Opening Remarks by Minister Josephine Teo at Google Cloud's AI Asia Event

Mr Thomas Kurian, CEO, Google Cloud,

Colleagues and Friends,

1. Good morning.

2. Thank you for inviting me to the Google Cloud AI Asia event. I am delighted to be here.

3. At the recent National Day Rally, Prime Minister Lawrence Wong spoke about the importance of AI and what it means for Singapore. As with past waves of technology and innovation – from the computer to the internet – our approach has always been to support our citizens to make the most of the opportunities and respond appropriately to the challenges.

4. This was also the spirit that guided the National AI Strategy 2.0 (NAIS 2.0) which we launched in December 2023. Since then, our AI ecosystem has grown stronger and more vibrant.

5. Our partners have made a definite contribution. Google is one of them. Through the “AI Trailblazers” initiative, early adopters of GenAI in Singapore were given access to Google Cloud’s compute resources, development tools, and engineers to build prototype applications. That created good momentum within the participating organisations. It got their peers to sit up too.

6. Earlier this year, we introduced the Enterprise Compute Initiative (ECI). This was to encourage companies to kickstart or accelerate their AI adoption, through using AI tools already developed and embedded in the offerings of cloud service providers. Google Cloud is now onboard as one of the ECI partners. Its “AI Cloud Takeoff” programme aims to help many Singapore-based companies build AI capabilities and develop AI-enabled products and services.

7. Several companies are already benefitting from this programme.

   1. One example is Mirxes. It is a biotech startup in Singapore that develops test kits for early detection of cancer and other diseases. Already valued at over a billion dollars, Mirxes is not staying still. To sharpen its competitive edge through R&D, it turned to Google’s open-source healthcare models such as MedGemma.

   2. Another example is Gill Capital. It is an operator and distributor of global retail lifestyle brands, such as H&M and Decathlon. The programme helped Gill Capital build AI agents that are embedded in their e-commerce platforms offered in Singapore. The agents can also help the retail store managers here improve product classifications, make recommendations on when to replenish stock, and develop sales strategies based on customer data. This has helped Gill Capital to unlock productivity savings of more than 200 hours per week. The company expects to expand the use of these agents developed in Singapore to their overseas markets too.

8. We will continue to take a partnership approach in promoting AI adoption. As seen from the examples I’ve shared, this is especially useful when exploring newer areas. One area attracting much attention this year is Agentic AI.

9. Agentic AI opens up new layers of possibilities in the way humans interact with AI.

   1. Agents can already act as simple assistants – following up on our instructions to analyse data, draft emails, or navigate websites to search for information.

   2. More sophisticated agents can implement a series of instructions within complex workflows. They can combine tasks and determine the next steps based on the results of the earlier tasks.

   3. And then there may be agents that understand our high-level instructions, autonomously break them down into smaller tasks, experiment with different approaches, and continuously learn and adapt from earlier efforts.

10. With increased sophistication, the potential for productivity improvements and value enhancements also grows.

11. We can imagine introducing AI agents to help improve public services.

    1. For example, businesses are sometimes confused by the multiple agencies they must deal with to get licenses approved. They may call each department or check many websites to figure out the right order of proceedings. When inspections are required, there is the added challenge of making appointments. Workflows like these could do with the help of an intelligent assistant.

    2. Another potential application could be in social services. Help-seekers can feel lost navigating the network of organisations and programmes designed to support them. An intelligent assistant could help social workers provide basic guidance to their clients, such as in meeting administrative requirements. This could free up social workers’ time to focus on more impactful activities like counselling and developing partnerships.

12. As with all emerging technologies, the Government believes we need first to understand how they work and why mistakes happen. With AI agents, there are valid concerns about unintended actions, and we need to pay even more attention to governance. What permissions should agents be given? When should humans be in the loop? If things do not go as expected, who should be held accountable?

13. These questions deserve careful consideration. MDDI will play an active role in ensuring that agentic capabilities are developed and deployed in a safe and responsible way, so that our public officers and citizens can work with these tools confidently.

14. We are building on a good foundation that already supports meaningful adoption of AI. About one-third of our 150,000 public officers now regularly use Pair, the Government’s AI chatbot, to enhance their productivity, writing and research. Public officers are also learning how to build their own AI bots, of which there are now about 18,000 bots. These bots help with a variety of work processes such as responding effectively to public queries, research data analysis, and policy reviews,

15. [Announcement] But we can go further. GovTech will be working with Google Cloud on a sandbox to experiment with Agentic AI and test agentic solutions for public sector use cases. This will be made possible by enhancements to data protection and how Gemini will be offered through Google Distributed Cloud, which Thomas will say more about later. Through this sandbox, Google will give MDDI agencies early access to Google’s Project Mariner Computer Use API, an Agentic AI tool that can reason, plan and manage tasks. Agencies will have a chance to test and evaluate the latest agentic capabilities, assess the risks, develop mitigation measures, and share the lessons learned with the broader community of AI practitioners in Singapore. From the sandbox, we hope to better understand how to interact with agentic AI and build confidence to capture its value for the public good.

16. The sandbox we are announcing today is part of Singapore’s efforts to learn and grow with AI. We will continue to seek out partners to push the boundaries of AI adoption.

17. We thank Google for the breadth and depth of activities you have built up in Singapore and look forward to supporting your business expansion regionally and globally.

18. I wish you a most successful event today.