Here’s what and where Singapore’s startup heads studied

This article was co-written by Febriani Ramadhanya.

It makes sense to presume that startup founders today have tech backgrounds or experience. However, this may not be the case in Singapore.

IPrice Group and Gobi Partners researched on the educational backgrounds of founders, CEOs, COOs, and other heads of some major startups in Singapore. And the most surprising discovery is that more than half of them pursued a non-tech major.

Let’s take a look at the findings.

75% are non-tech degree holders

It’s quite a surprise to find that only 25 percent of founders in Singapore have a degree in computer science, computer engineering, computing, or IT. This group includes Burpple CTO Daniel Hum, Carousell CTO Lucas Ngoo, and MoneySmart co-founder Timothy Kua.

What did the rest study then? Most of them have a degree in engineering (30), economics (19), and business (12), while others studied law, commerce, finance, and even history, among other non-tech majors.

Some startup heads who have an engineering degree are Fave co-founder Chen Chow Yeoh, Grab COO Tan Hooi Ling, and PropertyGuru co-founder Jani Rautiainen. Meanwhile, some of those who studied economics are Grab CEO Anthony Tan, Honestbee CEO Joel Sng, and Active.ai CEO Ravi Shankar.

Findings also show that you can still establish a successful startup even if you have a “less conventional” degree. Take note of these examples:

• Lunch Actually CEO Violet Lim took up law.
• MC Payment managing director Moon Soo Kim is an English Literature graduate.
• Clozette’s business development lead, Cheryl Tan, studied Chinese and Japanese languages.
• GoCoin co-founder Brock Pierce got a degree in film at the University of Southern California.

See also: Successful founders in the Philippines did not study tech, says this research

Meanwhile, some founders hold a degree relevant to their startup’s product. For example, Dawn Soo, the COO of DocDoc, studied medicine at the Imperial College London, and Farouk Meralli, CEO of mClinica, got his degree in biomedical sciences at McGill University.

40 founders attended NUS

The university that birthed the highest number of startup founders is National University of Singapore (NUS) with 40 founders, such as Be My Guest CEO Clement Wong and Ninja Van CTO Shaun Chong. NUS is followed by Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and Singapore Management University (SMU) with six and four founders, respectively. Founders from these two schools include M-Daq CEO Richard Koh and HipVan’s head of operations, Deborah Wee.

More founders studied abroad than in Singapore

Conclusion