TECHNOPRENEUR Ong Peng Tsin, 45, is passionate about engineering because it helps create new things: software, gadgets and even buildings.

'Engineering seems to have gone out of fashion,' he said. 'We need to create jobs that produce ideas, and not just pay to push buttons.'

New ideas patented or copyrighted in Singapore will enhance the Republic's position as an intellectual property (IP) centre, said Mr Ong who has two software patents under his belt.

Another five patents waiting to be registered are for software he built at his last company Encentuate, which he sold on March 11 to IBM for an undisclosed sum.

Mr Ong said that IP ought to be measured as a contributor to growth and not be included as part of other sectors like services and manufacturing.

'The measurement will allow economists and planners to know how well we're doing as an ideas place, which is crucial if we're to do well in the coming years,' he added.

Mr Ong founded Encentuate, which specialises in identity management, in 2001. In 1995, he founded Interwoven, an Internet content management company, in the United States. He made his first fortune when he listed Interwoven on Nasdaq in 1999.

Before this, in the late 80s, he worked as a software engineer in Silicon Valley with software firms like Sybase. It was while working there that he co-founded an online matchmaking site called match.com, which he sold off before he started Interwoven.

While Mr Sim Wong Hoo, the founder of Creative Technology, has been the popular poster boy for technopreneurship in Singapore, Mr Ong has had a lower profile. In part, this was due to the nature of the two men's businesses.

Creative's sound card and MP3 businesses are aimed at the mass consumer computing space, while Interwoven is a business software solution used in corporate computing centres and is thus less visible to the public.

Humble beginnings

MR ONG began his studies in computer science between 1980 and 1981 when National Junior College offered the A-level subject for the first time.

His software skills were honed further when he was posted to the Systems and Computer Organisation (SCO) in the Singapore Ministry of Defence for about a year as part of his national service (NS) after he suffered a knee injury.

The SCO was the place where many Singapore information technology (IT) pioneers like Mr Lim Swee Say and Mr Stephen Yeo cut their teeth in software development.

Mr Lim is today the secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress while Mr Yeo is the vice-president for South-east Asia at IT consulting firm EDS.

After finishing his NS, Mr Ong left to study electrical engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. Then he moved to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he earned a master's in computer science.

All for a passion

MR ONG, who is a board member of the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), now wants to nurture his passion.

As chairman of Infocomm Investments, an IDA subsidiary with a treasure chest of about $300 million to fund new start-ups, he will be rolling out a new programme to attract engineers with ideas for building new things to come forward.

He has also persuaded IBM - as part of the Encentuate deal - to open a lab in Singapore to do software development. Encentuate's 24 research and development engineers will form the core group for this lab.

Mr Ong will be hiring more engineers, some of whom will be high-level developers able to draw six-figure salaries.

Now that the deal has been sealed with IBM, Mr Ong wants to recover from his lack of sleep. Over the past month, he has had only two to four hours of sleep a night as talks with IBM drew to a close.

During the intense negotiations which began in the middle of last year, he travelled between the US and Singapore frequently. It was during this time that he suffered a relapse of an old back injury.

He was confined to bed for two days in a New York hotel, but recovered enough to get a ticket and head home. Back in Singapore, he was confined to bed for another week before he recovered fully.

As IBM's transition executive, Mr Ong will have to ensure that Encentuate, which has 40 staff and 80 customers, folds smoothly into one of IBM's software product groups called Tivoli.

To celebrate the acquisition, he held a party at his house in Singapore's District 10 area on March 16. 'Everyone in the company is happy. Now, we have this bulk behind us, a big IT company, which will be able to support us and open new markets,' he said in a recent interview at the IDA office in the Suntec convention centre.

IBM has moved fast since March 11. Encentuate's employees have already received training on Lotus Notes - IBM's corporate e-mail system.

Securing a partner

TALKS with IBM and other software companies on a possible partnership with Encentuate began last year when Mr Ong returned to the business after a 12-month hiatus.

He had taken time off to look after his ailing father.

By then, he had found that the identity management market had matured. For every deal Encentuate signed, another 100 were snapped up by other companies, said Mr Ong.

To compete effectively, he realised that Encentuate had to partner big IT firms. Talks were initiated with several companies including IBM, he said.

'The more we talked to IBM, the more both parties saw how it would be a good fit if Encentuate became part of IBM. Hence, we began to talk seriously about an acquisition.'

Now that he is part of IBM, would Mr Ong continue his career with the global IT giant?

'I don't know. Look at the number of software companies that IBM has acquired. Most of the founders are still with IBM today. There are also so many Nobel laureates at IBM, the company must be doing something right,' he said.