From Hotel School in St. Anton to Group General Manager in the UK
Patrick Mauser's career began in hospitality. Originally from Austria, he earned his hotel diploma and studied business there, training at the Hotel Post in the ski resort of St. Anton. At about 23, he moved to the UK and worked his way up quickly to general manager. He went on to become Regional Director for the Midlands and the Northwest of England for Macdonald Hotels, a Scottish company, running seven or eight hotels in the northwest of England.
Next came property. As development director at Regus, he was based at St James's Square in London. He then joined accountancy firm Grant Thornton as a director in its litigation department. In all, he has more than three decades of international business experience across Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.
A Buddhist Country, a Private School, and One Small Advert
About 20 years ago, Patrick travelled to Sri Lanka, where he studied Buddhism. From there went into solitude on a small island in the Maldives, continuing his studies. That's when he decided to make a Buddhist country his home. He planned to move to Thailand once his three UK-born daughters finished university, and he arrived in 2012. There he met his wife, Nok, a schoolteacher, and together they founded a private school.
His business in Thailand started with one small advert in the Bangkok Post, an English-language newspaper, offering business development training courses. The first course was fully booked, and so was the next one. That was the start of Asia Franchise Academy, which trained three groups of people: franchise brand owners, investors looking for an opportunity, and would-be franchise consultants.
At first, he rented hotel meeting rooms for his seminars. The business grew so fast that he launched what he describes as Thailand's first residential training courses, and people came from all over the world to attend. Soon he was running seminars in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Singapore, and Bangladesh too.
It was an accidental success story, actually. My whole thing is not my intelligence. It was simply being at the right place at the right time.
From Franchising to Financing: Building International Finance Alliance
His teaching caught the attention of Chinese investors, who flew him to Mauritius to speak at the China and China-Africa Peace and Development Forum. The audience included politicians and investors, and Patrick made plenty of connections there. At the same time, franchise brands kept asking if he could help them raise finance. With his finance background and his growing network, he could.
About four years ago, the business outgrew its name, and Asia Franchise Academy became International Finance Alliance (IFA). Today, IFA is a corporate advisory and finance facilitation firm. It connects project owners and businesses with capital providers and helps structure cross-border investment. Patrick is choosy about what makes the cut: he estimates up to 90% of projects aren't fundable, for reasons including geopolitics.
IFA's work spans defence, AI infrastructure, aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO), hospitality, and real estate. That includes defence projects in Switzerland, Germany, and Hungary, and AI data centres between Turkey and Germany.
Patrick also sits on the board of several companies. Alongside his fees, he asks every client for at least 1% equity in their company. He's won several awards in Asia, including best marketing campaign and best small agency, and he says his real trophy is always a happy client.
I only accept companies when they offer me equity in their company. Why? Because it assures my long-term commitment to my clients.
Finding Osome Through a Chance Meeting on the Coast
Clients often ask Patrick where they should set up their company. A chance meeting on the Thai coast turned that question into a real project. The man sitting next to him thought Patrick looked familiar, possibly from his YouTube videos. His family, from overseas, was building a resort on the islands and already had a Thai operating company. Patrick agreed to represent them and advised setting up a holding company in Singapore.
To find the right provider, he searched Google and contacted several companies. At the time, Osome's website listed more than 30,000 clients. That impressed Patrick, but it also worried him: would a company that size have time for him? What attracted him was the mix of professional expertise, a clear digital process, and experienced people to guide him, backed by offices in London, Hong Kong, and Singapore. He soon dropped the other providers because they were too slow to respond.
I made my first contact with Osome, and I can tell you it was like I felt enlightened, because I spoke to somebody that understood our problems, that understood our clients' issues.
Putting Structure Into a Complex Cross-Border Setup
Patrick's first contact was Pinky, based in the Philippines, who passed him on to Osome's Singapore team. From there, he says, it was plain sailing. The project was not a simple setup. Osome helped launch the family's company in Thailand, owned through a new Singapore holding company. The work covered registration options, corporate structure, shareholding certificates, and partnership agreements between the family's home country and Thailand. It also covered how the Singapore holding company would link to the Thai operating company.
Patrick runs his business on guanxi, the Chinese principle of putting personal relationships before business. Osome's Singapore team took time to understand his clients' needs, made detailed notes, and walked him through each step in order. Patrick admits he talks a lot. On those calls, he mostly listened.
He never felt left to work things out on his own, and he was impressed by how smoothly each stage of the process linked to the next.
With each phone call, the trust improved and increased, because I was more and more convinced I've now got the right company in which I can confidently send my clients to.
Support That Doesn't Stop Once the Fees Are Paid
The family's company also needed a Singapore bank account. Opening one with foreign passports isn't easy, and Patrick got stuck on the online onboarding himself. So Osome's team joined the call while the client spoke to the bank. They guided everyone through the Know Your Customer (KYC) checks in real time, including which codes to use. Without that help, Patrick says, it would have taken forever.
You (Osome) did not walk away from the client once you had the money, once we paid our fees. No, you really began the work after we paid, and that is the most important thing.
Time Saved at Every Step
For Patrick, time is literally money, and Osome's speed stood out from the start. He got a reply to his first email in under 24 hours. Within another 24 hours, the first WhatsApp call with his client was booked and confirmed. When the team said they'd get back to him, they did so exactly when they said they would. And once the family was ready to go ahead, they paid the same day.
Patrick estimates Osome saved him around 5 to 10 hours of direct admin work while setting up the company. He puts a notional value of €150 to €250 an hour on his time, so that's roughly €750 to €2,500 worth of time he could spend on clients, investors, and project mandates instead. The bigger win, he says, was peace of mind. He didn't have to work through unfamiliar registration rules in another jurisdiction by himself.
Patrick recommends the full package, including accounting, to every client, as it saves him headaches further down the line. In his view, if you choose Singapore as a safe and respected jurisdiction, paying for proper accounting is part of doing it right.
For me, the real value was the combination of time efficiency, professional expertise, and confidence in the process. That is what makes a service provider particularly valuable to an international founder.
Looking Ahead
That first setup was Patrick's test case. Now he's shaping his client proposals around Singapore company structures set up with Osome, for serious, established operators. IFA has an active portfolio of project finance mandates worth more than €350 million, and it's focused on growing its international capital network and strategic partnerships. Another Singapore-based company is also joining as a client, bringing more work Osome's way.
Patrick's praise for Osome on LinkedIn, where he has more than 21,000 contacts, was entirely unsolicited. He doesn't make recommendations for the sake of it, he says, and a company that delivers a professional service deserves recognition.
His advice to new founders comes down to clarity, credibility, and execution. Know what your business does and who it serves, choose your partners carefully and look beyond price, and protect your reputation. And delegate where you can, so your energy goes where it creates the most value.
Asked to sum up Osome in one sentence, he calls it an oasis in a chaotic world. For his future clients, he says, there's no longer a second option.
