TAN Su Shan - the group head of institutional banking at DBS - begins this interview with The Business Times by declaring that she is “segment, country and product-agnostic”. “I don’t care if you are a startup with no money, or a multinational in a hundred countries. I look at the business holistically,” said Tan, one of the bank’s most senior executives, at her office in Tower 3 of Marina Bay Financial Centre.

She speaks of the need to ensure all companies, big or small, have access to the necessary information, resources and financing to be competitive, especially in the current difficult operating environment that is troubled by wars, geopolitical tensions and supply chain disruptions, among many other challenges.

One of the ways DBS ensured small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Singapore were able to ride through the impact of the coronavirus pandemic was the provision of collateral-free loans. Since the start of Covid-19 more than 2 years ago, the bank has approved over 16,300 such loans totalling more than S$7 billion to SMEs, with 90 per cent going to micro SMEs.