Melvin Poh FRSA is a Malaysian entrepreneur, barrister, investor and speaker. He is known for his work as a media entrepreneur in crowdsourcing knowledge in Asia^[1][2][3][4] and his efforts to facilitate greater accessibility to knowledge in the region.^[5][2][6][7] Poh is also known to be a public proponent of the access to knowledge movement in Southeast Asia and has been advocating for the democratization of knowledge in public media as well as in his work.^{[8][9][10][11][12]}

Poh was born in Malaysia but had emigrated and spent most of his years living in New Zealand, Australia, United States and United Kingdom.^[11][13] He attended Hale School.^[14] He later pursued studies at Harvard University,^[2][3][15] Imperial College London^[16][17][18] and University of Cambridge.^[19][20][21] Poh subsequently became a barrister in the United Kingdom and was admitted as a member of The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn.^[11]

In 2019, Poh was among the 30 entrepreneurs admitted on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, for fostering education through crowdsourcing knowledge in Asia.^[29] In the following year, he was listed on Prestige 40 Under 40 for contributing to open access knowledge in the region^[58] through digital crowdpublishing.^[2] In 2021, Poh was named among the 30 honourees of industry leaders on Tatler's Generation.T Leaders Of Tomorrow for creating an open access knowledge hub in Asia and making contributions to regional education.^[59][6] In 2022, Poh was one of the 4 Malaysians whose work was recognized by British High Commission and HE Charles Hay;^[9][60] he subsequently was the recipient of the Business & Innovation Award from the British Council for his work in improving accessibility to knowledge in Asia.^{[5][61][62][63]} In 2023, Poh was officially made Fellow Of The Royal Society Of Arts (FRSA) of the United Kingdom in recognition for his work.^[64]