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Singapore's Million-Dollar Investments Will Drive AI Growth In Southeast Asia

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Fingerprint scanners and face-recognizing cameras will become more common sights throughout Singapore's businesses and public utilities, and major artificial intelligence companies kicking off operations in the country expect to bring their tech throughout the ASEAN region in the near future.

Singapore has taken a clear lead in AI technology and innovative biometrics solutions, partially because the government is boosting companies in the industry as part of its campaign to become a "smart nation.The country's Economic Development Board is currently working with as many businesses as possible to insert AI technology into Singaporean businesses and daily life, said Ang Chin Tah, director of Infocomms and Media within EDB.

Singapore’s government, working with the Economic Development Board, is incubating tech developments via a national initiative, AI Singapore. The government has invested $114 million into the center's co-funded projects to solve and market smart solutions for interesting problems the city faces, Ang said.

The government has already started integrating some of these new solutions into its operations. Public housing tenants now file their complaints to iConverse, a virtual assistant developed in Singapore by Taiger. Earlier this year, the city finished up a trial with biometrics company NEC Asia to test security programs--including fingerprint and facial recognition devices to register visitors at car inspection stops, and security and correlated visual and audio analytics to find and identify “suspicious behavior” in real time. 

Walter Lee, global relations leader in NEC’s Global Safety Division, said it was still not confirmed whether the government would fully implement their technology throughout the city-state, but the same technology is already starting to be used by individual businesses, both in Singapore and regionally.

Lee also sees plenty of future potential for biometrics in the private sector across industries, from using face or fingerprint recognition for authentication in online transactions to collecting consumer habit data via video surveillance in shopping malls.

Some businesses have embraced the technology on their own. Singapore-based bank OCBC just launched a feature allowing customers to control their banking app with voice commands through Apple’s Siri.

EDB is also attempting to convince major companies like media conglomerate Thomson Reuters and business tech firm SAP, as well as startups like ViSenze, to create their own research centers in Singapore, Ang said over email.

“[These companies] create exciting new jobs in computer vision, machine learning, data analytics, and software development, and contribute to the transformation of our economy,” he said.

Excitement for AI expands and spreads

Enticing consumers to buy AI technology was easier than expect, Lee said, because small pieces of the tech are already integrated into the most popular Apple and Samsung smartphones, and mass adoption has driven down some of the cost.

“The industry is now reaching an age of acceleration and mass adoption, but that means more players are entering the race,” he said.

Singaporean businesses are already buying AI products from YITU Technology, China's largest AI firm that just opened its first international office in Singapore, and Mark Chee, YITU's business director for Southeast Asia, contends companies would not need to make massive investments to buy the latest AI security solutions. 

“If the company wants to show that they’re on the forefront of technology...they can consider facial recognition as an option,” he said. “It’s definitely not going to be an immediate cut-and-replace process the next day.”

Even if other Southeast Asian governments haven’t given the same enthusiastic support as Singapore, he sees a lot of potential, especially in Malaysia and Thailand.

On the toes of a rollout of face recognition check-ins at Singapore’s Changi International Airport, AirAsia announced that it implemented its own AI-driven check-in process at Johor Bahru’s Senai International Airport last month. Chee said he only expects more ASEAN-based companies to join in as AI commercialization takes off in Singapore.

“[Countries in Southeast Asia] are all keen to explore, and everyone is looking at Singapore,” he said. “They want Singapore to be the one to say, ‘This is the way to go.’”