Loh Kean Hean, 30, has retired from competitive badminton. He now runs Élever Badminton, a badminton academy he co-founded in June 2023 with his friend Eng Chin An, who captained the National University of Singapore (NUS) Badminton varsity team and had played competitively at local and international competitions since young. Kean Hean will receive the maximum payout of $100,000.
With men’s doubles partner Terry Hee, Loh reached a career-high world ranking of no.22 in 2022 and won a bronze medal in the men’s doubles event at the 2021 SEA Games, among a clutch of medals at the SEA Games and Commonwealth Games between 2015 and 2022 in the team event. Hee and Loh have also won the Dutch Open and Czech Open together. This year, with his new partner, Howin Wong, Kean Hean nabbed his third men’s doubles title at the National Open Championships, having won the title in 2020 and 2021 with Terry Hee.
Kean Hean said: “I’m grateful for the payout as it will help alleviate my financial worries so I can focus on building Élever Badminton, now that I have retired from the international scene. I love this sport and I want to share this passion for badminton with more kids through the classes and community events that we do at Élever Badminton. This includes our collaboration with SBA through the SBA Academy where we provide weekly classes to schools without badminton as a co-curricular activity (CCA) to promote the sport, and hopefully grow the talent pool in Singapore so that they may one day represent Singapore in major games like I did. We partnered with three schools last year in the south and west of Singapore, and with the positive feedback we received, we hope to expand this programme to more schools this year in other parts of the island.”
He added: “Through Élever Badminton, I hope to be able to give back to society. Having received so much support in our sporting journey over the years, I have been thinking about what more we can do for the community. I have previously worked with Pertapis Children’s Home and also gave a sharing session and held a friendly badminton game with kids organised by The Salvation Army and Team Singapore. These types of events spurred me to do more. At Élever Badminton we also have a student with special needs, and we really want to create more programmes to make badminton accessible to all children, regardless of their background”.
