Next to the Skin: March 2014

As a head of South-east Area Region R&D centre, Mr. Youngbae Park is not only in-charge of over 400 R&D Engineers, Chemists and Scientists across six countries but also responsible for sponsoring and encouraging the 3M Innovation Culture that has kept 3M R&D alive and well for more than a century. Today over 30% of 3M sales in SEA Region comes from New Products and New Applications enabled by the active year-on-year contribution to sales by the R&D. In 2010, YB moved to Singapore upon his appointment as R&D Head for SEA Region which includes Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, Vietnam and Indonesia. Under his leadership 3M R&D is undergoing a strategic as well innovative cultural shift to create more localized innovation to support the business growth plan in the region.

Ms. Daphne Flynn has a design management role at Philips Design with a focus on design led innovation for the Asean & Pacific region. Major takeaways when u talk to her :

With so much diversity, designing globally is a challenge – make a product global but take into consideration local cultural nuances such as color and shape.
Take a chance in life, you never know, your dreams may come true!
Follow your passion, the rest will work itself out!
There is always a great excuse to learn something new.

Mr. Fabian Ong, Director & Partner of Laminar Labs & Ideal Laminar Pte Ltd. The company, a solution provider of Thermal management and EMI solutions for Portable devices. He is also the Director, of Uniqtek Pte Ltd, that focuses on providing Eco-friendly and energy saving solutions to the Oil and Gas, Maritime, Building and construction Uniqtek is a supplier of High Performance Coating and Paints for Corrosion control and Hot and Cold Insulation. These products are waterbased or low VOC and are certified by EnergyStar, Singapore Environmental Council and endorsed by other Green Councils. He is constantly looking for new revolutionary ideas to bring to the market !

Low Cheaw Hwei, Global Creative Director, Philips Design, joined the Philips audio concept design team in 1991. He worked in Hong Kong and Singapore before in 2002 he was made Senior Design Director for the consumer electronics portfolio in Asia and in 2007, took on the role of Design Officer for TV and AVM, leading the function of design in both business groups. He is now appointed the Global Creative Director for the Consumer Lifestyle responsible for overall creative direction in product and services design across the sector. In addition to his responsibilities at Philips Design, he has served on several design committees and international design competition judging panels.

Kwai Merng is Executive Vice President and heads the Science and Engineering Commercialisation Division. She leads a team responsible for enhancing the value of promising technologies for commercialisation from the research institutes under A*STAR’s Science and Engineering Research Council (SERC). Kwai Merng brings to the task her extensive experience in financial valuation, corporate planning, business development, merger and acquisitions as well as operations management accrued from her executive roles at companies such as NatSteel Asia and KPMG.

Kelvin is the Director of Focus-Tech Holding, a private investment company and formerly the holding company of the Seksun Group. He is the founder and CEO of FocusTech Ventures, a seed stage venture firm and technology incubator that focuses on projects around web, mobile, digital media and M2M communications. Kelvin co-founded T.Ware, a haptics technology firm, and serves on the Board of Directors of several internet startups. Adamant that hardware is the new black, he desperately wants to bring sexy back to the “makerpreneur” world.

Mark Lee, Chief Executive Officer, Sing Lun Holdings Limited, was accorded Most Outstanding Entrepreneur Award at Asia Pacific Entrepreneurship Awards 2010 in Singapore. With a workforce of more than 7,000 employees, with production facilities spanning across 6 countries worldwide, and a strategic supplier to brands including North Face, Puma and Underamour, Sing Lun is considered to be one of the leading integrated apparel provider globally.

Dr. Kenneth Lee joined A*STAR in July 2013 as Director, Biomedical Research Council. He shapes and oversees the council’s research initiatives and industry development strategy in the Consumer Business space (spanning Food and Nutrition to Personal Care and Dermatology). Ken is a passionate game changer and global executive with 14 years' experience in senior leadership positions in innovation and strategic planning (personal/beauty care, food and nutrition industries). At L’Oréal, where he was Director of Strategic Foresight, Ken led a multidisciplinary team tasked with identifying and incubating new growth opportunities based on emerging science and technology. By nurturing partnerships with research teams and start-up companies worldwide, the team helped L’Oréal to be future ready, and to gain access to white spaces with the potential to change the game for the industry in a 5 to 10 year horizon. Ken has undertaken assignments in Brazil, China, Europe, India, Israel, US. He looks forward to working closely with the A*STAR community, to help establish Singapore as the Asian Innovation Capital.

Jade Yip , Director of Shevron Pte Ltd, is currently running a new family business, as a one stop shop for design, fabric embroidery and silkscreen. The product focuses on distinctive embroidery styles and impressive techniques which can be seen on the merchandise of many famous local and US brands

Rudy grew up in the Silicon Valley; Started and sold two successful companies before finishing College. Upon completing post graduate studies at The Ohio State University, Rudy put his talent to work for Lockheed Martin Missiles & Space as a member of a Tiger team tasked with putting a commercial imaging satellite into orbit from design to launch in under 4 years. The project was a brilliant success, paving the way for companies like Google to have access to data that we now all take for granted in Google Maps. Fast forward 15 years and you will find Rudy living and working in Singapore after having been at Flextronics for more than a decade. During these last three years, Rudy has served as the Director for Flextronics Design. This world class R&D team has designed many of the technology products you use every day. Although you may never see Flextronics name on the logo, Flextronics Design provides Design Services to many of the most recognized brands in the world.

Spent the first 15 years of working life in an MNC environment picking up the “right answers” in the business value chain. Aspire to practice and refine these ‘right answers’ in a very different setting like small enterprise. One of the very few senior executive that has whole spectrum of experience in MNC, SME, high-tech start-up, A*Star spin-off and manufacturing plant in less develop country. Good balance of hand-on practical experience and academic learning for engineering, management and business. Well rounded technical know-how and self-driven profile.

Brian is a multidisciplinary Design Leader with more than 15 years of experience leading strategic design programs that drives successful Brands, Fortune 500 businesses, and Government Institutions such as GE, Philips, Nakamichi, Flextronics, Ericsson, Hannspree, and HP. His passion is in helping organisations leverage on Design Driven Innovation to make people’s lives better. His designs, or those by the teams he has led, have been recognized with prestigious awards such as: The Singapore Design Award – Silver (2010), 2 Red Dots in Product Design (2010 for HTS8160B, 2005), Chicago Athenaeum Good Design Award (2007), 2 CES Innovations Award Honorees (2007), Red Dot Concept Award (2006), and a “Merit” in the Young Professional Designers Award (2002). These designs have been featured in T3 (Lumos, HTS9520, HTS9140), Wired Magazine, Home and Décor, Engadget China, Yanko Design, and exhibited at Singapore Design Festival (2007) and 20/20 Product Design (2004). He was formally a Senior Design Manager at Philips Design leading their global portfolio of home cinema/entertainment products and Head of Industrial Design at Nakamichi. He founded and currently runs Design Sojourn, a strategic design consultancy.

Alfred Tan, Deputy Director of ITE College West Technology Development Center. This center brings engineering solution in the form of imaging, embedded systems, mechanical design and software to the industry. Alfred has more than 15 years wot R&D experience in different MNC industry covering MedTech, Military and Consumer. He is well versed in product development from product definition to mass production level ( high mix low volume and low mix high volume ).