Technical Engineer Diploma (TED) is the first niche diploma offered at the Institute of Technical Education (ITE), and the pioneer batch will be completing their 2 years of academic study at ITE by mid-March 2010. Of the 43 students, 36 are National Precision Engineering Specialist Programme (NPES) scholarship holders. This is part of the S$76 million Precision Engineering Manpower initiative announced in 2007 by Minister Lim Swee Say. Precision engineering forms the backbone of manufacturing. It is a key enabler for manufacturing industries such as electronics, medtech, aerospace, oil & gas equipment and cleantech.