NTU Singapore Hosts Dialogue with India to Foster New Collaborations in Technology, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship

To facilitate an exchange of ideas for collaboration, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) yesterday hosted the NTU Singapore-India Dialogue session, which was attended by over 200 dignitaries, including prominent business and government leaders, academics, and distinguished alumni.

NTU Singapore-India Dialogue inauguration ceremony

Held at The Leela Palace Hotel, Bengaluru, the event aimed to strengthen and build upon NTU Singapore’s existing partnerships with India’s leading universities and research institutes forged during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s historic visit to NTU in 2018. The NTU Singapore-India Dialogue explored the critical themes of the transformation of education, research, and innovation in a post-pandemic world, and how Singapore and India could further strengthen the collaboration in the area of technopreneurship.

President Professor Subra Suresh, NTU Singapore said, “The visit of PM Modi to NTU Singapore in 2018 led to the establishment of agreements between the University and several premier institutions in India. The NTU Singapore-India Partnership Dialogue in Bengaluru seeks to encourage the exchange of ideas that would potentially lead to multi-disciplinary and multi-sector collaborations in education, research, and translation of scientific discoveries to practice. The NTU leadership team looks forward to exploring opportunities to work closely with academic collaborators, Indian industry partners, and entrepreneurs in areas and activities that are aligned with the NTU 2025 Strategic Plan.”

NTU – India Partnerships
NTU signed five agreements during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit in 2018 to strengthen academic and industry partnerships with leading Indian universities and institutions which included Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore for Research Attachment and Joint Supervision opportunities; IIT Bombay and IIT Madras for Joint Ph.D. programmes. NTU also has academic collaborations with the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology for joint satellite projects; and with the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) to leverage NTU’s excellence in areas such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and big data analytics.

Hemang Jani, Secretary, Capacity Building Mission, Government of India said, “NTU Singapore is a leader in capacity building and training for many Asian governments to advance their human and economic development capabilities. Singapore is a model for impact and citizen centric e-governance. In India, we are exploring partnering with NTU to share their best practices for upgrading the technology, innovation and entrepreneurship training of the Indian civil service.”

NTU Senior Vice President (Research), Professor Lam Khin Yong added, “International collaborations are crucial to bolster Singapore’s research landscape and develop impactful and commercially viable solutions as the world seeks solutions to increasingly complex challenges. NTU has an established track record of collaborations with global industry leaders such as Volvo Bus, Rolls Royce, HP Inc, GlobalFoundries, Ecotech Mobility, and more. We are now in India to seek collaborations with institutions and industry in India and grateful for the support of the Confederation of Indian Industries.”

Notable speakers at the NTU Singapore-India Dialogue were Mr. Shekhar Kapur, Oscar-nominated film director and Chairman of the Indian Film & Television Institute; and Mr. S Somnath, Chairman of Indian Space and Research Organisation (ISRO).

The dialogue session also saw the participation of prominent figures with links to the University, including representatives from NTU partners, Mr. Govindan Rangarajan, Director of Indian Institute of Science, and Professor Rishikesa T. Krishnan, Director of IIM Bangalore.

The NTU Singapore-India Dialogue provided an opportunity for NTU to reconnect with its alumni community, which is made up of more than 275,600 graduates in over 160 countries. There are over 7,800 NTU alumni in India. Among the NTU alumni in India who attended or spoke at the session were Mr. Vinod Kannan, CEO of Vistara, Ms Suman Mishra, CEO of Mahindra Electric Mobility, and Mr. Ajit Mohan, VP & Managing Director of India-Meta.

Ms. Suman Mishra, CEO, Mahindra Electric graduated class of 2001 in Computer Science and Engineering from NTU. She said, “There is an increasing demand globally for sustainable transportation solutions to address the increasing fuel costs and climate change. India has been a quick adapter of electrification, particularly in the two and three-wheeler segments. We, at Mahindra Electric are creating an ecosystem that encourages the adoption of EV technology in the last mile. NTU Singapore is a leader in EV research and innovation, with the test bedding of full-size Volvo buses on its campus. We need more academic-industry collaboration to herald a new era of electric mobility.”

Also speaking at the session was NTU donor Mr. “Kris” Gopalakrishnan, Chairman of Axilor Ventures and Co-founder of Infosys. In 2018, during PM Modi’s visit to NTU, Mr. Gopalakrishnan made a gift of S$2 million to establish the Gopalakrishnan-NTU Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship to attract promising early-career scientists and engineers to NTU and fund cutting-edge research collaborations between students at NTU and renowned Indian institutes.

Together with the dialogue session, the NTU Singapore Graduate Programme Recruitment Roadshow was held, with information sessions on NTU’s graduate programmes.