PM Lawrence Wong at the SIT Punggol Campus Official Opening Ceremony

Mr Bill Chang, Chairman of the SIT Board of Trustees,
Professor Chua Kee Chaing, President of SIT,
My Cabinet and Parliamentary colleagues,
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and gentlemen,

I am delighted to join you this evening to launch the Singapore Institute of Technology or SIT’s new campus in Punggol.

A New Home

This marks a major milestone in SIT’s journey.

And it is also personally meaningful for me, because I have been closely involved in SIT’s development for a long time. Very happy to see [Tan] Chin Tiong here, in the front row. He was SIT’s first President, I got to know him then. He laid the foundations for SIT and instilled the spirit and ethos that SIT has today. He passed on the baton to [Tan] Thiam Soon, who is unable to make it, before he passed it on, now, to KC [Chua Kee Chaing] as the third President of SIT. But as you heard from KC just now, back in 2012, I had chaired the Committee to look at expanding university education pathways.

We mooted a new model of applied learning at the university level. And we recommended that SIT be made an Autonomous University, Singapore’s fifth University, and our first University of Applied Learning. These recommendations were taken up by the government, and it set SIT on a different trajectory.

SIT has grown rapidly since then. From just over 500 students in the inaugural cohort, you now take in over 3,500 undergraduates a year. You confer more than 30 undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in your own name, in addition to range of programmes offered in partnership with overseas universities. You have forged strong industry partnerships, and a solid reputation for producing graduates with excellent employment outcomes.

So in a very short time, SIT has grown into a vital pillar of our higher education system. And all this has been made possible only because of the commitment and hard work of everyone at SIT – the faculty, staff, students, and alumni. Thank you very much everyone.

Of course, this rapid growth meant that SIT needed a space of its own. I still recall visiting you, years back, at your Dover Campus, and your decentralised campuses across five polytechnics. I do not know how you ran the University in such a distributed manner. It was very challenging. It was possible at the beginning, but it progressively became more and more challenging as you grew. And that is why we started thinking about a new campus for SIT more than a decade ago. We had identified this site in Punggol, we broke ground for the works in 2019, as you saw in the video just now. Then-PM Lee did so. And today, I am delighted to welcome all of you to SIT’s beautiful new home in Punggol.

A Home for Industry Partnerships

And there are several features that make this campus truly unique.

First, it is the only university campus in Singapore to be co-located with a business district. And not it is just any regular business district. This is a digital district designed for industries of the future – including fields like AI, cybersecurity, and fintech.

This Punggol Digital District or PDD has already attracted strong industry interest. Two of Singapore’s banks, UOB and OCBC, have committed over $1 billion to the district, and plan to move part of their operations here by 2027. Just three weeks ago, Panasonic opened its flagship innovation hub for the region, here at PDD. These are just some of the examples, and companies like these will operate alongside tech-focused industry associations, as well as government agencies like GovTech and the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore.

So, this co-location means more opportunities for applied learning and industry collaboration – PDD will be a natural extension of the SIT classroom, and SIT, in turn, can provide a steady pipeline of talent and ideas for PDD. Everyone stands to benefit.

For students – you will gain access to internships and project opportunities with companies in PDD. After graduating, you can take up traineeships or jobs with them. For example, OCBC is setting up an Analytics and Innovation Lab at SIT, where students can gain experience using financial analytic tools and technologies. In the process, they will acquire and sharpen skills which are in high demand by employers.

For academic staff – you will be able to conduct applied research in partnership with industry and the wider Northeast community. For example, SIT is already working with partners like Sengkang General Hospital and St Luke’s Eldercare on data analytics, and to use the data to provide better care for seniors. And with more industry partners in PDD, such collaborations will only deepen and widen in scope.

For companies – you can tap on SIT’s networks and expertise to co-develop real-world solutions. Take for example what SIT is doing with A*STAR and HTX, the Home Team Science and Technology Agency – developing ways to improve detection of contraband at Jurong Fishery Port; which, if successful, can be scaled up for larger-scale deployment. Likewise, companies can work with SIT to prototype, test, and deploy solutions across diverse areas like cybersecurity, sustainability, and healthcare.

So this can be much more than a university campus. It can be an ecosystem for closer partnerships – where students, faculty, companies and government agencies come together to share ideas and co-create solutions.

A Home for Innovation

Second, this campus can push the boundaries of innovation. It will serve as a living lab – and a place where new ideas and entrepreneurship can take root and flourish.

The campus is connected by smart infrastructure systems that generate insights from real-time campus operations. Such data can be applied in teaching, learning, and research, especially in fields like electrical power engineering. They gave me a tour just now, because of my background and interest, perhaps, but we saw how the Micro-Grid operates, the dashboard, and the ability to use that for teaching, for research. Beyond that, these systems and data also make the campus a testbed – where industry and government can trial innovative urban solutions and test them out in real-world settings.

Many of these innovations may start small, within the campus. But they have the potential to be scaled up and deployed more widely across Singapore. For example, as I mentioned, SIT is working with the SP Group, and they have built a Multi-Energy Micro-Grid on campus. The Micro-Grid optimises energy use by integrating multiple power sources, including 10,000 square metres of PV (photo-voltaic) panels on the campus roof. At the same time, the Micro-Grid allows for research on how to integrate renewable energy and battery storage systems while maintaining grid stability.

And from all this, we will be able to glean valuable insights into how Singapore can power our future more sustainably. This is just one example, but there are many more possibilities.

SIT is working with JTC, IMDA and industry partners to set up a testbed that extends beyond the campus – so that ideas can be trialled across the entire PDD, and eventually beyond the District itself. For example, one idea is to testbed autonomous robots, to provide services within the precinct. The robots could even be programmed to patrol areas, detect suspicious objects, and alert security officers when needed.

Through initiatives like these, SIT is transforming this campus into a rich field of possibilities. Students and staff will have first-hand experience in seeing ideas move from lab to the marketplace. And companies can test out concepts here, before refining and improving them, and bringing them to a wider audience.

A Home for Lifelong Learning

Finally, this campus can be a vibrant place for lifelong learning.

We all know that learning cannot stop with formal education – not when the world around us is changing so quickly.

That is why the government is investing more in continuous education and training, through SkillsFuture.

SIT is a key partner in this national effort, enabling adult learners to re-skill and up-skill while balancing work and family commitments.

In particular, SIT has pioneered competency-based stackable micro-credential pathways, they call it CSM pathways. CSM degree programmes are broken into micro-segments, each one focussed on a specific set of skills that are required for particular job functions. So this gives learners flexibility – they can sign up for a single micro-credential to meet their immediate needs without committing to a full degree. At the same time, they can accumulate and stack the micro-credentials towards a degree over time.

Beyond this CSM pathway, SIT is also working with SkillsFuture Singapore to strengthen our skills assessment ecosystem. Many Singaporeans acquire skills through different channels – be it through short courses, on-the-job training, or even through life experiences. But there has not always been a good way to assess and validate these competencies. Employers too may lack a reliable framework to recognise them.

So SIT is working with SkillsFuture Singapore to launch a skills validation and assessment initiative. They will pilot new skills-based assessments with a few employers. Starting with some essential and AI-related skills. But over time, they will extend this approach to more areas. And this can help more workers and employers to assess, recognise and validate their skills, and map out concrete options for re-skilling and up-skilling.

I would also strongly encourage SIT to make full use of this beautiful campus to give continuing and adult education a much bigger push, because you have such a beautiful place here. I’m sure many people want to come here to study and to learn.

You can also tap on your alumni network to promote lifelong learning. In the leading universities overseas, you will often find not just students, but adult learners. Many of them are alumni, returning to campus grounds. They do so because the university offers a very attractive range of programmes to learn and study. So they are enthusiastic and they want to go back to campus to take up these courses. But they do so also to meet and network with one another, explore business opportunities, or even mentor the younger students.

All this creates a virtuous cycle of learning. And SIT has an opportunity to do this. You may be a young university, but you already have some 21,000 alumni. And if I remember the SIT motto, it goes “Once a SITizen, always a SITizen”. So you can harness the potential of your alumni network, engage them actively and get them to play a more active role in building a community of lifelong learners within this campus in Punggol, and in the process, help to strengthen Singapore’s overall culture of lifelong learning as well.

Of course, to make all this possible, SIT has had to rely on many development partners. KC mentioned them just now, but I think it is worth mentioning the many people who worked on this project over many years. It has been a labour of love for all of you – the architects, the consultants, the project managers, the contractors, of course we also appreciate our donors and supporters, who are here today. All of you made this SIT campus in Punggol come to life. So thank you very much for your contribution.

Conclusion

SIT now has a unique and very special campus. If I were a student, I would come here to study without any hesitation. So I ask SIT, all the people here, to make the most of this new asset. Treasure it, exploit it to the fullest, deepen your synergies with the industry; create groundbreaking solutions, and inspire Singaporeans to embrace learning for life.

To everyone in SIT, let me once again congratulate you on this significant milestone, and I wish SIT every success as you embark on this exciting new chapter!

Thank you very much.

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