it’s about replicating a premium, consistent experience across locations. MejorSet and NOX ensure that whichever Pop Padel you play at, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and others, you get the same world-class feel.
Malaysia Expansion & the Bamboo Hill Story
Photo: Padel.my
Pop Padel’s new facility in Bamboo Hills marks your first foray into Malaysia. Why was this location the perfect launchpad for your expansion here?
Bamboo Hills wasn’t just a location, it was a statement. Launching in Malaysia meant finding a place that could embody the brand’s lifestyle ethos while tapping into a rising urban demographic hungry for fresh, social, and wellness-oriented experiences. Bamboo Hills ticked every box. Bamboo Hills is more than real estate, it’s a destination and curated lifestyle enclave. With artisanal cafes, boutique dining, lush greenery, and design-forward architecture, it already draws a young, upwardly mobile crowd that values experiences over routines.
Located just 15 minutes from central Kuala Lumpur, Bamboo Hills is easily accessible but refreshingly removed from the urban chaos. That balance of convenience and escapism is core to the Pop Padel vibe: high-energy yet chill, social yet premium.
It allows Pop Padel to serve a wide radius of KL’s most active and influential neighborhoods from Mont Kiara to Bangsar to Damansara.
The space allowed for multi-court development, event hosting, and social zones, key to Pop Padel’s model of building not just courts, but community hubs. Whether it’s leagues, weekend mixers, regional high-profile tournaments or brand collabs, the Bamboo Hills setup makes activation easy and high-impact.
How does the Bamboo Hills venue differ from your Singapore flagship? And how have you adapted the experience to suit the Malaysian market?
The Pop Padel venue at Bamboo Hills is a bold evolution of the brand’s flagship in Singapore, not a copy-paste, but a strategic reimagination tailored for Malaysia’s culture, space, and lifestyle rhythms. While both venues reflect Pop Padel’s core DNA (world-class courts, vibrant energy, and a lifestyle-first approach), Bamboo Hills brings more space, more flexibility, and deeper localization.
Our Bamboo Hills outlet contains six padel courts, all equipped with AI cameras and including three courts with the technical run out space. We have a center court with spectator stands capable of hosting 400 spectators. We have a full-scale restaurant on site with a mezzanine for the hosting of private events, seminars, conferences etc. Additional services such as the NOX retail pro-shop, the ice baths room and the large available parking space right underneath the club will also be very appreciated by our visitors.
Vision & The Future of Padel in Southeast Asia
Photo: Padel.my
Padel combines sport, social connection, and lifestyle in a uniquely accessible way. How do you see it reshaping urban leisure culture in cities like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur?
In fast-paced cities like Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, people are increasingly seeking ways to connect and unwind that don’t involve crowded malls or late-night bars. Padel naturally fills this gap by offering a new kind of “active social” space—somewhere to move without the intensity of a gym, socialise without the pressure of a bar, and enjoy friendly competition without needing to be an athlete.
Its accessibility is one of its strongest advantages: the sport is easy to pick up in a single session, played in doubles for built-in interaction, and requires neither high fitness levels nor racquet-sport experience. This makes it ideal for diverse friend groups, corporate teams and multigenerational families, especially in a region where many traditional sports can feel intimidating or exclusive.
What truly sets padel apart, however, is its lifestyle-forward culture. The sport seamlessly blends movement with music, food, design and community, reshaping urban leisure into something more vibrant and inclusive. At Pop Padel, courts sit within lifestyle destinations like Bamboo Hills, and events feel more like day parties or creative hangouts than formal tournaments.
Collaborations extend beyond sports brands to include DJs, wellness collectives and local creators, reinforcing that padel is as much about energy and atmosphere as it is about play. This shift—from performance-focused sport to culture-driven experience—invites a far broader audience into the fold and signals a new era in how urbanites spend their social time.
