Prof. Inderjit Singh Dhaliwal
Inderjit started his career as Engineer with Texas Instruments (TI) where he spent the next 13 years ascending the corporate chain before becoming the youngest senior management team member – Director of Operations of the Singapore operations from 1996 to 1998.
Inderjit then began his entrepreneurial journey at the age of 37, after leaving TI in 1998, where he started and ran several businesses. He is the founder and first CEO and President of United Test and Assembly Center (UTAC), a technology-based global semiconductor firm that became an Unicorn in 2001.
In 1997, Inderjit also co-founded Tri Star Electronics together with his brothers, today a large MNC and one of the biggest distributors of consumer electronic products in Africa. He is now the CEO of Solstar, a Singapore-based consumer electronics brand which is growing rapidly in Africa.
In 2002, Inderjit founded Infiniti Solutions Inc., a Singapore-based semiconductor technology company, with operations in the Silicon Valley, a large manufacturing operation in the Philippines, two design centers in Hyderabad and Ahmedabad, India, with the HQ in Singapore. Infiniti Solutions received NASDAQ listing approval in the year 2004. Inderjit exited Infiniti Solutions via trade sale in 2015.
Inderjit served as a Board of Trustees Member of Nanyang Technological University (NTU) for 15 years, until March 2021, and became the founding Chairman of the board of NTUitive, the innovation company of NTU focusing on innovation, entrepreneurship education, technology transfer, commercialization of technology and incubation of start-ups and spin-offs. Inderjit was also the Chairman of the Alumni and Development Committee (ADC) of NTU, where he oversaw the university’s strategies for Alumni engagement and development, and fund-raising efforts for the University’s Endowment Fund.
Globally, he was the co-president of the World Entrepreneurship Forum (WEnF) for 10 years, until 2016 and is currently a board member of the World Business Angel Investment Forum (WBAF) where he concurrently is the President of the Global Start-up Committee, WBAF. Previously, Inderjit was among the founders of the Action Community of Entrepreneurship (ACE), a national organization that was instrumental in changing the entrepreneurship ecosystem and landscape in Singapore.
Inderjit was a Member of Parliament in Singapore from 1996-2015. As a politician, Inderjit served in various capacities, including being the Deputy Government Whip, and Chairman of the Government Parliamentary Committee for the Ministries of Finance, and Trade & Industry. Inderjit was a key board member of SPRING (now Enterprise Singapore) during the inception stages and played a key role championing Singapore’s innovation ecosystem. He was also the Chairman of the Investment Committee of SEEDS, a national VC, for 8 years. SEEDS was focused on early-stage investments of Singapore start-ups. He subsequently was the Chairman of the Investment Committee of the Growth Enterprise Fund (GEF), which was a growth stage government VC fund that invested in growth stage companies. As part of SEEDS and GEF, Inderjit was involved in seeding and funding many local start-ups and SMEs. Inderjit also served as board member of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA), for 8 years where he also served as the Chairman of the Audit Committee for several years.
Inderjit graduated from NTU with a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (Hons), and holds an MBA from Strathclyde University. Inderjit was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Amity University, India in 2018.
He is the author of the popular book, “The Art and Science of Entrepreneurship”, which captures his entrepreneurial experiences. Inderjit is also an inventor with 3 patents to his name, and is currently an Adjunct Professor at NTU, and also teaches Entrepreneurship at the Masters level at NTU.