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Opinion & Features

From targeted strike to regional firestorm: how the US-Israeli attack on Iran escalated

It is now a regional war – fought across at least seven countries, with missiles falling on civilian airports, naval headquarters and residential districts

A broader uplift in standards and clearer recognition of high-quality HR practice is needed, says the writer.
Opinion & Features
THE BOTTOM LINE

Singapore should professionalise HR to stay agile amid disruption

Stronger human resources capabilities strengthen business agility and resilience

If children generate positive externalities – fiscal, social and strategic – then public co-investment should mirror that reality across the life cycle.
Opinion & Features
THINKING ALOUD

Children are national assets. Our support must reflect that

A case for treating children as Singapore’s long-term equity

OCBC group CEO Tan Teck Long's corporate strategy, "The Next Frontier", seeks to bridge the gaps between the lender's individual engines.
Opinion & Features
HOCK LOCK SIEW

OCBC chief Tan Teck Long’s new strategy is a masterstroke, but execution risks abound

While his ‘Next Frontier’ plan looks good on paper, it must survive contact with operational reality

Jebel Ali, the emirate’s fast-growing port and transhipment hub, has paused operations.
Opinion & Features

The Iran war is a jolt to Dubai’s business model

Can the emirate keep people and investors coming?

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is well aware of the dangers of a potential two-front trade war with both Beijing and the second Trump administration.
Opinion & Features

Will Germany find a new economic equilibrium with China?

The Asian country’s domestic slowdown amid a volatile global outlook offers a strategic opening for Berlin to rebalance relations with Beijing

In November 2025, Anthropic partnered with Palantir Technologies, a data analytics company that does a lot of work for the Pentagon, turning its LLM Claude AI into the reasoning engine inside a decision-support system for the US military.
Opinion & Features

Claude AI helped bomb Iran. But how, exactly?

The lack of visibility on how artificial intelligence is already being used in war is deeply troubling

When someone does actually sound the alarm over a legitimate threat to our well-being from AI, nobody will hear it since we might have collectively tuned out by then.
Opinion & Features
THINKING ALOUD

If everything is an AI crisis, then nothing is

Beware the absurd tyranny of what-if scenarios

Rerouting around the US-Israel-Iran conflict in the Middle East might mean more transit through hubs such as Singapore, Bangkok and Hong Kong.
Opinion & Features

New airline hubs will be the gainers as travel reroutes from the Middle East

As the US-Israel-Iran conflict rages on, East-West travel will seek fresh routings, and domestic travel in Asia will continue to grow

Singapore's “sandwiched” mid-sized enterprises are often too large for broad stabilisation measures, yet lack the capital depth, specialist talent and implementation capacity to fully leverage transformation incentives.
Opinion & Features
THE BOTTOM LINE

Why Singapore’s mid-tier enterprises face the toughest transition with Budget 2026

Mid-sized enterprises caught between stabilisation and scale need greater support

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