Women in Business
Programme
A Scale-Up Journey for Women-Led Businesses
Quick Links
Purposeful Growth × Resilient Scale
The Women in Business (WIB) Programme is a 6‑month scale‑up journey designed for women business founders who are leading established companies and preparing for their next phase of growth.
Built in collaboration with UOB SME Banking (Emerging Enterprise), the programme strengthens commercial clarity, leadership capacity, and regional expansion readiness through practical capability-building, strategic mentorship, and access to UOB’s cross‑border ecosystem.
Programme Resources
Business Resilience Fundamentals: Winning The Bottom Line
These resources are designed to help founders gain clear visibility over their personal income and business cash flow, enabling more confident planning, better financial decisions, and a stronger foundation for long‑term business resilience.
LinkedIn Profile Optimisation
Programme Schedule
Digital Growth & AI for Business Leaders
9:30am - 2:30pm
(Registration starts at 9am)
Microsoft Singapore
182 Cecil St, #13-01, S(069547)
Agenda Overview
This session equips women business leaders with practical, accessible ways to harness AI and digital tools to drive sustainable business growth.
Designed for founders and decision‑makers, the programme goes beyond theory to introduce a clear digital transformation framework that supports confident decision‑making and real‑world execution.
Through real‑world case studies, hands‑on exploration, and peer learning, participants will see how AI can be applied across key business functions — from marketing and customer engagement to operations and analytics.
9.30am - 9.50am
Frontier Firms: Harnessing AI & GenAI for Business Transformation
This session looks at how forward‑looking “Frontier Firms” are redefining productivity and competitiveness by re‑imagining the way work gets done with AI.
Tech Discovery: AI & GenAI for Businesses
A clear, practical overview of AI and Generative AI — focusing on what these technologies can realistically do for businesses today. Participants will be introduced to accessible tools and solutions that can enhance efficiency, augment teams, and scale output without significantly increasing headcount or complexity.
9.50am - 10.20am
The 5 Focus Areas of Digital Transformation for Growth-Ready Businesses
A structured framework session that helps leaders look beyond individual tools to understand end‑to‑end digital transformation as a strategic growth driver.
Participants gain a clear mental model of how digital and AI capabilities come together across the business to support stronger decision‑making, capability‑building, and long‑term, sustainable growth.
10.20am - 10.55am
AI for Growth
This session shows how businesses can use AI to strengthen marketing, sales, and customer engagement without complex systems or large teams. Through practical examples, participants will learn how AI can support content creation, optimise campaigns, and enable more targeted and personalised customer interactions.
By connecting these touchpoints, the session highlights how AI can enhance the full customer journey from initial engagement to conversion and retention.
10.55am - 11.30am
Fireside Chat: SMEs on AI Adoption
An honest, peer‑led conversation featuring SME leaders sharing real experiences with AI adoption — what worked, what didn’t, and what they would do differently.
The session is designed to build confidence through practical insights, lived lessons, and candid advice, especially for SMEs navigating AI adoption at different stages.
11.30am - 12.15pm
AI for Operations
This session explores how businesses can use AI to run smarter, more efficient operations—across people management, data-driven decision-making, and day-to-day productivity.
Through an integrated showcase of solutions, the session will demonstrate how AI can streamline HR processes, turn business data into actionable insights, and automate workflows to improve speed, accuracy, and overall efficiency—without increasing organisational complexity.
Participants will gain a clear understanding of how AI can support end-to-end operations, helping businesses scale sustainably while staying lean and agile.
1. AI for Marketing
Discover how AI can strengthen marketing effectiveness — improving visibility, engagement, and conversion while managing time and resource constraints. Participants will explore how AI supports:
- Content creation and campaign optimisation
- Audience targeting and personalisation
- More effective digital marketing without large teams or complex systems
2. AI for Customer Engagement
Learn how AI‑enabled platforms can enhance digital presence, streamline marketing and sales activities, and deliver more personalised customer experiences at scale.
This session illustrates how AI‑powered customer insights, data segmentation, and automation can be applied to:
- Understand customer behaviour
- Optimise engagement across digital touchpoints
- Improve conversion, retention, and lifetime value
3. AI for Business Processes and Productivity Automation
A practical session focused on how AI and automation can simplify internal operations.
Participants will explore how businesses apply AI to:
- Streamline internal processes
- Reduce manual workload
- Improve day‑to‑day productivity across functions and industries
12.15pm - 12.30pm
Sharing session by UOB
UOB FinLab and Ecosystem Partnership
This session highlights how UOB FinLab supports SMEs — including women‑led businesses — in adopting AI across their operations. Participants will learn how UOB initiatives help businesses:
- Build AI awareness and readiness
- Identify and prioritise relevant AI use cases
- Navigate adoption pathways such as Proof‑of‑Concept (PoC) development
The session also shares how financing and ecosystem partnerships can help turn AI ideas into real‑world implementation.
12.30am - 2.00pm
Lunch and Networking
Strategic Growth & Mentorship Kick‑Off Day
9:30am - 4:00pm
(Registration starts at 9am)
Oakwood Bencoolen Hotel
Level 4 Function Room, 30 Bencoolen Street, Singapore 189621
Agenda Overview
This integrated session brings together strategic clarity and meaningful connection to kick off the mentorship phase of the Women in Business Programme.
Participants build on earlier insights by sharpening growth and expansion decisions, before transitioning into structured mentor conversations.
The day is designed to help founders clarify priorities, deepen reflection, and connect with mentors who can best support their business transformation journey ahead.
9.30am - 12.30pm
Strategic Differentiation & AI Decision Guardrails
Spark Launchpad
Businesses will develop more confident growth strategies by identifying practical ways to differentiate without relying on radical innovation. The session explores how to build on existing strengths, tap into new customer segments, and design scalable models for expansion across ASEAN markets.
In addition, key guardrails for AI adoption are introduced, highlighting the risks, governance, and compliance considerations leaders need to manage as AI becomes part of their operations.
12:30pm - 2pm
Lunch and Networking
2pm - 2.10pm
Welcome address and session overview
UOB
2.10pm - 2.20pm
SkillsFuture Singapore: Mentorship Grant Overview
UOB FinLab and Ecosystem Partnership
An overview of the SkillsFuture Mentorship Grant, highlighting how structured mentorship can be supported beyond the programme.
This segment is informational in nature, helping business leaders understand available pathways to deepen advisory support as they scale.
2:20pm - 2:50pm
Meet the Mentors
Meet the programme mentors and learn about their areas of expertise and experience. This segment helps participants identify potential alignment based on their current business priorities and transformation focus.
2:50pm - 3:40pm
Mentor Conversations: Guided & Open
A structured yet flexible session that combines focused group discussions with open mentor exchanges, helping founders identify the right mentorship fit for their growth and transformation goals.
Sessions Details:
- 2:50pm – 3:20pm – Guided Conversations
- 3:20pm – 3:50pm – Open Mentor Exchange
3:50pm - 4:30pm
Closing and Networking
Capstone Day - From Strategy to Opportunity: Expansion, Insight & Community
Agenda Overview
The Capstone Day brings the Women in Business Programme to a close by linking strategy, market insight, and community.
Participants sharpen their expansion and pitching narratives, ground their growth plans with ASEAN market perspectives, and connect with mentors and alumni through meaningful peer exchange.
Designed as both a culmination and a bridge forward, the day reinforces clarity, confidence, and community as founders step into their next phase of growth.
2.00pm - 4.45pm
Business Expansion Strategy and Pitching for Growth
Spark Launchpad
Learn how to articulate and pitch your expansion strategy clearly to investors, partners, distributors, and banks—especially in overseas markets.
This session focuses on brand storytelling as a differentiation lever in price‑competitive ASEAN environments and helps founders structure a compelling growth narrative.
Participants also get guided practice in pitching their differentiated expansion plans, with a brief focus on trademarks for overseas readiness.
4.45pm - 5.45pm
ASEAN Market Insights & Economic Outlook
This session provides participants with practical macro and market insights to ground their expansion decisions.
Translating regional economic trends into SME‑relevant implications, the session covers consumer demand patterns, operating considerations, and market risks across key ASEAN economies.
The discussion equips founders with a broader perspective to validate expansion plans and make more informed, risk‑aware growth decisions.
5:45pm - 6:15pm
Break and Preparation for Networking Night
A short transition break allowing participants to reset after the learning sessions, while alumni and mentors arrive for the evening programme.
Light refreshments are served as the space shifts from a workshop environment to a relaxed community setting.
6:15pm - 8:00pm
Women in Business (WIB) Community Evening
The WIB Community Evening brings together the current cohort, programme alumni, mentors, and ecosystem partners to close the programme through shared experience and connection.
The evening features lightly facilitated peer exchanges and organic networking, creating space for candid conversations, knowledge sharing, and relationship‑building across cohorts.
Alumni contribute practical insights from their growth journeys, offering perspective and encouragement, while participants deepen connections within the WIB community beyond the formal programme.
10:00am - 10:10am
Opening Address by UOB FinLab
10:10am - 10:20am
UOB Business Outlook 2026 Insights
UOB SME Banking (Emerging Enterprise)
10:20am - 10:40am
Financial Resilience for Business
UOB SME Banking (Emerging Enterprise)
10:40am - 11:00am
From Awareness to Action: Government Grants That Support SMEs
SME Centre@SICCI
11:00am - 11:50am
Foundations for Scale: Leading with Clarity, Confidence and Commercial Discipline
This fireside chat is a conversational and experience-driven session that explores how businesses like Manna Group scale responsibly amidst economic uncertainty, with a focus on strategic clarity, leadership confidence, and commercial discipline.
Moderated By:
UOB
11:50am - 1:00pm
Lunch and Networking
10:00am - 5:00pm
Lifelong Learning Institute
Level 1-02, 11 Eunos Road 8, Singapore 408601
Business Resilience Fundamentals: Winning The Bottom Line
Learn how to uncover the true drivers of profitability, identify margin leakages, and apply unit-economics thinking to make better pricing, investment and growth decisions.
Designed to help leaders strengthen resilience and scale intentionally – not just grow revenue.
10:00am - 5:00pm
Lifelong Learning Institute
Level 2 - 01, 11 Eunos Road 8, Singapore 408601
Leadership Identity & Personal Brand for Scale
An immersive session designed for women founders to clarify their leadership identity and strengthen their professional presence as they scale.
Through guided reflection and practical application, participants gain clarity on what they stand for as leaders and translate that into confident, credible visbility that builds trust, influence and partnerships.
This session reframes personal branding as a strategic leadership asset – supporting sustainable growth without superficial self-promotion.
Learning Outcome
- Build self-awareness & psychological safety: surface strengths, leadership challenges, limiting identities, and blockers to scale through open sharing.
- Shift mindset for scale: move from “doing everything” to building systems and developing people.
- Anchor a scalable leader identity: translate the new identity into clear communication, leadership behaviours, and an actionable personal brand aligned with business growth.
10:00am - 3:00pm
Lego Serious Play (LSP) Workshop
- Leadership Identity & Strengths
- Understanding Challenges in Scaling Business
- From Bottleneck to Builder
- Letting go of OLD Identity
- Embodying the Next-Level Leader
3:00pm - 3:15pm
Break
3:15pm - 4:00pm
Personal Branding Strategy
- Personal Branding Canvas Exercise
- Pair sharing & feedback
4:00pm - 5:00pm
Building a Brand that Grows Beyond You
Practical insights, and next steps for implementation
Panelist:
Bynd Artisan
Louken Group
Unilever
Grow with clarity and confidence
Personalised 1-1 mentorship to refine decisions and accelerate growth. Take the Business Needs & Readiness Assessment if you have yet to complete.
Key moments and conversations
Take a stroll through the moments, conversations, and candid highlights that shaped our Phase 1 journey.
Women in Business
2026 Vibes
Food &
Beverage
One That You’ve Been Eating Since 1999
GAN HUP LEE (1999) PTE LTD
Wholesome, Planet‑Loving Eats
Saute Earth Food Pte Ltd
We Don’t Chicken Out on Quality
Hai Ge Ji Pte Ltd
Fresh from the Oven – Tarts
Mdm Ling Bakery
Childhood Memories, One Pastry at a Time
Uncle Lee Confectionery
Pastries with Precision
Patissier Woo Holdings Pte Ltd
Baked to Be Loved
Butterfingers Pte Ltd (Butter Studio)
Where Concepts Become Cafes
Mega Collective Pte Ltd (cafés & F&B concepts)
Education & Enrichment
Growing Curious Minds
Bluetree Education Pte Ltd
Building Confident Communicators
WRITERS AT WORK ENRICHMENT CENTRE PTE LTD
Where Great Writing Begins
Writers Studio
Grooming Tiny Hands for Future Musicians
Joy Education
Early Genius Builders
Heguru Education Centre Pte Ltd
Playground for Future Tech Innovators
The Lab Education Centre Pte Ltd
Furniture Built for Kids
Kids Haven
Modernising Calligraphy Culture
Inklings Creative Studio
Health, Beauty and Wellness
Wellness from Tradition
Oriental Remedies Group
Bespoke Beauty and Wellness for Glow
A DrBrand Pte Ltd
Breathe. Stretch. Namaste
Hom Yoga
Skincare for Confidence in Every Layer
Skin Belief
Natural Ingredients for Better Living
Kew Organics
Caring for the Wellness of All Mummies
Lady Raffles International Pte Ltd
Purposeful Longevity Care
Ikigai Medical
Science Meets Skin
DR ORA PTE. LTD.
Hospitality & Travel
Handpicking Your Holiday Villa
VILLA FINDER PTE LTD
Design for Excellent Boutique Stays
Nuve Holdings Pte Ltd (Hotel Nuve)
Aviation, Up Close
WingsOverAsia
Industrial, Logistics & Trade
Making Stylish Power Point Tracks
Currentx Pte Ltd
Turning Sunshine into Energy for Eco Purpose
Stellar Industries Pte Ltd
Reliable Packaging for Your Irreplaceable Items
BlackVel Bulk Packagings Pte Ltd
Logistics Made Simple
A2EShip
Connecting Global Trade in Wellness
Iluho International Pte. Ltd.
Professional Services
Big Moments Made Beautiful
Rosette Creative Events Pte Ltd
Design. Build. Deliver
Builtbot Pte Ltd
Crafted Living Spaces
Haus Atelier
Making Words Work like Magic
Whitewords Pte. Ltd.
Weave Engagements and Impressions for Clients
Weave Asia Pte Ltd
Retail, Lifestyle & Consumer Brands
Everyday Active Living
Enso Lifestyle Pte Ltd
Timeless, Priceless
ANDRINA YVETTE
Thoughtfully Arranged Flowers and Moments
The Florte Pte Ltd
Raising Gentle Giant Cats
Oubao Asia (Perfect Maine Coon SG)
Minimal Looks, Maximum Vibes
byCaxs
Comfortable Wear Designed for Daily Life
JERNN INTERNATIONAL PTE. LTD.
Happily Ever After in Style
Z Wedding Design Pte Ltd
Dream Dresses Realised
Odelia Bridal Studio
Timeless Feminine Style, Everyday Elegance
Theory Inc Pte Ltd (Thread Theory)
Blooms with Heart
Petite Fleur SG Pte Ltd
Care for Every Creature
My Animal Dispensary Pte Ltd
Scents You’ll Remember, Especially in Sentosa
jetaime perfumery pte ltd
Ultra‑gentle Things for Tiny Humans
Elly Milley Pte Ltd
Timeless Sparkle Pieces
SIMONE JEWELS PTE. LTD.
Business Needs & Readiness Assessment
Start by understanding your business needs and priorities for a more meaningful scale-up experience.
All things Women
Home-grown Sonata Dancewear makes a jete into South-east Asia by pirouetting on tradition
Two women entrepreneurs on how they tackled tradition and gender biases to transform their businesses
Discover how Ms Ethel Tan, founder of Edith Patisserie, turned her passion into a thriving business.
