SPEECH BY MR CHAN SOO SEN, MINISTER OF STATE FOR EDUCATION & COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT AND SPORTS, AT THE NATIONAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP CONVENTION ON MONDAY, 7 JUNE 2004 AT 9.00 AM AT THE SINGAPORE POLYTECHNIC CONVENTION CENTRE, DOVER ROAD

Mr Low Wong Fook, Principal, Singapore Polytechnic,
Principals,  Teachers,  Pupils,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Good morning.

Introduction
1.      I am very pleased to join you at this year’s National Entrepreneurship Convention. Today caps three days of gruelling hard work and intense competition among participants from the 59 participating schools, of which eight are from neighbouring countries in the region.  My congratulations to the schools for taking up the challenge to participate in this competition, to the teachers and lecturers who have mentored them, and especially to the participants seated in this auditorium.
You have proven yourselves more than able to generate sound business plans and network effectively with your counterparts from other schools and other nations.

BACKGROUND
2.      The YES-NEC convention (Young Entrepreneurship Challenge – National Entrepreneurship Convention) is now into its fourth year, since its inauguration in 2000. The organisers, the School of Business of the Singapore Polytechnic, with the support of the Curriculum Planning and Development Division of the Ministry of Education, have come very far and have done much to foster entrepreneurship in our young people through the Young Entrepreneurship Challenge programme. All of you would have benefited from your experiences last week, which would have given you a foretaste of what it takes to generate sound business ideas and make them work. Today, you will have the opportunity to listen to some prominent entrepreneurs, and even more excitingly, to the finalists who will present their business ideas to you.

A WORLD FUELLED BY RISK-TAKING AND ENTERPRISE
3.      In an increasingly competitive knowledge-based economy, we often see the concept “entrepreneurship” get bandied about a fair bit. In fact, this convention follows hot on the heels of the Innovation and Enterprise Outreach boot camp organised by the Nanyang Technological University for Junior College participants that concluded last week. It is therefore not unusual to come across Singaporeans who react adversely to the word because they find it either overused, or the concept too daunting. Then there are others who are passionate about entrepreneurship and risk-taking. Someone like Mr Roderick Chia, founder and boss of Simulation Training Consultancy, who recently mentioned an even more newly minted concept, the “intrapreneur”, or the “corporate entrepreneur”.  Now, he represents another viewpoint entirely. To him, an “intrapreneur” is someone who embraces an enterprising spirit, even within a corporate context.

4.      While you, as young Singaporeans, need not worry yet about the full implications of that term while you are still in school, I am certainly heartened by the sheer amount of energy and verve demonstrated in your willingness to embrace this spirit of enterprise. In fact, I will not be surprised if one day, you choose to follow through with the ideas you have experimented with in this convention and turn your dreams into reality.

SINGAPORE’S BUSINESS CLIMATE
5.      As educators, we want to enthuse our youngsters to embrace the spirit of risk-taking and innovation. But we do so with a sense of realism that not everybody can succeed out in the real world. Having said that, we have to acknowledge the government’s part in making Singapore more business-friendly by ensuring that government regulations and rules remain relevant and supportive of a pro-business environment. And their efforts are bearing tangible and measurable fruit. 

6.      Singapore has been consistently ranked as one of the most competitive countries  and  best  places  for  business  in  the  world.
In its 2004 forecast, the Economic Intelligence Unit ranked Singapore as having the best business environment in the Asia-Pacific region.  The year before, in 2003, the Business Environment Risk Intelligence (BERI) ranked Singapore as the second most profitable place for investors worldwide, after Switzerland.  Again, in 2003 Singapore was rated as the second most globalised nation in the world, after Ireland.   

THE CHALLENGE FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
7.      So we can rest assured that as far as the government is concerned, all that can be done to help entrepreneurs succeed will be done. What then, is the challenge for you, the young people of Singapore? The task I set before you is not to think that you are too young and wet behind the ears to start planning. Start thinking about how you can carve out your careers as entrepreneurs. Start reading up about success stories, and how obstacles and failures may be surmounted. Start planning. It’s not too early. 

8.      A good case in point is the story behind the runaway success of the search engine, Google. Google began as a research project at Stanford University in 1995 by two computer science PhD candidates, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, aged 24 and 23 years respectively. In other words, when they started their company, the founders of Google were not many years older than you. How did they do this? With US$100,000 from a sponsor who wrote the cheque after a 30-minute discussion with them and a brief demonstration over lunch. 

9.      Today, people use Google an estimated 200 million times a day.  It can link to more than four billion web pages in 26 different languages.  Google has a billion pages in its massive index and has been voted a Global Brand by Interbrand – a global branding consultancy - for two years running. Later this year, when the search engine company gets listed on the US stock exchange, Google is estimated to be worth billions of US dollars for a company that had its beginnings only nine years ago!  

10.     This is just one example of how successful world-class companies come about.  In Singapore, we too have our own home-grown successful entrepreneurs. I am sure you are agog to hear the voices of experience of two such entrepreneurs, Dr. Kenny Yap and Mr. Lawrence Leow, who will share their success stories with you later this morning.
 
CONCLUSION
11.     At this juncture, I would like to congratulate the Singapore Polytechnic’s School of Business and the Curriculum Planning and Development Division of the Ministry of Education for their effort in promoting entrepreneurship among our secondary school pupils.  I have no doubt that this Convention has proven to be both stimulating and rewarding for our young entrepreneurs.   

12.    I wish everyone here an exciting morning and hope I will meet you again some day not as participants of an entrepreneurship convention but as successful entrepreneurs.
Thank you.