Imperial College London is to launch its first course overseas at a new medical school developed with a university in Singapore.

The school, which is due to open in 2013, will award joint Imperial and Nanyang Technological University degrees, it was announced today. It will operate as an autonomous school of the Singaporean institution, but will be managed in partnership with Imperial.

The majority of its students are expected to be Singaporean, and ultimately more than 750 students will be enrolled on its five-year undergraduate medical course.

Imperial said that the outpost would remedy the fact that ¡°few potential Singaporean medical students have the opportunity to study at Imperial¡­due to a cap of 7.5 per cent on international students attending the UK¡¯s schools¡±.

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While many British universities have partnerships and even campuses abroad, this is the first time that Imperial has developed a course overseas.

Sir Keith O¡¯Nions, rector of Imperial, said: ¡°We are extremely proud to be working with Singapore, a country we have long admired for its support and application of world-class science, engineering and medicine¡­The partnership gives us the chance to work with Singapore¡¯s talented students and also provides a rare opportunity to pioneer a new medical curriculum.

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¡°Singapore¡¯s healthcare system will face a range of challenges in the future and we aim to equip our students with the skills they will need to tackle them.¡±

The school¡¯s founding dean will be Stephen Smith, principal of Imperial¡¯s Faculty of Medicine and chief executive of the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.

john.gill@tsleducation.com