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SINGAPORE – To boost the competitiveness of Singapore’s burgeoning manufacturing sector, a new industry-led training programs office will plan ways to ensure the workforce has emerging skills and knowledge.
The Advanced Manufacturing Training Academy (AMTA), which launched on Tuesday (October 20), will be located in the Jurong Innovation District (JID) manufacturing hub, which has attracted around $ 420 million in investment. last year.
The AMTA program office will work with schools and training providers to design new courses that help workers excel as Singapore establishes itself as an advanced manufacturing hub.
It will also serve to predict what skills and knowledge these workers will need to meet future industry requirements.
AMTA was announced by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat on Tuesday during the Asia Pacific industrial transformation conference.
It is the latest of efforts here to continue the upward momentum of the manufacturing sector, which grew around 3.5 percent year-on-year in the first six months of 2020 despite the pandemic.
The manufacturing industry contributes about 20 percent to the Singapore economy and employs some 472,000 workers.
AMTA will be supported by the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A * Star), the Economic Development Board (EDB) and Enterprise Singapore. Nanyang Technological University and SkillsFuture Singapore also contribute to the academy.
It will be governed by a training council made up of institutes of higher education, public agencies and unions, and will be led by the former managing director and current country manager of Micron Semiconductor Asia in Singapore, Mr. Lee Kok Choy.
“AMTA aspires to collaborate with strategic partners to plan and deliver training to meet the needs of the industry and strengthen Singapore’s manufacturing competitiveness in the context of rapidly changing technology trends,” said Lee, who is also Chairman of the Board. of Governors of Temasek Polytechnic.
AMTA’s location in the JID is strategic, as the district plans to be a comprehensive advanced manufacturing hub for Singapore by bringing together researchers, students, innovators and businesses to develop the products and services of the future.
The first phase of the 600ha JID is expected to be completed around 2022, with the district creating more than 95,000 new jobs.
Singapore’s government agency JTC, which is developing the district, said on Tuesday that despite Covid-19 disruptions, JID has attracted around $ 420 million in new investment this year.
Last week, South Korean automaker Hyundai ushered in its new innovation center at JID, which will be ready by 2022.
The center, said to be the first of its kind, will allow Hyundai to develop new automotive technologies, including for the production of electric vehicles. It expects to produce up to 30,000 vehicles per year by 2025.
In addition to Hyundai, other companies that will open facilities at the JID include imaging products maker Konica Minolta and robotics developer Fanuc, as well as engineering firm Bosch Rexroth.
JTC CEO Tan Boon Khai noted that the district’s ecosystem is growing and that its goal is to serve the region as an advanced manufacturing hub.
“We continue to build strong partnerships with industry players, trade associations and academia, creating more opportunities for companies to leverage research and development, training and capacity building, and technology expertise in JID to accelerate their next phase of development. business transformation, “he said. .
Meanwhile, on Tuesday, EDB announced that it would partner with the World Economic Forum to globally expand the Singapore-developed Smart Industry Readiness Index (Siri), which details the ways in which manufacturing companies can transform to meet future challenges. .
The partnership hopes to make Siri an internationally recognized standard for Industry 4.0 transformation. Industry 4.0 refers to a new phase of the Industrial Revolution that focuses heavily on technologies such as artificial intelligence, automation, machine learning, and data analytics to optimize the way goods are manufactured.
To drive global adoption of the index, 90 certified Siri testers will be trained over the next 18 months. These testers will work to run between 500 and 750 new official Siri assessments by the end of next year.
More than 350 companies based here from more than 15 countries have completed such assessments since the index was launched in November 2017.
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