Over a third of staff left SGInnovate, a Singapore government-owned firm nurturing deep tech

More than a third of the employees at SGInnovate, a government-owned firm nurturing deep tech startups in Singapore, have left in recent months, according to sources with direct knowledge of the situation.

About 15 staff have departed, out of a headcount of nearly 40 full-timers, the sources told Tech in Asia. Many were offered alternative roles in the company, but exited anyway. While sources claim the exodus happened over three months, SGInnovate says it occurred over a longer period of time and their staff count is over 40.

Nearly half of the departures came from the ecosystem development department, which was tasked with connecting startups in Singapore with counterparts abroad.

That department is being shut down, the people said. Its head, Alex Lin, left in September after filing his resignation three months prior. He quit before his contract ended.

Dramatic transition

SGInnovate CEO Steve Leonard issued a statement via email: “People movement is common in all organizations, sometimes less and sometimes more. It is not surprising given we have been dramatically repositioning our business from the IIPL (Infocomm Investments) days to meet ever-changing market needs.”

“While we never like to lose good people in the team, we respect the decision of everyone seeking a change.”

Other executives who left include investment principal Zach Tan and acting finance head Shirlynn Teo.

IIPL was the forebear of SGInnovate. While IIPL focused broadly on internet startups, its direction changed after the new entity formed and Leonard took the helm.

Consisting of the same team working at IIPL, SGInnovate started focusing on supporting “deep tech” startups – shorthand for companies with strong intellectual property.

A big part of this was partnering with Entrepreneur First (EF) to launch a Singapore program. EF is a startup accelerator originally from London that focuses on individuals rather than companies. In other words, there is no need to register a company or have a prototype before you join.

EF graduated its first batch of 12 teams in May, and SGInnovate invested US$35,600 in each of the startups.

“The companies we are working with have seen more than S$2 million (US$1.5 million) in new business in the past six months,” said Leonard.

(Update on October 3, 5.15pm SGT: Added clarifications from SGInnovate, and corrections to Tan’s and Teo’s job titles.)