vritimes editor
LAPA Labs and HELP University are deepening their partnership, moving from a classroom pilot into two flagship programmes: a one-day corporate AI immersion experience and a CEO-level programme aimed at transforming how entire organisations think and build with AI. The announcement is anchored by HELP University CEO Dr. Goh Leong’s framing of AI as a state-of-the-art car that companies now have to learn to drive, and introduces LAPA co-founder Dr. Kenny Goh’s new book on staying human in an AI-driven world. Together, the two programmes signal LAPA’s shift from an academic pilot into a full corporate AI capability platform for Malaysian organisations.
Two flagship programmes extend the HELP-LAPA partnership
beyond the classroom: an experiential AI Immersion Day for employees, and a CEO
level programme built with global faculty.
Kuala Lumpur: LAPA Labs and HELP
University are expanding their partnership with two new flagship programmes
under their recently signed MOU. The first, LAPA Day, is a one day AI Immersion
experience for employees. The second is a CEO level programme co-delivered by
LAPA co-founder Dr. Kenny Goh and Professor Philip Charles Zerrillo.
An Engine, Not Just a Course
What sets LAPA apart is the method
underneath both programmes. Its learning engine came from competitive esports,
not EdTech, built on instant feedback, visible progress, and real stakes. That
same engine now runs three connected layers: the LAPA App for adaptive, project
based lessons, LAPA Assess for capability diagnostics, and LAPA Arena for live
competition, a system rather than a single course.
About HELP University
HELP University is a private university
in Kuala Lumpur, established in 1986 and now one of Malaysia’s largest
providers of Psychology and Business education. It was the first university in
Southeast Asia to receive a 5 star rating across 8 categories under the QS
Stars system, holds Premier Digital Tech University status from MDEC, and was
ranked first in Asia for outbound student exchange by QS in 2021, the academic
backbone behind the HELP-LAPA pilot and its corporate track.
“Having AI at our disposal today is
like having a state of the art Formula One car sitting in the garage,”
says Dr. Goh Leong, CEO of HELP University. “The car alone does not win
races. What we have to learn now is how to drive it. Done right, AI training
does not just make people more productive, it makes them better human beings.
That is the focus of this partnership.”
LAPA Day: The AI Immersion Programme
LAPA Day formally launches the workshop
format LAPA has been refining since its founding: the engagement mechanics of
competitive esports, brought into corporate training. The day is built around
high stakes problem solving in a dynamic, high-energy environment, learning by
doing rather than sitting through slides. The Remit is to allow employees to leave
with a working prototype, not a certificate.
A CEO Programme Built Around a Different Ambition
What distinguishes this programme is its
ambition: not to teach executives how to use AI tools, but to use AI as the
catalyst for a cognitive and skills upgrade across the whole organisation.
Participants leave with a mandate, a concrete plan for where AI can reshape how
their teams solve problems, decide, and innovate.
The programme pairs Dr. Kenny Goh with
Professor Philip Charles Zerrillo, who holds a PhD in Marketing from
Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and has held senior
academic leadership roles at the Indian School of Business and the University
of Texas at Austin’s McCombs School of Business.
Dr. Goh brings thirty years of
entrepreneurial experience to the programme, drawn on in his book, Whole Brain
Thinking with AI, published this year. The book is built around personal
stories from his career, including the founding of AirAsia and the expansion of
Genting, framed around a single question: how people stay fully human, using
both instinct and analysis, while working alongside AI.
“The technology is not the hard part
anymore,” says Dr. Goh. “The hard part is staying whole while you use
it, keeping your judgement, your instincts, your sense of people. That is what
I wrote the book to work through, and it is the same thing we are now building
into the CEO programme with HELP.”
What’s Next
LAPA Day and the CEO programme open for
enrolment in the coming months. LAPA’s
HELP University corporate track programmes are HRD Corp (HRDF) claimable. For partnership
enquiries, contact firdaus@lapalabs.co or visit lapalabs.co.
This press release has also been published on VRITIMES
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