It had been an eventful week for AI Singapore. 3 Memorandum of Understanding (MOUs) were signed namely with National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), Intel Corporation and PwC Singapore. These collaborations reiterate AI Singapore’s commitment to pursue research, develop skills and talents as well as embrace new technologies in AI-related areas.

NTUC
Recognising the importance of raising competencies and narrowing skills gaps in the fast-changing digital economy, the Labour Movement has been focusing on growing its outreach in emerging ICT areas, such as artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, immersive media and internet of things, to curate relevant programmes that meet the progression needs of our Professionals, Managers, and Executives. AI Singapore was one of three new ICT associations which signed a MOU to join the NTUC U Associate ecosystem on 12 March 2018. With the three new associations, the Labour Movement can reach out to about 40,000 professionals in the ICT sector.

In the 2-year MOU signed between AI Singapore and NTUC, both parties will explore projects of mutual interests in data analytics and AI for NTUC, undertake visits by engineering staff and collaborators for discussion; participate in outreach and development activities or events; and exchange scientific, academic and technical information, if appropriate.

“This partnership with NTUC will allow AI Singapore to reach a wider ecosystem in Singapore. With NTUC’s U Associate network of 67 associations (representing more than 250,000 members from different professions), we believe that they will each be impacted by AI in one way or another. We want to be there to support their adoption and evolution journey as AI becomes pervasive in their sector.” said Laurence Liew, Director of Industry Innovation, AI Singapore.

Intel
The 3-year MOU with Intel will accelerate the development of AI skills and research in Singapore. This is done so by providing industry-relevant and skills-based training to the Singapore AI ecosystem with a goal of engaging and training around 2000 students and developers in the next three years.

Under the MOU, AI Singapore intends to host free-of-cost training sessions based on the Intel® AI Academy* suite of content for students, developers, start-ups and companies. Intel intends to send their world-wide AI experts to co-host some of these sessions. In addition, AI Singapore will be including the Intel® AI Academy content as part of its AI Apprenticeship Programme. AI Singapore will also be able to access or submit relevant publicly available, research papers, whitepapers, solution briefs, project descriptions and technical content via the Intel® Developer Zone or affiliated Intel websites.

“AI is going to be pervasive and will impact all sectors of the industry,” said Laurence Liew. “Intel is an important ecosystem player and partner, and we believe having the AI apprentices and ecosystem of developers, start-ups and companies trained and familiar with the Intel accelerated frameworks and tools, especially the next-generation of AI CPUs and frameworks, is important in staying at the bleeding edge of AI. In parallel to AI Singapore’s AI Apprenticeship Programme, the partnership with Intel will allow us to reach a wider audience who are keen to come on board the AI/ML ecosystem.”

“The rise of AI will open up incredible new experiences and fuel new business opportunities, scientific discovery, and societal improvement,” said Santhosh Viswanathan, Managing Director-Sales & Marketing, Intel Asia Pacific and Japan Territory. “Intel believes AI has the potential to improve people’s lives and therefore continues to collaborate with institutions like AI Singapore to develop the right talent to lead this movement.”

Participants in Intel ® AI Academy will be provided with access to Intel-hosted forums and technical support for their usage of Intel hardware platforms and software tools for research and projects. The Intel® AI Academy will assist in organizing meetups, offer event-based training and provide expert guidance on Intel frameworks and tools to the next generation of AI professionals.
* The Intel® AI Academy is an open initiative offered to academia, professionals, and start-ups worldwide.

PwC
This 3-year MOU with PwC Risk Services will see AI Singapore collaborating with them on AI projects and enhance digital trust competencies in both the public and private sector. This will be through dedicated research projects relating to data analytics; AI research & development; and risk management and governance to ensure responsible AI adoption. This collaboration is pivotal to ensure trusted digital ecosystems as Singapore develops as a Smart Nation.

“We are excited to collaborate with PwC to accelerate the use of AI in the finance, audit and risk markets. The 100Experiments and AI Apprenticeship Programme, which PwC will participate in, will accelerate the adoption of AI in these areas and train new AI engineers for PwC and the Singapore ecosystem.” remarked Laurence Liew.

“As the demand for automation and use of AI increases, designing in appropriate levels of risk management and governance will be essential for the trusted application of AI adoption. PwC Singapore advocates responsible AI adoption and is well positioned to help embed the right level of risk assessment, controls and governance frameworks to enable organisations to innovate with confidence. We are glad to be the first professional services firm to work with AISG in support of Singapore’s AI initiatives in line with Singapore’s Smart Nation ambitions.” said Greg Unsworth, Digital Business and Risk Assurance Leader, PwC Singapore