Lee joined TCS on a contract in 1995 after emerging as 1st runnerup in the male category of the Star Search programme in 1995 He worked as a factory worker salesman and parttime model before joining star search in 1995 Lee first started acting in Chineselanguage television dramas produced by Channel 8 Lee rose to prominence in his career after winning the Best Actor award at the Star Awards 1997 for his role as a hanjian in the television drama The Price of Peace set in Japaneseoccupied Singapore during World War II In 1998 he starred as Yang Guo in The Return of the Condor Heroes an adaptation of Louis Chas novel of the same title He was voted in as Taiwans Most Popular MediaCorp Male Artiste at the Star Awards 1998 for his performance Since then Lee has acted in many television series jointly produced by Singapore and other countries in the AsiaPacific region costarring with actors from Hong Kong and Taiwan such as Nadia Chan Vincent Chiao Jimmy Lin and Jordan Chan Apart from acting Lee also recorded the theme songs of MediaCorps television dramas He released his first solo album in 1999 and another one in 2002 At the 2010 Star Awards Lee was awarded the coveted AllTime Favourite Artiste Award after winning the Top 10 Most Popular Male Artistes award from 19971998 2000 20022009 respectively with longtime colleague Mark Lee He became the first nonSingaporean artiste to win the award More recently Lee has also ventured into hosting and has hosted several travel and food programmes He was nominated for the Best InfoEd Show Host award at the Star Awards 2012