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SINGAPORE: Internet consumer company Sea Limited agreed to recruit and train 500 Singaporeans in partnership with the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA), as part of efforts to provide job opportunities amid the COVID-19 economic recession. 19.
Sea, which is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, is the parent company of e-commerce platform Shopee, online game developer Garena and digital financial services provider SeaMoney. Sea has 3,000 employees in Singapore.
Under the agreement, Sea will hire and train 500 Singaporeans, comprising 400 entry-level and 100 mid-career job seekers (people with more than three years of work experience), said a joint press release between Sea and the IMDA on Friday (Oct 2).
READ: 1,000 professionals to be hired, trained to support Singapore’s 5G launch
Students will receive six months of Shopee training, in areas such as product management, software engineering, and user experience design, and will have a mentor or project advisor from the same department.
All trainees will be paid a monthly salary while they undergo the training, and “suitable” candidates who complete the training will be employed by Sea’s business entities, according to the press release.
Lim Teck Yong, Shopee’s head of regional operations and staffing team, declined to disclose the salary range, but said the company pays “competitive (ly), in line with the other recent graduates.” He added that he hopes to keep all 500 employees as full-time employees if they perform well.
When asked about the type of people the company seeks to hire, Mr. Lim described the ideal candidate as someone with a “great passion for e-commerce” and who has demonstrated a willingness to acquire skills in data or coding, including before. applying for the job.
“We are still experiencing very strong growth in (the) e-commerce sector. And this strong growth is not just in Singapore, but across the region, in all of our markets in Southeast Asia, ”Lim said.
“We recognize that during this difficult pandemic period, the job market is becoming much more challenging. That is why we have taken the initiative to work with IMDA … to see how we can generate jobs for the market ”, he added. “I think it’s important now that we provide jobs in the high-value-added sector, like in technology, where we can train them for the jobs of the future.
The program is expected to start before the end of this year.
The agreement between Sea and IMDA is part of IMDA’s TechSkills Accelerator Initiative (TeSA) company-led training program, where the companies hire new and mid-career professionals and offer them on-the-job training.
Under the agreement, Sea will receive subsidies for monthly salaries, fees for training courses, and any overseas bonding costs.
The TeSA initiative was launched in the 2016 Budget with the goal of increasing training and placements for infocomm technology jobs.
Sea and IMDA said the partnership is TeSA’s largest company-led training program conducted by a Singapore-based company to date. The company had previously participated in the program, but on a smaller scale.
READ: New Scheme to Help Mid-Career Professionals Get Tech Jobs While Receiving Training
In response to a question on whether changes to the rules for work passes abroad will affect the technology industry, the Minister of Communications and Information, S Iswaran, who was at the signing of the memorandum of intent between Sea and IMDA , said the new regulations are to make sure Singaporeans are treated fairly.
Iswaran said tech companies are very willing to hire Singaporean citizens, but they believe their main challenge is finding those who have the necessary skills and are willing to learn.
“That is why our work in what we are doing … is key,” he said. “Because what that allows us to do is really develop that core of Singapore in the growing tech sector.”
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