SINGAPORE: Veteran architect Tay Kheng Soon has appealed to newly minted Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong to implement his idea of turning the country’s autonomous universities into what he calls “enterprise campuses”.
Mr Tay envisions these campuses to blend the university environment with startups. He argued on Facebook that “co-locating startups with students, labs and profs” would help create “a new generation of bold and innovative people to take Singapore to the next stage.”
The noted sociopolitical commentator has even filmed a YouTube video on this idea – a video he claims Mr Wong has seen. Calling on Mr Wong to put this idea into action, Mr Tay said that doing so would “turn Singapore over the next 10 years into the financial and innovation heart of South East Asia.”
He urged: “No more small incremental steps please. Singapore now desperately needs big bold steps to break out of this little red box! It is survival!”
Mr Tay, who also serves as an adjunct professor at the National University of Singapore, said that other political figures like National Development Minister Desmond Lee and Bukit Batok MP Murali Pillai met him last year to discuss this idea.
Both politicians previously met Mr Tay in 2017 to discuss another idea he had of creating a food street made of shipping containers that were rented out for a flat fee of $1,000 a month. Mr Tay claimed that this idea was ultimately deemed unfit for implementation “because it would upset existing rental profits of existing landlords.”
The feasibility and potential adoption of Mr Tay’s latest proposal remain uncertain. Whether the veteran architect’s vision for enterprise campuses will come to fruition and reshape Singapore’s academic and entrepreneurial landscape is yet to be seen. However, his persistent advocacy clearly highlights a pressing desire for bold innovation in the country’s developmental strategies.
TISG/