GovInsider’s FOI 2025 celebrates public sector innovators
By James Yau
The second and final day of Festival of Innovation 2025 extended the dialogues around public service transformation and previewed an upcoming training programme from GovInsider – GovImpact.
Thirteen winners were recognised at Festival of Innovation awards ceremony for advancing innovation and digital transformation within Asia-Pacific's public sector. Image: GovInsider
From limb savers to autonomous food waste robots, these were among the winners at this year’s Festival of Innovation (FOI) awards ceremony on March 26.
The FOI awards were part of GovInsider’s annual flagship event, which celebrated public sector innovation across Asia.
This year’s FOI awards saw 171 submissions across 107 agencies in 13 award categories. The full list of award winners can be found at the bottom of this story.
The Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF)’s SWiFT office won the Innovator of The Year award.
Established in 2018, the SWiFT office empowers and equips Airmen with the tools and resources they need to tackle challenges head-on, by developing both digital and non-digital products.
The innovation office led the RSAF to an increased number of successful innovation projects, increasing the participation of staff in these initiatives.
Among some of their initiatives, the RSAF signed a renewed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) to create a robust innovation ecosystem that bridges military requirements between industry and academia.
"[We are] grateful for RAiD (RSAF Agile innovation Digital) to have been acknowledged for the work we do at this morning’s GovInsider Festival of Innovation.
“Extremely proud and privileged to be a part of this transformative journey with like-minded folks. It’s a great day for RAiD,” said RAiD (RSAF Agile innovation Digital)’s Head of Digital Plans and Strategy, Cheot Yeechien, in his LinkedIn post.
Singapore's national healthtech agency, Synapxe, also won the Digital Agency of the Year.
“We are heartened to be recognised for our commitment to accelerating HealthTech innovation in Singapore. This recognition reflects our team’s hard work and our close collaborations with our public healthcare partners.
"We are also thankful for support from the industry to accelerate the adoption of technology to improve care. As Singapore’s national HealthTech agency, Synapxe remains driven to boost the adoption of tech solutions to inspire tomorrow’s health.” said Synapxe's CEO, Ngiam Siew Ying, to GovInsider.
Deepening civil servant innovation
What is the biggest killer of a successful innovation culture and conversely, its most powerful driver? This was the question posed at the opening panel of the day.
EnterpriseSG’s Executive Director, Innovation Eco-system Development, Tan Boon Kim, noted that leadership can be both the killer and driver of innovation.
“If we think innovation is not efficient, it becomes a cost driver. But if we see [innovation] as a medium-term investment and put in place the environment and resources that encourage innovation, that will help a lot,” said Tan.
Japan Digital Agency’s Head of Intelligence Research and International Strategy, Chikako Masuda, offered a cultural perspective around innovation.
As a new agency established in 2021, she shared that her agency comprises both public and private sector specialists - where the two different cultures often argued on the best way to move forward the Japanese government’s digitalisation efforts.
Across the six panelists, the common theme of collaboration was evident.
Summing up this theme, Synapxe’s Director, Innovation Capabilities Enablement, Glenn Neo, said: “To solve the biggest problems and the biggest paradoxes that we share, it will have to be down to our collaboration and how we work together”.
Transforming public services
As government agencies embrace technology to enhance citizen experiences, a critical balance must be struck between automation and human interaction. The panel discussion on Creating Great Public Sector Experiences revealed several key insights.
The Agency for Integrated Care (AIC)’s Director, IT, Innovation & Digitalisation Division, Mohamed Farouk Bin Mohamed Ismail – who was one of the panelists – highlighted that the key element is having empathy.
“I think the common thread that I wanted to share in terms of a great customer experience is really the need to have human centeredness as the primary principle for us to serve our clients.
“If you look at us in terms of policymakers or implementers, we are actually designers.
“We design policies for the benefit of our clients and in government, I think the essence of it is you need to know what the customers need and how do you simplify things for them,” said Farouk.
work dynamics were among the main content pillars that delegates of FOI 2025 were treated to. Image: GovInsider
AI and robotics can augment human capabilities, allowing staff to focus on higher-value, empathetic interactions, said National Council of Social Service (NCSS)’s Group Director, Capability Group, Anjan Ghosh.
He added that the challenge faced is how we balance the experience of human interaction enabled by technology.
“What we are trying to bring innovation in is that traditionally nonprofit sector has supported the bottom 20 per cent of the population.
“But going forward in our country, we will have a group of the population who may need social support. How are we getting ourselves ready to serve them? They may not come to your center because of social stigma, but they need the support at their doorstep. So, innovation has to be thought from that perspective,” he said.
Ultimately, the goal is to leverage technology to create more responsive, empathetic and effective public services - without losing the human touch that citizens value, he said.
More innovation to come
On top of the programme, FOI 2025 teased further activities and resources that serve to drive public sector innovation.
The downloadable e-book of the inaugural Women in GovTech series was just released featuring over 100 inspiring women in government technology around the world. This collection of stories and insights highlights the incredible women driving digital transformation in government.
Moreover, delegates at FOI 2025 were the first to learn of GovImpact – an upcoming training programme led by former Political Office Holders, Senior Public Officers and curators of TEDxSingapore that GovInsider will be organising.
GovImpact will feature a programme of workshops and lectures for public officials to build their skills in areas from strategic and crisis communications to strategy mapping and leadership philosophy.
Many thoughts, opinions, insights were shared across two days of sessions, presentations, and panels at FOI 2025.
Using Snapsight’s sentiment analysis tool, GovInsider dived into this deluge of text data to gain deeper insights from each nook and canny of emotional tones, attitudes, and anomalies to summarise the five overarching themes at FOI 2025: Artificial Intelligence, Sustainability Efforts, Workforce Upskilling, Data Security, and Remote Work Dynamics.
We hope that you enjoyed the past two days of innovation and look forward to welcoming you next year, as plans for an even bigger and more innovative FOI 2026. You can register here.
The winners for each category of the Festival of Innovation Awards 2025 can be found here:
- Team SustainaHaul, ITE College Central (Dare to Do Award)
- SWiFT Office, Republic of Singapore Air Force (Innovator of The Year Award)
- Nicole Lee, Government Technology Agency (Rising Digitial Star Award)
- Ybhg. Datuk TS. Dr. Fazidah Binti Abu Bakar, Jabatan Digital Negara (Digital Leader of The Year Award)
- Alliance for Digital Transformation Program, GovTech, Singapore Armed Forces/Mindef (Inter-Agency Award)
- SecureMobilePilot, Cyber Security Agency of Singapore (Agility Award)
- Discover Civic Action platform, National Youth Council (Digital Society Award)
- Vital, Ministry of Finance Singapore (Digital Government Award)
- Sentosa Development Corporation, Singapore (Digital Economy Award)
- The Limb Savers @JurongHealth, Ng Teng Fong General Hospital (Moon Shot Award)
- Synapxe, Singapore (AI-Ready Award)
- Republic of Singapore Air Force (Transformative Agency of The Year)
- Synapxe, Singapore (Digital Agency of The Year)