Singapore entrepreneurs invited to take part in InnovatorsRace50: a chance to win equity-free funding of US$50,000 and global business support.
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| Source: Capgemini. The Capgemini AIE in Singapore is formally launched. From left, Lanny Cohen, Global CTO, Capgemini, Patrick Tay, Member of Parliament and Assistant Secretary-General NTUC, Yeoh Keat Chuan, Managing Director, Singapore Economic Development Board, and Luc-Francois Salvador, Chairman and Chief Executive officer APAC & Middle East Group Executive Committee Member, Capgemini. |
Capgemini, a global consulting, technology and outsourcing services provider, has opened its first Applied Innovation Exchange (AIE) in Southeast Asia, its 10th globally. Located in Singapore, the exchange will deliver a service catalogue with a focus in areas such as data analytics, visualisation, artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive computing within an ecosystem of other AIEs around the world.
The AIE is a Capgemini-designed global platform to enable enterprises to discover relevant innovations; to contextualise and experiment with them within their specific industry.
To help companies proactively plan for shifts in technology, the AIE leverages:
A framework for action
A network of exchange locations
A high performance engagement experience with a global curated ecosystem
The AIE complements existing Applied Innovation Discovery Centers around the world and will strengthen Singapore’s reputation as an innovation hub by expanding the region’s innovation capacity and bolstering the development of local talent, to co-create a technology-enabled future. It will be working with Capgemini’s partners and academic institutions in Singapore to develop a databank of knowledge and expertise specifically for Singapore. It will also collaborate with existing AIEs in locations such as London in the UK, Munich in Germany, Mumbai in India, Paris, France and San Francisco in the US.
Singapore is already one of five Asian cities ranked among the top 10 locations for innovation centres worldwide, according to Capgemini Consulting’s research, with Asia now rivalling Silicon Valley as a new home to global innovation centres*. The decision to now launch an AIE in Singapore is a confirmation of the region’s prime status as an innovation hotbed with reliable infrastructure and stable business environment, Capgemini stated. Singapore in particular is among the most promising locations within Southeast Asia due to:
its reputation as a business-friendly environment
its efforts in positioning itself as a digital innovation testbed in line with its overarching Smart Nation vision which is designed to harness digital technologies as powerful catalysts for change. For example, it opened the world’s largest fintech hub and has started trials of the world’s first self-driving taxis.
“Businesses are now focused on how to embrace and apply innovation with speed and scale in a secure and sustainable way. This requires a new way of thinking and working, in which companies drive corporate innovation through collaboration with a broad innovation ecosystem, to reinvent themselves for tomorrow’s business challenges,” said Lanny Cohen, Global CTO and a member of the Group Executive Committee at Capgemini.
“With its vibrant startup scene and business friendly environment, Singapore is the vanguard of Asia’s rise as an innovation superpower and the perfect location for Capgemini to establish our first AIE in Southeast Asia.”
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| Live infographics in action during the opening ceremony. |
Capgemini’s AIE enables local and regional organisations to future-proof themselves, by proactively planning for forthcoming transformations by responding in an agile way that breaks with the traditional siloed models of research & development (R&D). According to the company, many organisations are not designed to innovate effectively or quickly. They lack the necessary processes, talent, risk tolerance and leadership alignment, as well as a culture that encourages, rewards and promotes innovation.
For example, most enterprises devote more than 90% or almost 100% of their focus, priorities, investment and competency pools to their current business model and technology platforms - simply to protect and modernize their core business. This goal is sometimes referred to as 'horizon one'. Considerably, little on the other hand is directed at what comes next which is creating the new and changing the game, or horizons beyond horizon one**.
The AIE’s tried-and-tested framework provides the necessary discipline and rigor to the applied innovation process. It advances our clients' digital innovation and helps their organizations to accelerate digital proficiency.
“Singapore’s recent Committee for the Future Economy report underscored the nation’s need to further develop innovation by fostering entrepreneurial talent and collaborating with innovation hubs. To that end, we are committed to working closely with our key partners, the Economic Development Board, and the city’s varied ecosystem of innovators and startups to create new solutions for companies to future-proof their businesses,” added Luc-François Salvador, Executive Chairman of Capgemini Asia Pacific and the Middle East.
Leveraging Capgemini’s culture of applied innovation, the AIE framework helps organisations foster a structured approach to drive the innovation process comprising four phases – discover, devise, deploy, and sustain. It enables companies to systematically work through the process of innovation, uncover and experiment with new creative ideas, while simultaneously remaining agile enough to respond to the constant market and technology shifts.
Companies from industries such as automotive, manufacturing, consumer products and retail, banking and insurance, and energy and utilities have used this framework to help drive real and sustainable growth opportunities for their businesses. The new AIE will also function as a gateway to broader and deeper knowledge by providing businesses from Singapore and neighbouring nations access to a wider global ecosystem of emerging technologies and innovation collaborators, as well as to the entirety of Capgemini’s innovation capabilities and expertise.
Samuel Tan, Chief Digital Officer, Singapore Power said, “In today’s fast changing world, innovation does not happen in a vacuum, and cannot be contained within an organisation. Innovation is a process, and requires an ecosystem of partners that enable you to be aware, agile and imaginative. Rapid innovations with a fail-fast mindset are critical to foster this ecosystem. The traditional models of procurement are also fast changing since innovation is not confined to a single partner, and hence cannot be ‘procured’. When it comes to innovation, the ecosystem outpaces the individual, and therefore, finding the best brains to collaborate with is the mantra for smart innovation.”
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| Patrick Tay, Member of Parliament, delivered a speech at the opening ceremony. |
Capgemini works closely on talent initiatives with the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB), with MD Yeoh Keat Chuan inaugurating the launch of the AIE as one the Guests-of-Honour. In line with the recommendations of the Committee on the Future Economy (CFE), Capgemini will continue to make the training of its employees its top priority.
Among CapGemini's mentorship and training programne is a 12-month graduate programme to train budding local talent in the technology sector. Graduates have the opportunity to learn firsthand from industry experts in the AIE to develop their skills and knowledge in business lines, such as cybersecurity, insights & data, digital customer experience, digital manufacturing and emerging technologies.
Capgemini hired 35 graduates in Singapore over the past six months, and intends to hire another 50 more over the next 12 months, as part of its commitment to develop local talent in Singapore. Recent graduate hires include Associate Consultant for Analytics Charmaine Pek, who is leading partner engagement in the AIE; Shazwi Suwandi, Associate Consultant, who helps to operate tech showcases in the region for the AIE and bring emerging technologies to clients; and Sherilyn Sia, Associate Consultant and Business Analyst, who is analysing the status of other innovation labs in Singapore to better serve AIE Singapore's clients.
“With talent development at the very core of our industry development strategy in the infocommunications and media sector, we are pleased to learn that Capgemini will allow our young graduates to work on real-life problems that centre on technological fields such as cybersecurity, software development and data analytics,” said Yeoh. “We are confident that Capgemini’s Applied Innovation Exchange will accelerate the rate at which new solutions are prototyped to solve future business problems, supporting our drive to build an innovation-led economy.”
In his speech at the ceremony Yeoh noted that some of the recent graduate hires at Capgemini are not computer science graduates. He hailed Capgemini's commitment to "focus less on existing qualifications and more on skills development".
"Talent development has always been at the heart of EDB’s industry development strategy in the infocomm and media sector. We are happy that new hires made by Capgemini will undergo a structured onboarding process that aims to help them develop skills that span the technical, such as software development, to creative, such as client solutioning," he said. "As Singapore's economy continues to digitalise, such training opportunities help to ensure our people can thrive in this new environment,"
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| A virtual reality-powered training application that teaches technicians how to repair windmills on a windfarm at sea. This saves training costs as maintenance staff do not have to go in person to the windfarm for training. The application is part of the results from an AIE in Munich, Germany. |
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| WeInvest founder Bhaskar Prabhakara explains how the WeInvest cloud based end-to-end digital wealth management platform (sometimes termed robo-advisors) eliminates the need to hire people, pay them commissions on sales made, or maintain physical bank structures, so the cost of subscribing to the WeInvest service is lower than hiring a physical wealth management department. He also said Capgemini will help to integrate the WeInvest platform with their clients' infrastructure as part of the AIE framework. |
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| IBM Watson powers a voice-activated robot in a demonstration of use cases at the AIE. Users can request their choice of three beverages from the robot, which will then stop its industrial tasks to serve the user. Asking for a beverage that is not available - such as for soda - will return an error. |
Capgemini also noted that its InnovatorsRace50, a global competition for startups and entrepreneurs, is now open to applicants worldwide including from across Singapore and the Asia Pacific (APAC) region. Launched in January with an entry deadline of March 6, the competition provides startups with an international platform to showcase the potential of their products, services or innovative uses of technology to disrupt businesses and industries.
Through celebrating the spirit of innovative entrepreneurship, this special 50th Anniversary edition of Capgemini’s Innovators Race series offers five winning startups the opportunity to secure equity free-funding of US$50,000, extensive networking opportunities, participation in international tech events, access to industry experts, and the opportunity to become a Capgemini partner.
Capgemini’s annual Innovators Race competition is unique because it is the only global competition created for establishedstart-ups, offers a wide range of awards and cash prize to finalists and winners, and provides valuable opportunities for startups to tap on an extensive network of experts and customers, Capgemini said.
In line with the global AIE framework the Singapore AIE will be reaching out to more partners and startups, and working with existing AIEs as part of Capgemini’s InnovatorsRace50.
Hashtag: #appliedinnovation
*The Spread of Innovation around the World: How Asia Now Rivals Silicon Valley as New Home to Global Innovation Centers. by Capgemini Consulting, Fahrenheit 212 and Altimeter Analysis.
** Source: 2017 Business Technology Trends That Matter Now by Capgemini (PDF)
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