Ms Low Sin Leng

Chairman of the Board, Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts

A President Scholar and Colombo Plan Scholar, Ms Low Sin Leng holds a First Class Honours in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from the University of Alberta, an MBA from the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium and an AMP from Harvard Business School. 

Ms Low has been awarded the Board of Governors Prize in Engineering (1973, 1974), and Gold medals in the Electrical Engineering Department and Engineering Faculty (1975) of the University of Alberta. She supports her Alma Mater the National Junior College and serves as an advisor to the St. Nicholas Girls’ School. She has been conferred the Service to Education Award 2006 from the Ministry of Education. 

Ms Low served 20 years in the Singapore Government Administrative Service holding senior positions including Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Trade & Industry, Deputy Secretary of the Ministry of Finance and Director of the Ministry of Education before joining the private sector. First with Singapore Power Limited as Executive Vice President in 1995 and subsequently Sembcorp Industries Limited as Group Chief Operating Officer in 2000.

Ms Low was the Senior Executive Director of Sembcorp Industries Limited and concurrently the Executive Chairman of Sembcorp Development Limited which spearheads the Group's integrated township and industrial park business in China, Vietnam and Indonesia. Under her leadership, she transformed the business model and built a series of sustainable integrated township projects in these countries. Of particular success was the expansion of VSIP (Vietnam - Singapore Industrial Park) from one Industrial Park to 5 Integrated townships during her tenure. The footprint of Sembcorp's integrated township projects had also been expanded from Wuxi/Suzhou into Nanjing and Chengdu in China; and from Riau Islands into Central Java of Indonesia. 

On 1 January 2013, she retired from Sembcorp Industries Ltd and assumed the new role of Senior Advisor. From 1 January 2013 to 31 December 2016, she was the Chairman, Sino-Singapore (Chengdu) Innovation Park Development Co., Ltd; steering the development of the Joint venture project between Singapore consortium (Sembcorp and Ascendas-Singbridge) and Chengdu government under the wave of "Great Western China Development". 

She has relinquished her senior advisory role from Sembcorp since 1 January 2017, to focus on her extended family. She currently has 4 grandchildren from two sons. 

In 2021, Ms Low was conferred the prestigious Public Service Medal (Pingat Bakti Masyarakat), in recognition of her outstanding contributions to education and the public service.

Ms Low served on several Boards and Committees:

  • Board of Trustees of the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) since June 2011.

  • Board Chairman of Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts (NAFA) since 1 Aug 2013.

  • Independent Director on the Board of Air Liquide S.A., a public listed French Company with worldwide operations; from 7 May 2014 to 4 May 2022.

  • Board of Trustees of the University of the Arts Singapore (UAS), Singapore’s first arts university; appointed on 24 August 2022.

  • Founding Council Member of the China Cultural Centre since 2015.

  • Member of the CCOHC (Chinese Community Oral History Committee) since 2017.