Daily Briefing: Manufacturing sector job openings double to 6,370 in mid-October; MOM offers one-time vaccination for migrant workers

And B2B sales productivity startup Nektar.ai raises $2.89m.

From ChannelNewsAsia:

The number of job opportunities in the manufacturing sector has doubled in the last two months, with about 6,370 openings in the sector as of mid-October compared to 3,200 at the end of August.

These make up about 61% of the 10,400 openings in the manufacturing sector under the SGUnited Jobs and Skills Package, which also includes 2,710 traineeships and attachments as well as 1,330 training places.

This was announced on 9 November in the 13th edition of the Ministry of Manpower’s jobs situation report.

About 4,540 of the job openings (around 71%) are for professional, manager, executive, and technician (PMET) roles, whilst an additional 1,830 are for non-PMET roles.

Most of the openings are in three sectors: electronics, precision engineering, and food manufacturing. 

Read more here.

From ChannelNewsAsia:

The Assurance, Care and Engagement Group, under the Ministry of Manpower (MOM), is organising a one-time vaccination for employers to protect their workers from flu, said the ministry on 9 November.

The flu vaccination will be available to all migrant workers in the construction, marine and process sectors, whether they are living in dormitories or in the community.

It will also be available to all migrant workers residing in dormitories.

The vaccination is priced at $25 per shot.

The exercise is being organised in light of the coming flu season to "protect workers who may be at higher risk of infections," said MOM.

Read more here.

From DealStreetAsia:

Singapore-based B2B sales productivity startup Nektar.ai has raised $2.89m (US$2.15m) in seed funding led by Nexus Venture Partners, according to a press statement.

Other investors who joined the round are Insignia Venture Partners, Arka Venture Labs, Better Capital, and Vietnam Investments Group.

Apart from these institutional investors, the round also saw the participation of some high-profile individuals namely Anand Chandrasekaran (EVP at US-based cloud contact center Five9), Ganesh Lakshminarayanan (CEO, enterprise business at Airtel), Vinod Muthukrishnan (chief growth officer, CCBU at Cisco), Venkat Tadanki (ex-founder and board member at IBM Daksh), and Aneesh Reddy (co-founder and CEO at Capillary Technologies).

In the last decade, the investment in sales tools globally has grown five times, but the average sales quota attainment has fallen 40%, said Abhijeet Vijayvergiya, co-founder and CEO of Nektar.ai.

According to Forbes, as much as 57% of sales reps missed their numbers in 2018.

Read more here.