Technology is evolving. Governments, businesses and people should, too

Source: Lionel Lin for SingEx. Dr Balakrishnan delivers the opening keynote speech.

Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Singapore and Minister-in-Charge of the country’s Smart Nation initiative acknowledged the fear that all the advances in technology could lead to jobs being disrupted, but said Singapore has to do more to ride the waves of change.

Speaking during the opening keynote for IoT Asia 2017 in Singapore, Dr Balakrishnan talked about living in a revolution as a result of the accelerating pace of technology advancement, from translation to robotics. "We are living in an age where the pace of skills acquisition, the pace of capability advancements exceeds that of human beings. Even middle-class white-collar work is going to be disrupted. There is no way to sugarcoat this. There is a disruption going on; people are worried about their jobs, people are worried about their wages," he said.

While it may feel natural to retreat, build walls and call for protectionist measures, Dr Balakrishnan called the reactions 'plain-wrong prescriptions' and a 'recipe for disaster' for people to not feel the pain, and not know what is going on around them. "The political challenge is to prepare people around the revolution, to be masters of technology, creators. We don't compete with machines and programs. They are doing regular things and more interesting things faster and better," he said.

Dr Balakrishnan noted that Singapore is an ideal reference platform for IoT solutions sold to the world. "It is a city with sophisticated and demanding people. That is your calling card when you try to open doors in other countries," he said.

"People, companies, and nations who master technology first will have enormous reach because their market is global. Our challenge is to democratise these new technologies, and build a new middle class which has the skills and the abilities to harness these capabilities and generate good jobs and good wages. It's about jobs, jobs and jobs," he said.

The government has been working on the challenge on many fronts. In the manufacturing sector. the Economic Development Board (EDB) is helping companies adopt digitalisation, and also attracting solution providers to work with local companies to develop new applications and new business models. "We are also helping our SMEs build stronger digital capabilities to seize opportunities for growth in the digital economy," he added.

He spoke on the announcement that the government is reorganising to accelerate the way digital technologies are deployed in the public sector, both for internal and external use. Dr Balakrishnan shared that Singapore is setting up the Smart Nation and Digital Government Office (SNDGO) with thc Government Technology Agency (GovTech) as the implementing agency, under the Prime Minister's Office (PMO).

"Collectively, the Smart Nation and Digital Govemment (SNDG) Group will tighten linkages between planning andi implementation, and allow us to be more agile in driving digital government and building Singapore as a Smart Nation. Onc priority for the group is to ensure that the public service can use and deploy technology effectively, and better use data and digital tools," he said.

He announced that as part of this realignnment a partnership between GovTech and the National University of Singapore (NUS). " Among other things, NUS will provide training for 10,000 public servants in data science over five years. NUS will also work with GovTech to develop methods and processes to strengthen cybersecurity for public agencies," he said.

Another priority area will be around the building of national technology platforms to enable innovation, benefit citizens, and reduce business costs, such as a new national IoT/sensor communication backbone as a Smart Nation platform. "This platform will enable the sharing of sensors deployed by government agencies and the sensor data collected," he explained.

While there is still no consensus on the technology or on the standards for the national platform, Dr Balakrishnan said the lack of consensus is not an excuse for paralysis. "We still need to take a pathway with an open mind, avoiding technology or vendor lock-in," he said. "We will take decisions which, even if the technology doesn't pan out, (will result in) platforms and approaches that are still relevant. The technology can be swapped out and replaced with something better."

Singapore is also working on maximising the potential of existing infrastructure, such as lamp posts. "We will pilot the use of lamp posts as nodes for deploying sensors, beacons and connectivity," the minister said. "It will first be for public sector use, but we can explore if it can also benefit the private sector."

Dr Balakrishnan also talked about a national digital identity framework that goes beyond a physical plastic national identity card and national passcode (Singpass). "As a pilot, we have made personal information available to banks through the Mylnfo portal. We are starting with four  banks, DBS, OCBC, UOB and Standard Chartered Bank. When you want to sign up for bank accounts, you log in with your Singpass and your information can be passed to the bank to open the account for you. We are exploring how to make this service more widely available," he said. "It saves you the hassle and it helps companies reduce cost."

The Singpass system is also slated for upgrading. "We need to make sure it is good enough as a secure digital identification system, and have the infrastructure made available not just for government, but for the private sector as well. We need to do all this in order to engender greater confidence, reduce transaction costs, allow information to be exchanged securely and seamlessly, to create new services and to improve consumer experiences," he said. "We want to enable our companies to ride on these platforms to derive competitive advantage."

Another area to be enhanced is that of electronic payments. He said that cash and cheques have been so successful in Singapore that they remain the predominant mode for payment, but incur transaction costs such as in terms of labour for counting and deposits. Dr Balakrishnan said: "The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is working with the indusuy to roll out a central addressing scheme (CAS) this year. This will better enable or facilitate digital cash transfers. The CAS works like a register to map mobile numbers or the unique entity number (UEN) of businesses to bank account numbers. With this, we can send funds to friends and businesses without needing to know their bank account numbers. All we need to know are their phone numbers or UEN."

The MAS is also planning to introduce a unified point of sale (UPOS) terminal at check-out counters. "It simplifies the payment platform for retail stores, so you do not need a whole array of POS terminals, or find that a POS you need for your credit card or mobile device is not available," the minister noted.

For transport, expect account-based ticketing. Driven by the Land Transport Authority (LTA), commuters have been able to use their contactless Mastercard credit and debit cards in addition to the EZ Link cards, for public bus and train rides since 20 March. In all, LTA and Mastercard hope to attract at least 100,000 commuters to participate in the pilot. Singapore is the first in Asia to enable this pilot of the Account-Based Ticketing (ABT) System for public transport. 

"If successful, more payment providers will be brought on board," Dr Balakrishnan said. "The intent of all these is to make transactions easier and more convenient so that more transactions will go cashless. It helps Singaporeans, and it helps our businesses."

Dr Balakrishnan also stressed that control systems must be protected even as they become smarter. "We must ensure that our digital identity framework and e-transactions are secure and robust," he said.

The minister further announced that GovTech will sign a memorandum of intent (MoI) with the National University of Singapore (NUS) to develop methods and processes to strengthen cybersecurity for public agencies.

"Even within a government like Singapore, getting all these different strands together has been a challenge. Ownership is a powerful position. It gives you a chance to specify, to impose standards," he noted.

Dr Balakrishnan also advised solution providers to tackle customer pain points rather than offer technology for the sake of technology. "So be open and responsive to your customers' needs, be prepared to adopt new business models or adapt solutions for different industries and for different needs. And in doing so, be prepared to work with new partners. For all you know, you could then be on the way to conquering a part of the world with a new innovation," he said. "Transform our own approaches. If we don't put together solutions in new and novel ways, we'll be left behind."

"There is a digital revolution going on, it is disrupting jobs. The political disquiet is reflective of a revolution. The choice governments all over the world have to make is whether you insulate and build walls and avoid facing the reality of this revolution, or take the opposite approach to prepare people on the relevant skills to surf the revolution," he said.

"I would like to reiterate that Singapore is approaching the digital revolution from a position of strength. We continue to offer one of the best digital infrastructures in the world. Our people are well educated, well trained and technology savvy. We have a single layer of government and leadership who is prepared to do what is necessary. We have nurtured a vibrant startup and conducive business ecosystem for solutions to be tested and scaled-up. Therefore, a successful outcome for building a Smart Nation is not just the platforms that the government is building, but one where Singaporeans and all of you here can actively innovate, test ideas, and create new services and products on top of them."

He added that no one has a monopoly on wisdom, and everyone has to contribute. "It needs a collective approach for us to truly prepare ourselves for this revolution. Those who get it right will have a head start. It will be another golden age awaiting us."

Interested?

Commuters interested in using their Mastercard cards for travel can register at the Transitlink ABT portal

Read the TechTrade Asia blog posts about Singapore tech policy makers reorganising, and  GovTech's partnership with NUS

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