Government’s role important to ensure use of AI for public good, says GovTech CTO

Comparing the current focus on artificial intelligence (AI) to the dotcom era of the 1990s, GovTech Singapore’s Chief Technology Officer and Deputy Chief Executive (Products), Chang Sau Sheong, emphasised the importance of the government’s role in steering the use of artificial intelligence (AI) for the public good.  

Chang delivered the keynote address during the recently concluded Public Sector Day Singapore, which was organised by Amazon Web Services (AWS) in collaboration with GovInsider. 

Outlining the country’s National AI Strategy 2.0 to ensure that a “potent force” like AI can be used for “public good,” he said the government was driving activities, building capabilities and communities, and laying the infrastructure and environment to develop an AI-enabled environment.  

GovTech creating AI tools to support public sector 

He noted that GovTech, on its part, has been building various AI tools for public sector employees to be more productive. 

In his keynote speech, Chang mentioned some of GovTech’s recent apps to support citizen engagement. These include Kaki, an AI-powered chatbot developed with OneService for easy reporting of municipal issues through multiple citizen touchpoints, such as WhatsApp, Telegram and Instagram. 

To subscribe to the GovInsider bulletin click here.

He noted that citizen call experience to Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) hotlines has also dramatically improved by integrating AI into ServiceSG call centres. 

This has resulted in agents being able to handle 40 per cent more calls, resulting in 750 hours of additional time freed per agent to serve citizens. The AI also provides 15,000 call summaries per month, leading to a better understanding of citizen needs, Chang said. 

He also mentioned other well-known tools to support civil servant productivity, such as Pair, an AI-powered chatbot for public officers that facilitates language tasks such as email composition and report writing.  

He noted that 148 government agencies have adopted Pair and there are 55,000 public officer users, of which 50 per cent are active users. 

Chang said GovTech has created tools to help public officers to use AI for their custom use cases, such as AIBots which allows public officers to quickly create custom chatbots. AIBots has 16,000 active users across 97 government agencies.  

He also mentioned GovText and Maestro, whole-of-government platforms for government agencies to build AL and ML models. 

Chang added that the goal was to drive innovation and AI literacy across the government, and he encouraged everyone to explore and adopt AI tools and practices. 

Building a progressive workforce 

Continuing the theme of AI for good, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM)’s Chief Information Officer, Khang Leng Sing, said the ministry was focused on developing a productive and progressive workforce for Singaporeans. 

He noted that current challenges include an ageing population, disruptive tech, and rising public expectations. To address these challenges, MOM has embarked on a transformation effort centred on policy and business, and organisational set-up, underpinned by technology, Kang said.  

The Ministry has also put in place strategies to create a data-driven, AI-enabled ecosystem for proactive policy-making, he added.  

To subscribe to the GovInsider bulletin click here.

Kang noted the Sensemaker GenAI tool that was developed in collaboration with GovTech has helped policymakers analyse, generate insights and sense-make large volume of unstructured data.

Around 300 users have been onboarded in the first eight months and more than three million documents, such as emails and survey data, have been analysed. Kang added there has been a 60 per cent increase in the ministry’s ability to extract insights and more than 50 per cent of time has been saved.  

He said the ministry expects to have 5,000 manhours savings yearly thanks to Sensemaker. 

Kang noted that MOM has developed a cloud-ready infrastructure and security platform (CRISP) to improve speed, agility, and security. He explained that the platform enables digital product teams to iterate through prototypes by accelerating the cloud workload build process without relying on contractors. 

As a result, product teams could focus on ideation and product discovery instead of waiting for weeks /months for contractors to provision the required workloads manually, he added. 

Significant challenges 

In his presentation, JTC Corporation’s Group Director, Wong Wei Loong, noted that the construction industry was grappling with significant challenges that were putting pressure on timelines, budgets and overall efficiency.  

He highlighted that feedback from JTC project managers was that they spent an average of 20-30 per cent of their time searching for and gathering information.  

To subscribe to the GovInsider bulletin click here.

To tackle this, JTC has been integrating digital delivery access across the entire value chain. This is why the organisation began using JTC Optimus, which is a common data environment (C-DE) platform that connects consultants, construction contractors, suppliers, and sub-contractors.  

JTC was creating a Tech Alliance to encourage vendors to connect with Optimus. The Alliance will open certain APIs to vendors, allowing them to integrate with JTC's systems and potentially earn more business, Wong added. 

He said that it was a key part of the integrated digital delivery approach, which encouraged the use of digital tools in the built environment sector. He added that Optimus aims to integrate multiple user systems and governance frameworks into daily work processes without burdening project teams. 

AWS announces new investments in Singapore 

AWS Country Manager, Public Sector, Singapore, Elsie Tan, highlighted the company’s significant investment in Singapore and the region. In Singapore, the firm has invested US$11.5 billion (S$15.1 billion) since 2010 and plans to invest an additional US$12 billion from this year to 2028.  Key areas of investment would include data and AI security, modernisation and cloud transformation. 

She mentioned AWS’ involvement in the AI Spring Singapore programme to scale AI adoption across six strategic pillars, including the public sector, enterprise, startups, research, communities and the workforce. 

The company aims to train 5,000 individuals annually in AI skills from this year to 2026 through partnerships with local institutions and learning companies.