The Singapore Straits Times article marking the 15th anniversary of the Suzhou Industrial Park (SIP) in which I was interviewed came out last week (May 23rd issue). Ms Grace Ng did a fine job of reportage. Some things I did not know about my adopted home/economic development zone that I read in the article included:

• The Singaporeans, ten years on, are still angry about the way the local Suzhou government treated their fledgling investment project;
• The Singaporeans marked their investment down to 35% equity stake (I always thought it was 40%), and from the planned 70 sq km of Park land to just 8 sq km.
• The Singaporeans are still smarting from missing out on dividends from profits the Park has taken since 2003.
• The Suzhou Singapore International School angered a lot of Singaporean parents in the Park when they changed from a Singaporean curriculum (a thinly-veiled British system, methinks) to an international system at the turn of the century, to support and attract a growing international population.

But Singaporean investors have learned their lessons, according to the article, moving on to Tianjin, Nantong and Dalian (Dalian was not cited in the article) to develop other industrial parks based on the Singaporean model.

Good thing, too: it’s a terrible thing to see a grown Singaporean cry.