©2026 Business Next Media Corp. All Rights Reserved. No.102, Guangfu S. Rd., Da'an Dist., Taipei City 106, Taiwan
Singapore’s award-winning language app comes to Taiwan for tech and creative talents
A Singaporean couple who moved to Taiwan from New York, transformed their comics company into a Chinese and English learning app for kids that blends comics, language learning, tech and adorable dumplings!
In an interview, Dr. Yen Yen Woo, one of the creators of Dim Sum Warriors for IOS and Android, said the move was aimed at addressing a gap in the Taiwan market for English learning for kids, as well as at tapping the country’s tech and creative talents.
“Dim Sum Warriors is a brand that my husband Colin [Goh] and I created... We started as a comics company and last year [2020] we started developing an app. Dim Sum Warriors is really a brand of comics and it's an app for reading bilingual in English and Chinese,” she said.
You can hear the interview here! Not just a hub of tech talents, Taiwan has a lot of world-class creators
Certified by Education Alliance of Finland
Because of Dim Sum Warriors’ unique approach to language-learning, the app was certified as having a high pedagogical quality by the Education Alliance, Finland, one of the world's top EdTech impact verification industries.
Woo explained that the process for certification involved Education Alliance Finland sharing the app with a group of teachers that the alliance regarded as experts around the world.
“They [the teachers] studied the app very closely and then they generated for us an 80-page report on different aspects of learning… we got high marks and basically got told that we had high pedagogical quality,” she said.
“Kids just love comics and the comics form. The comic form basically supports multi modeled learning. What multi model means is that it's not just text but also visuals, sound effects and stories that kids love. I think that's what really kind of put us in the high pedagogical quality category.
The app supports English and Chinese learning which separates Dim Sum Warriors from others in its category. “Unlike many kinds of language learning apps, we really use the method of trans language to help kids map from home language to the target language [and vise-versa] … It's easily used to learn English as well as Chinese,” she said.
Woo said that while their focus is on the young demographics, some adults use their app because there are not a lot of language learning apps for adults that have graphic form.
“The early childhood group is where we are targeting right now and also because of my background and education, I've been able to work with schools very closely to get this app into schools,” she said.
Woo obtained her doctorate from Columbia University and has worked as a professor at Long Island University in New York and National Central University in Taiwan, specializing in curriculum development as well as multimedia production.
Why Taiwan?
Market for young English learners
Whether it's in Singapore or Taiwan, learning English or Chinese as a global language is a difficult process for many people, Woo said.
“There's a market for kids who are having difficulties with reading in Chinese in Singapore and in Taiwan is the reverse kind of kids having difficulties reading in English. The market here [in Taiwan] has a need for creative fun, engaging and actually funny content that helps kids learn English because many kids I've spoken to in Taiwan, tell me about how their English curriculum focuses a lot on lists of vocabulary and grammar rules and not so much on stories and they would actually really love to use comics as a reader,” she said.
Source of talents, not just in tech
The other important reason for expanding in Taiwan is its pool of talents, not just in tech.
“We make comics, right? Taiwan has such a deep history of making comics, there's so many artists that we collaborate with and designers that we collaborate with. And of course, Taiwan has tremendous tech talent as well who we can tap,” she said.
Safe place to live
When asked how life is in Taiwan as a foreigner, she pointed out three things that make it comfortable for her – safe place for kids, convenience, and consideration for old and young children. She appreciated these more when she moved to Taiwan from New York right before Covid pandemic started.
“One is that it's very safe [here], so as a parent of a young child, to me that's a number one priority in any place to live in. Two, it's really convenient, right? So, every neighborhood has markets and I just love how easy it is to get fresh produce from all the markets. Three, everywhere I went there there's a lot of consideration for the old people and for young children,” she said.
Rooms for improvement
When asked what could be done to improve a foreigner's life further, Woo mentioned a common request – improving the banking system to help small businesses.
“I feel maybe that for a small business, doing business in Taiwan, banking is something that I kind of struggle with quite a bit, I have to say. Coming from Singapore where its banking is kind of a global banking center and it's quite easy to run like regular errands… to set up a company bank account and so on. [Banking is] actually pretty difficult in Taiwan, so that's one area which I think could be, could be expedited, could be improved,” she said.
Woo also noted that “having more signage, having websites that are bilingual would actually be very helpful.”
Dim Sum Warriors is currently offering a six-month free subscription.
©2026 Business Next Media Corp. All Rights Reserved. No.102, Guangfu S. Rd., Da'an Dist., Taipei City 106, Taiwan