Govt spending on emerging technology projects to more than double to S$2b in FY2022

SINGAPORE — The Government will more than double its spending on projects adopting emerging technologies such as machine learning, sensors and the Internet of Things (IoT), and data science this financial year, as it "looks to harness the potential of such technologies to a greater degree".  

The value of such projects will go up from S$790 million in Financial Year 2021 to S$2 billion Financial Year 2022, said the Government Technology Agency (GovTech) on Friday (June 10) in a statement in conjunction with its annual Smart Nation and Digital Government industry briefing.

Among some of the examples GovTech gave of how these technologies will be utilised is an automated speech-to-text audio service that the judiciary is exploring as a means to improve the transcription process for judicial proceedings.

At present, transcription is done manually by human operators and GovTech said that the audio service “could potentially complement the work of transcribers in some cases”.

Another example GovTech gave is a Smart Facility Management system that the agency is working with the Ministry of Education to implement in all schools to improve energy and water efficiency.

When the system is ready, GovTech said it will not only be able to monitor utility consumption and increase labour productivity through automating facilities management processes, but it will also be able to collect data for improving maintenance.

All in all, GovTech estimates that the Government will spend S$3.8 billion on information and communications technology (ICT) procurement this year, which will be used to “re-engineer government digital infrastructure and build better digital services for citizens, businesses and public officers”.

GovTech said that the spending for this financial year is similar to last year. For the 2020 financial year, the estimated sum was S$3.5 billion.

Almost 70 per cent (S$2.6 billion) of the Government’s projected ICT spending this financial year will go towards application development — to build new applications and upgrade existing ones.

In total, GovTech said the Government has invested about S$12.6 billion in ICT over the last four years.

"These investments have laid a firm foundation of common infrastructure and platforms for the Government to work more closely with industry to deliver better digital services and generate greater value for the digital economy."

GOVERNMENT COMMERCIAL CLOUD

Giving an update on its “Cloud First” strategy, which was announced in October 2018, GovTech said about 55 per cent of eligible government systems have been migrated to the Government on commercial cloud, which means its 2023 goal of having 70 per cent of these systems on the cloud is within reach.

In 2018, the Government announced a five-year plan to migrate most of its information technology systems from on-premise infrastructure to the commercial cloud to speed up the delivery and improve the quality of services for citizens and businesses here.

Among the benefits of deploying applications on the cloud is that the Government’s ICT infrastructure has become more agile and resilient, said GovTech.

Moreover, it has also accrued average cost savings of between 30 and 40 per cent for each system migrated to the cloud.

The Government has spent more than S$200 million since 2018 to build up cloud infrastructure and capabilities.

For this financial year, about S$1 billion in procurement opportunities has been set aside for projects that will be developed on the cloud.

Turning to collaboration with the industry, GovTech said that the proportion of projects co-developed with industry partners has increased from about 11 per cent in Financial Year 2020 to 20 per cent the next financial year. 

This is expected to go up to about 27 per cent (S$1.04 billion) in this financial year.

Small- and medium-sized enterprises will stand to benefit from this, with almost 80 per cent of ICT procurement opportunities going to them, a level which GovTech described as "plentiful".