Jack Foster tops inaugural APP Asia Penang Open draw in Malaysia

Jack Foster has been installed as the top seed in the Pro Men’s Singles draw for the inaugural Leapmotor APP Asia Penang Open, giving the first stop of the new APP Asia Tour a familiar headliner. The tournament is set for July 22-26 at Pickle by the Sea in Penang, Malaysia, and SportsSync already has the event listed with single-elimination bracket materials in place.

The official fact sheet lists the same dates and venue, underscoring that this is being staged as a real launch, not a soft opening. The prize pool is listed at USD 35,000, a modest but concrete starting point for a tour trying to establish consistent professional stops across Asia.

That structure matters. APP has framed the Asia Tour as a six-stop circuit across Malaysia, China, Thailand, Chinese Taipei, India and Vietnam, and Penang is the first clear test of whether that footprint can produce a repeatable product. A tour only starts to look bankable when the draw is named, the venue is locked, the brackets are live and the money is attached to a date on the calendar. Penang checks all of those boxes.

The surrounding build-out points in the same direction. APP has added Yui See Lau and Yuki Chen to its expansion leadership team as it pushes global growth, and it has also become a partner of three D-Joy events in Vietnam. Those moves suggest the organization is not just stacking tournament dates, but building a regional operating model with local partners and named personnel behind it.

Malaysia is already becoming a key part of that sequence. The 2026 APP Kuala Lumpur Open was held Feb. 9-14 at PLAYA Racquet Club in Subang Jaya, Selangor, giving the APP a second Malaysia-based marker before Penang even starts. With Foster leading the men’s draw and SportsSync carrying the bracket, the Penang Open arrives as more than an isolated stop. It is the clearest sign yet that Asia’s pro pickleball calendar is starting to look like a circuit, not a collection of one-off events.