Silicon Valley has established itself as a startup destination, offering access to top tech talent, financial backing, expert advice, and supportive infrastructure. And no less than one Asian country has been watching and is now trying to follow suit: Singapore may very well be the following global startup capital.
While Singapore’s appeal is partly as a consequence of its prime geographic location on the crossroads of massive Asian markets like China, Indonesia and India, its investments in digital connectivity make it an excellent destination for startups.
World Economic Forum Global Information Technology Report 2016 Singapore has been rated first on the planet in its Network Readiness Index, noting that the city-state has among the best pro-business environments on the planet and a government that has established a transparent digital technique to spur innovation. According to Akamai’s State of the Internet Report, the country continues to first by way of the fastest connectionand ranks first in McKinsey’s Connectedness Index, which measures the inflow and outflow of products, services, finance, talent and data.
“The average Singaporean is someone who owns one or two smartphones, certainly has 4G, and has fibre internet at home because it is cheap and readily available,” explains Samson Leo, co-founder Xferya Singaporean fintech startup that makes online transactions and peer-to-peer payments safer, cheaper, and more reliable. The company has received funding from angel investors from Silicon Valley and Asia, including Eduardo Saverin, considered one of the co-founders of Facebook, who now lives in Singapore.
It’s no wonder then that Singapore hosts a lot of tech and startup-related business events—including Tech in Asia, innovfest unbound, Echelon Asia Summit, the 2016 CSX Asia Pacific Conference on cybersecurity, the Internet Engineering Task Force, and the Singapore International Robotics Expo. It even hosts Inside 3D Printing Singapore, the world’s largest skilled 3D printing event, where regional startups and other firms like them come together to lift funds, get inspired, and gain expertise.
But Singapore’s involvement with tech entrepreneurs goes beyond bandwidth and technology events. Smart Nation Initiative works with residents and businesses to create a greater future through technology. Between 2008 and 2015, Singapore’s National Research Foundation invested S$41.3 million in 144 start-ups. In 2014, Singaporean firms raised an estimated S$2.7 billion in enterprise capital, putting the country far ahead of its Asian counterparts. To further support innovation, the federal government maintains R&D spending at around 1% of GDP.
“We got to interact with some of the bank employees, which wouldn’t normally be fun for us as a startup,” Leo says. “But it was helpful. We were able to position our product better.”
Between 2016 and 2020, Singapore plans to allocate SGD 19 billion for science and technology research under Research, Innovation and Entrepreneurship (RIE) Plan 2020With a comprehensive effort to leverage technology and promote digital transformation, Singapore is poised to each expand its influence as a worldwide innovation hub and transform the Asian technology landscape in the approaching many years.
Source: Quartz
