31 May 2005 - Opening Remarks By Mr Chan Yeng Kit, Chief Executive Officer, Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore At EGovernment Forum, Organised by SSC, Shanghai Convention Centre, China.
Opening Remarks By Mr Chan Yeng Kit, Chief Executive Officer, Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore At EGovernment Forum, Organised by SSC on 31 May 2005, Shanghai Convention Centre, China.
Mr Qiao Zhi Gang, Deputy Director, Shanghai Informatization Centre,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
1. First of all, I would like to thank the Shanghai Informatization Centre for your support and participation in this eGovernment Forum that is put together by the Singapore Solutions Centre (SSC for short). I would also like to thank the staff of SSC for putting together this eGovernment Forum.
2. The SSC was launched about one year ago to leverage on the strong government and economic ties as well as the cultural rapport between China and Singapore. The objective for SSC was to bring together Chinese and Singapore companies to collaborate and develop innovative ICT solutions to meet the growing needs of the China market.
3. The SSC serves as a one-stop centre for Chinese companies and government agencies that wish to find out more on the technologies, products and services that Singapore Infocomm companies can provide. The Centre is currently featuring solutions from key vertical sectors like Healthcare, Logistics, Transport and Financial Services, that Singapore is also known to be strong in. The companies providing the solutions have track records of having successfully implemented these in Singapore and in quite a few cases, also in China. For examples, IPACS Logistic's solutions are used not only by Sembcorp Logistics in Singapore, it is also used widely by EAS, Shanghai Asia Development International Transport Pudong Co. Ltd, Shanghai Industrial Sinotrans International Transportation Co. Ltd . Transnational companies like Atlantic are also using IPACS's solutions across the Asian region. In the area of healthcare, SCS solutions are widely used in Mount Alvernia Hospital in Singapore before being adopted by Tongren Hospital in Beijing.
4. I am also happy to note that SSC has fostered several business linkages within Shanghai and beyond to create a vibrant exchange and relationship between Chinese and Singapore companies. SSC had signed a few MOUs last month, with key industry associations, like the Shanghai Computer Trade Association, Shanghai Withub White-cat Science Park Co., Ltd (WITHUB), Shanghai Communication & Transportation Industry Association (SCTA), Shanghai Association of International Service Trade (SAIST) as well as the Hangzhou East Software Park. I hope that this will further strengthen the relationship between China and Singapore and I look forward to more business collaborations between companies from both countries.
5. Besides ICT developments in key vertical sectors, the use of ICT in government to promote eGovernment is also a key area where China and Singapore can work together on.
6. As I have mentioned yesterday at the CIAPR conference, our foray into eGovernment is not by choice. Singapore is a very small country with no natural resources. Our key assets are our people. In order for us to operate more efficiently and to overcome our lack of size and numbers, we have to use information and communications technology (ICT) as a force multiplier and help us to be more efficient and productive. We see ICT as a strategic tool to help us achieve greater competitiveness.
7. Although the issues and challenges faced by China will be different from Singapore, our goal is similar. And that is to see how we can use ICT to enable our governments to be more effective, productive and to serve our citizens better. This eGovernment Forum will provide a good opportunity for our governments to share experiences and exchange views on both of our eGovernment journey. SSC has also invited some of the Singapore Infocomm companies that have helped us to implement our eGovernment solutions to share some of the success stories.
8. I hope this session will be a useful one for you and that there will more of such forum to promote interactions and exchanges between China and Singapore government and businesses.
9. Thank You.
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