Associate Professor Ivan Lee

Vice President (Industry & Community), Singapore Institute of Technology

Associate Professor Ivan LEE is the Vice President, Industry and Community Group, at the Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT). He provides strategic leadership in building a close nexus between SIT, students, industry partners and the community. Responsible for strategies in promoting industry collaboration and community partnerships, he actively engages companies, trade associations, government agencies and various interest groups to advance SIT’s mission and vision.

Associate Professor Lee joined SIT in 2013, and has taught manufacturing operations, engineering design and entrepreneurship courses across several degree programmes. He has been instrumental in conceptualising and spearheading various Innovation & Enterprise platforms and initiatives to promote and enhance collaboration, innovation and entrepreneurial activities between industry, academic staff and students.

Prior to joining SIT, he has acquired over 27 years of experience in high-tech manufacturing, R&D, management and consulting in such areas as tooling engineering, plastic injection molding, metal fabrication, product lifecycle management, business process improvement, operations management and enterprise systems. He has deep knowledge of precision engineering, printing, general manufacturing and IT industries, with significant experience in developing business strategies, enterprise IT systems and start-up companies.
Associate Professor Lee has founded two start-up companies, BLC Solutions Pte Ltd in 2004 and TrueZ Pte Ltd in 2013. The first was a spin-off company from the Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology (SIMTech), established to commercialise Web-based Product Lifecycle Management solutions, while the second specialised in cloud-based technologies for B2B collaboration and e-sourcing.

Associate Professor Lee graduated with a Diploma in Production Engineering (Silver Medal) from the Singapore Polytechnic in 1981, and a Bachelor of Engineering (First Class honours) conferred by the National University of Singapore (NUS) in 1985. He earned his PhD from NUS in 1993, focusing on intelligent process planning using expert systems.