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Media Release
SINGAPORE HONOURS INNOVATION AND DIGITAL READINESS
TRAIL BLAZERS
Singapore Digital (SG:D) Techblazer Awards 2019 recognises nation’s best in tech
innovation - 10 organisations clinched top honours in the Most Promising, Best
Adoption and the new Student categories
Inaugural Digital Participation Pledge (DPP) Awards honours organisations from
people, private and public sectors for their digital readiness initiatives
SINGAPORE – 5 November, 2019: 16 organisations were honoured for their efforts to
transform the economy and strengthen Singapore’s digital readiness, in support of the digital
economy.
10 organisations were recognised as Singapore’s most innovative at the 2019 Singapore
Digital (SG:D) Techblazer Awards. The companies received their awards from the Minister for
Communications and Information, Mr S Iswaran at the Tech Industry Night Gala dinner, jointly
organised by the Infocomm Media Development Authority (“IMDA”) and SGTech.
Now in its second year, the SG:D Techblazer Awards is the nation’s highest accolade for tech
innovation. In addition to corporate participants, three student teams received awards in the
new Student Techblazer category, which seeks to recognise and encourage the next
generation of tech innovators.
While businesses continue to innovate in technology, it is important to ensure that the
community is also equipped with digital skills so as to be able to enjoy the benefits in the digital
economy. As part of the Gala Night, organisations that pledged to help businesses,
employees, customers and the community acquire skills and adopt technology were honoured
in the inaugural Digital Participation Pledge (“DPP”) Awards. The DPP Awards is the nation’s
highest recognition for organisations that made a positive impact on Singapore’s digital
readiness.
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Recognising Nation’s Most Innovative at the SG:D TechBlazer Awards
This year’s Awards saw close to 300 applicants. Seven companies and three student
organisations emerged as winners in three categories – Most Promising Innovation, Best
Adoption and Student Techblazer.
Deep learning and AI were a common theme with applications ranging from medtech to
fintech. BioMind clinched the Gold award in the Most Promising Innovation category, for its
deep learning diagnostic support system that helps doctors review MRI and CT images. In the
same category, CashShield’s fraud-detection product and Tookitaki Holdings’ anti-money
laundering solution both won the Silver award1. Students from Singapore University of
Technology and Design won the Gold award in the Student Techblazer category for their
simulated data platform, Bifrost.
The public sector also demonstrated the impact of digitalisation, as the National Parks Board
won Best Adoption (Public) category for its new digital tree management system that helps
effectively manage its database of all the trees in Singapore. For more information on the
winners and their winning solutions, please see Annex A.
"We are in an era of unprecedented disruptions and changes, both in technology and by
technology. Through their innovative solutions, the winners have demonstrated how to lead
the way to address today's challenges by exploiting technology. With the Student Techblazer
category, it is our wish that participating in the Awards would spur our students to leverage
their learning and experience from the competition, and inspire them in using tech disruptions
to better lives," said Wong Wai Meng, Chairman of SGTech.
"There was a general improvement in the quality of submissions this year. What stood out was
a handful of Singaporean entrepreneurs who demonstrated courage and foresight. They grew
their start-ups in an unconventional direction - starting overseas to leverage favourable
conditions such as easy access to large data sets, before bringing their solutions home. I look
forward to seeing more deep-tech solutions competing in the field next year." said Mr
Raymond Choong, Partner at FocusTech Ventures and an SGTech judge.
1CashShield and Tookitaki are accredited companies under IMDA’s Accreditation@SG programme, which aims to accelerate the growth of Singapore-based innovative technology product companies through winning contracts with government agencies and large enterprises, as well as facilitating new growth capital into the companies.
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Organisations’ digital readiness efforts recognised through the Digital Participation
Pledge
Since the launch of DPP in March, administered by Ministry of Communications and
Information (“MCI”) and IMDA, close to 900 organisations from the private, people and public
sectors have taken the pledge to help equip everyone with digital skills and adopt technology.
The DPP Awards was introduced to recognise Singapore-based organisations that have
exemplified the spirit of digital readiness and made a significant impact in equipping
Singaporeans with digital skills, to enable them to tap on the opportunities offered by
technology to improve their quality of life.
The awards saw about 70 nominations entered for two award categories. Six organisations
received the nation’s highest accolade today for their outstanding digital readiness efforts.
“I would like to offer my heartiest congratulations to all our award recipients. The SG:Digital
Techblazer Awards and the Digital Participation Pledge Awards are our nation’s highest
honours in their respective spheres. Through these awards, we celebrate the indomitable spirit
of tech innovation as well as the heart shown by our industry to help the community better use
technology. It is my hope that these awards will serve as a beacon to all as the industry
continues to blaze the trail in Singapore’s journey towards a digital economy and a smart
nation.” said Tan Kiat How, Chief Executive Officer, IMDA.
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Related Resources
Annex A: Write-ups of SG:D Techblazer Award Winners
Annex B: Quotes from winners
Annex C: SG:D Techblazer Awards overview and categories
Annex D: Digital Participation Pledge Award Recipients & Companies’ Quotes
Annex E: Digital Participation Pledge Awards Categories
Annex F: Factsheet on Digital Participation Pledge
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ISSUED BY THE INFOCOMM MEDIA DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY
About Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA)
The Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) leads Singapore’s digital transformation
with infocomm media. To do this, IMDA will develop a dynamic digital economy and a cohesive
digital society, driven by an exceptional infocomm media (ICM) ecosystem – by developing
talent, strengthening business capabilities, and enhancing Singapore's ICM infrastructure.
IMDA also regulates the telecommunications and media sectors to safeguard consumer
interests while fostering a pro-business environment, and enhances Singapore’s data
protection regime through the Personal Data Protection Commission.
For more news and information, visit www.imda.gov.sg or follow IMDA on Facebook IMDAsg
and Twitter @IMDAsg.
About SGTech
SGTech is a premier trade association for the tech industry in Singapore that strives to create
an ecosystem which anticipates trends and develops sustainable initiatives to strengthen and
help the industry. SGTech’s close to 1000 members range from start-ups, SMEs, to MNCs
that leverage technology as a core driver for business. The two fundamental value
propositions of SGTech are:
Advocate for Industry -
A voice that actively and responsibly advocates for change that benefits members and the
industry
Supports Singapore’s Agenda for Technology -
Contributes to the industry’s growth and transformation by supporting programmes and
initiatives that enhance the Singaporean economy.
For more information, visit www.sgtech.org.sg or follow SGTech on Linkedin SGTech ;
Facebook SGTechSocial ; Twitter @SGTechSocial
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For media clarifications, please contact:
Patrick LIM (Mr)
Assistant Manager, Communications & Marketing, IMDA
DID: (65) 8163 2689
Email: [email protected]
Jasmine XU (Ms)
Assistant Manager, Communications & Marketing, IMDA
DID: (65) 8201 5741
Email: [email protected]
TAN Lay Ping (Ms)
Assistant Director, Communications & Marketing, IMDA
DID: (65) 8870 2688
Email: [email protected]
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ANNEX A
SG:D Techblazer Award Winners
Company Product/ Solution
Most Promising Innovation (Gold)
BioMind
Hanalytics Pte Ltd (BioMind®) is an
artificial intelligence company specialising
in healthcare. The company builds
advanced AI technology and creates
predictive applications to assist doctors in
decision making for diagnosis, treatment
and reporting. The company has a strong
team of over 60 in-house deep learning
scientists, medical experts, and research
advisors from prestigious hospitals and
universities.
BioMind ®
BioMind® is a diagnostic support system that uses
deep learning technology to analyse MRI and CT
images. It automatically recommends a diagnosis and
a report for doctors to review – all within seconds. This
is faster than the average 1 hour or more doctors take
for analysis and reporting.
Its signature feature is the analysing of neurological
disorders such as brain tumours, vascular diseases
and stroke-related medical conditions, which take up
the majority of the conditions determined through
medical imaging.
With the application of AI technology, not only can
BioMind® analyse a large spectrum of neurological
conditions, its technology can also be upgraded to
analyse medical conditions of other body systems.
Most Promising Innovation (Silver)
CashShield
CashShield is a global enterprise risk
management company that leverages
over a decade of domain intelligence
and AI to help companies block fraud in
CashShield
An end-to-end fraud management solution that is fully
machine automated with no human intervention. It
provides a comprehensive protection that covers all
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real-time. Founded in 2008, CashShield
was the first to introduce a 100%
automated fraud solution. We profile
more than 5 billion devices per year and
over 500 million user accounts.
CashShield secures businesses across
the globe, covering industries such as e-
wallet, super apps, e-commerce, travel,
and digital goods etc. Trusted by
leading players and governments
worldwide, we partner with and secure
billions in GMV for enterprises such as
OVO, Alibaba, Razer, Scalefast and
Grab, empowering them to compete
and scale without risk. For more
information, visit www.cashshield.com.
vulnerable entries to fraud attacks across multiple
channels and devices, at every stage of the process.
With a combination of domain intelligence, AI, and
machine learning, CashShield is able to monitor and
deal with fraud in real-time, protecting enterprises
from all sorts of fraud attacks, such as account
takeovers, promo abuse, loan fraud or money
laundering.
Most Promising Innovation (Silver)
Tookitaki Holdings
Tookitaki is providing enterprise
software solutions that create
sustainable compliance programs for
the financial services industry. The
company is innovating the regulatory
compliance space by moving beyond
rules-based applications and
introducing software solutions to
maximize efficiency and reduce risks in
the compliance processes. Its mission is
to provide machine learning-powered
regulatory compliance solutions that are
auditable, scalable and actionable.
Anti-Money Laundering Suite (AMLS)
AMLS is a proven, end-to-end machine learning-
powered transaction monitoring & name screening
solution, which improves operational efficiency,
mitigates the risk of money laundering and reduces
the cost of compliance.
AMLS comprises of two modules: AMLS-TM for
transaction monitoring and AMLS-NS for names and
sanctions screening.
The solution offers many benefits such as:
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Incorporated in November 2014 in
Singapore, the company is currently led
by a core team with cumulative 150-
years’ experience in finance, AI, Big
Data Analytics and financial crime.
Tookitaki is backed by institutional
investors Jungle Ventures, Enterprise
Singapore (Singapore Government)
and Illuminate Financial and have a
presence in the US, Singapore and
India.
Improves risk coverage by identifying new
suspicious transaction reports/suspicious
activity reports (STRs/SARs).
Reduces false positives and improves
efficiency in the alerts disposition process.
Provides detailed explanations for every alert
to ensure better regulatory compliance.
Provides actionable analytics for an integrated
AML view across key components of
transaction monitoring and name screening.
Complements and integrates seamlessly with
existing AML systems.
Most Promising Innovation (Bronze)
Spark Systems
Founded in 2016, Spark Systems is a
Singapore-based FinTech company
that provides all-around high-tech
solutions for forex (FX) trading. The
platform connects buyers and sellers
directly, and aims to resolve existing
issues in FX trading
SparkFX Platform
SparkFX is a trading platform, with a unique solution
such as:
Innovative & Efficient FX Aggregation
Ultra-Low Latency Execution
Extremely Low Rejections
Enhanced and Optimised User Experience
Whitelabelling/ Sell Side / Pricing Engine
Commercialization potential of the solutions are as
below:
Aggregator –easy to use modern graphical
interface
Algorithm –designed for optimal execution
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Company Product/ Solution
Best Adoption (Public Sector)
National Parks Board
The National Parks Board (NParks) of
Singapore is the lead agency for
greenery, biodiversity conservation,
wildlife and animal management. With
the aim of maintaining Singapore’s
extensive urban greenery, NParks
continuously innovates to enhance
operational effectiveness and meet
challenges such as climate change.
Today, NParks manages four nature
reserves, more than 350 parks as well
as an estimated 2 million urban trees.
Digitalisation of Tree Management
The Digitalisation of Tree Management plays a key
role to meet the challenges of managing Singapore’s
greenery.
It supports NParks transformation from providers of:
Basic tree care services (e.g. tree planting and
tree pruning) to managers of tree risks (e.g.
tree health and safety assessment, and
species selection).
Collection of Information for Tree Health
Assessment –through sensors, mobile field
equipment and integrated systems; and
Building Analytics and Modelling to
understand Tree characteristics
Best Adoption (Enterprise)
Parkway Hospitals Singapore
Parkway Pantai is one of Asia’s largest
integrated private healthcare providers
operating in Malaysia, Singapore, India,
China, Brunei and United Arab Emirates.
For over 40 years, its Mount Elizabeth,
Gleneagles, Pantai, Parkway and Fortis
brands have established themselves as
the region’s best known brands in private
AI-Powered Pre-Admission Cost of
Hospitalization Estimation (APACHE)
APACHE is a scalable plug-and-play system that
provides high availability, fault-tolerance, and real-
time processing of high-volume estimate requests.
APACHE provides highly accurate cost estimates,
dynamically generated based on relevant parameters
such as the patient’s age, gender, length of stay in
hospital (i.e normal room or Intensive Care / High
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healthcare, synonymous with best-in-
class patient experience and outcomes.
Leveraging its global track record for
medical excellence and managing world-
class hospitals, Parkway Pantai is
committed to making a difference in
people’s lives through excellent patient
care, steadily expanding its reach in
markets where demand for quality care is
strong and growing.
Parkway Pantai is a leading healthcare
player in its home markets of Malaysia,
Singapore and India and key growth
markets of China and Hong Kong.
It is part of IHH Healthcare, one of the
world’s largest healthcare groups by
market capitalisation. IHH operates more
than 15,000 licensed beds across 80
hospitals in 10 countries worldwide,
offering the full spectrum of integrated
healthcare services from clinics to
hospitals to quaternary care and a wide
range of ancillary services including
medical education.
Dependency Unit), admitting diagnosis and/or
surgical procedures etc.
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Best Adoption (SME)
York Launch Service and Maritime
Technologies (R&D)
Started in 1993 with a fleet of 6 old
wooden launches, York Launch Service
provides launch services to the different
anchorages around Singapore and has
since grown to be the leading provider
for launch services boasting the largest
fleet in Singapore.
Book-a-Launch (B-a-L)
A launch service ferries passengers or small cargoes
to/from the hundreds of ships that arrive and anchor
in Singapore’s port daily. These ships call at
Singapore for various operations and bring in
substantial income and value for Singapore due to our
competitiveness and ability to keep their turn-around
fast.
The maritime sector contributes 7% of Singapore’s
GDP. As such, the launch service is critical because
any delays or disruptions will incur costs to these
ships and Singapore very dearly.
“Book-a-Launch” is an operation system that
incorporates agile and flexible ERP, CRM that are
tailored for the launch industry specifically. It also
connects them digitally with their customers.
Company Product/ Solution
Student Techblazer (Gold)
Singapore University of Technology
and Design
Bifrost allows companies to build AI in a
week instead of a year. Autonomous
vehicles, robots and drones need
hundreds of thousands of images and
video to learn about the world around
Bifrost- Accelerated AI through Synthetic Data
Bifrost is a synthetic data platform that will give AI
engineers the ability to create and access quality
artificial datasets using synthetic data generation
technology.
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them. Collecting these images is the most
time-consuming and expensive step
when building AI. Instead of capturing
data from the real world, Bifrost generates
custom virtual worlds. These worlds let
our clients capture rich data at a fraction
of the time and cost.
With this platform, engineers will have access to
affordable, fast and high quality labelled data,
unlocking the enormous potential of AI development
at scale.
Student Techblazer (Silver)
School of Science And Technology,
Singapore
The School of Science and Technology,
Singapore (SST) is a Specialised
Independent School that offers a
distinctive 4-year GCE O-Level
programme with an integrated approach
to applied learning. Learning in SST is
multi-faceted as students gain a strong
foundation of key academic concepts in
core subjects like Mathematics and
Science. Receiving institutions of
graduated students have reported that
the SST students demonstrate a distinct
difference in the way they approach their
CodeCollab
CodeCollab is a real-time code editor and compiler
aimed at aiding both students and teachers learn
together in a collaborative classroom environment.
CodeCollab currently supports 16 programming
languages, and is used in 2 Secondary Schools in
Singapore.
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learning, indicating that the school is well
on its way to becoming a global leader in
transforming learning and nurturing
passionate innovators through real-world
applications of science and technology.
For more information, visit
www.sst.edu.sg
Student Techblazer (Bronze)
Anglo-Chinese School (Independent)
Founded in 1886, Anglo-Chinese School
(Independent) is a school under the
Singapore Ministry of Education and an
International Baccalaureate (IB) World
School. ACS (Independent) is distinctive
for its quest for excellence and focus on
all-round, values-centric development,
anchored in a school environment of
family and community. For more
information, please visit
https://www.acsindep.moe.edu.sg/
MedACS – Medicine Automated Control System
An integrated medication scheduling, provision and
reminder system. With a smartphone app, MedACS
supersedes existing systems by offering a system
which remotely and automatically tabulates and
schedules pill dispensal.
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Annex B
Selected quotes from winners:
BioMind® is an artificial intelligence (AI) application that assists radiologists in decision
making for medical image diagnosis and reporting. It has obtained both the Singapore HSA
certification and European CE mark as a diagnostic support solution in the complex field
of neurological diseases. Since its inception, BioMind® has helped hospitals improve their
productivity, workflow efficiency and reduce misdiagnoses.
The Techblazer Award is a prestigious award and the assessment process is a self-
discovery journey during which more than 30 judges provide valuable insights to generate
sustainable results and global impact. Winning it cements the company's position as the AI
leader in the medical field and boosts confidence to our stakeholders in the ecosystem.
- Raymond Moh, CEO, Biomind; Winner of Most Promising Innovation (Gold)
“We at Tookitaki have always been keen to participate in competitions recognising
innovations. The Techblazer Awards was especially compelling with its unique approach to
assessing modern technologies and their use cases. The entire process was well
coordinated; the judging panel was very relevant and experienced to handle complex
innovation themes, and the Techblazer team was very helpful with timely feedback and fine-
tuning of pitches.
We thank the organisers for giving startups like ours this opportunity to present our
innovations to the world and for giving us a great platform to build our brands.”
- Abhishek Chatterjee, co-founder and CEO, Tookitaki Holdings, Winner of Most
Promising Innovation (Silver)
“The digitalisation of tree management advances the National Parks Board’s management of
Singapore’s greenery. For example, 3D models and analytics are used to model our trees to
allow for remote sensing of tree growth and health. This, coupled with sensors, mobile field
equipment and integrated systems, enhances our tree health assessment capabilities,
thereby strengthening our tree management regime.
This award is made possible due to the collaborative efforts of our research partners in
academia and industry, and encourages us to continue to advance the science behind tree
management.”
- Mr Tan Chong Lee, Chief Technology Officer and Assistant CEO, NParks, Winner of
Best Adoption (Public)
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Selected quotes from winners (Continued):
“We believe our synthetic data platform has the potential to fundamentally change the way
AI teams develop image recognition technology. We're excited to be pushing AI technology
forward! It's an honour to be recognised at the Techblazer Awards, and we're grateful to
IMDA for giving us the platform to show our technology to the world!”
- Charles Wong, CEO, Bifrost, Winner of Student Techblazer (Gold)
"MedACS helps patients and caregivers by automating medicine dosing and allowing remote
care. The Techblazer Awards has been a great platform for us to learn from industry leaders
and apply our engineering and scientific knowledge to create practical solutions. The Award
is a strong affirmation of our product’s potential to improve the safety of patients and reduce
the burden on caregivers."
- Dylan Tay, student, ACS (I), Winner of Student Techblazer (Bronze)
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ANNEX C
Overview of SG:D Techblazer Awards
1. SG:D Techblazer Awards is the nation’s highest accolade for tech innovation and aims to
provide recognition and endorsement to Singaproe-based organisations and companies
that exemplify the spirit of innovation in the development of their tech products and
services.
2. The Awards is a merger of the bi-annual National Infocomm Awards (NIA) by then-
Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) and the annual SiTF Awards by
then-Singapore Infocomm Technology Federation (SiTF), with the goal of strengthening
and accelerating digital transformation efforts.
3. SG:D Techblazer Awards 2019 is the second run of the Techblazer Awards with the first
run in 2018.
Techblazer Award Categories:
A. Most Promising Innovation
Recognises the innovation behind products or solutions developed by Singapore-registered
Infocomm Technology (ICT) companies. The product or solution must create outstanding
impact on the way businesses operate or greatly enhance the quality of lives for end users.
The companies should have fulfilled a marketplace need by developing a commercially viable
business model around this innovative product or solution, which has the potential to be
sustainable in the long run. They should also have carved out new markets, with high growth
potential, for themselves through this innovative product or solution.
B. Best Adoption
Recognises Singapore-registered companies and public sector organisations that have
adopted products or solutions leveraging emerging technologies. Solutions could have been
co-developed jointly with technology companies to digitally transform their businesses,
resulting in greater competitive advantage, operational efficiency, enhanced productivity and
improved citizens or customer experiences.
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C. Student TechBlazer
Recognises innovative ideas with commercialisation potential developed by students and
student teams from Singapore public educational institutions. Solutions must leverage
emerging technologies to fulfill a marketplace need or has potential to carve out new markets.
The submission should demonstrate the spirit of entrepreneurship through technology
innovation, and include potential business plan. This award category aims to discover and
encourage the next generation of innovators.
Judging Criteria
The nominations are judged by industry veterans, business leaders, investors, and public
sector representatives. There were 2 rounds of judging - Preliminary & Finals. Participants
presented to a panel of judges for each category.
Nominations were judged based on:
(i) Product innovation and competitive advantage;
(ii) Types of customers/market served;
(iii) User experience and ease of implementation; and
(iv) Value and business impact among others.