The 13th Lee Kuan Yew Global Business Plan Competition has opened applications from university founders and recent graduates building deep tech for urban and sustainability challenges.
The competition is organized by Singapore Management University (SMU)’s Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship. It covers 12 focus areas, including climate tech, energy, food and land use, urban mobility, longevity and health tech, sustainable materials, and circularity. Applications close on March 31, 2027.
Fifty finalists will travel to Singapore from September 28 to October 1, 2027, to compete for more than S$2.5 million ($1.95 million) in prizes. The finals will include an innovation festival with investor engagement, mentorship and meetings with corporate and ecosystem partners.
Finalists can also join the Urban SustaInnovator accelerator, launched by the SMU launched in 2025 to provide market access, pilot projects, and introductions across Asia. In May 2026 SMU launched a $10 million fund, the USI Fund, to back ventures as they pilot and scale.
Rony Palathinkal, head of the competition and of the accelerator at SMU IIE, said the accelerator and fund give founders a route to pilot, scale and raise capital across Asia after the competition.
Chor Chee Hoe, co-founder of Qarbotech, a Malaysian agritech company that turns agricultural waste into compounds that improve crop productivity, said the competition and accelerator led to meetings with family offices that secured pilot projects.
The SMU said its overseas centers in Bangkok, Jakarta, Ho Chi Minh City and Shenzhen, and its international advisory councils in eight countries, can help startups cross borders. Sun Sun Lim, vice president of partnerships and engagement at SMU, said the network connects startups with industry, government, and community partners.
Two finalists from the 12th competition have secured pilots with The GEAR by Kajima, the innovation hub of Japanese construction group Kajima in Singapore.
Standard Physics, founded by Qiu Ziming and Kabir Jain, combines real-time sensor data with computational fluid dynamics to build digital twins that help buildings and data centres cut energy use. It joined Y Combinator’s Winter 2026 cohort and then SMU’s inaugural accelerator. It has secured a Kajima pilot and is in talks on three more and recently raised a US$2.3 million seed round led by Square Peg Capital.
The competition, founded by SMU in 2002, is held every two years and is open to start-ups with at least one founder enrolled in a university program or who graduated within the past five years. The 12th edition, held in October 2025, drew more than 1,500 entries from founders at more than 1,200 universities in 91 countries. The last four editions have collectively raised more than S$1 billion.
Singapore’s Research, Innovation and Enterprise 2030 plan dedicates S$10.8 billion to mission-oriented research, including urban solutions and sustainability.