Friday, 6 September 2013
MEDIA RELEASE: NR/27/2013
Singaporean and Indonesian Training & Education SMEs Sign MOUs to Form Joint Ventures
1. Bridge Learning and Republic Education Group, two Singaporean training & education small and medium enterprises (SMEs) signed Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) with Indonesia’s PT Budhi Lestari and its subsidiary, Raffles International Group of Schools to partner each other, in the areas of learning intervention and skills training respectively. This is an effort to meet the learning needs of the Indonesian market and further strengthen the economic cooperation between both Singapore and Indonesia, in the areas of vocational and skills training and education.
2. The two MOUs were signed in Bali, Indonesia in conjunction with the 37th APEC SME Working Group Meeting[1], from 4 to 7 September. The signing of the MOUs was witnessed by Singapore’s Senior Minister of State for Trade & Industry and National Development, Mr Lee Yi Shyan and Indonesia’s Minister for Cooperatives and SMEs, Dr Sjarifuddin Hasan.
3. The collaboration between the Singaporean and Indonesian educational institutions will meet the needs of the Indonesian market in two specific educational areas. The Singaporean SMEs bring with them their high-quality curriculum, training and expertise in their respective fields, while the Indonesian partners, established education institutions with international campuses offering University and International Cambridge programmes, will offer their vast networks and infrastructure.
4. Bridge Learning Group, an early intervention institution that uses a whole-brain based non-categorical approach to provide expertise and facilities for a wide spectrum of mild to moderate learning difficulties and disabilities, will partner PT Budhi Lestari in establishing two learning needs education centres in West and South Jakarta called PT Rophe. These centres will offer training and consultancy, and target to reach out to 800 students with learning difficulties in the next three years. The first student intake is expected to commence by November 2013. Bridge Learning plans to collaborate with PT Budhi Lestari to open 10 to 15 centres in Jakarta over the next five years.
5. Republic Education Group, is an education and training consortium formed by four training & education SMEs – Auston Institute Limited, CSM Academy International Group, First Media and SDH Corporation – with relevant expertise in engineering, healthcare, design, entrepreneurship and hospitality. This newly-formed SME will partner Raffles International Group of Schools in setting up a polytechnic in Jakarta called Raffles Polytechnic. Republic Education Group will offer consultancy, skills training and education to serve the vocational and training needs of the service industry in Indonesia. The new polytechnic will be the first in Jakarta to be equipped with the Singapore training curriculum for the service industry. Raffles Polytechnic is projected to enrol 1,000 students by 2017, with plans to establish more campuses in other parts of Jakarta to meet the growing training needs of the industry. This polytechnic will take in its first batch of students by July next year.
6. Ms Areena Loo, CEO of Bridge Learning said, “Through Rophe, we are very happy to bring our expertise and proven programmes to Indonesia. We are very excited about the positive impacts we are going to make in improving the learning, cognitive, social-communication and emotional development in the children through our neuroscience-based methodology. We are also looking forward to empowering the local parents and educators through our intensive training courses.”
7. “The Republic Education Group is pleased with the collective spirit of enterprise and joint mission of both our Singapore and Indonesia partners to provide a wholesome quality education. This polytechnic offers us a platform to showcase our best in terms of teaching, commitment and professionalism,” said Mr Mark Phooi, Director of Republic Education Group.
8. Mr Gary Tan, CEO of PT Budhi Lestari and Raffles International Group of Schools said, “We are indeed excited to embark on this partnership with Bridge Learning and the Republic Education Group. The meeting of minds, alignment of core values, vision and growth plans have been a strong impetus and motivating force for this MOU. We believe that the partnerships forged with Bridge Learning and Republic Education Group will bring about significant impact in Indonesia as we look forward to contributing to Indonesia’s growth in the coming years through the provision of quality education services.”
9. Indonesia was Singapore’s third largest trading partner in 2011 and 2012. With the Indonesian government’s enhanced initiatives to build schools across the country in the early 1990s, school enrolment rates have increased significantly. As a whole, education has been growing steadily every year and this has opened up more opportunities in the education sector in Indonesia. In turn, this has also provided Singaporean companies ample opportunities to collaborate with Indonesian partners in introducing their curriculums into the local markets. Many successful joint ventures and franchise partnerships have taken place. One example is Kinderland which has been in Indonesia for the last 18 years and has ten centres across Indonesia now, including Jakarta, Surabaya, Bandung and Medan. Given its extensive partnerships within the market, Kinderland is now the largest Singaporean preschool player within the Indonesia market.
10. In line with helping Singapore training & education SMEs scale their intellectual property to serve the region's growing needs. SPRING Singapore also led a business mission with six leading early childhood education and enrichment providers to Jakarta and Bali from 4 to 6 September, to explore partnerships for growth. As part of its efforts to enable training & education SMEs to attain stronger growth through regional market access, the mission seeks to leverage the APEC platform to showcase strong bilateral educational partnerships within Indonesia.
11. The MOUs signed today hopes to see keener collaborative interests between Singaporean and Indonesian SMEs in the education industry.
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About SPRING Singapore
SPRING Singapore is an agency under the Ministry of Trade and Industry responsible for helping Singapore enterprises grow and building trust in Singapore products and services. As the enterprise development agency, SPRING works with partners to help enterprises in financing, capability and management development, technology and innovation, and access to markets. As the national standards and accreditation body, SPRING develops and promotes an internationally-recognised standards and quality assurance infrastructure. SPRING also oversees the safety of general consumer goods in Singapore. Visit www.spring.gov.sgfor more information and news about SPRING Singapore.
About Bridge Learning
Bridge Learning is Singapore’s leading early intervention institution that provides one-stop non-categorical expertise and facilities for a wide spectrum of mild to moderate learning difficulties and learning disabilities. It caters to children between seven months to twelve years old, through its proven expertise, best practices and experience in therapy, specialised education & mainstream academic pedagogies. Bridge has a client base of almost 10,000 parents and educators and is a partner of Thomson Pediatric Medical Centre and the KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital. To date, it has partnered with more than 50 formal and informal learning institutions in Singapore, including preschools, primary and secondary schools.
About Republic Education Group
Four training & education SMEs- Auston Institute Limited, CSM Academy International, First Media and SDH Corporation - has set up a new entity called the Republic Education Group. With relevant expertise in engineering, healthcare, design, entrepreneurship and hospitality, this Singapore-based training & education SME will offer skills training, consultancy and education to serve the vocational and training needs of the service industry in Indonesia.
About PT Budhi Lestari
PT Budhi Lestari in Indonesia, an entity in partnership with the educational foundation Yayasan Pendidikan Kristen Ora et Labora founded by the late William Soeryadjaya, provides world-class, futuristic and quality national and international education programmes at all levels. This includes Raffles Academy (international learning institution offering foreign pathways for Foundation and Year 1 University Programmes from world-class universities) and Raffles International Christian School (RICS) that provides the International Cambridge (Primary Checkpoint, Secondary Checkpoint, IGCSE & A Levels) programme. RICS currently has three international school campuses in Jakarta, with plans to expand to more campuses within Jakarta.
About Raffles International Group of Schools
The Raffles International Group of Schools is synonymous with a strong tradition of excellence and quality education. The group of schools are located in North, West and South Jakarta. The school’s vision is to be a world class, futuristic and Christian learning community that nurtures Rafflesians to become active, lifelong learners and influential leaders of sterling character.
The students from the Raffles International Group of Schools have strongly outperformed global benchmarks for the subjects that they sat for in the past seven years and one in two students scored more than five distinctions consistently in international exams. The students at RICS also have a rich tradition of garnering the Outstanding Cambridge Learners Award consistently. RICS Alumni has successfully gained admission to top Universities in US, UK, Canada, Europe, Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore.
For media enquiries, please contact:
Ms Rozlin Farid Vanzandt
Senior Manager, Corporate Communications
SPRING Singapore
T : +65 6279 3894
M : +65 9476 2502
E : rozlin_vanzandt@spring.gov.sg
[1] The APEC SME Working Group (APEC SMEWG) works to encourage the development of SMEs and build their capabilities to engage in international trade. The APEC SMEWG meets twice a year. This meeting is hosted by Indonesia.
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