Today CNA reported that Dyson was conducting “surprise” layoffs in Singapore that left employees “shocked and in a state of low morale”. According to the report Dyson employed 1920 people in Singapore before this round of layoffs. In July Dyson had announced that it was axeing around 1,000 jobs in the UK, but that Singapore would not be “directly impacted.”

In July 2023 James Dyson, the founder and owner of the eponymous company, was awarded the Public Service Star by President Halimah Yaacob (on the recommendation of then PM Lee and the Cabinet) for his “remarkable contributions to the Singapore economy”, according to Economic Development Board (EDB) Chairman Png Cheong Boon.

Today’s report said that the company’s planned high tech battery manufacturing plant in Tuas, previously announced. in 2023, as part of a 2022 commitment to invest $1,5 billion in advanced manufacturing, would still be going ahead. However there must be serious questions on whether these plans will ever come to fruition in view of Chinese competition and Xi’s determination that China will dominate new technologies and make unviable any advanced or even basic manufacturing currently taking place outside China.

Dyson has a history of cancelling or scaling back investments in Singapore. In 2019 it decided to scrap its electric car project which was to be manufactured in Singapore after deciding that the company could not compete with Tesla and the legacy automobile companies. At the time I wondered how much of the investment by Dyson had actually been paid for by the Singapore taxpayer in the form of subsidies and grants.

EDB and the PAP Government should disclose how much of the investment Dyson has made and still says it will make in Singapore has been underwritten by undisclosed Singaporean state aid. How many of the existing jobs and production would be viable if not underwritten by the Singapore taxpayer? How much has this contributed to Dyson’s profitability and thus directly to James Dyson’s personal wealth? James Dyson has also been a big investor in Singapore property, buying Singapore’s biggest penthouse flat in 2019 for $74 million, no doubt attracted by the fact that Singapore doesn’t tax investment income, foreign income or dividends. No doubt it will be worth considerably more now as more foreign billionaires move to Singapore.

Will the Government re-examine its decision to award Sir James Dyson a Public.Service Star in light of the layoffs or will there just be an embarrassed silence?

Published by kjeyaretnam

I'm a Singaporean economist who became an opposition activist. I blog to provide an alternative to the porkies that the Pinkies tell. It just so happens that my alternative is the truth. That's why I've never been sued in any civil or criminal court no matter how hard hitting my criticism. I'm quoted and interviewed and asked to speak across the world but largely censored in Singapore in an effort to silence my political opinions. The left hate me because they think I split their vote and because I eschew their outmoded economic models. Models that don't work. The Right and the Conservatives hate me because I'm a liberal. I'm not sure what the middle think of me. I don't think there are more than a handful of people in the middle, here in Singapore. I'm a Singaporean born and bred, dual heritage, my parents Singaporean established here before the State of Singapore was created. I'm not Eurasian. I read economics at Cambridge and could be broadly described as from the Keynesian school but I believe in interventions. I was formerly a successful hedge fund manager. After economics and politics my greatest interests are history, film and Makan. I run but I run so I can eat like a Singaporean. View all posts by kjeyaretnam