NTU deepens ties with Sweden at visit by Swedish King Carl XVI Gustaf

NTU Singapore is deepening its collaboration with Swedish institutions, following a visit by His Majesty King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden to the University’s campus today.

As part of a three-day state visit to Singapore, King Carl XVI Gustaf attended a lunch and panel discussion hosted by NTU, together with the Swedish royal delegation, government representatives, business leaders and NTU faculty and management. During the visit, NTU and Swedish institutions signed two agreements that further academic and research ties.

This is the King’s first visit to NTU. In 2019, His Royal Highness Prince Daniel of Sweden visited NTU to learn about NTU's innovation and entrepreneurship initiatives in medical technology.

NTU President Professor Ho Teck Hua said: “We are honoured to host King Carl XVI Gustaf on our campus today. NTU enjoys close relations with many Swedish institutions. Faculty from both countries take advantage of the numerous research collaborations and fellowships available to them while our undergraduates benefit from the many exchange opportunities provided by Swedish universities. We look forward to deepening our ties with Sweden as we enhance our research, academic, and industrial ties to meet the challenges of sustainability and artificial intelligence.”

Furthering research and academic collaborations

NTU affirmed its collaboration with Swedish institutions through a series of joint initiatives that enhances academic, research and industrial ties.

NTU and Lund University signed a Memorandum of Understanding to boost research collaboration and inter-university educational opportunities. Both universities will identify new opportunities to collaborate in research areas such as materials science engineering, life sciences and sustainability. Aritificial intelligence (AI) is another major research area, especially within topics such as AI in the field of ageing, generative AI and computer science.

Graduate students from both universities, especially PhD students, will also have more opportunities for exchange programmes.

NTU’s Energy Research Institute @ NTU (ERI@N) and Swedish energy systems firm Anodox inked a research collaboration agreement on two projects to develop innovative and efficient energy storage solutions through cutting-edge immersion cooling technology.

The research collaboration taps on NTU’s expertise in advance power electronics system and Anodox’s specialisation in immersion cooling technique for energy storage systems.

By leveraging cutting-edge technologies and industry expertise, the joint research projects aim to develop more efficient batteries and energy storage solutions contributing to a more sustainable and resilient energy future.

Exploring the implications of AI on education, business and the public sector

The royal visit brought together industry, academia and government leaders from Singapore and Sweden to examine the impact and opportunities of AI at a panel discussion, a new area in which NTU and Sweden are deepening their research partnership.

The panellists, comprising Mr Marcus Wallenberg, Chairman of the Board of Directors for Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken (SEB), a North European financial group; Ms Darja Isaksson, Director General of Swedish innovation agency Vinnova; Professor Erik Renström, Vice-Chancellor, Lund University; Dr Ayesha Khanna, co-founder and CEO of AI solutions firm and incubator Addo.ai; and Dr Ong Chen Hui, Assistant Chief Executive, BizTech Group, Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA), discussed the implications of AI on the future of education, business and the public sector.

Professor Luke Ong, Vice President (AI & Digital Economy) and Dean, College of Computing & Data Science, moderated the discussion.

NTU’s strong ties with Sweden

Professor Bertil Andersson, a Swede, served as NTU President from 2011 to 2017, while Swedish banker and industrialist Mr Marcus Wallenberg received an honorary doctorate from NTU in 2022.

Both participated in the royal visit to NTU, which also included Ms Miriam Söderström, State Secretary to the Minister of Health Care and His Excellency Anders Fredrik Sjöberg, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Sweden to Singapore.

NTU has joint PhD programmes with top Swedish universities in diverse areas such as biomedicine with Karolinska Institutet; materials and nanoscience engineering, electrical engineering and integrated circuit design with Linkoping University; and electrical engineering, land and water resources engineering, transport science and building technology with KTH Royal Institute of Technology, among others.

On the research front, NTU has ongoing projects with the Wallenberg Autonomous Systems and Software Programme, Sweden’s largest individual research programme.

In collaboration with the Alice and Knut Wallenberg Foundation, NTU also established the Wallenberg-NTU Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2018.

The fellowship supports promising young researchers from Singapore and all over the world to carry out research at NTU and one of five Swedish universities involved in the Wallenberg Autonomous Systems and Software Programme.