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UPM students get to intern with small & medium enterprises

By Stephanie Shallini
Photo by Marina Ismail



SERDANG, 2 April (UPM) – Students of Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) will do their internship with small and medium enterprises (SMEs) following a collaboration pact between the university and SME Corp Malaysia.

The 4th edition of the SME-University Internship programme between UPM and SME Corp was launched by UPM Deputy Vice Chancellor (Industry and Community Relations) Prof. Dr. Ing. Ir. Renuganth Varatharajoo at the Philip Kotler Hall here today.

Present at the ceremony were Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Management, Mohd Shahwahid Othman, Manager of SME Corp, Murniyati Mokhtar, lecturers, business advisors and entrepreneurs from various companies.

In his speech at the ceremony, Prof. Renuganth said the programme was a good platform for students to gain knowledge about entrepreneurship and business in the real world.

“I believe this programme will be able to enhance the entrepreneurial skills of the students as this programme also embraces the Association of Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) standards.

“This approach will indirectly foster student’s interest in becoming an entrepreneur in the future,” he said.


Puan Murniyati, in her speech, said that this SME-University Internship programme would benefit both the students and entrepreneurs because the students would be able to gain experience and exposure they needed, while working with the entrepreneurs and business advisors from SME Corp.

At the same time, the companies could improve their performance which included increasing their productivity, using effective business strategies through analysis and recommendations done by the students during their four-month stint.

Under the SME- University Internship programme, five groups of students from different faculties in UPM would work for a SME company, each with three UPM lecturers and business advisor from SME Corp to guide them.

They will compete among each other and the champion will represent UPM at the inter-university level of the SME-University Internship programme that will be held on 22nd October 2013.

The students are from disciplines like accounting, engineering, biosistems, agriculture, business administration, economics, human developments, agri-business and physics.  – upm

- upm/ss/kgo


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