There are tons of (too many?) options to travel to SE Asia in Business using MR reward points. You can probably fly any airline you want, using one of the MR partners. For example, you could fly JL using BA miles. You could fly SQ/NH/AC/CO/UA/OZ using SQ, NH, AC or CO miles. You could fly DL using DL miles. The key is first finding an airline that has availability (at the lower redemption level), and then figuring out which MR partner offers the best redemption "price" for that award on that airline. For example, a Star Alliance business class award to SE Asia might be 120,000 CO points but 110,000 AC points. I'm making those numbers up for illustrative purposes; you have to do the research yourself.

Then you have to make sure that the award is available for redemption from the specific partner program. Sometimes, say, JL may make awards available only to its own FFers, not its partners' FFers.

It's the same deal for upgrading. You'd have to find out what airline has availability, and then you could transfer the appropriate number of points, book the flight and confirm the upgrade. It doesn't have to be on CO. Though I can tell you that CO will let you waitlist for an upgrade if it isn't available for immediate confirmation (you can check and request the upgrade/waitlist on their website). It's obviously a little risky because there's no guarantee a waitlist will clear, although CO will clear all waitlisted customers into any empty seats prior to departure. The waitlist is prioritized by CO elite status and time of waitlist (the earlier the better). Lots more info on the CO forum in the FAQ sticky.