MR. KOH YONG GUAN
Independent Director
Koh joined Singapore’s Civil Service as a Biomedical Engineer in the Ministry of Health in 1972 and was absorbed into the Administrative Service in 1979. He served in the Ministries of Finance (Revenue Division), Education and Defence before being appointed Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Defence in 1989. Mr Koh was the Commissioner of Inland Revenue from 1991 to 1997. In 1998, he was appointed Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore (Governor of the Central Bank). He had also held the appointments of Permanent Secretary, Ministries of Health and National Development, and Second Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Finance (Budget and Revenue) between 1998 and 2001. He retired as the Managing Director, Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), in June 2005, and remained a member of the MAS Board until April 2011. He served as the Chairman of Central Provident Fund Board, the national pension fund for all employees in both the private and public sectors in Singapore, from 2005 to 2013. He was Singapore’s Non-Resident High Commissioner to Canada from May 2008 to March 2013.
Koh is currently the Chairman of the Board of SMRT Corporation Ltd, a publicly listed company that runs the underground train system, buses and taxi services in Singapore. He is also Chairman of the Singapore Deposit Insurance Corporation, and Chairman of the Cancer Sciences Institute of Singapore. Mr. Koh is Singapore’s Ambassador (Non-Resident) to Greece since May 2013.
He graduated with a Bachelor of Applied Science (Honours) degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1970 and a Master of Applied Science in Mechanical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering in 1972 from the University of Toronto on a Colombo Plan scholarship. He obtained a Master in Business Administration (with distinction) from the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium in 1981. He was conferred an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Toronto in 2011.