As Chief Communications Officer at the National University of Singapore (NUS), Ovidia oversees university branding and communications, including reputation management, marketing communications, digital communications, VIP events and protocol, issues management as well as crisis communications for a diverse community comprising 17 schools and 30 university-level research institutes across three campuses. She is also the Press Secretary to the University President, and University Spokesperson.

Ovidia began her career buying wine, liquor and tobacco for Changi Airport for a US-based luxury duty-free retail group. Among other responsibilities, she managed duty-free prices for wine, liquor and tobacco at the airport, working with counterparts in Dubai and Hong Kong. She later joined Singapore Press Holdings as a newspaper reporter, covering areas such as courts, crime, government, as well as Parliament news. Ovidia was part of a duo that won awards for a series of investigative reports on a banned religious sect. Her stories have appeared in regional newspapers, including Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post.

Ovidia joined MediaCorp Singapore as a producer at its flagship current affairs programme Talking Point, and was part of the team producing live coverage of the Singapore 1997 General Elections. She later joined Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) as a lecturer at the School of Business Management, teaching business communication to polytechnic students, adult learners, and foreign civil servants under the Singapore Cooperation Programme. Ovidia led the development of an early version of SilkAir’s website as part of an industry project, and was part of the founding team that put together the Diploma in Media Management at NYP. She advised the Polytechnic’s public affairs team on issues management, and also consulted on an early proposal for the Bachelor of Communication degree programme for the predecessor institution to the Singapore University of Social Sciences.

Ovidia graduated from NUS with a Bachelor of Arts majoring in political science and history, and holds a Master of International Communication from Macquarie University, Australia.