What is the main reason Singapore had grown its economy so fast?

I anticipate a lot of people would initially think Lee Kuan Yew. But one of the most important developments economically would be suggestions by Albert Winsemius to go quickly for industrialization and to provide housing for Singaporeans - incentive to get a job, is to be able to buy a house. Ability to work a job is to have a proper house. Housing and jobs in Singapore at the time was a positive cycle.

Another important player was Goh Keng Swee who was Finance Minister. He kicked off a lot of projects including JTC (Jurong Town Corporation), which resulted in a lot of land in the West that was unusable swampland, being turned into factory space. EDB invited a lot of MNCs from around the world to set up shop here - and attracted them with a cheap and educated labour force combined with an attractive tax scheme.

One of the long term issues with this strategy however, in my analysis, is that we have relied on "big companies" - MNCs very long, without doing as much indigenizing of technology as Japan and Korea did. Their engineers and industrial professionals are able to aspire to designing cars, nuclear power plants, and railway systems around the world. Ours tend to me much more limited in their vision. Singaporean engineering students often aspire to get out of engineering and into banking. We need to have local productive industries that young people can aspire towards.

Increasing immigration, ramping up of infrastructure, positioning of Singapore as a financial hub, open to free trade, attracting international investment and foreign talent to grow the economy.