Dear Colleagues,

This was a year of change, catastrophes and continued uncertainty.  We began the year with Arab Spring, an event sparked by the action of a fruit seller in Tunisia that led to profound changes in the entire Middle East.  The full impact of this spontaneous movement is still evolving.  In March, we witnessed the awesome force of nature as one of the most powerful earthquakes off the coast of Japan triggered a tsunami that resulted in the biggest catastrophe for Japan since the Second World War.  Against this backdrop, the global economy continues to be uncertain as Europe teeters from summit to summit to find a solution to the Euro crisis.  Meanwhile, in the US, there are signs of a gradual recovery, but it faces many challenges ahead.  Despite these external conditions, Singapore’s growth prospects have held up, and our economy is expected to grow by 5 per cent for the full year.  Singapore is fortunate to have been bolstered by resilient demand from emerging Asian economies, and strong performance in some domestic sectors such as manufacturing and tourism.

In A*STAR, we started 2011 preparing ourselves for the transition to a new funding framework under the Research, Innovation & Enterprise (RIE) 2015 plan.  One year on, I am pleased to say that A*STAR, together as one community, has risen to the occasion and crossed a major hump.  The transition has been difficult, especially for those in BMRC and the related research institutes, but the community has nonetheless turned in a remarkable performance.  Significantly, we have forged many strategic public-private partnerships. Some of these include that with Procter & Gamble, Applied Materials, Micron, Servier, L’Oreal, Danone, Nestlé, Huawei and Gamesa, bringing in considerable investments into Singapore and creating good, high-value jobs.  These partnerships take many forms but, ultimately, they are win-win arrangements for both the companies and A*STAR.

In 2011, building on our strong foundation in excellent science, A*STAR also received significant recognition for our innovations and technologies.  A*STAR won the Asian Wall Street Journal’s ‘Asian Innovation Awards’ for the automated disease diagnostic device MicroKit; Popular Science magazine’s ‘Best of What’s New Award’ for plug-and-play file-sharing device iTwin; and the Scientific American’s ‘10 New Technologies That Will Make a Difference’ for the discovery of a nano-particle that can destroy drug-resistant bacteria.  We also put A*STAR and Singapore in the Guinness Book of World Records for the world’s smallest molecule-sized gears.

Looking towards 2012, the global economic outlook is grim. The advanced economies are not expected to spring a sudden spurt of growth while the forecast for the emerging BRIC economies is that of a slowdown. This is notwithstanding that the emerging economies will still be contributing to most of the world’s growth next year.  Singapore will therefore have to be prepared for some challenging times ahead.

Amidst this climate of uncertainty and challenges, A*STAR will need to be nimble so as not to lose the momentum of 2011.  In particular, there will be a need for greater flexibility and responsiveness on our part.  A*STAR’s fundamental value propositions remain to be our world-class research capabilities built on excellent science; accessibility to state-of-the-art research facilities and infrastructure; and our dynamic and diverse talent pool.  We must however be flexible to adapt to changing conditions and in how we engage and collaborate with the companies and the wider research community.  Underpinning this, we must continue to think of meaningful ways to integrate effectively across our world-class capabilities both within and beyond A*STAR to open up new opportunities for knowledge creation and innovation for ourselves and our partners.  Even in difficult times, there will still be many opportunities for A*STAR to make an impact.  I am confident that by working closely together, we will remain on track to deliver our mission to create social and economic value for Singapore.

This year, Singapore celebrated 20 years of national science and technology planning and development, and A*STAR celebrated our 20th Anniversary.  We commemorated this milestone with a year-long celebration that started with our first A*STAR-wide Family Day at Universal Studios in April, and culminated in the launch of the A*STAR Commemorative Publication in November by our Prime Minister.  I have no doubt that many of you who have read the publication will find the vision, leadership and commitment of the pioneers, including policy makers, administrators and scientists, truly inspiring.  What is clear from the publication is that research is a human enterprise and it is people with passion and purpose that truly make all the difference.  Now that we have just celebrated the last 20 years, we should all work together to create an even better next 20 years.

We therefore have much work ahead and, at the same time, much to look forward to in the years to come.

I wish all of you a happy and successful 2012.

Lim Chuan Poh
31 Dec 2011