From its origins in the former Nanyang Technological Institute (NTI), which was set up in 1981 to provide facilities for tertiary education and research in various branches of engineering and technology, Nanyang Technological University (NTU) has undertaken an extraordinary journey of excellence to become one of the world’s top young universities. In The Making of NTU, Cham Tao Soon gives a firsthand account of the 22 years he spent in building up NTI, which was later inaugurated as NTU. It is a remarkable story of how a very small team of dedicated people were put to the test in starting a university from scratch. Searching the world for teaching staff with the right credentials, it was impressed upon Cham more than once that they were “indeed a small start-up in the large engineering universe”. Yet, in just four years, NTI was singled out as one of the best engineering institutions in the world by the Commonwealth Engineering Council. How they did this is Cham Tao Soon’s story.