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In Singapore, the digital economy maintains a 17.7% share of GDP, with small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and artificial intelligence (AI) expected to play a key role in driving growth.
The country’s digital economy contributed S$113 billion ($85.31 billion) to GDP last year, accounting for S$1 in every S$6, according to the latest statistics released by industry regulator Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA). accounted for the dollar.
According to IMDA, Singapore’s digital economy recorded a compound annual growth rate of 11.2% from 2018 to 2023, almost double the economy-wide nominal GDP growth rate of 5.8%. Its digital economy is made up of the information and communications sector, which accounts for about one-third of the pie, with the non-information and communications sector accounting for the remaining two-thirds.
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Approximately 94.6% of SMEs have adopted digital technologies in one or more of six key areas, including AI, cybersecurity, cloud, and data analytics. IMDA said businesses that implemented under the government’s Productivity Solutions Grant saw an average cost reduction of 50% between 2018 and 2023.
The agency added that small and medium-sized enterprises in the country can access 400 digital solutions pre-approved for deployment through the CTO-as-a-Service platform, which has been used by 145,000 users to date. Ta.
SMBs can also adopt AI-enabled applications on the platform, with 20% of pre-approved solutions being AI-enabled. IMDA said it plans to increase this number and encourage 15,000 more SMEs to adopt AI solutions over the next two years.
If you’re considering this, you can also try Generated AI (Gen AI) in an SMB-specific sandbox environment. First introduced in February 2024, the second installment of the sandbox is scheduled to launch in December with a curated list of 15th generation AI solutions across various market segments. These include Gen AI for talent acquisition, generative web design, and virtual assistants for customer engagement agents.
According to IMDA, more than 300 small and medium-sized enterprises are expected to take advantage of the sandbox, and eligible applicants will receive up to 50% financial support to trial one of the Gen AI applications for three months. It is said that you can receive. More than 150 companies participated in the first run of the sandbox feature, which ended in May, and after three months, 80% of these companies were running Gen AI applications.
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The AI adoption rate among small and medium-sized enterprises reached 4.2% last year, up from 3.5% in 2018.
IMDA added that large companies in Singapore are also eyeing AI, with 44% deploying such applications last year, up from 16.7% in 2018.
The technology sector is growing at a rate of just over 11%, more than double that of other sectors of the economy, highlighting the need for all businesses, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, to leverage digital opportunities as growth enablers. He said that. IMDA CEO Loo Chuen Hong said:
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“While there will always be uncertainty in the global economy caused by a number of macro trends, sometimes beyond our control, technology as a structural driver will remain the same in the long term,” Lu said. said. “As far as digital and the digital economy are concerned, we will continue to see significant growth.”
“AI has huge potential in the long term and in any technology cycle. There will be some initial excitement, but at the same time, AI will transform the fundamentals of every field. In that sense, it has demonstrated its influence.” “The key here is how, as a very small country, how do we invest in the right areas so that businesses can take full advantage of the benefits of this technology?”
